UPDATE: Sen. Tina Smith says the boy in the story below will receive a passport to return to Minnesota.
FLORIANOPOLIS, Brazil (AP) — A Minnesota couple is looking for answers and desperately seeking to bring back to the U. S. their newborn son, who was born three months earlier than expected during their vacation in Brazil.
Cheri and Chris Phillips of Cambridge, Minnesota, were about six months pregnant when they traveled to Brazil for two weeks last February. Doctors had approved and encouraged the Array and Phillips’ due date was not until early June.
Two days before the couple returned home, Cheri was admitted to a local hospital for pregnancy complications.
“I just thought I was in pain,” Cheri Phillips said. “But in the middle of the night I started bleeding, I told Chris, yes, I want to go to the hospital. “
After days of procedures, she ordered an immediate cesarean section.
“Over time, it became apparent that I was going to be born,” Phillips said. “I’m in the operating room with her and it’s terrifying. “
The Phillips welcomed their first child, Greyson, into the world on March 12. The newborn weighed just over 2 pounds. His fight was immediate. Doctors resuscitated his facility and transferred him to the neonatal intensive care unit almost immediately.
“It’s scary, like, oh my God,” Cheri Phillips said. I don’t speak the language (in Brazil), I have no idea what’s going on in part. It’s scary. “
After 51 days in intensive care, Greyson was given the green light to return home. The only challenge: The area is still 6,000 miles away, and getting there has proven to be a struggle in itself.
At this point in the trip, the Phillips were staying in an Airbnb apartment near Florianópolis. The couple, who worked remotely periodically, hoped to bring their newborn home after they were discharged from the hospital.
But to leave Brazil, the two men would need a passport, which would require a birth certificate, allowing them to curry favor with the Brazilian judicial system.
“The biggest impediment has been the local registrar’s office, called a cartório, which refuses to consider Greyson’s birth certificate just because (our) U. S. passports do not have the names of (our) parents,” Phillips wrote in a plea for help. circle of family and friends. ” Four weeks ago, we hired a lawyer to help protect Greyson’s Brazilian documents but, after nearly a month, it has come to nothing and they have no way of knowing when judgment will be issued on the will. take charge of your case or how long it will take once. He does. “
From there, the couple say the next major hurdle will be obtaining Greyson’s U. S. documents. This would require bringing your birth certificate and would require going to a consulate or the U. S. embassy in Brasilia. The couple will have to do it in person, they said. The nearest consulate is three hundred miles from its current location, in a domain badly affected by flooding. Grayson, who weighs just five pounds, still doesn’t have compatibility in his car seat.
“It’s just a huge list of things to check; to be honest, it’s scary and it’s overwhelming,” Phillips said. “Basically, we’re stuck in a bureaucratic vacuum. “
“What you want is for a user to make the decision. It takes one user to make the right decision,” Phillips said Tuesday. “We can’t stay here forever. We’ve been here for almost three full months. “
The couple say they have been in contact with the office of Sen. Tina Smith, who said in a statement to WCCO on Tuesday that Smith has been in contact with the embassy and is running to eliminate the need to travel to obtain a passport.
Still, the family depends on obtaining a birth certificate from the Brazilian government.
“Being at home, in our house, with help, other people washing the dishes and holding them, you know, it would mean everything,” Cheri Phillips said.
“When we get home, when we finally walk into our home in Cambridge, it’s going to be a time to celebrate,” Chris Phillips said.
Data released earlier this year through the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention showed that preterm and preterm births have increased in the U. S. The U. S. has been in the U. S. over the past decade.