Vickie Thompson had only a few blissful hours with her newborn son, Charlie, when the seemingly impossible revealed itself.
On Aug. 12, Charlie was born seemingly as any baby should. Thompson, 36, had just enough time to begin bonding and feeding when Charlie’s body apparently began to shut down. Unable to awaken the sleeping baby, the mom realized that her son had not yet filled his diaper and his urine appeared unnaturally green.
Doctors diagnosed the issue with haste, rushing him off to have his stomach pumped.
“I was absolutely petrified … I thought he was dying,” the beautician from West Sussex, England, told Jam Press. “The doctors said, ‘We don’t think he has an opening.’ I was so scared.”
Charlie was born with a rare congenital defect leaving him without an anus, with no way to expel solid waste from his bowels after digestion.
According to Johns Hopkins Medicine, imperforate anus, where the anus is missing or blocked, is a relatively common condition that occurs in about one in 5,000 infants.
Charlie was brought to the Neonatal Intensive Care Unit at Worthington Hospital where the doctors removed the contents of his stomach to ensure no toxins were left behind. He was transferred the following day to Brighton Hospital where specialists installed a stoma, an opening on the abdomen that’s connected to the digestive or urinary system, allowing waste to be diverted out of the body, per the Bladder & Bowel Community.
Charlie spent two days in a medically induced coma, allowing for his new appendage to heal.
“I was petrified I was going to lose him,” Thompson shared. “They had to put him on life support and I kept thinking he was going to die. I kept thinking the worst.”
After seven days in the NICU, Thompson and her fiancé, Alex, 37, were able to bring their son home.
“Being a first-time mum is an experience anyway, so having the stoma as well was hard,” Thompson admitted. “It was very, very stressful and at times felt quite lonely because people were scared to deal with the stoma, so I had to do it all.
“Friends and family were scared to change his stoma in case they did it wrong and caused an infection. They couldn’t handle the risk. It has certainly been tough going.”
Charlie has had six life-saving surgeries since his birth — with more on the way — including one previous attempt to create an opening for Charlie’s rear. Unfortunately, the procedure caused his stoma to malfunction, forcing doctors to reverse course.
He then underwent an ileostomy, an operation that brings the end of the small bowel through an opening in the stomach, pushing it further out of the body, according to the National Health Service.
“Charlie became very poorly and couldn’t eat for 11 days. He was very vulnerable and malnourished,” Thompson said. “The liquid coming out of the ileostomy was six times the amount that was going into his body, so he was on fluid drips with vitamins.”
Charlie has undergone four more major operations following this one, including one where a large part of his bowels which had died was removed.
He’s now under constant review by doctors, and they are unsure if the toddler will ever be able to be potty-trained. They expect he will spend his life with a stoma.
“This has caused him a lot of trauma. The key thing [for me] is spreading awareness and teaching mothers how to check their babies,” Thompson said.
“Despite everything, he’s such a happy baby.”
