March for Babies
Albuquerque
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North Domingo Baca Park
Redondo Dr NE , Albuquerque, NM 87106
Date: Saturday, May 06, 2017 11:30 AM
Redondo Dr NE , Albuquerque, NM 87106
Date: Saturday, May 06, 2017 11:30 AM
Our ambassador
2017 Albuquerque Ambassador Emily Schimmel
2017 Albuquerque Ambassador Emily Schimmel
10 years ago I was in the hospital. I was 22 weeks pregnant with twin girls and despite just having seen the doctor a few days before I was in danger of delivering prematurely. For the next 17 days I was not allowed out of bed for any reason. On February 22, my daughters, Katherine Ruth and Emily Grace were born. |
Unfortunately they were not supposed to be born until early June. Those next months were a rollercoaster of the worst kind. Both girls had problems. Kate had bilateral grade 4 brain bleeds, Emily had a duct between her heart and lungs that did not close, which caused serious lung issues. Kate had 3 brain surgeries, Emily, heart surgery to close that duct. When one did well, the other did not. |
I spent my days at the hospital doing what I could to care for my daughters. I spent the evenings caring for our 5-year-old son and trying to pretend that everything was at least somewhat normal. It wasn’t. In spite of everyone’s best efforts, on June 2nd, Kate died in our arms. 5 days later we brought Emily home after 106 days in the NICU. She was on oxygen and an apnea monitor for the next 4 to 5 months 24/7 and on oxygen at night for a total of 18 months. She had weekly eye appointments to check her eyes, which were affected by an issue specific to premature infants, ROP, retinopathy of prematurity. To this day there is still an oxygen tank in her closet. |
Our family has had the best and worst outcomes anyone could imagine for a premature infant. Today Emily is a happy, healthy, and sometimes annoying preteen who will be 10 2 weeks from today. She does have asthma, which is a result of her prematurity, but in school she does just as well as everyone else, but people do comment on her voice. I shrug and tell them “that’s just her.” What it is, however, is the fully paralyzed left vocal cord that she has. A permanent reminder of what she went through in the first few months of life. We never knew what caused the girls to be born so early, and that is why the March of Dimes is so important. |
The March of Dimes funds research into causes of premature birth. They have also funded research that developed surfactant, which helps the lungs of severely premature infants, without it, Emily would not be here. It is my wish that in my lifetime no other parent ever have to go through what we went though.
National partners
Thank you to our local sponsors