I believe in Miracles

On the 7th October 1990, Nicholas Kyle Kruger, my first-born son made his entrance into the world. The eve of his birth, I was out on the dance floor having a whale of a time at my aunts 50th wedding anniversary. You may be asking how I was able to party like that while so heavily pregnant? Well the thing is, I hardly looked pregnant at all and was only 24 weeks. No stopping Nicholas…. he was on the way!

After getting home from the party on the evening of the 6th, I was full of energy and took ages to fall asleep. Sometime after midnight I awoke suddenly feeling the urge to get to the bathroom in a hurry. Upon standing, I felt a strange damp feeling between my legs and the bed was stained bright red with blood. In a mass panic we rushed to the hospital, where after convincing the nursing staff that I was pregnant (due to the fact that I had very little pregnant belly to speak of and was standing in my jeans and a t-shirt), they admitted me at the Johannesburg General Hospital and proceeded to try and find a heartbeat.

I was so young and had no control over my emotions. I remember lying there like a rag doll as young doctors (Johannesburg General is an academic hospital), poked and prodded and examined. My small belly was strapped up to a heart monitor and Nicholas’ little heartbeat could be heard echoing throughout our small maternity room. His fight to survive had only just begun. That whole day, my medical team tried their best to stop the contractions, but when my doctor finally told us that I needed steroids to strengthen my baby’s lungs, I knew the war to keep him safe and growing inside was surely lost.

At 20h20 on the evening of the 7th, I was wheeled into the delivery room, terrified and overcome with impending grief. Nicholas was born weighing little more than two blocks of butter. I saw his little head, barely the size of an apple, for only a split second, before they whisked him away in an incubator to the Peadiatric Intensive Care Unit.

Nicholas was so small and sick, he needed to be ventilated and was only given a 10 percent chance of survival. The staff in ICU told us that he was critical and that they would discuss the course of action with us if he survived until morning.

If I were to go into detail of all the ailments Nick had to fight and surgeries he had to survive over the four months that he spent in ICU and hospital, I would be here forever writing a medical journal. It does have to be mentioned though, that the doctors warned us he would probably be deaf and blind because he was on a ventilator for so long. The 3rd grade brain haemorrhage they also discovered on his scan, would result in huge future complications.

On the 7th October 2020, my Nicholas turned 30! He is 100 percent well…. his hearing is good and although he wears glasses, he is most certainly not blind! He wears the scars of his many surgeries all over his body, but I tell him that they are reminders of the truly strong-willed fighter he is. He is also the sweetest, kindest, most loving person you will ever meet, and we are thankful for him every day.

Do I believe in miracles? Of course, I do…. I was blessed with my very own!