Sam's Story

Sam was born 16 weeks too soon. This is his story in pictures. Sam was born too early and was too poorly to be expected to make it. Amongst other problems he had repeated bouts of sepsis and a grade 4 IVH (brain bleed). At 10 days old things looked bad for him and a blessing was held. It was no small miracle that he managed to pull through. Sam had to have surgery for a PDA when he was a month old. A few days later it was found that he has a bicuspid aortic valve and has aortic stenosis. At 6 weeks Sam came off the vent and onto CPAP. He had many episodes where he had to go back onto the vent. When he was 3 months old he was diagnosed with ROP and had to have laser eye surgery to save his sight. In theatre it was found that he had subglottic stenosis and he had to have an emergency tracheotomy. Sam also had undiagnosed bowel problems. This resulted in him having to have an ileostomy. Despite having such a rough start to life, my little boy never stops smiling.