To take our tragedy and turn it into a positive. Founded by Joel & Marisa Michaud in memory of our first born son, Drake. September 2010, we were looking forward to the arrival of our son Drake. We had no idea that things would change in such a drastic way. We, as new parents, looked forward to all the first that come along with your first born. At 38 weeks pregnant, we found out that Drake was in
the Frank Breech position. A c-section was scheduled for 2 days after Labor Day. We never made it to that surgery as I went into labor prior to that. My labor progressed quickly and before we knew it. He was being partially born on the floor of our bathroom. With the help of EMTs, we were unable to finish delivering him at home, so we arrived at the hospital with him still partial inside of me. He was not breathing when he was finally born, they had to resuscitate him. He was soon taken to another hospital where a NICU was, I was finally released after 15 hours and we left to go be with him. Over the following 12 days, we spent every moment that we could with him, even spending the night in is room one night. No matter how many tests he had, the end result was that he would never be able to breath on this own. The doctors gave us 2 options: leave him on life support where he would probably pass within months or we could make the decision to let him go. You see, due to the injuries he sustained during delivery, he sustained brain damage that would not allow him to breath on his own. We had always had the mindset that if one of us was on life support, we would allow enough time for family/ friends to come in and say their last goodbyes. We knew that this was no life for him, we had no idea what kind of pain he might have been in. So we decided that we had to make the decision and say goodbye. To let our little boy go. To pull our Drake off his ventilator. This was the hardest, most difficult decision we ever made. We pulled him off at 12 days, 12 hours old. We were surrounded by friends, family, nurses, doctors. Four hours after he was pulled off he took his last breath in my arms, in my hands. This is something that I will always remember. This is why we started this non-profit, we just want to help those going through similar situations. We want to keep him memory alive. We want to turn our tragedy into a positive. We want to remember him. We want to love him.
