My first born child, born at 24 weeks in the 80s, When I first went to see him the day after his Csection birth he was laid on the corner of a newborn pampers in what looked like a roasting tin under a grill (too sick to be risked in an incubator as the docs did procedures every few minutes to keep him alive), very warm and bright he had tubes wires and monitors over every limb and on his head and torso, a ventilator was down his throat breathing for him. he was 9 inches long, weighed 2lb 3/4 of an ounce. less than a kilo. his ears were just fuzzy little flaps of skin, he had a red cross of blood vessels where his nipples would be (we watced grow in over the weeks after he was born. one eye was sealed shut but the other eye was open and earily followed every move near him, His skin was translucent and you could almost make out his organs closest to the surface of his skin.

I went into shock and asked the doc if it was the right baby, heartless mother. He looked like the inside of a dalek after doctor who had yanked the lid open,

3 months later he made national news coming home.
Matthew the miracle baby makes it home.

Six foot tall now and towers over me, but if ever he gets too big for his boots I just show him the tiny tiny footprint in a fathers day card the nurses gave my husband, they inked his little foot and stamped it into a card. He is nearly 28 now and none of us have ever been the same since.