Thomas, Garreth Mervy

http://www.cherubs-cdh.org/Album/new...s-garreth3.jpgOur son Garreth Mervyn Thomas was born at 9:44am on 15th September 2005 in Bangkok, Thailand, with undiagnosed CDH. At birth he weighed 3.2kg. After X-ray and diagnosis, he was transferred to a NICU where they had the facilities to deal with critically ill babies. In addition to CDH, he had pneumonia, PPHN, and a malrotated stomach. In total, he spent a month in NICU before being released.

My wife and I have just returned with Garreth from a six-month check-up with the consultant who cared for him in hospital. He is very pleased with his progress and has assessed him as being equivalent to an 8-9 month old in terms of his physical development. He continues to gain weight and is now 7.1kg and 68cm long.

While we are not 100% clear of the woods, we hope that our ordeal is coming to an end, and that happier days are around the corner.

he Cherubs-CDH website gave us an insight into a very dark subject, and brought us fully to our senses in terms of what to expect, and what the future might hold. At times in those early days, just after Garreth’s birth, we had no way of knowing which way our fortune would turn. While this website tells it like it is, there will be many for whom the statistics are too grim, and the case histories too bleak. There were days when I could not read any more. I am not ashamed to admit that on two occasions when Garreth was suffering, I thought that things would not work out. But we continued to hope and hold on to, and look forward to, each daily visit, and the brief time that we were able to spend with him.

While Garreth lay critically ill, we tried to comprehend what had gone wrong. Why him and why us? We struggled to come to terms with our fortune and why this had remained undiagnosed despite repeated ultra-sounds (four in total) by the gynecologist, who was a well-respected senior doctor.

In all of my searching for clues to the mystery, there was one small glimmer of light which gave me hope and something to hold on to. It was a quote that I copied and pasted onto my desktop for inspiration when things were looking grim. The exact wording escapes me now, but essentially it said that “the majority of infants who survive surgery and respond well to treatment go on to lead perfectly normal lives”. That sentence gave us something to look forward to that was beyond the drama that was playing out in front of us, and something that we might aspire to. The other thing that inspired me was when the Doctor advised that the babies who do survive tend to be the ones who are undiagnosed, especially where ultrasound has been performed. This is because if the CDH was not capable of being detected, then it suggests that the condition was not too severe, and the child not too obviously handicapped.

Fortunately, ours is one of the few happy, silver-lining-type stories, in what remains an under-researched and grim illness that is very unforgiving, and which claims too high a percentage of its victims.

The shock and trauma that we initially suffered is being tempered by the realization that people do survive this illness, and go on to prosper. My wife and I lead simple ordinary lives and we are not religious people. We are, however, aware that we have been blessed by the events of the last six months, and marvel that, despite the setbacks we have had, we have had the support of friends and family near and far, and the community in which we live has been very generous with their support.

We are now devoted to raising cash for the Doctor who saved our little boy, and so far have raised over $8,000. This is a small step towards his goal of having the primary healthcare facility for infants in Asia, but every little thing we do is a small step towards that goal. Just as he helped our son recover, now we hope to be able to repay that favour.

I also hope that this story might give help, and give hope and encouragement to anyone who finds themselves in similar circumstances. If anyone should need to contact me or my wife, please don’t hesitate to mail or call and we will try and do all that we can to ease the burden.

Above all, try to remember the words to The Wizard of Oz: “And the dreams that you dare to dream Really do come true”.


Haydn, & Ek-orn Thomas (Thailand)
2006