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This is our champ, Clinton William. 
He was born on December 17, 2007 - who could ask for a better Christmas present!  Clinton was born - c-section - full term but a c-section because my daughter (who is 22 today) was a c-section.  We thought about possibly going 'natural' but didn’t want to risk myself or the baby.  We went for every test there is under the sun, and more, because of my age and all tests came with negative results...everything was fine! Whew!  We thought we were out of the woods and never expected what would come next. 
After Clinton was born, screaming as all babies do and after he met his dad they brought him to me wrapped so cutely in his little blankie.  As I was looking at him (couldn’t hold him yet, my c-sect was not officially finished yet) I noticed that his breathing was a little rough and they said not to worry it was just a little grunting.  He stayed for a few minutes and than the nurses whisked him away so that they can finish cleaning him up.  I thought everything was fine and went onto recovery and my husband went to check on the baby.  They were saying that they MIGHT have to put in a breathing tube temporarily and not to worry - once again! Well - within hours they did.....
The next day – my husband comes into the room after he checked on Clinton and told me that the baby took the tube out overnight and we were both relieved that he was breathing on his own. Well….after our 4 days in the hospital they sent us home and the baby had little ‘strider’ and not to worry – he will out grow it – he will be fine!
Well, this is where our nightmare began! December 26 at 1AM we went to the hospital via ambulance because the baby was not breathing well. This started our 35 day tour in 2 different hospitals. At first we were at our local hospital – Stonybrook- and our pediatrician said that if they have to put in a trach than you are going to Cornell to see Dr. Ward. And after 5 days at Stonybrook (took them that long to arrange transportation) we were on our way to Cornell. We saw Dr. Ward that Wednesday and there was no other option but to put in the trach. We put Clinton through a CAT scan and MRI to rule out any other disease. We stayed at Cornell for about a week and than back to Stonybrook (closer to home) to be trained in taking care of a baby with a trach before we could take him home.
It’s been 8 months since than and Clinton is 9 ½ months old as I write this. His vocal cord paralysis was caused by one of 2 things, both of which were some form of trauma for the vocal cords… 1. When they interested the breathing tube 2. When Clinton removed the tube himself (he was unrestricted – a big NO NO!)Neither of these incidents will the Dr.’s will admit to have causing the problem.
We have tried to remove the trach 3 times already and we are gearing up for a 4th try soon. In the past 9 months Clinton has been progressing very well. When he was about 3 – 4 months old we downsized his trach from a 3.0 to a 2.5. Since 'the downsize' he has used a Montgomery speaking valve and as of today he uses a Pacy-Muir valve. Dr. Ward didn’t want to even try the Montgomery valve because most babies don’t do well with speaking valves but we figured - give it a try and it works beautifully. Now that he has the Pacy-Muir  valve we rarely suction him. In the beginning we used to suction him sometimes as much as every 20 minutes. Now – maybe once a day!! Decannulation is coming soon for us! I believe that next time – will be "it"!!!
Update July 2009

Well...Try #4 didn't work, we tried to remove the trach in March 2009. We went into the hospital on a Tuesday and we were home on Thursday.  Here's the puzzling part....Clinton had his trach out for 3 days and during those 3 days - when he was sitting - watching TV - reading or not doing anything that required to much effort - he was breathing fine.  When he really started to move around he was having trouble breathing - very noisy and using a lot of effort to breathe.  We decided that at the end of day 2 to have the Dr. put the trach back in. Of course at this point the hole was closed and we had to have Clinton go into the operating room to re-open the hole.  Our Dr. at this point does not have a definite answer when his trach will come out.  We are slowly approaching the 2 year deadline that we were told in the beginning.  However, it doesn't seem like its been 18 months - it seems like it was just yesterday when this all started!
 
After our visit to the hospital we took Clinton to Disney (Florida) and he had a great time! He really enjoyed seeing Mickey Mouse - Clinton loves Mickey and Pluto is another favorite!  We had equipment sent to our hotel directly from a supply company near Disney and what they couldn't supply us with - I had our supply company (at home) ship a package of supplies to arrive before we got there.  This didn't work as smoothly as we anticipated.  My company didn't ship the package in time (although they had plenty of advanced notice) and we got our supplies 3 days before we were leaving Disney.  It was very frustrating and its a good thing Clinton isn't very dependant on his supplies or we would have been in some serious trouble!  We all had a great time and it was great to get away from the nurses and be out as a family!
Montgomery Valve website -http://www.trachs.com/cart/xcart/customer/home.php?cat=346
Tracoe 2.5 websitehttp://www.trachs.com/cart/xcart/customer/home.php?cat=406
 

• Gender: Male
• Demographic Region: North America
• Siblings: One
• Medical Conditions: vocal cord paralysis

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1 year 43 weeks

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United States

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New York