An Alabama baby got an NICU graduation ceremony complete with a cap and gown purchased from a local Build-A-Bear store after spending 160 days in the neonatal intensive care unit.
It is common practice for the nurses at the University of South Alabama Children's and Women's Hospital in Mobile, Alabama, to do a special send-off for the babies who are discharged, but they decided to do something a little different for Cullen Potter, according to Good Morning America.
He was just 22 weeks when he was born in March, and only weighed 3.9 ounces at the time.
Initially doctors said Cullen Potter had a 2 percent chance of living, but his parents were not going to give up hope.
"We called 16 different hospitals in three different states to find a hospital that would deliver him at under 24 weeks," said his dad, Robert Potter, Good Morning America noted.
"If he was fighting, we were going to fight no matter what," he said, according to AL.com.
The weeks following Cullen Potter's birth were up and down, with his parents posting regular updates to Facebook.
Initially, Cullen Potter was meant to go home in mid-July but he was discharged over a month later.
His parents thought it was only fitting that they give him a graduation ceremony, considering the obstacles he had overcome to survive.
Cullen Potter was discharged on Tuesday, Aug. 21, and in celebration, his primary care nurse, Jewel Barbour, paraded him around the hallway outside the NICU in his outfit for the other staffers to see, AL.com reported.
He is now at home with his 7-year-old brother Kayden Potter.
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