VIDEO: “Harry Potter” Saves One-Pound Newborn

Juniper French was born at 23 weeks and 6 days, weighing only one pound. Her father, Thomas French, read one seemingly hopeless night in the hospital – “The Bot Who Lived”. Because Harry lived when he shouldn’t have. Because Harry survived the impossible, thanks to his mother’s love. Her dad believed a book about a boy who should’ve died would be the magic his daughter needed. Was he right?

Watch the video and read the full story below, provided by Liftable.

Every once in a while the difference a story makes is big. For Juniper French, born at 23 weeks and 6 days and weighing only one pound, that change came in the form of six words.

“Chapter One,” her father Thomas French read one seemingly hopeless night in the hospital. “The boy who lived.”

Those six words send chills down my spine, and even if you’ve never read the Harry Potter series, chances are you still recognize the iconic phrase. Because Harry lived when he shouldn’t have. Because Harry survived the impossible. And why? Spoiler alert: because of his mother’s love.

They say preemie babies who are given love, attention, and physical touch are more likely to survive than those who aren’t. But what about the babies who are born much too early, the ones who shouldn’t possibly survive in such a small and fragile state?

Juniper’s story proves miracles can occur. It was her dad who believed a book about a boy who should’ve died would be magic for his daughter.

“Stories are a promise,” Tom said to his wife Kelley. “They are a promise that the ending is worth waiting for.”

Beginnings can be dark and many times disheartening, but it’s the endings we strive for. It’s the ending we stay up late into the night to read.

“When Tom read to her, she breathed better, held her temperature better, seemed generally more content,” Kelley recalled. “Tom read every paragraph in a soothing, sing-song voice, and when he stopped, her oxygen levels would plummet and the alarms would blare.”

Small enough to hold in one palm, Juniper held out to hear the ending of the novel. But it wasn’t Juniper alone who found life through Harry’s story.

Her parents discovered the kind of love that brings you alive in a whole new way. They discovered the love of a parent for their child changes you.

“I’d do anything to spare my daughter her traumatic six months in the NICU,” Kelley wrote of her experience. “But for myself? I wouldn’t change a day.”

Each day was a struggle, each chapter of Harry’s story an uncertainty. Would Juniper survive long enough to hear the end?

Indeed this story has a happy ending, and Kelley explained how J.K. Rowling’s words became more than mere fiction. “It became this way that we could actually communicate with her,” Kelley said.

Now the French family has their own story in print, appropriately entitled “Juniper: The girl who was born too soon.” Much like Harry’s tale, one little girl’s story can give many hope that love and faith in the impossible are magical gifts indeed.

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