The Miracle of Modern Medicine

 

I recently joined the Compassion Bloggers Network and the first assignment I have is to blog about this little boy, Judah, in the video below. You'll fall in love with him and his story immediately.

 

 

In many ways, I can identify with Judah's mom. My youngest son, Henry, had some complications a month after he was born. Around four weeks old, he began to throw up most of what he ate. At first we thought it was reflux and he was prescribed medicine.

But it kept getting worse. He started projectile vomiting within an hour of eating. I knew something more was wrong and the doctor finally agreed with me. He had an ultrasound on his stomach and he was found to have pyloric stenosis, a condition  where the muscle that surrounds the pylorus (the valve connecting the stomach and intestines) was growing too quickly and blocking his stomach from emptying. We caught it before he started dehydrating, and the operation was a simple one. Still, those three days in the hospital were miserable. I will never forget that first night before his surgery, and he was still throwing up from his feeding 12 hours earlier. I remember the nurses trying to pump his tiny stomach and wishing I could comfort him during his cries of pain.

Henry, happy and healthy at 10 months

The surgery went well and he recovered quickly. Like Judah's mom though, I often wonder: what would've happened had it occurred in a part of the world where we would not have been able to help him? Where, because of either location or finances or both, we would've had to sit and watch our baby just get sicker by the day until he died?

I am so very fortunate I live in a part of the world where a simple surgery was all it took to make my little Henry healthy again. How many millions of other moms and dads would wish for the same?