Finding out about her microcephaly
Hello, my name is Alondra. I'm 24 yrs old and my daughter's name is Hennessy. She's 3 yrs old. When I was 26 weeks pregnant I found out Hennessy would be born with microcephaly. Once the doctors gave me that news, they told me what microcephaly was and said she had a low chance of survival after birth. The Doctor told me I had the choice to have an abortion but I quickly told her no that I wasn’t going to do that. I knew I was going to have my baby but of course she offered it at every single appointment I had with her until I told her to stop telling me I had that option. Nothing was going to change my mind. I was going to give my baby a chance to fight. Hennessy was born at 33 weeks 4 days and was taken straight to the Nicu for testing and they confirmed the microcephaly and also hydranencephaly. She only had a week stay in the Nicu and got discharged to go home but was sent home on hospice and palliative care on failure to thrive. Just 3 1/2 months later she was discharged from hospice because she wasn’t failing to thrive, she was gaining weight and was such a happy healthy baby. Then right before her first birthday she was also discharged from palliative care.
First bday and trying to get her to gain weight
At Hennessy's first year check up, her primary care doctor began to worry about her weight more because she was only about 13lbs. I knew she needed a g tube at some point in her life but I tried pushing it off and feeding her more and trying to have her gain weight, but she would move a lot and burn all the calories she was getting. So we got referred to a gastroenterologist and she gave us a higher calorie milk and we tried that for 6 months. She gained and soon lost a pound. So once her gastroenterologist saw that, waiting to get a g tube was no longer a choice she definitely needed it because what we were doing wasn’t helping so less than a month later she got her g tube placed when she was 14lbs at 1 1/2 years old, she just turned 3 and is now 26.3 lbs.
Therapy
Hennessy gets physical therapy, occupational therapy, and speech therapy. Speech therapy is on hold until they get a slot open for us again but she’ll get it at school and she just got approved to get physical therapy through the school. Now they can work on getting equipment for her to have in the classroom.
Hennessy is now 3
Hennessy just turned 3 and aged out of her early intervention program which meant she was able to start preschool. I knew she would love it. She wakes up everyday happy to get ready and gets happy when she sees her teacher. She is healthy and doing so much more than the doctors thought she would. I am so proud of her and can’t wait to see all the amazing things she will do. 💛
