Danielle and Michael's Story:

        We lost our first pregnancy at just eight weeks, January of this year.  In March, we found out we were pregnant with our “rainbow baby” on our 1 year wedding anniversary. We felt so blessed but also so scared knowing that we had just lost a baby and didn’t want experience that pain again. Every dr appt was filled with emotions, just waiting for the tech to confirm the heartbeat. At our 20 week anatomy scan, the tech checked all the organs and then went back to the heart and spent a good amount of time rescanning the heart, as silence filled the room. My husband and I both looked at eachother and knew something wasn’t right. We then heard the words, “there’s no easy way to say this but there is an abnormality with his heart, and we’re going to send you to a specialist for further testing”. Our heart’s dropped. Later that week we went to the specialist who diagnosed Vincenzo with “Tetrology of Fallot with Pulmonary Stenosis”. The week after we met with cardiology to discuss what this means and what his care would look like after birth. My husband and I just felt a huge weight on our shoulders but kept our faith and knew that God chose US to be his parents. A few weeks after this appt, I started having cramping which led to an ER overnight stay to make sure I wasn’t having contractions. A few days after that, I had a follow up appt with my OB. I told her about the cramping and that it felt it was getting worse. She wanted to do an exam and her words were “You are about 3cm dilated and in preterm labor. We need to get you to the hospital”. My husband and I were in shock and felt such a rush of adrenaline. We got checked into labor and delivery at 12:30 pm on August 12th. I was now 7cm dilated with contractions every few minutes. The whole thing felt like a dream and my husband and I kept having to tell ourselves we are having our son tonight. 

       Vincenzo Anthony was born at 4:40pm and taken immediately to the nicu. Two weeks after birth, he had an intestine perforation, and needed to have an emergency surgery and would have an ostomy bag. He then spent two months in the NICU growing. We were then moved to the cardiac ICU where Vincenzo underwent his first heart surgery on November 3, which was a stent intervention to help get better blood flow to his lungs. He is now weaning his respiratory support and will be learning to eat! He will need his Tetrology of Fallot repair in the next few months, which will be open heart surgery to fully repair his heart. We have a long road ahead but he is such a little fighter and we are anxiously awaiting the day we can bring him home. 

       We have had so much support over the past several weeks and are just so thankful to have all of you. We have opened this storefront for you to support “Team Vincenzo” during his fight, and especially during his full repair surgery! Please send pics to mom and dad in your gear, so we can have these memories to share with him someday.