Tears of Joy

Our lives are made up of many complex experiences; some are difficult and stretching, some make you angry, and some move you to tears of joy. What makes you tear up and cry? The sound of a newborn’s first cry brings so much happiness to new parents. Everyone is filled with relief and joy when a newborn comes into this world making noise. However, when a child is born with complicated medical problems, a parent’s cry may go from joyful to anxiety ridden as they figure out how to help their newborn child.  

Little Yue is an example of one of the children that might have brought sorrowful tears and anxiety to his parents. Yue was born with anal atresia. This means that he has difficulty passing stool. Yue is the 1 out of every 5,000 babies that is born with this condition (based on statistics provided by Healthline). He was rushed to the hospital for his first stage surgery. Yue was a tiny boy with protruding ribs when he came to us and it was clear that he would need ongoing specialized nursing care to get stronger. 

Yue when he first arrived at our home

 Over the last 4 months, we have provided him with meticulous care. We have changed his colostomy bag over one hundred times and ensured that he was gaining weight. Now, Yue is a transformed boy!

Does Yue’s story bring you to tears? His transformation fills his caregivers with tears of joy! At the end of last month, Yue was hospitalized again for his second stage surgery. The surgery was successful but after the operation, Yue caught a serious infection. He continues to need specialized care to heal from this infection that is causing his abdomen to swell. Despite this, Yue is full of smiles. His eyes look lovingly at his caregivers. Even so, his primary caregiver is full of tears for this sweet boy as she tries her best to comfort him.

To keep him comfortable, his legs are raised. 

To help reduce his fever, a wet towel is placed on his head. 

When he is strong enough, his caregiver helps him drink some water and Yue is full of smiles. It seems like he doesn’t remember that he is still fighting an infection! 

Yue’s story brings us to tears – tears of joy for the hope of his future and tears of sadness that he has to go through so many surgeries at such a young age. Together we can take away sad tears and bring smiles to the sweet babies at Dew Drops!