GoKawiilOwen arrives
On September 23rd, 2021, my first son Owen was born. Clearly inheriting his mom’s type-A personality, he arrived on his due date at a chunky 8.75 lbs. We were over the moon.
Until we weren’t. At a few hours old, we noticed cute snoring. The nurses noticed nostril flaring. He was having trouble breathing.
“No problem,” they said, “Many babies born at altitude need a little oxygen to get started.” We put him on an oxygen cannula.
A few hours later, his oxygen saturation was still falling. Nurses were panicking. The neonatology NP was paged in. She performed an emergency intubation and called for helicopter transport to Children’s Colorado.
By the time we arrived at Children’s, his oxygen had stabilized. The team reassured us there was nothing to worry about. Transitioning from “breathing” the mother’s blood to gaseous oxygen is hard (if you don’t know how this transition happens, read about it; it is fascinating). Big guys like him never stay long in the NICU.
Days turned to weeks. No one had any idea what was wrong. One pulmonology fellow suggested a structural problem with the lungs, but we bristled at the suggestion. Our little boy was perfect.
Until he wasn’t. A routine dressing change sent him into a pulmonary event. His oxygen plummeted. Alarms were ringing. Doctors were sprinting down our hallway. Our little boy was blue.
We were rushed into a consent for ECMO, a lifesaving surgery that oxygenates the blood outside of the body with a machine. It is used as a bridge to a permanent treatment, but was this a bridge to nowhere? We had seconds to consent. Without it, Owen would die. The neonatology chief assured us that no family had ever regretted the extra time with their child. We signed.
The surgery went smoothly. Owen’s blood oxygen was pinned at 100 for the first time in his life. But we had no idea how to get him off the machine.
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