PRAYER REQUEST: She is only 2 weeks old, and tonight a Texas family is hundreds of miles from home waiting for doctors to tell them why their newborn baby girl is so sick.
PRAYER REQUEST: She is only 2 weeks old, and tonight a Texas family is hundreds of miles from home waiting for doctors to tell them why their newborn baby girl is so sick.
Her name is Ximena.
And when her big sister Lori reached out to me, you could feel how scared this family is.
Ximena was born with Down syndrome and Lori says doctors also discovered a heart problem shortly after she was born.
But their tiny girl was able to overcome that first hurdle and go home with her family in Midland, Texas.
They thought they were bringing their baby home to begin their life together.
Then, just days later, something changed.
Ximena stopped keeping her food down.
She began vomiting and having severe diarrhea.
She was losing weight.
Her family noticed she was becoming pale.
Maryann Mireles and Johnny Cazares rushed their daughter to the hospital.
Within hours, Lori says they were told Ximena needed a higher level of care and would have to be flown to Covenant Children’s Hospital in Lubbock.
Her parents didn’t have time to prepare.
They followed their baby with essentially the clothes they were wearing and whatever money they had with them.
And now comes one of the hardest parts.
They still don’t know exactly what is wrong.
Doctors are running tests and the family is waiting for answers while their 2-week-old little girl remains hospitalized.
Back home in Midland are Ximena’s five siblings.
Johnny may eventually have to make the heartbreaking choice to leave Maryann and their sick newborn in Lubbock so he can return home, care for their other children and work to support the family.
That is what Lori is desperately hoping her parents can avoid.
She told me one of her biggest fears is knowing how frightened and anxious her mom will be if she has to face whatever comes next at the hospital without Ximena’s dad beside her.
So tonight, this big sister is asking strangers to help carry some of that fear.
Not just with financial help.
With prayer.
Please pray that doctors figure out what is making Ximena so sick.
Pray that this tiny girl’s body gets stronger.
Pray for answers about her heart and everything else doctors are investigating.
And pray for Maryann and Johnny, trying to be parents to a critically ill newborn in one city while five more children need them back home in another.
Lori sent me this photograph of Ximena from before she became sick.
Look at that beautiful little face and that enormous pink bow.
She has only been in this world for two weeks.
Let’s surround her with a whole lot of love and prayer while her family waits for the answers they desperately need.
