All 10 babies arrived from the NICU at Driscoll Children’s Hospital in Corpus Christi, Texas, through a transportation effort that involved four planes from three different hospitals – Cook Children’s Teddy Bear Transport, Driscoll Children’s and two aircraft from Children’s Health in Dallas.

The babies were transported back-and-forth throughout the night. It took about 18 hours from the time of the initial phone call from Driscoll to when the last babies arrived at Cook Children’s at 6:30 a.m. Friday.

Once the parents arrive they will be in a private room with their baby. Level IV is the highest ranking a NICU can receive, meeting stringent requirements, especially in the areas of advanced medicine and quality of care.

“We are so honored and privileged that Driscoll Children’s trusted us to care for their precious patients. This was an act of remarkable teamwork between Cook Children’s, Children’s Health and Driscoll Children’s Hospital, all in an effort to care for these vulnerable patients and get them out of harm’s way of the hurricane,” said Nancy Cychol, Chief of Hospital Services at Cook Children’s. “These are critically ill babies. The Transport teams continued the excellent care they were receiving in Corpus Christi and now are settled in our Neonatal Intensive Care Unit.”

Because of the complex nature of the patients and the equipment and staff needed in the planes, parents could not travel with their babies and had to arrange their own transportation.

“Because of the extraordinary nature of the hurricane and the transport teams working together, these babies arrived in a dramatic way to our NICU,” said Sheralyn Hartline, RN, director of the NICU at Cook Children’s. “But now that they are here, our NICU staff is very much in their comfort zone of taking care of these babies. This is normal for our team. Our physicians, nurses and everyone who works in the NICU are all prepared and trained for occasions exactly like this one. Every day, they are treating the sickest children with the most difficult and complex diagnoses.”

About Cook Children's NICU

Neonatology is an in-hospital subspecialty of pediatrics that focuses solely on the care and treatment of critically ill newborns and babies that are born prematurely. Our neonatologists and Level IV Newborn Intensive Care Unit (NICU) are ranked among the best in the nation for care that combines the most advanced treatments with heartfelt compassion. Click here to learn more.

From the beginning, it was clear that my body didn’t like being pregnant. My husband, Shawn, and I worked on getting pregnant for a little over a year and were finally successful after seeing a fertility specialist. I can honestly say that I didn’t really have one day during my pregnancy where I could just enjoy being pregnant. Whether it was being really nauseous, increased problems with my asthma or dealing with high blood pressure.

This new chapter of our lives began on March 13 when I called the doctor with an exceptionally high blood pressure reading. I’d been battling high blood pressure since week six of my pregnancy but it had been controlled with medication. I remember thinking to myself before I called the doctor that morning that I was probably just overreacting. Two hours later, I was in a helicopter being taken from Harris Southwest to Harris downtown. The whole feeling was completely surreal. I didn’t really feel that bad so why were people acting like I was so sick?

I was told that I was being transported to Harris downtown so we could be closer to Cook Children’s in case I needed to deliver. Deliver?? I was only 26 weeks; there was no way I could deliver yet. I wasn’t ready. She wasn’t ready. But, less than 48 hours later, at 8:33 p.m. on Friday, March 14, Avery Leigh Wooley came into this world via a C-section, weighing 1 pound, 5 ounces. The doctors had diagnosed me with preeclampsia and decided it was just too dangerous for me and her to stay pregnant any longer.

Being in the operating room for the C-section was another surreal experience. Shawn just kept telling me to “stay Avery strong!” That has now become our battle cry. We’ve even printed up bracelets that say “I am Avery strong” for friends and family to wear.

We are on day 14 of being in the NICU. Overall, she has done really well. She is experiencing all the normal things that a premature baby at 26 weeks would but nothing out of the ordinary. You never know what news could be lurking around the corner so we’ve really focused on taking it one day at a time. We celebrate the good news, try not to focus too much on her setbacks and try not to think too far in advance. This is definitely a marathon, not a sprint. They say to plan on her being her until her due date, which was June 20.

The care that we’ve received here in the NICU has been incredible. There is nowhere else, except in my belly, that I would rather Avery be right now. All her nurses and doctors show incredible empathy and do a great job of comforting me on a daily basis. It’s not just a job for these people, it’s a calling. They do it because they love it. They’ve taught me so many new terms and do a great job at explaining things in plain English.

The amount of guilt I have for not being able to carry Avery to term is overwhelming. I feel like I failed at my first act of motherhood. I will spend the rest of my life trying to make it up to her. For right now, I am trying to do that by being here with her as long and often as I can and giving her my breast milk to make her grow big and strong, so she can be Avery strong!

Avery's Journey Continued:

• Avery's Journey - Part 2
• Avery's Journey - Part 3
• Avery's Journey - Part 4
• Avery's Journey - Part 5
• Avery's Journey - Part 6
• Avery's Journey - Part 7
• Avery Goes Home! - Part 8
• Thankful to be Home - Part 9
• Avery turns 1 - Part 10
• Independence Day- Part 11
• An Autism Spectrum Diagnosis - Part 12
• NICU Parents Suffering from Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder - Part 13