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Premature baby defies odds
28-Mar-08
Landon Conder was the size of a beanie baby teddy bear when he was born. At 15 ounces and four months premature, doctors didn’t give him any chance for survival.
Tiffany, Landon’s mom, was in kidney and liver failure and her blood pressure was sky high. Her doctor told the family that they needed to terminate her pregnancy or she would die. Mike, Tiffany’s husband, and her parents agreed and an emergency C-section was performed within the hour. The family had mixed emotions – Tiffany was going to be okay, but the baby for whom they had been preparing would be gone.
Tiffany doesn’t know exactly when her water broke, around 23 weeks, but the baby lived for another three weeks in her womb with no amniotic fluid.
Even at such an early stage of development, Landon was a fighter and was born breathing on his own. Doctors told the family that the baby would not live more than 24 hours and they should say goodbye. Later, the doctor changed his prognosis and told the family the baby would not live more than 72 hours. Landon apparently did die three or four times when he was in the neonatal intensive care unit (NICU), but fought back.
“The first time I saw him, his skin was so translucent I could see his heart beating,” said grandfather Randy “Papa” Warren. “We could see the color markings from the key line through his skin.
“We wouldn’t let Tiffany see him for three days because we didn’t want her to form more of an attachment to the baby if he was going to die,” Papa said.
“The nurses kept me up to date on his condition,” Tiffany said. “When I did see him for the first time, I thought he looked like an alien monkey.”
Landon was in the NICU for 97 days, roughly the number of days he was premature.
“The NICU nurse told me Landon was the healthiest baby in the unit, just small,” Papa said.
Landon will turn three in July. He recently discovered Elmo and Sesame Street. He goes just about everywhere with Papa and grandma Diane has a special place in his heart.
“People ask me what March of Dimes did for Tiffany and Mike and I tell them nothing, but March of Dimes saved my grandson’s life,” Papa said. “Without funding the research that they have to find causes of prematurity, my grandson would not be here today.”