Walk for Prems: Annual charity event for premature and sick babies to be held at Burswood on Sunday

For new mother Luarna Wooding, her start to parenthood has been rocky.

When her baby son Cody was born at just 26 weeks, she believed the odds “weren’t in her favour”.

Ms Wooding was having a seemingly normal pregnancy until she suddenly felt intense cramping.

“I called the local hospital but they tried to get me to stay home,” she said.

But the mother-to-be insisted on going to hospital and when she arrived — little Cody was born within 20 minutes.

“It was a spontaneous thing, there was nothing to indicate why he was early,” she said.

“But he was born sick so they mentioned that maybe my body sensed it so tried to get rid of it.”

Larger than most premature bubs, Cody was born an impressive 40cm long and weighed 1.1 kg.

But his battles had only just begun.

“He was born with a high infection level. He had bacterial meningitis so he was on antibiotics for 14 days, and possibly due to the fast labour, he was also born with two brain bleeds, grade two and three,” Ms Wooding said.

After spending 101 days in King Edward Memorial Hospital’s neonatal intensive care unit, Cody left with two strains of the common cold.

Five months on from the ordeal, Ms Wooding and baby Cody will on Sunday join other families for the annual Walk for Prems at Burswood Park’s Matagarup Causeway Loop.

The event aims to raise vital funds and awareness for the 48,000 babies born premature or sick in Australia each year.

Ms Wooding said it was a crucial fundraiser for Life’s Little Treasures Foundation — a charity dedicated to supporting the families of babies born prematurely.

“When we were going through NICU, we didn’t know anyone that had had a prem baby before... you don’t want to google anything as the odds are never in your favour,” she said.

“It’s so important, it is so isolating and easy to get lost in it.

“One in 10 babies are born premature, but it’s not spoken about until it happens to you.

“But these organisations provide so much help, it’s so expensive to go back and forth from the hospital, they provide a community for families doing it tough, food packages and all that kind of support that we couldn’t have survived without.”