This Mother’s Day, Embrace honors the love, resilience, and devotion of mothers across the globe. Mothers who will do anything to fight for the life of their children. Mothers like Shivamadamma, who inspire our work.

Shivamadamma, a young mother who comes from a family of rural farmers in India, gave birth to a premature baby boy weighing only 3.5 pounds. The tiny infant struggled to keep himself warm, putting his life at risk.

Three generations of motherhood: Shivamadamma with her mother, grandmother, and beautiful first-born son.

Shivamadamma’s family was concerned that they wouldn’t be able to afford the care that the baby needed to survive. Keeping her baby in the Neonatal Intensive Care Unit was an impossibly high price, given the family’s income. Sadly, babies who are in severe need of thermal support are often sent home because their parents can no longer afford to keep them in the NICU. Fortunately, doctors were able to provide thermal support to Shivamadamma’s baby with the Embrace infant warmer they had just received. By providing an affordable alternative, Shivamadamma was able to stay in the maternity ward so that her baby could receive the treatment necessary for his survival.  Deeply moved by her story, the Embrace team visited Shivamadamma and her family in their village a month and a half after the baby was born. We were happy to see that her son had continued to make progress. His weight had now increased to 5 pounds and he was feeding well. The excitement in the house was palpable.

The family was planning the baby’s naming ceremony, an important cultural event. This joyous occasion also served as a grim reminder that many families in India share a common custom of naming their babies nine months after they are born because sadly, there is a high occurrence of infant deaths. Following the custom of Rashi, the first letter of the babies name is determined by the position of the Moon in a Zodiac sign at the time of birth. The family happily deliberated on two choices, “Surya” after the sun, or “Sunil” which refers to God?

Even though the family had very few resources of their own, they wanted to thank Embrace for giving their baby a chance at a happy and healthy life, and gifted the team with grain from their field. Our team was thankful for the warm welcome, and opportunity to reunite with Shivamadamma and her healthy son.

Shri Mrityunjaya Health Clinic is a small facility in Davangere district of Karnataka, India, which until now, had absolutely no equipment to keep babies warm. Since most of their patients can’t afford specialized neonatal care, this facility ends up treating many sick babies. In the absence of any other options, the clinic used a room heater to keep babies warm – a highly unsafe and ineffective solution.

Fortunately, the Embrace infant warmer has provided a ray of hope for this clinic. It has now become the standard of care for low birth weight babies, and given families access to life-saving technology that they otherwise wouldn’t be able to afford.          Laxmi resting, while her baby girl sleeps peacefully by her side. 

Laxmi, delivered her daughter via C-section at the Shri Mrityunjaya Health Clinic. Her tiny baby girl weighed 2.1 kg (4.6 lbs) and was in desperate need of thermal support. Luckily, Laxmi was able to place her newborn in the Embrace infant warmer where she stayed for seven days, drastically improving her body weight and overall health.

This is the impact we strive for – empowering doctors, nurses and parents to save tiny babies through high quality health care, and ultimately give each infant an equal chance for a healthy life.

The Embrace Team would like to extend a heart-felt thank you to the students at Mirman School (K-8) who raised over $5,000 through their “Donate a Heart, Save a Life” campaign.  Funds raised will help Embrace provide Infant Warmers to resource poor clinics in developing countries that will help over 1,000 premature and low birth-weight babies receive thermal support, critical for their survival.

                              Wall of Embrace- Hearts That Save Lives

For every donation collected, each student decorated a heart and posted to the “Wall of Embrace.” Please join us in applauding all the students who made this effort an amazing success. We would like to give a special acknowledgement to the two classes that raised the most money during the three-week campaign.

                               Mirman School Class 2N Collected $820

                            Mirman School Class US2 Collected $1,226

We would also like to recognize Cydney Davis, age 11, who raised $673! Embrace is impressed by the initiative demonstrated by Cydney, and grateful for her hard work and dedication. We have shared Cydney’s touching essay below, about why she was inspired to help Embrace.              “How Embrace Inspires Me” -By Cydney Davis, Grade 7                                                            

When people ask me, “What is Embrace and why is it so important to you? Or when I hear my peers say, “What’s so special about saving premature babies?” Essentially, they are asking me, “What is so important about saving a life?” In asking myself that same question, I think about the heart broken families of the 20,000,000 low birth-weight and premature babies that are born each year.

What’s so special about saving premature babies? Well, I know personally that were it not for wonderful doctors and innovative medical technology, I would not be blessed to have my best friend and cousin Salima Hester, who was born two months earlier than expected, weighing only 3.5 pounds. She was lucky to have the advantages of being born in a hospital with state of the art life saving equipment that helped to keep her alive.

 I really never imagined until seeing the Embrace presentation that there literally are people in other parts of the world that do not have the same medical advantages that we sometimes take for granted in this country. In watching the Embrace presentation, I was able to see how these little babies born prematurely in developing countries were dying because they were born so small that they were unable to maintain their body temperature. What if that was your baby? You would probably feel really bad and depressed if your baby was on the verge of dying. It really broke my heart to see the families in the video presentation that did not have enough money to pay [the clinic fees] to use a $20,000 incubator to house their premature babies. It was just too expensive. I couldn’t stand the fact that 450 of those babies died each hour.

That is why I was so motivated to collect as much money as I could to help the cause of Embrace. I absolutely love caring for babies and kids are drawn to me. The Infant Warmer or Thermpod developed by a group of young Stanford students was such a great, yet simple concept that I was inspired to raise money for this cause. I feel like if these students can create this “sleeping bag” product that is saving lives, then I am going to do my part to help them in their efforts to make as many baby sleeping bags as possible. Embrace gives all infants an equal chance for a healthy life. We are not alone in this fight to decrease infant mortality. In 1990, world leaders at the United Nations Millennium Summit pledged to reduce the deaths of children less than 5 years of age by two thirds by 2015. I believe that I will help to achieve this goal by raising money for Embrace.

I felt that this experience of raising money was exciting and powerful. When people donated money and placed it in my envelope, I just wanted to give him or her a big hug. I truly believe that the people who donated money literally are helping Embrace achieve their goal of saving babies. Knowing that I helped save a life inspires me to make a difference in the world, even if it is on a small scale. I may never meet any of the children who benefit from my efforts, but it makes my heart feel good to know that what I have done will help a baby and their family. It makes me feel like I can do anything. Embrace is an organization that is dear to my heart. As soon as I saw the video of the Embrace babies, I knew that this was something I wanted to support.

Thank you Mirman School for all of the money you were able to raise for Embrace, and for your amazing support of our cause. We are truly grateful for all of your hard work!

This campaign would not have been possible without the tireless efforts of the parents, faculty and staff at the Mirman School. We would like to especially thank Asma Furniturewala, Rosalyn Davis, Ms. Sheila Simmons, Ms. Julie Hansen-Clark, Ms. Allison Denner and Ms. Toy Kelly for coordinating the project.

Today is the first-ever Parents of Preemies Day. The initiative was created to build support for parents by recognizing the courage and commitment it takes to stay strong and resilient during the overwhelming experience of caring for a premature infant.

When a baby is born extremely premature, parents often find their world turned upside down, sometimes faced with life and death decisions, while facing an uncertain future for their baby. Please join us in celebrating Parents of Preemies Day.

What You Can Do:

• As a parent of a preemie, visit the Parents of Preemies Day Facebook Page to post a picture of you and your baby and share your story of Hope, Resilience & Miracles. Alternatively, you can send an email to graphicdesign@grahamsfoundation.org with your story and picture attached.
• As a supporter of a preemie parent, help spread the word by updating your Facebook profile picture with the Parents of Preemies Day logo.
• Show your support on Twitter by posting this message: Today, I am recognizing the courage and commitment it takes to stay strong and resilient when premature birth turns a family’s world upside down. Happy Parents of Preemies Day. www.parentsofpreemiesday.org  #parentsofpreemiesday

Your submission will become a part of the Hope, Resilience & Miracles banner to be unveiled on Parents of Preemies Day.

With your post, you will be entered into the Parents of Preemies sweepstakes with a grand prize of diapers for a year from Pampers, plus other fabulous prizes such as a Dr. Brown’s Welcome Home Kit and Designed to Nourish Kit, a 16 x 20 photo on canvas from CanvasPop, Nap Nannies, Snack Packs from Snikiddy, Food Should Taste Good, Clif Bar and much, much more!

Embrace would like to acknowledge the thoughtful leadership of Graham’s Foundation for launching this important campaign and helping spread awareness by acknowledging and supporting the extraordinary commitment of mom’s and dad’s of premature babies all over the world.

Graham’s Foundation is a non-profit organization founded in 2009 by Jennifer and Nick Hall in memory of their son, Graham. Its mission is to offer both practical and emotional support to parents of extremely premature babies. The foundation supports the parents by sending care packages to them during their journey in the NICU, and the foundation’s website provides a place for parents to share their stories and find support.

Embrace is grateful to have amazing supporters who are helping us spread the warmth! Check out a few different campaigns that are creating awareness about neonatal mortality, and helping deliver our life-saving device to tiny infants and their families across the globe.

Joey Cosner’s Embrace Birthday Party

Joey was born premature and spent his first 30 days in the NICU. For his first birthday, Joey’s mom, Helen, threw an “Embrace Birthday Party” to help raise money for tiny infants, like Joey, who don’t have access to health care.

The path to prematurity is different for every babe. For Joey, his premature birth followed weekly visits to high-risk neonatologists, over 20 high definition 4-D ultrasounds, and many more steps to determine why things didn’t look and measure the way they should. I had amazing medical care, a pre-pregnancy healthy, active lifestyle. Before Joey came, even though I was seeing the high-risk doctors, I created a birth plan and assumed his arrival would be natural, healthy and beautiful.

After attending a conference for work on Wednesday night, I came home and crawled into bed at about 4 pm. This was typical, as I was exhausted through most of my pregnancy. I got up to use the restroom and there was blood, a ton of blood. As it was gushing from me, I called for my husband. He walked me immediately to the car, grabbing my empty baby bag. Both more scared than we had ever been in our lives, we arrived at the hospital and I was admitted to the high-risk maternal unit for monitoring. It was concluded that I had experienced an abruption, and after consultation with the neonatologists, it was decided that I could probably go home after the weekend, still pregnant. I was not thrilled about having to sit in the hospital for 3 days, but figured I could endure it.

Saturday evening it started happening. The monitor kept showing Joey’s heart rate drop to 20-30 beats per minute, when it is supposed to be 150 beats per minute. The sound was one of the worst I had heard in my life. I had grown accustomed to the regular beep of Joey’s monitor and as it slowed down and the nurses hustled in, my heart rate skyrocketed! Within minutes it seemed, I went from believing that I would be going home, to lying on the operating table. Joey was born at 8:25 pm through an emergency c-section. He wasn’t breathing on his own, so I kissed him as they pumped oxygen into his lungs  and whisked him away to the NICU (Neonatal Intensive Care Unit).

This started his 30-day stay in the NICU, where Joey lived most of his days in his 98.6 F incubator. He was fed through a tube and put under a bright blue bilirubin light. He was so tiny! At only 4 lbs. 3 ounces, I was so scared to even touch him. I was able to take him out of his incubator every 2-3 hours to attempt to feed him. As every mom knows, you just want to hold your baby and take your baby home. In total, Joey (and I) spent about 30 days in the NICU. While in the unit, we experienced the power of health care innovations and technology in many, many ways. I often thought about what it would have been like if Joey had been born 30 years ago, or if he had been born in a country where there is less access to medical equipment.

Fast-forward about six months, and I learned about Embrace. As soon as I read about the organization’s mission and ability to save other premature and low birth-weight babies, I was inspired. I knew that Joey was the healthy boy that he now was thanks to the fact that he had access to an incubator and other life-saving medical interventions. I knew I had to take action, and Joey’s birthday party came to mind.

I decided to ask friends and family to donate to Embrace and help save the lives of babies just like Joey. Our community blew us away with their generosity. Thanks to their support, Joey has already made a huge impact in one year. He has impacted the lives of over 150 babies! We hung a picture of an Embrace sleeping bag in Joey’s room and plan to tell him all about the impact he has already had. It is my hope that someday Joey and I can travel to India to help distribute the sleeping bags to mommies who are just like me, and babies who were just like Joey.

-Helen Cosner, Joey’s mother

Arushi Raval’s Arangeteram

Arushi Raval is a high school Freshman in Colorado. For the past nine years, she has been studying a South Indian classical dance called, Bharatnatyam. She chose to donate her Arangeteram (graduation performance), to Embrace. Through her philanthropic efforts, Arushi raised almost $1,500, enough to impact the lives of 400 babies. Thank you so much Arushi, we are so grateful and humbled by your generosity and philanthropic spirit!

I have always wondered how I can make a difference to at least a few children less fortunate than me around the world, as I have been blessed with so much in terms of financial and social support. Instead of receiving gifts for my Bharatnatyam Arangetram, I decided to try to make a difference.

Bharatnatyam is a classical dance form from the South Indian State of Tamilnadu. It is considered a national dance of India. It is accompanied by classical Carnatic music, and its inspirations come from ancient Hindu scripture.

An Arangetram is the graduation performance that reflects all that I have learned in my training. An Arangetram is a test for both the student and the guru, and is judged by the public. Oftentimes, people bestow gifts on the dancer once the performance is over. In lieu of receiving gifts, I decided to have my friends and family donate to Embrace.

I first saw the embrace product and charity on a special edition of 20/20 in December of 2010. I was extremely surprised to see how a group of students could come up with such a seemingly simple idea that could save many innocent lives. Also, because I have been to India, I have seen the living conditions of the children and citizens. Things such as water, nutrition, and infant care are often taken for granted, and people often turn a blind eye towards these situations. I am proud to be part of such a great organization that has helped turn a simple idea into something that can give life back to infants.

-Arushi Raval

 Embrace, the Berkeley Chapter

We are excited to announce the first Embrace University Chapter at UC Berkeley. Co-President, Paras Shah, explains how the club was started and their plans for the future.

It began with an idea. A simple desire to effect a change, to forge an impact, to embrace the problem and create a solution. As I sat in front of the television, the first fragments came to me—and over the course of six months—those fragments materialized into an event larger than anything I could have dreamed up. The program was an ABC 20/20 special “Be the Change Save a Life” and it spoke of the plethora of problems faced by millions of people on every continent and every nation, then presented innovative solutions to these problems. The story that truly hit home for me was a tale of hope via Embrace for thousands of premature babies born every year across the globe. They often die within their first few months of life simply because they are too small to keep themselves warm.

I had an instant connection to the vital work that the Embrace team is doing. You see, I was born three months premature, weighing one pound, six ounces. I remained in the hospital for 110 days and am now legally blind as a result.

Last summer, I held a talent show to fundraise for Embrace and over the course of six months we raised $3,029.10 all of which went directly to saving the lives of premature infants.

In the fall of 2011, I began my freshmen year at the University of California, Berkeley. I knew I wanted to bring the success I had enjoyed with Embrace during high school along for the new chapter of my life. Throughout the course of last semester I found a group of highly motivated individuals who share a profound enthusiasm and desire to save lives. We filed the necessary paperwork and thus Embrace the Berkeley Chapter was born.

Our first general meeting took place on February 1, 2012 and the leadership team feels the event was a great success.  We had about 40 people in attendance and the audience remained engaged and lively throughout our presentation. We developed a duel fundraising committee structure in which the members will belong to one of the two committees, and each committee will work on brainstorming, implementing and evaluating original ideas and projects.

I and the rest of the leadership team look forward to what the semester holds for Embrace. We feel the future is bright and we are constantly encouraged by the innovative ideas and passion of our peers. It is our distinct honor to serve as the first Embrace chapter on a university campus and we keep that in mind as we seek to create an enduring model that others may follow in the years to come.

-Paras Shah, Freshman, UC Berkeley

Cal State Fullerton- International Women’s Day Celebration

Cal State Fullerton celebrated International Women’s Day by hosting a campus wide event that focused on empowering women. The day included special guest speakers, and a Resource Fair in the Central Quad to introduce the students, faculty, staff and community to many organizations who are helping women and children around the globe.

Embrace was honored to be among the amazing organizations that participated in the Resource Fair. Cal State Fullerton student interns, Kien and Iris, staffed the Embrace booth and demonstrated the functionality of the Embrace Infant Warmer. They also informed attendees how Embrace is advancing maternal and child health by delivering innovative solutions to the world’s most vulnerable populations.

Thank you baby Joey, Arushi, Paras and Cal State Fullerton for supporting and advancing our cause! If you would like to get involved and help Spread the Warmth, please send us an email at comments@embraceglobal.org.

On this International Women’s Day, I write this to honor the courage, the love, and the hope I have witnessed of so many women through my work at Embrace. I write this to acknowledge the millions of women in this world who have lost a baby, who have endured one of the most painful experiences imaginable.

Over the last few years I’ve spent in India, I know that a mother, no matter how poor or impoverished, will do anything to save her child. And yet millions of babies still die every year around the world. Because despite their best efforts, these mothers simply don’t have access to healthcare or life-saving technologies.

I am often asked if there is a woman whom I admire. There is, and she’s not a Nobel laureate or global CEO. The woman is Sujatha, a mother from a village in south India. Sujatha lost all 3 of her babies, one after another.  One of her babies was two months premature, and I suspect all of her babies suffered from hypothermia. 

When we showed Sujatha the Embrace Infant Warmer, she wept and said, “maybe if I had this, I could have saved my baby.” Her grief was so deep, even seven years after she had lost her children. She then said, “the world is apathetic to the birth and death of a child. It is the mother who carries the emotional burden.”

And yet rather than being swallowed by this grief, she didn’t give up her hope of becoming a mother. She, instead, adopted a baby girl. Greater yet, Sujatha uses her own experiences to educate and help other women in her village, and is now working with Embrace to ensure we can prevent these deaths from happening in the future, by helping us refine our product and get it into the hands of the women who need it.  The last time I saw her, I told Sujataha that her strength gives me the strength to do my work.

Jane, Sujatha and her little girl.

Sujatha is shining example of a woman making a difference in the lives of other women, despite the tragedy she has experienced.  My hope is that all of us can play a role in empowering and helping women less fortunate than ourselves. Because at a fundamental level, we all share the same courage, love and hope to make the world a better place.

Jane Chen, Embrace’s Co-founder.

China Program – Baby Long, 930 grams at birth.

Somalia Program – Twins born at just over 2 pounds each. 

India Program – Twin baby born at 2.65 pounds