Tiny baby brings hope

One pound, 6.3 ounces.

That’s what Joseph Michael Ojeda weighed when he came into the world June 9 at Medical Center Hospital.

To put that into perspective, Angelina Navarrete, born at 1 pound, 9 ounces, was the smallest baby born at the hospital to go home when she left in August 2006. That’s a difference of nearly 3 ounces.

“I didn’t know how serious it was until I woke up, and they explained it to me,” Annette Ojeda, Joseph’s mother, said. “The doctors said I had no color.”

During her Caesarian section, Ojeda said she lost 2.5 intravenous bags full of blood in 30 minutes. But that was nothing compared to what Joseph has gone through.

Born at 24 weeks, after his mother’s placenta became detached from the uterus, Joseph was far from fully developed.

“I was scared,” Ojeda said. “I got to the hospital at 6 in the morning. By 6:30, he was born.”

After his birth, Joseph was placed on a respirator, which Ojeda said breathed 100 percent for him. Doctors didn’t expect him to last the night.

By the next day, however, doctors were able to cut the respirator down to 80 percent, she said.

Joseph has also undergone open-heart surgery — at only 5 days old. A hole in his heart, which normally closes in the womb, had not had time to do so.

“He’s a fighter,” she said. “They didn’t think he was going to make it to the second day. Here we are the fifth day already.”

Additionally, Joseph’s head didn’t fully develop before birth.

Ojeda said doctor’s greatest long-term concerns are Joseph’s development of lungs and kidneys. But there is hope on both those fronts. By Thursday, he was down to needing 30 percent oxygen from the respirator.

The day after he was born, Ojeda said Joseph’s kidneys were not working, but by Monday and Tuesday, he was “peeing like crazy.”

Joseph also has risk of seizures and blindness, she said.

“We won’t know until he gets a little older,” she said. “Our main concern is keeping him alive.”

When the tiny baby was born, though, many thoughts went through Ojeda’s head.

“Oh my gosh, he’s premature,” she said. “Is he going to walk?”

“Is he going to have to come home with a machine?”

“Is he going to need a doctor the rest of his life?”

Ojeda said doctors are planning to keep Joseph at Medical Center until around Sept. 28 — her original due date.

There have been positives, though. Ojeda, who lives on 87th Street in Odessa, has been able to avoid trips home by staying in Medical Center’s Ronald McDonald Family Room.

“It’s comforting,” she said. “I like having somewhere where the kids can play, watch TV and play games. It’s not just an isolated waiting room.”

The family room features two overnight rooms. Ruth Johnson, Permian Basin coordinator for Ronald McDonald House Charities of the Southwest, said it’s designed to provide families a home-type atmosphere to give them a break from the hospital situation.

“Out volunteers don’t wear uniforms,” she said.

The family room, which opened in April 2006, differs from a traditional Ronald McDonald House in that it doesn’t have as many bedrooms, and it serves both local and out-of-town guests, Johnson said.

In the meantime, Ojeda, 31, has also been happy with the care Joseph has received in Medical Center’s neo-natal intensive care unit.

Joseph is Ojeda’s fourth child. Her younger daughter, Bianca Nicole, was born just 10 months ago, something Ojeda said doctors told her could have contributed to her problems carrying Joseph.

“I was scared, frightened, mad at myself, thinking it was my fault,” she said. “As they told me what really happens, step-by-step, they said, ‘it just happens.’ ”

The situation has taught Ojeda to take life more seriously, she said.

“It’s a new experience,” she said. “It makes me realize there are people in my situation where it happens the first time — and they never get to have kids again.”

Ojeda, along with her husband, Israel Ojeda, said she hopes to bring Joseph home Sept. 28. But before then, she has one wish.

“I’ve never heard him cry,” she said. “That’s the one thing a parent waits for.”