A pair of premature twin girls are fighting for their lives at separate Boston hospitals — while their parents race against the clock to reunite them amid a looming nurses’ strike.
Mike and Kelsey Kennedy have been spread-paper thin since their girls, Juliette and Kendall, unexpectedly came into the world at just 24 weeks’ gestation on Aug. 31 — then became separated as they each faced serious health issues.
Little Juliette underwent heart surgery upstairs in the NICU at Brigham and Women’s Hospital, while her sister — younger by just one minute — was whisked off to Boston Children’s Hospital, where she received treatment for a severe case of spina bifida, a condition that occurs when the fetal spine doesn’t fully close during pregnancy.
Almost six weeks later, both girls remain in stable but critical condition at the respective hospitals, as their parents frantically try to be at both of their bedsides as much as possible — all while raising a 3-year-old and an 11-month-old they already have at home.
“We feel guilty as it is every time we leave the hospital and can’t bring our children home with us and have them be with their siblings. But at least we had the security of knowing they are in good hands,” Mike, 30, told The Post.
“It was obviously hard for my wife to go back and forth, for me to go back and forth, but we were comfortable with that, given the nurses we had,” he said.
Now, by contrast, the already hemorrhaging couple is petrified that some 4,000 Brigham nurses will walk off the job during an indefinite strike set to begin next week, unless union and hospital officials can come to an agreement before then.
“Our big concern is losing the nurses and that’s what makes it so difficult – the stress of not having [the twins] together and also not knowing what type of care that they’re going to be receiving,” said Mike, who has also been trying to juggle his job as a residential builder throughout the nerve-wracking ordeal.
“We don’t have any answers. We’ve tried to reach out to the hospital. The nurses, obviously for legal reasons, can’t talk to us, so they just try to comfort us, but we don’t know who’s coming in or what their qualifications are.
“We’re just afraid. We don’t know what we’re up against,” the exasperated father continued, adding that the twins “require such delicate care.”
At the very least, Mike and Kelsey hope their daughters can finally be reunited at the same hospital because they would heal better together, according to the dad.
“From day one, we have always wanted them to be together. They were basically hugging one another for 24 weeks in the womb…and then you kind of just rip them out and they’re on their own in traumatic settings,” Mike said.
“Ideally, we would love to just get them in the same place so that my wife can hold them and provide milk for them at the same time.”
Kelsey, a 32-year-old school teacher, was just able to hold each of the girls – both of whom were born weighing less than two pounds, and still remain on breathing tubes today – for the first time this week.
A silver lining in the family’s long, heart-wrenching journey came after doctors performed a “miracle” operation on Kendall’s severe spina bifida, the most common permanently disabling birth defect.
Initially, her parents were told that Kendall would need assistance in order to walk, go to the bathroom and perform everyday tasks throughout her lifetime, according to Mike.
“But luckily, it’s been kind of a miracle — we think that there are good signs. She’s got full movement in her toes, her brain is totally unaffected and it’s kind of scientifically unexplainable, but that’s the case right now,” the dad explained.
“We’re just hopeful that everything is going to work out the way it’s supposed to, and that they’ll both continue to heal,” he added.
