Lukas the little trooper

[Kodieh]

So, as with many people on the forum, I recently became a parent. Though, with a twist.

On 11/11, Lukas James Paul Hill was born with both a bilateral cleft lip and bilateral cleft palate. This has been an eye opening experience, and I'm very humbled by the perseverance of my son after a little over two months of life.

Lukas spent the first six days of his life in the NICU due to a breathing issue that went away quickly but also to help both me and my wife plus Lukas learn how we needed to feed/eat. He blew the nurses away with his progress.



Here you can see his lip, I believe he was only a few hours old in this picture. I can never tell because everywhere we were had no windows, so my whole internal clock was thrown off.



After the sixth day, we were allowed to go home. This was our first stressful day with baby Lukas because he was inconsolable, and we didn't know what we were doing wrong. Eventually it came about that he needed to sleep at an incline due to his cleft as well as he suffers from reflux. After we got his sleeping arrangements figured out, he became the sweet, quiet baby they raved about in the NICU.



He also got to meet Santa, who was actually G-daddy. I think he knew, because he was giving Santa a dirty look.



This was technically yesterday, right before his surgery to repair the lip. He's a fighter and got through it all great.



This is right now, as I stay with him in the hospital tonight. We're getting ready to go to sleep, and he's not having any of it.

I'll periodically update this with more pictures as he develops into his lip and more surgeries to come.

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[satomi325]

He's wonderful Kodie.
Good luck with his progress and surgeries!

[cecilbturtle]

Congratulations on the birth your beautiful son! I know you know this already but he will forever change you and he will keep changing you. My son is my heart. Looks like yours is too.

Congrats again!

[Neal]

I know we have our share of disagreements but I wish you luck on your journey with your son and wish the best for him to recover without any issues.

I'm not a parent and probably never will be, so I haven't the slightest idea about any of this but it sounds like a lot to deal with.

[Kodieh]

It can be, but we at least knew about the difficulties ahead before he was actually born. I couldn't imagine him being born and then finding out he was cleft.

From the start everyone involved in his care has said first this step, then this step, then this step. It's all been laid out for us with one of the top teams in the nation for this. He's already got an ear nose throat doc looking at him, the surgeon of course, and then an audiologist/speech pathologist will help with hearing and speech, and finally a orthodontist to round out the extensive dental work he'll need.

We haven't met everyone in the team yet, but so far we've had nothing but good experiences.

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[Mephibosheth1]

And he picked a good day to be born...11/11 is mine too

[AlexisFitzy]

Oh he's such a cute baby! I'm so glad he's been such a trooper threw all of this. My best friend Hannah is apart of Operation Smile and lived/worked in India for a year and helped children there get surgeries to fix their clefts. Definitely keep us updated on his progress! I love seeing them progress through this, it's amazing to see


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[ballpythonluvr]

Your son is just beautiful! Children are such a blessing and I am so glad that your baby boy is doing so well.

[CrystalRose]

He's beautiful. Good luck to him and your whole family with his recovery and future surgeries. He looks like an amazing little guy!

[DooLittle]

I love him. He's such a sweetheart. My thoughts are with you guys through this. He's going to bounce right back from surgery, you just watch!