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Premature Birth Means Fear, Not Joy In Delivery Room

NEW YORK (WCBS 880) - For Patty Frisbee, giving birth was not the blessed event she had always dreamed of.

WCBS 880's Marla Diamond With The Happy Ending

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"I was totally taken by surprise. It was my first baby. I was the first of my friends to ever go through this. I never even heard the term NICU before," said Frisbee.

She and her husband spent seven weeks in the Neonatal Intensive Care Unit after their daughter Gabrielle was born eight weeks premature.

"They delivered her by c-section and she only weighed 2 pounds 11 ounces. In the beginning, my friends and my family, they were congratulating me. Flowers and phone calls, congratulations. I was like 'This is not a happy occasion,'" Frisbee told WCBS 880 reporter Marla Diamond.

The first time she saw her, tiny Gabrielle was full of tubes and hooked up to monitors.

"I was so overcome with emotion and everything I had gone through and the drugs I was on and I was like, 'You have to take me back. I can't deal with it,'" she said."

But this story does have a happy ending.

"Right now, I have an almost 8-year-old whose perfect in every way. So healthy. And I've been walking for the March of Dimes ever since because, if all that money and support can save one family from going through my circumstance, then it's definitely worth it," said Frisbee.

WCBS 880 and Walgreens invite you to join us as we team up with the March of Dimes for the March for Babies walk on Sunday, May starting at Lincoln Center. Help fight premature birth. To register, go to marchforbabies.org. Let's walk together for stronger, healthier babies.

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