A mother whose premature twins, born at 23 weeks and 3 days, spent over 150 days in neonatal intensive care is giving back by making toy bunnies for other extremely premature babies.
Caroline Bentley Noble was experiencing a typical pregnancy with twins until she experienced premature rupture of membranes (PROM), in which a mother’s waters break at or before the 37th week of pregnancy. Caroline was just 22 weeks through her pregnancy at the time that her waters broke.
The Maternal-Fetal Medicine team at University of Kentucky HealthCare attempted to prevent the twins from arriving too soon.
Dr John O’Brien, head of the team, said “The six-week interval of pregnancy between 22 and 28 weeks’ gestation is the most critical period to help determine whether newborns can survive or whether they have long-term complications related to prematurity. Every day during this crucial period is important”.
Babies Paisley and Jaxson were ultimately born in December, 116 days before their due date, at 23 weeks and 3 days old. Paisley, the older baby, weighed 1lb 5oz, while Jaxson followed quickly weighing just 1lb 4oz.
“I was in utter shock”, Caroline said. “I had no idea babies could be born so small. I think each baby had a team of 10 or 15 people”.
The twins had a long hospital stay ahead of them
At just eight days old, Paisley had an emergency surgery for a spontaneous intestinal perforation, which required her intestines to be rerouted. Due to her small size, this operation carried a higher level of risk of bleeding or damage to other organs or structures.
“Paisley was born very early and was very small when she delivered”, said Dr Eric Rellinger, one of the surgeons who performed the operation. “She was smaller than my hand when we operated on her”.
“When I started training 17 years ago, children born this early rarely lived. Advances in neonatal intensive care have allowed us to better care for these children when they deliver earlier in pregnancy”.
“These wonderful surgeons performed a miracle and successfully put PJ through an unthinkable surgery with success”, said Caroline. “I am forever grateful. Dr. Rellinger was truly an angel. He handled us as a family with such grace. I will work for the rest of my life to make sure our gratitude for the KCH (Kentucky Children’s Hospital) staff is felt and understood. It’s hard to find the words of how important they are and how wonderful they are at their jobs”.
Both Paisley and Jaxson spent their first Christmas and New Year at the hospital. It was 159 days before Paisley came home, and a further six days before Jaxson was able to join her. Once home, both twins required ongoing specialist care due to complications of prematurity.
Creating bunnies for staff and babies
The twins’ time in hospital gave their mum, Caroline, the opportunity to think of a way to give back to the hospital staff. “I’ve always been passionate about finding new ways to use second-hand items and manipulating them to be different”, Caroline said.
In gratitude to the hospital staff working with her children, Caroline and a friend set about creating fabric bunnies to give to each of the people involved with the twins’ care.
“I don’t know where I would be without them”, she said. “They picked me up off the floor and treated me with such kindness and care that I was able to make it through with their help and help from my uncle Mark and grandmother”.
She added, “I am very passionate about making sure I can give someone a token of my gratitude, which pales in comparison to what they’ve shown me with my children”.
Once every member of the care teams had a bunny, Caroline started to create toys for the parents of the other children in intensive care. She began working with social worker Anna Bullard to ensure that every baby in the unit would go home with a bunny.
Caroline’s project has now grown into a non-profit organisation, Lucky in Kentucky, which is dedicated to providing a custom-made bunny for any patient who might need one. She has ambitions to provide bunnies in neonatal intensive care units across Kentucky and beyond.
“From every moment of everything that has happened, every person that entered my or my children’s hospital room, has been there to help in a genuine, honest, caring, respectful way”, she said. “It’s awoken something in me, a desire to be able to spread that kind of feeling to anyone who will possibly listen to me for five minutes”.
Spokesperson for Right To Life UK, Catherine Robinson, said, “In the midst of one of the most challenging experiences a parent can have, Caroline was able to find a way of using her talents to show gratitude to those helping her children and to show encouragement and kindness to other parents in a similar situation”.
