What is Spina Bifida?

When a baby is developing in the womb very early on the back will not close up like it is supposed to. The bones of the spine do not form properly around parts of the spinal cord. This can be either minor or severe. Sometimes with some babies there is more then one opening. By the point you find out that you are having a baby this defect had all ready formed on your baby. Another part of spina bifida is the fluid buildup in the brain. This is called hydrocephalus. What happens is the brain does not drain the spinal fluid correctly because of the malformation of the spine. Because of this your child will need a shunt to drain the liquid from the brain. It is also referred to as "water on the brain". This can cause seizures, learning problems, or vision problems. Depending on where the lesion is located determines how much control or lack there of in some cases the person has.

Starting from the bottom up I will show a little bit of what each controls. Below the L5 you have the controls of the bowel and bladder. L5 to L1 controls all the way up to the waste. The L3 is where they will be able to, for the most part, walk and be OK walking around. T12 to T7 are the abdominal muscles. T7 to T1 are the chest muscles. So essentially the lower on the spine the better off the person is going to be.

So what does this mean for our baby? We were extremely lucky and blessed with everything that has happened. I can truly say A LOT of prayers have been answered. Thanks to family, friends, and little sisters that prayed for our little guy we have been very fortunate. At first we thought from our initial ultra sound that it was on the L3. So this could have affected how well he walked. But later on when we got some better images they were able to determine that it was on the L5 which is very good. He will have bowel problems the rest of his life and have to use a catheter. But from how severe it could be we can handle that. At this point as well his brain fluid level has been measuring at a normal level. It could still change and it might change but at this point he would not need a shunt. This would lower the chances of him having infections and having to have the shunt changed every few years. The shunt and brain fluid was what the surgery that we could have done had the chance of fixing.

This is something that will affect him for the rest of his life. But I know as a father I need to make it so he doesn't blame everything for this. I am blind in my left eye and they told my parents that there was no way I was going to play sports. That I could possibly have problems walking even. I played sports growing up and was able to do the things that I want to do. Was I limited sometimes and could tell things affected me? Yes, but that didn't stop me from trying and doing my best. I hope that I can pass that on to my son and he can be successful in anything that he wants to do.