Wide Smiles
Wide Smiles
Bundles of Love
Dawn and Randy Addington wanted a miracle, and on March 31, 1993, that miracle came -- in ways they had never dreamed to hope. After years of frustration and infertility, Dawn and Randy became the proud parents of four beautiful, healthy babies! Jarred, their only son, had a unilateral cleft lip and palate. His three sisters, Hannah, Haley and Heather, were physically perfect.
Dawn and Randy always wanted children, but they experienced the all too common frustrations of infertility. In hopes of producing a child biologically, they attempted the procedure known as invitro fertilization. In that procedure, ova are removed from the mother and fertilized by the father outside of the mother's body. Those fertilized ova are then reintroduced into the mother at a point at which her body is receptive to the implantation. While many hundreds of babies are born per year via invitro fertilization, the success rate is still quite small, at about 25%. To inrease the likelihood of a pregnancy, it is the common practice when using this method to introduce several fertilized ova into the mother at one time, in the hope that one will implant and develop into a baby. Four fertilized ova were available for Dawn.
Throughout the pregnancy the doctors thought that Dawn was carrying triplets. Dawn and Randy prepared for the multiple birth and adjusted themselves to the thought of three new babies.
By the 31st week of the pregnancy, Dawn's high blood pressure dictated that the babies had to come early, so, on the last day of March she went into the hospital for a C- section delivery. A multiple birth is always high risk, and a premature birth is even more so. Dawn's experience as a nurse made her very aware of the possibilities. They felt they were ready for anything.
The first baby was born, then the second and finally a third. They had two girls and a boy. The Ob- Gyn was removing placenta when she felt arms and legs and she yelled out, "We've got another one!" And to everyone's amazement, out came Heather - girl number 3 and baby number 4.
Dawn's first questions were the same as any mother's. "Are my babies ok?" The answer was, "They seem fine. The boy has a cleft lip." Dawn thought of all the problems she could have faced, all the potential for serious complications and she sighed with relief and said, "Is that all?!"
After two months in the hospital, the Addington quadruplets went home. Mom and Dad bonded readily. And, while their hands are full with four healthy, growing babies, their hearts are full too.
With days that are filled with feeding, holding, cuddling, dressing, bathing and loving four new little people, the problems associated with the cleft have moved to a back burner somewhat. Jarred's surgery will happen when the time is best for Jarred. The low birth weight of a preemie and then multiple ear infections have postponed the initial closure of his lip. Meanwhile he is being fitted with an oral prosthesis that will align the palatal segments before surgery. But Mom is in no hurry "He has the prettiest smile," she says. "Sometimes I forget that he even has a cleft."
And though life with a cleft child is not always easy and life with four infants is sometimes exhausting, blessings abound in the Addington home.
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