"Are you telling me my son is dying?" said Gabriel's mother. Gabriel was three days old. His 19-year-old mother had delivered him at home at 27 weeks of gestational age. He was intubated by our transport team and stabilized and rushed to our hospital, but now had taken a turn for the worse. Mr. and Mrs. Petit never left Gabriel's bedside. I spoke to them every few hours. This was a planned pregnancy. The parents were poor. Neither had finished high school. Gabriel's primary nurse, Ann, was worried about them. "Mom is in denial," she said, "She treats him like a doll. She keeps saying he is soooooooooooooo cuuuuuuuuuuute. She wants to dress him up. He is sick, doesn't she get it? She needs help. We need to get them some help. Poor parents, poor baby, poor mother, she is so young for this."
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