In January last year, Cheri Price was taken to hospital after experiencing premature contractions. She was expecting her third child, a daughter, and feared that she would lose her if she arrived so early on. After several weeks of fear and anxiety, however, the baby arrived, and - miraculously - survived.
Baby Hailie was just 23 weeks and six-days-old when she was born on February 23rd, meaning that she was still technically in the fetus stage of development. Because of this, her skin pigmentation had not developed properly, and her skull wasn't fully formed, either.
"When Hailie was born, it sounds bad to say it, but she looked like a red alien," said Price, now 22-years-old.
Tragically, the little one was suffering from multiple complications due to her premature arrival. Weighing just 1lb 2oz, though, Hailie managed to survive a collapsed lung, a compromised immune system, and - at one point - not being able to breathe for seven minutes.
She was kept under close observation for the first few weeks of her life until, finally, she was stable enough to be held by her mother.
"She was still in the fetus stage and she didn’t look like a baby at all - we couldn’t believe she even survived," said Price. "From birth, she was put in an incubator and we couldn’t touch her - but we could see all the veins of her brain through her red skin."
According to the NHS guidelines, newborns are only considered "viable" at 24 weeks old, but even then their chance of survival only sits at 35 percent - so Hailie really was at serious risk.
Originally, Price and her boyfriend, 32-year-old Timothy Dillon, tried to seek medical help from St Mary’s hospital on the Isle of Wight, but were turned away because they supposedly did not have the facilities to deal with such a premature child.
Because of this, the couple were forced to travel to Middlesborough, where Price spent two weeks in and out of hospital. She was eventually discharged, only for her waters to break two days later while she was still staying in the area.
"We just thought we would take the chance at a larger hospital - and we were closer to relatives so they could help with childcare for Jack [one of their other children],” Price said.
It is fortunate that they made the decision when they did, as Hailie would almost certainly not have survived had she been born without access to immediate medical care.
Now, thanks to the help of a dedicated team of doctors and nurses, the baby is a perfectly healthy one-year-old.
"I’m so proud of her, what we’ve been through and what she has been through has been horrendous. We thought we would lose her at so many points and we’ve had no help whatsoever," Price said.
The mother was unable to leave the hospital for three months, and during that time she was not entirely sure whether her baby would survive. Thankfully, she's home now, and the family are very grateful to have her.
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