Support Baby Juliet's Medical Journey

For those of you that know Chris and Anna, you know they are not the type to ask for help. But sometimes, those are truly the people that need it the most.

On April 5, 2024, Chris and Anna welcomed Baby Juliet to the world. It was not easy. Anna had two emergent surgeries: one at 22 weeks to try and stop her body from going into labor, and then a second one at 24 weeks to get the baby out and try saving her. She was 16 weeks early, and both her and Anna had/have medical issues that needed to be tended to.

Juliet was born in Danbury Hospital at 24 weeks. She spent roughly 3 weeks in their NICU before requiring a higher level of care, resulting in her being transferred to Connecticut Children’s in Hartford. While there, Anna spent most days with and caring for Juliet while Chris continued to work.

Due to Juliet being so premature, she has severe Bronchopulmonary Dysplasia (BPD) and had Retinopathy of Prematurity (ROP). During her stint in the NICU and hospitalization, Juliet had been on max settings for multiple ventilators. She was on various medications to allow her to try getting and staying relaxed so she could grow and heal. She was tube-fed since being born to provide the necessary nutrition requirements. She was intubated up until her due date (July 24th). She had 14 blood transfusions, 6 rounds of steroids, and 5 procedures/surgeries: 2 on her eyes to correct the ROP and prevent her from going blind, and the other 3 were for tube placements in and beyond her stomach.

After 271 days, Juliet is home. Although Chris and Anna are thrilled about this, it comes with a lot of work and challenges. Juliet still has daily medical needs to take care of and will need constant and continuous care. She is home with various medical devices and monitors. Juliet still requires a higher level of respiratory support, so she is home on a ventilator. Due to this, she requires an oxygen concentrator at home and oxygen tanks for travel. She needs to have a nebulizer for daily treatments and emergency suction machines to be readily available. She is still on monitors 24/7 to monitor her oxygen levels and heart rate. Juliet is fed continuously by a pump and medicated through feeding tubes in her belly.

Anna can’t work and Chris is now taking time off of work to help care for and bond with Juliet. This resulted in a very dramatic decline in income. They will need to pay for some home nursing out of pocket as insurance will not cover this care. They appealed with their insurance company, lost this appeal, and are now currently waiting for some state representatives to try making a case for them. They also need to pay out of pocket for some of her medications which insurance is only covering part of, and some not at all. They’re also trying to work with Eversource to get help with the increased costs associated with the sudden bump in usage for these machines running continuously.

We are asking for any help you are willing to give at this time. They still have a very long road ahead of them where nurses and doctors won’t be a daily presence in their lives. We’d like to be able to raise them some money to help pay for things insurance won’t cover and to help alleviate their living costs while they are both home helping Juliet and not able to work. They are amazing parents and we need to help them to be able to care for their daughter as much as possible. Thank you!