Born on World Prematurity Day: Kaleb’s Journey
In 2020, after a year of fertility treatment, I discovered I was pregnant. I was very ill from the moment of conception and was diagnosed with Hyperemesis Gravidarum at 13 weeks. The pressure from the copious amounts of vomiting caused multiple vaginal blood vessels to burst, and I bled for almost 2 months of my pregnancy.
At 20 weeks, the vomiting finally slowed down and I was able to enjoy the little kicks here and there. At 22 weeks, there was some concerns about his growth. He was a bit smaller than he should have been for that gestation and there were abnormalities with the blood flow around and to baby.
At 23 weeks my midwife sent me to be admitted for one night in the maternity ward due to gestational hypertension. I thought everything was okay as I was able to leave the next day but had to begin daily injections of blood thinners due to the hyperemesis. Just a week later on a Wednesday, I found out Kaleb had IUGR and they were very concerned about the blood flow to him. The very next day on the Thursday, I was diagnosed with early onset of preeclampsia. The Friday I travelled from Tauranga to Auckland for an appointment with Foetal Medicine. I was taken straight from Auckland to Hamilton as Waikato was the nearest NICU from home.
I stayed in Hamilton for about 1.5 weeks, then I self-discharged home. I’m not proud of it but I was in a very bad place mentally and I just needed the comfort of home. So, with a game plan set up with my local hospital I went home. I made it 3 days at home before my hospital doctors and my midwife said I can’t stay there anymore, it’s getting too dangerous. Monday the 16th of November I was transported via ambulance back to Waikato and I lasted until lunchtime on Tuesday the 17th of November. After hours of battling my blood pressure and the slowing blood flow to baby, Kaleb was born at 5.44pm, weighing 739grams and he screamed as loud as he could.
I knew nothing about premature babies as I had never experienced it myself and this was my first pregnancy. The day after he was born, I learnt he was born on World Prematurity Day. He sure liked to make a statement!
He will be 5 on the 17th of November 2025 and I will always be thankful for every doctor, nurse, volunteer and so in for everything that was done for us. We couldn’t be more grateful.
Thanks so much for sharing your personal story!
We get a lot of positive feedback from families in a neonatal unit who read these stories and feel strength, hope and positivity knowing that they are not alone going through these experiences and feeling certain emotions.
If you would like to discuss sharing the story of your neonatal journey, we’d love to hear from you.
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If you want to help our support of families going through the stress and anxiety of a neonatal journey, you can donate via the link below.
- The Little Miracles Trust provides support to families of premature or sick full-term babies as they make their journey through Neonatal Intensive Care, the transition home, and onwards. We do not receive any Government funding and are entirely reliant on the generosity of individuals, companies and organisations in the form of donations, value-in-kind donations, grants, sponsorship and fundraising events to supplement operating costs and fund our services and initiatives.
- As we are a registered charity (CC56619) with Charities Services New Zealand we will send you an IRD compliant tax receipt – this will happen automatically by return email.