‘There is hope’: Teen celebrates 16th birthday with NICU staff who cared for him as a newborn
By Aspen Andrews
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COLORADO SPRINGS, Colorado (KKTV) — Tuesday morning, staff at the Neonatal Intensive Care Unit (NICU) at St. Francis Hospital celebrated the 16th birthday of one of their former patients.
Jaden Boncler was born prematurely and spent nearly six months in the NICU in 2010, and this year, for his 16th birthday, Boncler wanted to come back and meet the team that saved his life.
Boncler’s mother, Lisa Ford, said pregnancy complications began at 16.5 weeks when her water broke, and at around 23 to 24 weeks, an emergency C-section was performed after she became septic.
She said her son was born at just more than one pound and was given a 0% chance of survival.
“He crashed three times, and we didn’t think he was going to make it,” Ford said. “And the doctor, the neonatologist at the time, Dr. Prado, was here. And she just said there was nothing else they could do. And so they put him in my arms, and we actually have photographs of him where he was ash gray. He was flatlined, and then some time passed, and he came back. His heart just started beating.”
From that point on, Ford said she and her newborn were in the NICU for nearly half a year. Every month they were in the NICU, Ford said the hospital brought them a cake to celebrate one more month of Boncler.
“They said if he lived, he may never walk or talk,” Ford said. “And Jaden is 16 today, and he just achieved Eagle Scout rank with the Boy Scouts. And he has got an amazing journey ahead of him.”
The family now lives in Texas, but with a trip planned back to Colorado Springs during Boncler’s birthday, Boncler said that he wanted to take the opportunity to visit the place and the people who saved his life.
“I don’t think words can describe what this means to me and what this means to the entire team who had the privilege of caring not only for Jaden but for his family,” Neonatologist Marya Prado said.
Boncler’s mother has a message for families facing similar situations: “There is hope. With Jaden, we were given no hope, but hope was all we had. And I just want to encourage every family out there that may be struggling with a diagnosis or whatever the case may be, there’s always hope. And miracles still happen.”
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