Sarah was born healthy on November 13, 2024. We were able to take her home with us and settle in briefly to being a family of 5 (two older brothers, ages 5 & 2).

Shortly after Thanksgiving, when Sarah was 2.5 weeks old - she was brought via ambulance to the local hospital, where she was diagnosed with a mild case of RSV. She was admitted for observation on the evening of 12/1/24. Over the next few days, Sarah's oxygen began to decline further and she was placed on a ventilator. In addition to the RSV, Sarah had developed pneumonia and was showing several cysts of infection on her lungs. While on the ventilator, Sarah progressively got worse. Her oxygen needs continued to rise, beyond what the ventilator alone could provide for her. To make matters worse, her lungs kept developing holes (pneumothorax), which would collapse her lungs. In total, she had 4 chest tubes put in to try to evacuate air outside of her lungs. 

After 12 days at our local hospital, we were informed that there was nothing more that their hospital could do for her and she would need to be transported to the main Children's hospital in Minneapolis (a 20 minute drive away). They were unsure if she would survive that transfer - so we said our goodbyes and prayed that she'd make it. 

She did - and was quickly put on lung bypass (ECMO) life support. ECMO allowed her lungs to rest and heal and after 7 weeks, 3 days on life support. Sarah was removed on February 3, 2025. 

We will still have quite a journey to get her lungs back to full health. With life support gone, she's now back to being on the ventilator to help with her breathing, and we will need to wean off of that, remove the trach, relearn eating, etc.