March for Babies walk celebrates family’s personal triumph

One year ago, Meghan Beatty, of Elmhurst, Ill., and her husband walked in the March for Babies as new parents with tiny twin babies still in the neonatal intensive care unit (NICU). They were unsure what the prognosis for each of their newborns was or if they would even survive. One year later, the Beattys will return to the March for Babies, but this time they will bring Ben and Jacob, their healthy and happy 14-month-old twins.

Ben and Jacob were born 12 weeks early on Feb. 23, 2013, at Advocate Good Samaritan Hospital. Ben weighed 2 pounds 9 ounces and Jacob weighed just 1 pound 11 ounces. Meghan recalls this day as the scariest day of her life.

The next few months were a challenging time for the twins as they overcame various health conditions. Both needed some of the most advanced medical technology available to help them develop as healthy babies, and some of this technology was not available just a few years ago. The twins battled necrotizing enterocolitis on two separate occasions, but both times the attentive care of the NICU nursing staff caught it before it could cause serious damage.

“We owe our boys’ lives, health and happiness to the care they received at Advocate Good Samaritan Hospital and to the research funded by March of Dimes,” says Meghan. “Research is what led to the technology that saved their lives and helped them thrive.”

Today, the twins are chatty, active and healthy—something their parents are very grateful for.

“March of Dimes has been a leader in the prevention of prematurity and birth defects,” says Dr. Vibhaben Thaker, neonatologist at Advocate Good Samaritan Hospital in Downers Grove, Ill. “Their work has saved lives and improved the quality of life for babies who are born premature not only in the United States but around the world. It has made a global impact on the well-being of mothers and babies.”

Since 1970, March for Babies has raised over $2.3 billion, which has been used to support community programs that help moms have healthy, full-term pregnancies and fund research. This year, 3 million people will participate in March for Babies events across the nation.