A Utah couple who went to the doctor to determine the gender of their baby received the shock of their lives. “We were going in for one of the happiest times of our lives and come out walking like we just heard the worst news we could’ve ever heard,” Ben Reidhead, the father, said.
The doctor explained to them that their baby’s brain was growing outside of the skull at 23 weeks. This terrifying information only got worse. “They just kept saying oh he’ll be born but he’ll only live for a couple minutes or if you go through labor, he’ll probably pass away during labor,” Alyssa Reidhead said.
After being given this devastating new update on the newest addition to their family, the couple started planning for the funeral before the birth. The diagnosis of the rare condition called encephalocele comes with little hope from doctors so the Reidheads decided to prepare for the worst. “We picked out a casket and we picked out what we were going to do,” Alyssa Reidhead said.
The rest of Reidhead’s pregnancy was filled with fear and dread for what was to come. In a shocking turn of events, the labor was not the horror they had expected. “Almost scared of having the baby come not because we didn’t want him to come but just because we were afraid of losing him,” Ben Reidhead said. After the C-Section delivery the mother described what happened, “We heard a cry and that made me cry and him cry because we were like, “oh he’s crying. He’s not hooked up to anything. He’s breathing fine. He’s lifting his head. He’s moving around. He’s pretty much acting like a completely normal baby.”
Although the baby has survived against all odds, he faces a challenge ahead. The only thing protecting his brain from the environment for now is a thin, transparent membrane. Doctors are unsure what step to take now. “They’ve been consulting with a lot of other doctors and trying to figure out exactly what is the best option,” Ben Reidhead said.
Source: Mad World News
Photos: Mad World News
