If you’ve visited DifferentDream.com lately, you know January is EA/TEF Awareness Month. Once again, the parent of a child with this condition will share her family’s story. Guest blogger Maggi Gale’s story is one of global proportions as you will soon see.

EA/TEF Awareness Month: Call Me a Romantic

Call me a romantic, but I had pictured the scene months before the baby had arrived. My mental picture was based on our sunny, Saturday afternoon visit of the maternity ward in the East African Government hospital. I would sit in the corner of the room in a low chair, cradling the baby. Then her dad and sister would arrive. Phoebe would hold her little sibling for the first time.

Being well acquainted with life in Africa, it seemed natural to stay for the birth, rather than uprooting our family to stay with family or friends back in the United Kingdom. Sure, the hospital wasn’t exactly state of the art, but this wasn’t my first baby and I’m made of fairly tough stuff. So my line of thinking went.

Ah, yes, the scene I visualized was sweet and cozy.

EA/TEF Awareness Means Facing What Really Happened

So what really happened? Reality was a far cry from my daydream. After a long labor, my daughter Lois was born without a cry. She was whisked away as I lay waiting for stitches. But why did I detect a determined, rather fixed smile on the midwife’s face?

And what was the pediatrician doing in the room? “There’s nothing to worry about, Mrs. Gale,” he began.

Instinctively I knew that he was wrong, and my world had changed forever.

That evening, a doctor friend had come to visit. Although she didn’t tell us, she wasn’t comfortable with the diagnosis. After seeing Lois, she went home to do research. The next morning she came back to chat with the pediatrician, explaining she was a doctor with pediatric experience.

From that point on, we were on a roller coaster. The doctor wasted no time in advising us. “You need to leave the country. Go to South Africa or the United Kingdom.” I walked out of the hospital on automatic and caught a taxi home to pack. As my husband decided on the UK, organized flights, accommodations, and an ambulance, I mechanically seized the scissors and cut the sleeve off baby gowns so that Lois could wear them with her drip in her arm. Despite my stitches, I flung suitcases around and packed for us all.

EA/TEF Awareness Means Letting Go of Preconceived Ideas

The only question on my mind, the only question that mattered was, “Will she make it?” We had arrived at the bottom line, oh so suddenly, oh so unexpectedly. All emotions were suspended as my spirit continually cried, “Please God, just let her live.”

I wrestled with my preconceived ideas. It wasn’t supposed to happen this way. We were the blessed ones, the ones God showered his grace upon. So what was this? Where had we come to? I didn’t know this scary place.

Back in the UK just 48 hours after her birth, our surreal experience began to be given names, forms, and explanations. The surgeon sat down with us and explained that Lois had been born with tracheoesophageal fistula (TEF), a condition which affects one in 3500 babies. For some unknown reason, her esophagus had not been properly formed. The top part stopped short of her stomach. The bottom part, came from her stomach was somehow attached to her windpipe. Consequently, she was totally unable to swallow or make any sound.

Surgery was absolutely essential, but the full extent of her problem couldn’t be known until she was opened up. There were many variations of TEF. Some requiring a single operation. Others requiring multiple surgeries. No guarantee of success was offered, either.

EA/TEF Awareness Means Dangling in Space

So, on the afternoon of May 26th, 2003, we perched on our friends’ settee, but  we were not really there. Emotionally, we were dangling in space. Waiting hour after long hour for a call from the hospital to tell us if the operation was a success. That call eventually came. Words can’t convey the feeling of relief that swept over us, that allowed us to breathe again, feel our bodies again, and slowly begin to come out of automatic mode and to process what had happened, emotionally and mentally.

EA/TEF Awareness Means a World Changed Forever

Yes, my world changed forever, when my daughter was born. Along with my visual image of those first few days being shattered, some of my preconceived ideas were also shattered. What had gone wrong?

It took me some time to understand that it nothing had gone wrong. It had just gone differently. My preconceived ideas had been wrong. My assumptions of what God, in His grace, allows His children to experience had been wrong. The remarkable thing was that He is with us in it, as He demonstrated in the coming weeks, months and years of our EA/TEF experience.
But that’s another story. Or, perhaps, more than one.

Questions about EA/TEF Awareness Month for Maggi?

Do you have questions for Maggi about EA/TEF or their family’s experience? Leave them in the comment box.

Do you like what you see at DifferentDream.com? You can receive more great content by subscribing to the quarterly Different Dream newsletter and signing up for the daily RSS feed delivered to your email inbox. You can sign up for the first in the pop up box and the second at the bottom of this page.