PHOENIX — A baby weighing less than one pound when she was born nearly five months ago is being released Monday from a Phoenix hospital.
The girl was born 15 weeks premature, underwent a surgery to address a heart defect and now weighs seven pounds.
She didn't suffer brain bleeds or blindness due to prematurity.
"The mood in the room changed with the ultrasound," said Kallie's mother, Ebonie Bender. "There was like hardly [any] fluid around Kallie."
Bender then went to St. Joseph's Hospital where she gave birth 15 weeks early.
Her parents waited 37 days to hold their daughter for the first time.
Kallie will have to use an oxygen tank and feeding tube as she learns to breath and eat on her own.
Bender says they are grateful to the doctors and nurses who helped their daughter the entire way.
"Although she's going home with oxygen and her feeding tube, she's still doing an amazing job at fighting," Bender said. "Because that's what she is."
Kallie's doctor agreed she beat the odds.
"We usually tell families there's a very good chance the baby may not make it," said Dr. Vinit Manuel, the medical director of St. Joseph's Nursery Intensive Care Unit. "Because sometimes, when the baby's so small we don't have tubes the size to fit and intubate those babies."
