Davin is born....unconscious.....without ears??

March 1, 2008~ 2:05 a.m. (WARNING LONG and a somewhat graphic pic)

After pushing for about 4 hours and a VERY traumatic delivery my bundle of joy, Davin Thomas, was born into this world......only he was unconscious, "loose and limp".  Davin was placed on the left side of my chest for about 5 seconds then swiftly taken away from me.  In that 5 seconds I noticed his left ear, it looked like it had been smooshed from being in the womb. 

They put him in the crib across the room and about 6-8 people were around the crib working on him, while I was being worked on myself.  After what seemed like forever we finally heard him cry, someone (a nurse I think) said, "listen he's crying".   We were so happy!! 

Soon our happiness turned to devastation, sadness, anger, pity, confusion, hatred, blamefulness....more emotions than I can even explain.  One of the pediatric nurses brought him over and told us that he didn't have ears, he was deaf and would never hear, and that he had a cleft palate (which we later found out that he didn't), then she proceeded to show us his little ears. 

They swiftly took him away from us again and took him to the NICU because of his breathing, and other problems.  At that moment our life felt empty, all Chris and I could do was hold each other and cry as hard as we ever had.  My mom was also in the room with us and I am so thankful that she was because I really needed my mommy then!!!  We all just cried......

Chris and my mom were able to go to the NICU to see Davin, my dad was on his way to the hospital too.  They would come back and tell me how cute and precious he was.  I had some issues myself from the delivery so I couldn't go to see him for a few hours.  The nurses wouldn't let me leave the room but I was determined to go and see him, I stood up (have no idea how) and fell right back down into the wheelchair, the nurse gave in and let Chris take me to see our son.  I finally got to really hold him, it was amazing!!! 

Looking at his little ears, running through my head was, what did I do wrong, what did I not do, what did I do......to make this happen to him, why, why, why?!?!?!  I blamed myself, and actually that feeling lasted for a long time.  Even to this day I still have my moments, but deep down I know that it was nothing I did, or didn't do. 

After a few hours of sleep, we went back to the NICU to see Davin.  We were there when the doctors were making their rounds and we noticed one doctor palpitating Davin's head, he ordered a CT Scan on his head and a kidney ultrasound.  Sometimes with ear deformities there may be something wrong with the kidneys.  I don't recall the doctor telling us that he was ordering the CT Scan but we knew about the kidney ultrasound.  We didn't think anything of the palpating of the head and continued holding and ogling over our new son. 

Meanwhile, no one ever told us what Davin's condition was, just that he was deaf.  We ended up finding everything out on our own, thanks to my uncle's girlfriend who searched the internet that Saturday morning and called my mom and told her the name of his birth defect.  It was called Microtia.....later to find out he had Aural Atresia too (normally comes along with the Microtia).  As soon as I had a "name" to the condition I haven't stopped researching since. 

In the NICU 2 1/2 hours old

About noon (ish) we had another storm of emotions rush through our room, some of the NICU doctors came in and said that they were calling in the head Neurosurgeon from Children's Hospital, Dr. Steven Ham, to do surgery on Davin.  The CT scan showed a skull fracture on the left side of his skull.  The skull fracture was caused by the traumatic delivery and the forceps that were used.  SO 12-13 hours after Davin was born he had surgery to lift his skull off of his brain.  The CT scan also showed that he had a hemorrhage on the right side of his brain.  Dr. Ham didn't do anything about the hemorrhage, he said that it should go away by itself.  Davin then had another CT scan on Sunday (the next day) to see how everything looked.  The right hemorrhage was smaller and they saw one on the left as well, it wasn't detected in the first scan because the skull was covering it.  I love Dr. Ham!!!

Davin's incision 2 day's after surgery :-(



Davin was discharged about a week later.  In the hospital we noticed that the left side of his face was droopy, you could really notice this when he would cry.  His left eye wouldn't open, everyone at the hospital said it was from the swelling from the surgery and it would get better when the swelling would go down.  We took Davin to a ped opthamologist when he was 10 days old and learned that he had third and seventh cranial nerve damage from the skull fracture.   We had to patch his good eye to strengthen his left eye.  If this would not work he would need surgery to correct it or else he would go blind.  It worked thankfully, the opthamologist was amazed at his recovery!!  

My maternity leave was anything but being at home blissful with my newborn.  It involved many doctors visits (specialists, ENT, Audiologist, Neurologist, Opthamologist, as well as meeting with the Early On program through the School District).  It really was an emotional roller coaster.   

Now fast forward two and a half years and we have a very happy, bright, joyful, loving, HEALTHY boy, with, might I ad, an amazing personality!!!!

~Davin~