Benefit planned for tiny infant

FORT FRANCES—Kathy Cuthbertson, along with workers at the Fort Frances High School cafeteria, are planning a meatball and perogy benefit dinner for David and Jennifer Marr of Emo on Friday, Jan. 25.
The couple’s new baby, Benjamin, was born prematurely at 24 weeks and four days, and so the family has been spending most of their time in a Winnipeg hospital.
“I’ve seen what our community can do so easily for people,” Cuthbertson said. “We wanted to do whatever we could do to help them.
“There’s not much physically we could do, so we thought this was something that could help.”
The benefit will be held in the high school cafeteria beginning at 4:30 p.m. There also will be a silent auction, live entertainment, and a kiddie fish pond.
“People have been really receptive to the idea,” Cuthbertson noted, adding many already have offered their assistance from making the tickets to performing during the event.
“People have just been wonderful about wanting to help,” she enthused.
Organizers still are looking for donations for the silent auction, and any other monetary, prize, or food donations also would be greatly appreciated.
“We just want to make it a fun family night to help out a really great couple.”
Cuthbertson noted ticket sales for the benefit already are going well and they are hoping to prepare dinner for 500 people. Nearly 250 can be seated in the cafeteria at a time, and they plan to keep the tables clear as people finish eating and more arrive.
Tickets, which cost $20 for adults and $10 for students, are available at Northwoods Gallery & Gifts and Crazy Lady Fabrics in Fort Frances, as well as Cloverleaf Grocery, Tompkins Hardware, and Norlund Oil in Emo.
“We just want to do as much as we can to help lighten the load for them,” Cuthbertson stressed.
Jennifer Marr has been in Winnipeg, at the hospital and Ronald McDonald House, since Sept. 22 due to her high-risk pregnancy.
She and he husband tried to get pregnant for the past three-and-a-half years and went through every fertility drug available. Last January, they were told there was nothing left besides artificial insemination or in vitro fertilization.
They started with artificial insemination, but after she received too much medication, they found the money needed to switch to in vitro in May.
“We had complications pretty much from the get-go,” Marr recalled. “Since they gave me too much medication, my ovaries continued to grow and . . . I was in a lot of pain.
“At the time we didn’t know if [the procedure] had worked or not worked,” she added.
At six weeks, she felt something was wrong—that if she was pregnant, she was losing them. She called her fertility doctor in Winnipeg and soon after it was confirmed she was pregnant.
Then she was told she was carrying twins.
“I started to cry,” Marr said, adding she was told everything was okay with the pregnancy. This continued until about Week 17, when her water broke unexpectedly.
She went to La Verendrye Hospital here in Fort Frances and the doctor there confirmed the membrane had ruptured on the lowest baby. She was told things were fine, but that they needed to get to Winnipeg.
“They weren’t able to handle our situation—twins so early,” she explained. “They told us at that point we were probably going to deliver and that they could not save them.”
Marr stayed in the hospital for five days, with no contractions or signs that she would deliver. The doctors had told her she would go into labour within 48 hours, but it didn’t happen.
She started having ultrasounds twice a week and there were no issues with either baby. Both were growing at the proper rate, but Baby “A” (a girl which they named Mckalia), had little amniotic fluid.
She made it six more weeks and the fluid began to replenish itself.
But soon Marr began to have some back pain and the next day she decided to go to the hospital. When she got there, she already was three-four cm dilated.
Within a couple of hours, Mckalia was born. But since she was less than 24 weeks old at the time, they couldn’t save her.
Marr then was told to get ready to deliver Baby “B” (Benjamin). The doctors said her labour wouldn’t stop after delivering the first baby.
“By a miracle of God, it stopped,” she remarked. “They don’t know why. They can’t explain it.”
Eight days later, she went into labour again after an infection set in, and Benjamin was born on Nov. 10. This time they were able to save him.
He came out breech and his legs were black and blue, he was put on antibiotics, and he weighed just one pound, four oz.
“Then we started our adventure in the NICU,” Marr said, noting Benjamin is doing very well to date.
He now weighs two pounds, 10 oz.—double his birth weight—and is about 14 inches long.
“He’s a fighter,” she stressed. “He’s come through everything they said he wouldn’t come through. He had a valve that wasn’t closed in his heart when he was born . . . they had to do surgery and they closed it.
“He’s doing amazing.”
She said Benjamin opens his eyes and looks around. And she got to hold him for the very first time on Dec. 19.
“He’s very tiny, but it’s the most amazing feeling to hold him,” Marr remarked. “I can’t wait ’til the day I can take him home and just rock him. . . .
“When you love someone so much, you just want to take every poke for him and do everything you can.”
Marr said she feels so lucky and grateful to have been able to watch him grow from the very beginning.
“I think I’m the luckiest mom alive,” she enthused. “I wanted to be someone’s mom for so long and now I am. He was so wanted for so many years.
“We’re very grateful to have had this experience,” she added. “It’s been a long four years, but it’s well worth it to be about to watch him and know that he’s probably going to come home with us.
“He’s fighting every day and he’s getting bigger and stronger, and his chances are way better than at the beginning when they weren’t sure whether he’s make it through the night,” she continued.
“I thanks God every day and I don’t take anything for granted.”
Premature babies don’t normally go home before their due date, which for Benjamin is Feb. 26. So Marr is hoping they will be able to bring their new baby home in March or April.
She said she’s amazed by all of the support they’ve received, not only from family and friends, but also strangers who have heard their story. She’d like to thank everyone for their cards, letters, gifts, visits, and prayers.
“It’s your prayers that are going to get us through,” she stressed. “And we really appreciate everything.”
Marr said although it is a sad story, it is also a success story. She wants people to know that good things do happen, and for others struggling with infertility problems that it is possible to have a child.
For more information about the upcoming benefit for the family, to buy tickets, or to offer donations, contact Cuthbertson at 274-7511, Jennifer Jourdain at 274-0159, or Stacey Bragg at 486-3424.
(Fort Frances Times)