Taylor had a rough start.  She was born August 11, 1997 at 39 weeks gestation.  She weighed 8 lbs and was 21 inches long.  She should have been a healthy baby.  However, a series of mistakes by a nurse, a doctor, and a hospital led to disaster.  I would later find of that my baby had been in distress for at least two hours preceding her birth, and no one had done a thing.  She was born at 7:10 p.m. with no signs of life.  She was blue, had no heart rate and was not breathing at all.  A neonatologist was already in the room and immediately began CPR.  After 22 long minutes, the neonatologist gave up and called her time of death.  Her father and the OB/GYN refused to give up and continued CPR for 8 more minutes until they found a heart rate.  She was put on a ventilator and rushed off to the NICU.  We were told that the next 48 hours were critical, and she could die.  We were told that we would be sorry that we saved her that she could be like a vegetable.  The next 48 hours were critical for Taylor.  She was in the NICU in a dark room hooked up to a ventilator and all kinds of other tubes.  She had brain bleeds and all her organs were failing.  We were told not to expect much or get our hopes up.  With her type of brain bleed, she would probably not progress beyond a 6 month old.  She would never walk or talk.  Boy were they wrong!  Taylor was only on the ventilator for four days.  There were struggles still.  She had constant seizures and had to be sedated to stop them.  She could not suck on a bottle and had to be fed through a tube in her nose.  Her kidneys and liver continued to fail for two weeks.  She did not even cry or make a sound for two weeks.  Then, one night they were washing her hair, and she started screaming like crazy.  From that point on, she started to progress rapidly.  Her organs started working.  Her seizures were finally under control.  She even started to eat. There was a point she was transferred to Texas Children’s Hospital because fluid was building on her brain because of the huge bleeds.  By the time she got there, whatever had caused the fluid to build up had resolved itself.   She was a miracle.  Our prayers were answered.  Taylor only spent 4 weeks in the NICU.

Taylor was released from the hospital 4 weeks after her birth.  While there were setbacks, she flourished.  She even met most of her milestones on time her first year of life.  However, she did not walk until she was 20 months old.  When Taylor was two years old, she was diagnosed with Cerebral Palsy.  It was not severe at all, but she did have some struggles.  She could walk and talk.  She had to have physical, occupation and speech therapy.  She was also diagnosed with a seizure disorder when she was 2 years old.  This was very scary and something I prayed would get better (it never did until she was diagnosed with cancer).  Taylor did so well and continued to progress.  She attended school and was so smart.  She made more progress than expected by her doctors. She astonished them every day with her progress.