Miracle baby born at 23 weeks weighing just 800g celebrates first birthday
Adam has continued to defy the odds - and is now a happy healthy one-year-old
A couple whose son was born at just 23 weeks, weighing a mere 800g, and who faced repeated warnings about his survival, have now celebrated his first birthday.
Adam, the son of Anita Ibrahim-Goddard and Paul Goddard, has consistently defied expectations since his birth on December 1 2024.
He arrived with a grade two brain bleed, chronic lung disease, and a hole in his heart.
Complicating matters, a breech birth resulted in a damaged and dislocated arm.
Adam endured 114 days in hospital, requiring 19 blood transfusions, aggressive ventilation, morphine, sedatives, and numerous invasive procedures.
Ms Ibrahim-Goddard, 45, who works in tech inclusion, reflected on the ordeal, stating: "We nearly lost him a few times."
Given the couple, from London, had spent the previous eight years trying to conceive, trying various IVF methods and suffering miscarriages, falling pregnant with Adam felt “miraculous” – so when doctors continued to say that Adam might not survive, it was “heart-wrenching”.
However, after receiving treatment in three separate hospitals, Adam started to make improvements and was discharged on his original due date – March 23 this year – and now he is “smiling and loving life” and recently celebrated his first birthday.
Although Adam has limited movement in his left arm because of nerve damage and will experience developmental delays as a result of his premature birth, Ms Ibrahim-Goddard and her husband, 36, who is a tech consultant, are now focused on enjoying every moment with their son.
Ms Ibrahim-Goddard told PA Real Life: “When you look at how he is as a baby today, I absolutely attribute it to how heroic he was when he was in hospital.
“He’s been through the wars already, now he just wants to enjoy life.
“It’s almost like he was fighting to be here, he absolutely wanted to be here.”
Ms Ibrahim-Goddard had been trying to fall pregnant for eight years, but without success.
This included the couple trying to conceive naturally, along with multiple rounds of IVF, some of which resulted in miscarriage.
The couple then tried IVF with donor eggs. This process is similar to an IVF cycle, except that donor eggs are mixed with the male partner’s sperm to create embryos for transfer into the female partner.
“We did that in Spain, and I fell pregnant the first time,” Anita said.
“It was something that we’d ummed and ahhed about because it’s something that you do have to consolidate – is that the right route? Is that the right journey for us? But I do not regret it for a second.”
Apart from a heightened sense of smell, Ms Ibrahim-Goddard said her pregnancy was “totally fine” and she even started a new “dream job”.
At the end of November last year, the couple were about to head to the Cotswolds for a relaxing “babymoon” when Ms Ibrahim-Goddard started experiencing stomach pains, which she initially attributed to “trapped wind”.
“I could just feel my tummy doing weird stuff, but I’m only 23 weeks pregnant, so never did it occur to me that these were contractions,” she explained.
As the pains continued, Ms Ibrahim-Goddard said they reminded her of what she experienced during a previous miscarriage, but she told herself to stop “catastrophising”.
Still, she decided to call the hospital, and she was called in for a check-up, and this is when she was told: “You’re in labour, you’re dilated. You are having this baby.”
Ms Ibrahim-Goddard continued: “I was like, what? I still didn’t believe them.
“I think the part of me that didn’t want to speak it into existence was that I’d had miscarriages before, so I thought… we’re going to lose the baby.”
Ms Anita Ibrahim-Goddard was given steroids and intravenous magnesium sulphate, which is offered to women in established pre-term labour, and she said this felt like “lava” running through her veins.
She was then blue-lighted to Royal London Hospital in Whitechapel, and she was induced and gave birth to Adam in the early hours of December 1 2024.
“They took him straightaway and they were working on him for what felt like ages,” she said.
“I could hear them conferring with each other, and I guess this was the do or die moment. Is my baby going to be able to be intubated? Will they be able to get him to breathe?
“Doctors told us he had only around a 40 per cent chance of survival.”
Ms Anita Ibrahim-Goddard and Paul Goddard's son Adam in hospital after his premature birth said the next few days were a blur, but she vividly remembers seeing the neonatal intensive care unit (NICU) and hearing the constant “beeps” of machines.
“He had everything that premature babies would have – the bleed on the brain, hole in his heart, bad eyes, bad lungs, he had everything – and one by one, they were treating those things,” she said.
“During that December period, we nearly lost him a few times… and Christmas Day is where it all culminated, as we were called in to say goodbye.
“But Christmas Day wasn’t just the day we almost lost Adam – it was the day he decided to stay.”
Thankfully, Adam “pulled through” a few hours later and the couple were able to stay in Stevenson House, a “home from home” run by The Sick Children’s Trust, next to the hospital.
Although there was fear and heartache, Anita said there were milestones that she will never forget, including holding Adam for the first time at 14 days old and “hearing his tiny cry at 19 days”.
Although doctors continued to say “he is probably not going to make it”, the couple remained hopeful – and as he improved, he was transferred to Queen Charlotte’s and Chelsea Hospital, followed by Watford General Hospital.
Incredibly, after 114 days in hospital, Anita said Adam was discharged on his original due date on March 23.
Ms Anita Ibrahim-Goddard said she is determined for their son not to be held back by events that “he didn’t choose”, and with her new outlook on life, she is ready for this next chapter.
For more information and support, visit The Sick Children’s Trust’s website at www.sickchildrenstrust.org.