Preemie Baby Rucker

After experiencing a sudden onset of the serious and fatal disease of preeclampsia, the Rucker family underwent life-altering changes including the premature birth of their baby boy. Mom had stroke-level blood pressure and the pre-eclampsia was restricting blood flow to the baby, endangering him and causing complications. Mom also endured 17 days of excruciating pain in the hospital, being administered numerous drugs to protect her and the baby, including 4 bags of painful magnesium drips to stabilize her condition. After trying to balance her blood pressure with keeping the baby in as long as possible, she ultimately had to be ushered into emergency c-section preparations in the middle of the night. Born at 29 weeks at just 2 pounds 7 ounces, Elias came into the world requiring incubation, ventilators, oxygen, bilirubin, CPAPs, feeding tubes, pulmonary support, eye exams, constant labs and monitoring, surgeries and lastly a surgical g-tube.

After spending almost 4 months in the hospital and most recently having surgery for the g-tube, he is set to come home within the next few days. Unfortunately, 4 months in the hospital have caused a lot of bills to pile up and the savings the parents had for the baby were depleted while they put their lives on hold to first, get Mom better and later focus on the newborn. Baby Elias has developed severe oral aversion which will require lots of feeding therapy. Once the baby comes home, he needs to have consistent feeders that are familiar with his feeding requirement making it very difficult to put him in childcare.

This fund will help them get back on their feet and will hopefully allow some time for the parents to be able to work with the baby on teaching him how to eat by mouth so that one day his g-tube can be taken out. These two parents are wonderful human beings who have constantly shown others generosity, giving whatever they can when needed. Any and all help given will be greatly appreciated!

Below are some snippets of their journey so far:

Mom during her 17-day hospital stay before delivering.

Elias at 5 days old.

Elias at one week old.

Elias (at 10 days old) and Mom.

Elias at one-month-old.

Elias at 7 weeks (left) and 9 weeks (right).

Countless, sleepless NICU nights.