Baby Born As Mom Fought For Life On Ventilator Home For Christmas

FERGUSON, MO — Monique Jones kept her baby close as she celebrated Christmas with her family in Ferguson, Missouri.

“I don’t want her away from me,” Jones told news station KMOV of her daughter, Zamyrah. “I feel like she was away from me for too long.”

Zamyrah entered the world at just 29 weeks. She was tiny and fragile, weighing just over 2 pounds. As the baby was fighting for her life in the neonatal intensive care unit, her mother was waging her own battle against COVID-19, the coronavirus illness.

Jones was 26 weeks pregnant when she learned she had been infected with the virus. She had been hospitalized for three weeks when her blood pressure spiked, putting both her life and the baby’s life in grave danger.

Doctors put Jones on a ventilator and made what news reports call the “difficult decision” to deliver the baby early.

Jones woke up a few days later and learned she had given birth while intubated. She eventually recovered and went home. Zamyrah, though, spent weeks in the neonatal intensive care unit. At 3 months, she now weighs more than 5 pounds.

She came home just in time for the family to spend Christmas together.

"I feel like I'm complete, and I feel like I was fighting not for me but for them," Jones told the news station. "Family always meant a lot and for me to have one of my own, it feels good, to have the support."