Katie and Josh Butler of Nashville, Tennessee, were overjoyed to learn they were expecting a child. They had always desired children and were glad for the opportunity. But, as fate would have it, fate had other plans for their family. When the couple went in for their 20-week ultrasound, they were hopeful that everything was going well with their pregnancy. However, during the ultrasound, the doctor found that something was seriously wrong. The physicians couldn’t pinpoint the issue, but there were several fᴇᴀʀs that their baby’s health was in ᴊᴇᴏᴘᴀʀᴅʏ.
When their son Dewey was born, he was taken to the NICU, where he was cared for for 132 days in a ᴅᴇsᴘᴇʀᴀᴛᴇ attempt to preserve his life. Unfortunately, the efforts of the doctor and nurse were insufficient to preserve baby Dewey. Dewey ᴅɪᴇᴅ during a routine surgery to surgically implant a feeding tube; his frail heart couldn’t handle it. Katie and Josh, understandably, were upset. We spent a wonderful morning with him on the day of the operation. We hadn’t seen him since then. Katie and Josh looked to God for comfort as they battled to come to terms with the ᴅᴇᴀᴛʜ of their son. God fulfilled their prayers at a celebration of baby Dewey’s life.
Katie and Josh got a surprise call from a nurse in the hospital’s NICU, with whom they had grown close. They had shown an interest in fostering, and she had a recommendation for them. On the 5th floor of the hospital, there was a baby in need of a mother and father. Brax, a little child with a variety of medical issues, had been ᴀʙᴀɴᴅᴏɴᴇᴅ by his family due to their inability to care for him. It was the phone call that would transform their lives. There was a gleaming brightness among their sᴏʀʀᴏᴡ. They met Brax in the NICU and fell in love right away. He’d been in the hospital since he was 11 months old.
He was on a trach-vent because he had ᴄʜʀᴏɴɪᴄ respiratory failure, tracheomalacia, and pulmonary hypertension. Fortunately for Brax, his health was predicted to improve as he grew older. Katie and Josh had a clear vision of what they wanted to achieve. They brought Brax home with them and fostered him until September 2017, when they were finally able to adopt him. Brax’s condition began to improve the minute he was taken home with them. I think the best medicine is love… While the ᴘᴀɪɴ of losing Dewey will never go away, his untimely ᴅᴇᴀᴛʜ opened the door for another kid in need of a loving home to have a shot at life.
