A few tables away, Greg and Cecilia McLean of Sharpsburg spoke of their son Chase's ordeal. Chase, 7, was so premature at birth that one of his lungs tore. Doctors inserted tubes into his chest in the delivery room. On a ventilator for 68 of his 88 days in the NICU, Chase underwent brain and eye surgeries.
Today the only sign of those traumatic weeks is the pair of glasses he wears.
He flashed the blue bracelet he won by sinking a basket in a child-sized hoop. "I beat my brothers," he said.
As the Sister Sledge oldie "We Are Family" throbbed through loudspeakers, nurses and doctors spoke of the deep connections they develop with their patients. "They give us so many scares," said Mena, "so it's wonderful to be able to see them here, kicking balls and running around." The feeling is clearly mutual.
Nurses who tended to Chase attend his birthday parties, said his mother, Cecilia, who fought back tears as she recalled the months when she didn't know, day to day, whether the first of her four children would survive at all.
"It was a very real [possibility] he would not make it," she said, her voice quavering as she looked around at a room full of families that seemed as normal, happy and healthy as any. "Look at what I'd have missed out on."
