Two events. One mission. A lifetime of difference.

Friday, July 31st (Bloomfield, CT) & Saturday, August 1st (Wethersfield, CT)

Our Story

In November 2017, we were told our identical twin girls were dying. We were fifteen weeks pregnant.

A maternal-fetal medicine specialist at Yale diagnosed them with Twin-Twin Transfusion Syndrome (TTTS), a condition where the babies share a placenta unevenly and one slowly drains the other. If we did nothing, both would die. We booked emergency laser surgery for the next morning.

That surgery should have been the end of the story. It wasn't. Days later we were diagnosed with Twin Anemia Polycythemia Sequence (TAPS), then a velamentous cord insertion that put fetal blood transfusions in a place no surgeon wanted to go. One of our daughters needed a transfusion directly into her liver, and the plan to repeat transfusions until the girls reached viability was abandoned. We were running out of options, and we were running out of time.

So we threw a Hail Mary. We e-mailed Dr. Ruben Quintero, the surgeon who invented the staging system used worldwide to classify the very condition that was killing our girls. He answered immediately. “Come to Florida and I will operate on the babies.”

On December 7, 2017, we left our 2-year-old son with his Grammie and Pops, hugged him goodbye, and boarded a one-way flight to West Palm Beach to fight for our girls. The next morning Dr. Quintero performed an ultrasound and confirmed what we feared: the membranes between our babies were separating from the previous procedures, and there was a high risk that another procedure would kill them. Most surgeons would not have attempted what came next. He did. Three hours later, every adverse connection had been severed. Days after that, in his Miami office, we heard the words we had stopped letting ourselves imagine: “The TTTS and TAPS are cured."

Words that gave us the courage to paint a nursery, and to give names to "Baby A" and "Baby B." But there was still a long way to go.

More hospitalizations, an amnio-patch procedure Dr. Quintero himself invented, and a snowstorm flight home to spend a Christmas morning with our son that we'll never forget. However, Christmas was followed quickly by hospital admission and bed rest for the 50 days. We took up residence in Room 124 at the UConn Health Center. Literally.

But at 1:34 a.m. and 1:35 a.m. on February 21, 2018, Alexis Suzanne and Melina Quinn were born. Melina's middle name is a quiet thank-you to the doctor we believe saved her life. Our girls fought for the next two months in the NICU and reached every milestone. We were finally able to bring them home to meet their older brother, and our family was complete.

Today both of our girls are happy, healthy, and home.

We are the lucky ones. We had an in-network hospital by coincidence, family thirty-four minutes from the out-of-state operating room, savings to risk, and the knowledge to fight an insurance company while we held each other's hands in pre-op. Take any one of those pieces away and our family looks very different today. No parent should ever have to weigh the life of their unborn child against the survival of their family's finances. That truth is why we are hosting this event.

The Work

The Fetal Institute operates on babies before they are born.

Founded by Dr. Quintero and Dr. Eftichia Kontopoulos, it is the world's leading center for fetal therapy to treat TTTS, TAPS, spina bifida, LUTO, CDH, and seventeen other conditions most families have never heard of and most hospitals cannot treat. Over 1,000 fetal surgeries. Patients from every continent. The techniques and instruments they invented are now taught around the world.

The Fetal Institute Foundation funds the next chapter: the research, the training, and the medical devices that almost no one else will pay to build. Few devices are formally approved for fetal use. The Foundation is fixing that. Every dollar goes back into the chain that brought our girls home.

Join Us

Friday, July 31—The Quintero Classic

Charity golf at Wintonbury Hills, Bloomfield, CT. Named for the surgeon who saved our girls. Foursomes, sponsorships, on-course contests, awards reception.

Saturday, August 1—An Evening with Zac Clark

Live music and celebration at The Webb Barn, Wethersfield, CT. Dinner, drinks, and one unforgettable night to celebrate families who beat the odds and to raise money to support the families who’ve yet to fight.

Presented by Claggett, Sykes & Garza Trial Lawyers.

How to Help

Attend or sponsor.

Donate to the Foundation: thefetalinstitutefoundation.org

Share this page with someone whose family was held together by a doctor who refused to give up. They'll know exactly what this is for.

With love and gratitude,

Claggett, Sykes & Garza

Andrew & Jennifer Garza

— and Lexi, Lina, and John