Neonatal Hypoxic Ischemic Encephalopathy

An update on Benjamin

Benjamin continues to make terrific progress. He came off of the mechanical ventilator on January 1st. He then weaned to something called bubble CPAP (it's a kind of oxygen-delivering facemask). He has now been weaned to high-flow nasal cannula, at 30% oxygen and 5 liters per minute. Once he weans to 2 liters per minute, he can start to breastfeed. He is already taking about 50 ml of mother's milk through his nasogastric tube every 3 hours, which is extremely close to our goal.

He will come home with us once he doesn't need oxygen and is nursing on his own. I'm hoping for next week, but the average duration of hospitalization for this problem is 12-24 days, and Benjamin is on the more severe side.

He is a bit irritable, stiff, and has a fine tremor, which is to be expected given everything he has been through. We appreciate your continued prayers.

Some people have told me they are surprised by how calm and collected I am about everything (this was not the case in the first few days). I found tremendous peace the morning after my first post on this, which I credit the Holy Spirit with.

I draw a great deal of my inspiration for dealing with health crises from Hal Elrod's book, "The Miracle Equation." My favorite book on success and personal development is, "Mach 2 with Your Hair on Fire," by my friend and mentor Richard Brooke. I recorded podcasts about both of these books:

Success Mindset: Visionary Leaders & Holistic Health | Richard Brooke

The Miracle Equation

Three things I've learned from people who have achieved great things.

First, never ask what the odds are. The odds reflect the mediocrity most people accept as normal. Normal is processed food, artificial light at night, constant negative thinking and programming, increasing electromagnetic pollution, moldy homes and offices, chemical-laden personal care products, and more. If that's you, go ahead and bank on the "odds." I am not interested in the odds, because they do not apply to me.

Second, you must fall in love with the process of success. Success for Benjamin looks like all the healthy habits we teach and preach, the proper supplementation protocols, and all the fancy biohacking and "stuff" that we specialize in at my medical practice. More on this later... I'll be sharing each part of what we're doing for Benjamin as I have time and as the necessary ingredients come in. We'll eventually publish this as the Benjamin Charles Stillman Neuro Recovery Protocol. This will be broadly applicable to anyone with any neurological injury, more specifically to those with injuries related to lack of oxygen (stroke, drowning, lack of oxygen at birth). It will also be more generally applicable to people who have suffered from lack of oxygen to any major organ (heart attacks, strokes, and neuropathies, to name the most common).

Third, you must never admit or accept defeat. My friend, Danny McDaniel, a Senior Presidential Director with LifeWave, says, "you can't lose, you can only quit." The reality is that most people create the barriers they then take for granted as their lot in life.

My favorite example of this is a man named Les Brown. Les Brown was diagnosed as retarded as a young child, but went on to become one of the world's most sought after motivational speakers. I enjoyed Richard Brooke’s interview of Les Brown on his podcast, recorded a few years ago now. Another motivational speaker who has impressed me is Nick Vujicic. He was born without arms or legs. He has a little flipper on one side. He likes to ask people, "I've got no arms and legs. What's your excuse?" Another of his tag lines is, “no limbs, no limits, no excuses.”

In my practice, I have observed that my patient's success is directly related to their mindset. The more positive they are, the more they belief in their success, and the more strongly they expect to recover, the better their prognosis. I am never surprised when my most negative patients fail to see improvement, no matter what we do. They've proven to me beyond a shadow of a doubt that healing begins with your thoughts, emotions, expectations, and beliefs, and not your doctor, supplement protocol, education, medications, lab results, imaging findings, or forces beyond our control. Jesus himself makes it clear time and again that those who believe will enjoy the most miraculous of healings (Matthew 9:22, Mark 5:34, Luke 17:19, Luke 18:42, just to name a few).

My son is going to make a full recovery. I don't know what or how long that's going to take, but it doesn't matter. I can't lose - I can only quit. Other children have made complete recoveries - so can he.

Amy, who works at our practice, mentioned in our podcast on her recovery from multiple sclerosis that eventually she stopped talking to people who had NOT recovered. She didn't care what they said or what they believed. She only wanted to talk to people who had recovered. She, of course, has made a full recovery. This podcast has not aired yet - stay tuned.

"Success leaves clues." I've heard this over and over again. The vast majority of people I encounter who are struggling with and complaining about chronic failure in life often lack the humility to acknowledge the abundance of clues that could lead them to success. This is why the Bible frequently links humility with success. This is not a coincidence (James 4:10, Proverbs 11:2, Psalm 25:9).

The formal diagnosis for Benjamin's hospitalization is "hypoxic ischemic encephalopathy."

This is a fancy way of saying, "lack of oxygen delivery to the brain (and body)."

In addition to brain injury due to lack of oxygen, the following were present on hospital admission:

• Kidney injury due to lack of oxygen

• Liver injury due to lack of oxygen

• Bone marrow suppression due to lack of oxygen

• Scrotal injury and edema due to breech delivery (they even thought he would lose a testicle!)

These things have turned around and should be sorted out in the next few weeks. He is not going to lose a testicle (thank God!).

This happens in approximately 2.4 out of 1,000 live births in the United States. Ben's case is on the more severe side. More on this later...

This is a scary diagnosis. Michelle and I cried a lot over the first week. Now, we are simply committed to doing everything possible to help our beloved Benjamin reach his full potential. There is no reason to believe he can't make a complete recovery. We have already spoken to one couple whose four-year-old has made a complete recovery. He had severe seizures and his MRI showed that the whole left side of his brain was severely hypoxic (lacking oxygen).

Benjamin is absolutely adorable. I'm glad my wife and I make cute babies (he's just the first). My wife is amazing.

More posts to come on how we are helping Benjamin along, with insights that will help you and those you love overcome medical problems relating to lack of oxygen now and forever.

Until next time, be well,

Dr. Stillman