Life is Beautiful

Life is Beautiful November 1, 2013

…and that is revealed in unexpected ways:

On June 18, 2012 a baby boy named Dominic Pio was born into the world who, had he been given different parents, may never have been born at all. Mid-way through her pregnancy, Mary Gundrum would learn that her son had an encephalocele, an extremely rare birth defect that occurs when part of the skull doesn’t close properly, allowing the brain to grow through that opening in the skull. Told that her baby boy might not survive the pregnancy or his birth Mary, along with her husband Mark, didn’t contemplate abortion. The Catholic mom told The Boston Globe: “We did a lot of soul-searching. I was thinking, ‘That’s my child. It’s that simple. I’m not going to take the life of my child.’

Mary and Mark found Dr. John Meara, plastic surgeon in chief at Boston Children’s Hospital. He had removed an encephalocele in 2008 and videotaped the procedure which was then posted online. The couple could hardly believe it. They sent Meara the ultrasoundof Dominic and he called them the next day, telling them it was going to be okay. This alone makes him the greatest doctor.

However what Meara saw on the ultrasound was not one but two conditions. However, Dominic also had a Tessier facial cleft…

Read the rest.


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