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WACO, Texas (AP) — As she does each year around her birthday, Tiffany Hlavenka makes a visit bearing flowers.
One Friday earlier this month was no different as the 20-year-old "miracle baby" and her mother, Kelly, surprised the staff of the neonatal intensive care unit at Baylor Scott & White Hillcrest Medical Center with a bouquet and a chocolate cake. Most of the faces have changed, but what that unit did for her 20 years ago remains something she will never forget.
Born 10 weeks prematurely with a birth defect that newborns rarely survive, Hlavenka beat the odds and now thrives. She runs 25 to 35 miles a week around her hometown of Robinson, training for a half-marathon, and she is preparing to pursue an advanced nursing degree by attending McLennan Community College and then Texas A&M University.
Her dream, she said, is to someday work in the NICU that has become an annual obsession.
"I have a soft spot for kids, especially those who were sick like I was," Hlavenka told the Waco Tribune-Herald (http://bit.ly/1wKYKQi).
Hlavenka was born in 1994 at the "old" Hillcrest Baptist Medical Center, just four years after Hillcrest had opened its neonatal ICU.
"If we had not had that ICU, we would not have saved her. Fortunately, we had the necessary equipment assembled to do what needed to be done," said Dr. Darrell Wheeler, who remains a member of the neonatal unit and had the expertise to diagnose her rare illness before her delivery by emergency cesarean section.
Hlavenka suffered from hydrops fetalis, a condition of the fetus characterized by an accumulation of fluid. Scans revealed that her abdomen and chest were encased in liquid, Wheeler said, and her lungs would not have been able to pump oxygen to her brain and body.
Wheeler used catheters to drain away the excess fluid, knowing that was Hlavenka's only hope of survival, and even then the odds remained long.
She remained in the Hillcrest neonatal intensive care unit from Sept. 13 to Nov. 7, when she was transferred to Cook Children's Medical Center in Fort Worth for surgery.
"She went home on Nov. 20," said Kelly Hlavenka, who kept a journal of the family's experience.
"Dr. Wheeler had studied two or three cases of hydrops fetalis during his residency in Houston, so he knew what he was getting into," she added. "I heard later that he told my husband and in-laws that she would not survive the birth, but she did, and I give him a lot of the credit."
She also credits God, saying, "I did a lot of praying, and I always had a real peaceful feeling that he would take care of things."
That faith often was tested, she said, when days turned into nights of waiting, and family members took turns staying near the ICU.
"Someone was always here, always. They would not give up hope," said Julie Luna, a secretary who smiled and gave Tiffany a long hug upon her arrival.
Kelly said her husband, Billy, now the fire chief for the city of Bellmead, stayed with his tiny daughter whenever he could despite working two jobs at the time, including that of captain of the fire department. He would watch her sleep, read her stories, talk to the doctors about her progress.
"Right after she was born, Dr. Wheeler said the first four hours were critical. If she made it through those, at least there was hope, but he was not going to give her that hope," Kelly said. "Well, after 3 hours and 45 minutes, he said we could see her. My lower body was numb, and I couldn't get out of bed. But Billy went. He told me later that she grabbed his finger and her heart rate went up. It was as if from that moment on, things started in the right direction."
Kelly Hlavenka said staffers helped make the situation more tolerable by applying a touch of levity.
"The nighttime nurses thought she looked like Pebbles, the Flintstones character, so they would put little paper bones in her hair and spike it up," she said.
Kristy Clendenin, a registered nurse in the NICU, said she still was going through orientation sessions when Tiffany was born.
"She was my first sick patient to take care of," she said. "So sick it was scary."
Clendenin marveled at the healthy, athletic woman that sick little girl has become, adding she appreciates her annual display of thankfulness.
The Hlavenkas said they likely will continue visiting the neonatal intensive care unit every year to show their appreciation.
"At 25 years, I'll probably put it all on her," Kelly Hlavenka said with a laugh.
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Information from: Waco Tribune-Herald, http://www.wacotrib.com
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