Glen Marais parents rejoice as 10-day-old baby survives heart surgery – more pictures

BA God fearing couple that was never expected to have children went through hell before they could finally share their story.

Engaged to be married, Leazille and Ralph Lister from Glen Marais experienced great joy followed by sadness, fear and joy once again – all within a few weeks.

The couple told EXPRESS they had been told by doctors they would not be able to have children because Leazille’s uterus was positioned upside-down.

But by a miracle she finally fell pregnant and they got engaged.

The joy you experience is of an exquisite nature; but the pain is far worse when your baby falls terminally ill a few days after he was born and needs to be placed in a special kind of ICU.

This is the story of baby Tristan who had heart surgery at 10 days old after a doctor sped from Krugersdorp to Linmed in Benoni after midnight. He informed the couple had they not rushed Tristan to hospital, he would have died in his bed.

“My fianceé and I never expected to have a child because medically she could not get pregnant but with the mercy of the Lord, it happened. When we went for check-ups we would be asked if we had artificial insemination because, in their professional eyes, she could not fall pregnant naturally.

“Come June 25, Leazille’s water broke. We were at home. I had mixed emotions of joy and nervousness and she wanted to brush her teeth, do this and that, but I couldn’t let her do that,” Ralph said.

“I had to rush her to hospital. When we got there she couldn’t give natural birth because the baby wasn’t positioned right. They tried to induce her but that did not work either. Forty hours later, they finally performed an emergency caesarean section. At that point I haven’t slept, I was tired and very nervous but finally my baby boy was born on June 27,” explained the joyful father.

After a few days, the couple went home with Tristan for the first time as Tristan and his mother seemed to be in good health.

“Tristan weighed 3.7kg at birth, was 55cm tall and two weeks early. He was home with us for a couple of days and we decided to go to a restaurant in Centurion for lunch on June 5.

“We are not experts on parenting but while we were at the restaurant, we noticed he was crying like a baby that was experiencing pain.

“We returned home and after close inspection, we noticed our boy was swollen and his skin was turning yellow. We decided to rush him to a hospital, suspecting he could have yellow jaundice.

“When we arrived at Linmed they put him in ICU. Later we learned he had coarctation of the aorta, which meant he had a blockage in his heart valve. As they explained it to us it then became clear why Tristan was refusing to breastfeed and preferred the bottle.

“We learned his heart was beating faster as he was putting in too much effort and breastfeeding was just too hard for him.”

Ralph said when their son was admitted to ICU and they saw all the pipes and machines connected to his tiny body, they burst into tears. “But we did not lose hope and we prayed for him. We prayed and said, God, we leave everything in your hands, be with us in this time of need and the Lord was with us.”

On June 6, an ambulance transported Tristan to Netcare Sunninghill where heart surgery was performed on him the following day when he turned 10 days old.

“The day the surgery was performed was the day our son was actually supposed to be born. His heart was fixed.

Ralph and Leazille want to thank the Lord for being their strength, all the nurses at the two hospitals and Drs Schoeman and Sinyangwe.

“We feel very blessed and we wish to thank all our family, friends and all the people that prayed for us on all the WhatsApp groups. We thank everyone who played a role in saving our boy and all the other babies who were also at the hospital for similar surgery,” Ralph concluded.