A community-wide baby shower will be held Saturday in downtown Tylertown for the family of a rare set of identical quadruplets born Feb. 8 at University of Mississippi Medical Center.
Craig and Kim Fugate of Jayess are now the parents of five girls, 10-year-old Katelyn, along with her newborn sisters, Kelsey, Kenleigh, Kayleigh and Kristen.
The Fugates, who live in a small mobile home and don’t have reliable transportation, will be facing huge challenges when the premature infants come home. The quadruplets are patients at UMMC, where they continue to improve and have gained weight.
Jayess resident Kathy Reid, the children’s maternal grandmother, said Kelsey and Kayleigh were at 3 pounds, 14 ounces this week. Kayleigh still has critical problems with her lungs and is receiving steroid treatment. Kenleigh is 3 pounds, 11 ounces and has been able to take a bottle.
“Kristen really shot up. She weighs 5 pounds, and she’s in a baby bed, not an incubator,” Reid said.
The family’s big worry right now is Kelsey, who has an infection in her colon and is getting antibiotics and X-rays every 8 hours to check her condition. Twice this past week, Reid said, doctors tried, unsuccessfully, to do a spinal tap on the infant to rule out spinal meningitis.
None of the babies is expected to come home before May.
“They have to be able to suck, swallow and breathe on their own,” Reid said. “They still have a ways to go.”
But when the infants do come home, it will be a challenge for everyone involved. The family is tentatively planning to enlarge their living quarters by building a room onto their home. But, they’ll need so many everyday items — multiplied by four.
The family’s church, Calvary Temple Pentecostal Church, is sponsoring the baby shower on Saturday. It will be held in Tylertown’s Centennial Square from 11 a.m. to 2 p.m.
By the time the babies come home, they’ll most likely have outgrown preemie clothing, but they’ll need many other items, including newborn size diapers.
“We have plenty of pacifiers and bottles,” Reid said.
The Fugates qualify for the Women, Infants and Children’s Nutrition program, or WIC, which will provide all the necessary formulas for the babies.
Reid said she and her husband are buying infant carriers at a reduced price, and a woman on the Gulf Coast is giving the family a stroller designed for quadruplets, something Reid said can cost $1,000 or more.
Those planning the shower said monetary donations or gift cards are always welcome for the family that more than doubled in size overnight.
Kimberly’s sister, Kelly Reid, is spearheading much of the behind-the-scenes work and has signed up for fundraising for the Fugate quadruplets on the www.gofundme website — www.gofundme/70ie10. A check on the site this morning shows that nearly $2,500 has been collected through online donations.
A Facebook page also has been set up in the name of Fugate Quadruplets, where visitors can get updates on the medical condition of the babies and see their photos.
In addition, Fugate Quadruplets accounts have been set up at Regions Bank and Citizens Bank.
“It’s been a roller coaster ride,” Reid said, adding that the family has been blessed not only with the newborns but also to have caring family and friends.
If all goes as planned, Kimberly said she will be attending the shower, driving down with her sister-in-law Saturday morning.
“I’m coming that way as long as the babies are OK,” Fugate said. “The doctors think they’re good enough for me to leave for the day. If anything changes, they’ll call and let me know.”
Fugate said she’s been able to give Kenleigh a bottle twice a day, a task that many mothers may take for granted, but one that means the world to Fugate.
She’s been overwhelmed with emotions since the babies’ births, and she’s counted on family and friends — and her faith — to get through it.
“I feel very blessed and very honored to have such a great church,” she said. “The babies are little miracles and they’ve come a long way.”
