A MUM has revealed how her baby was born with a cyst the size of a football under his arm – which left the limb at a 90 degree angle.
His mum Christina DiMartino, 34, was told her unborn son, Matteo, had an abnormally large mass located across his chest and left arm, which covered up to 50 per cent of his body, after going for a routine scan at 13 weeks.
The tot was found to have a rare lymphatic malformation – and medics warned he had just a nine per cent chance of making it to birth.
First-time parents Christina and her husband, Franco, 36, an electrician for the Long Island Railroad, in the US, decided not to terminate the pregnancy, but to give their little boy a chance – and their son was born via emergency c-section on 7.17pm on April 17, 2019.
Matteo tipped the scales at 9lbs 3oz, but it’s thought 3lbs of that – one third of his body weight – was down to the huge cyst which covered his side up to his armpit.
It meant the newborn struggled to move his neck and head, couldn’t roll over, sit up, fit into a car seat or baby clothes, and also left him suffering from frequent skin infections.
At six months old in October last year, Matteo was operated on by a team of specialists at Cohen Children’s Medical Center in New York to have the cyst removed.
He is now a happy 10-month-old with a bright future, but will need to be monitored as he grows older.
Christina, a special education science teacher from Long Island, said: “We are so proud of Matteo and all he’s been through.
“He’s defied all the odds to not only survive but to thrive. We knew he was going to be born with a huge cyst, but even we were surprised when we saw it for the first time.
“Despite all of the treatment and operations he’s been through, Matteo is such a happy baby.
“He is now meeting and surpassing milestones for his age. He’s now pulling himself up to stand, crawling, eating foods with his fingers and saying ‘mama’ – we couldn’t love him anymore if we tried.”
It was crippling. It was absolutely the worst days of our lives. I felt like I was going to have a nervous breakdown
Christina DiMartino
Christina and Franco were over-the-moon to discover they were expecting a baby after trying to start a family for a long time.
She said: “I found out that I was pregnant two days before Franco got a new job so it all seemed ‘meant to be’.”
But the couple’s blissful bubble burst at 13-and-a-half weeks when Christina and Franco were told their baby had a “cystic hygroma” at a routine scan.
She said: “I thought: ‘A cyst? How bad can a cyst be? I guess the baby will have to get it removed?’ But the doctor told me that it was a bit more complicated than that and showed me the scan.
“The cyst was already about the size of the baby’s head at this point – at 13-and-a-half weeks. It was located under his left arm, in the armpit region.
“She said there was only a nine per cent chance the baby would make it, and there was a 75 per cent chance that it would be a chromosomal disorder.
“It was crippling. It was absolutely the worst days of our lives and it was so hard trying to be calm and not stress for the baby.
“I felt I was going to have a nervous breakdown. We knew how hard it was to conceive so we decided to stick it out because we would handle whatever God’s plan had set out for us.
“The doctor then presented me with my options which were termination or chorionic villus sampling – that would involve inserting a needle into the placenta to collect fluid which would diagnose a chromosomal abnormality or disorder.”
Christina had two tests for chromosomal disorders, both of which came back negative within a month.
She said: “It was a good feeling. I knew with all these results that the chance of him being born healthy was good.”
But research into their son’s condition left Christina and Franco feeling worse.
She said: “I felt worse seeing all the statistics. It was debilitating to say the least.
“I had one week of excitement of my pregnancy, and that was then on until the birth – it was sad. I actually felt sorry for myself.”
Christina had regular hospital appointments, weekly at first, building up to three times-a-week from 32 weeks.
She said: “The cyst consistently grew. It started growing more rapidly than he was and became the size of his chest.
“His arm was also now involved and stuck in a 90 degree angle inside the womb.
“Though, each test came back in our favour – even the heart exam showed zero defects which surprised us all.”
Christina was then told she would need to have an emergency C-section.
She said: “I went into hospital and assumed it was just for observation, but the doctor told me I would have the baby that day because he thought he may have seen a little fluid in the baby’s cheeks. It turned out to be chubby cheeks!
“He drained 500ml of the cyst’s fluid after the spinal tap, to make sure he would fit out of my belly.
“Then Matteo was born, we called him that because it means ‘gift of God’.
“I didn’t get to hold my baby, they whisked him out immediately for assessment and I only saw a glimpse of his little face on the way out the door.
“He was breathing on his own and surprised doctors that he needed no medical intervention. They were prepared with 24 nurses and doctors in the delivery room.”
Despite knowing their little boy had a huge cyst, Christina and Franco were still shocked when they saw their newborn baby for the first time.
Christina said: “One thing we could not have prepared for was the open lesion on Matteo’s cyst – no-one can figure out how that happened.
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