Home at last for Levi Storch
On May 27, 2026, Levi Storch was discharged from HSHS St. Vincent Hospital in Green Bay after 194 days in the neonatal intensive care unit (NICU). (Courtesy photo)
Seven-month-old Levi Storch of Escanaba gives a big smile. His size has increased nearly tenfold since he was born weighing just one pound and eight ounces. (Courtesy photo)
On May 27, 2026, Levi Storch was discharged from HSHS St. Vincent Hospital in Green Bay after 194 days in the neonatal intensive care unit (NICU). (Courtesy photo)
Seven-month-old Levi Storch of Escanaba gives a big smile. His size has increased nearly tenfold since he was born weighing just one pound and eight ounces. (Courtesy photo)
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ESCANABA -- "He truly is a miracle," said mother Alyssa Fedak, after her six-month-old son finally came home from the hospital for the first time.
The infant Levi, born on November 15 after just 24 weeks, weighed one pound and eight ounces upon delivery in Green Bay and had remained in neonatal intensive care unit (NICU) for 194 days.
On May 27, parents Fedak and Dakota Storch brought the baby to their Escanaba home, where little Levi joins three siblings -- Alecia, Cami and Mason.
Fedak said that her pregnancy started normal until the placenta started abrupting -- detaching from the uterine wall -- 15 weeks in.
"I hemorrhaged until 24 weeks when they decided it was more safe for him to be delivered," Fedak explained.
Levi was born at HSHS St. Vincent Hospital in Green Bay on Nov. 15. He was 12 inches long and weighed one-and-a-half pounds.
The newborn had a congenital heart defect called Patent ductus arteriosus (PDA), in which major blood vessels that usually close after birth remain open. To correct the PDA, doctors in Madison, Wis. placed a piccolo.
"The large, open PDA contributed to his lung damage -- fluid flowing into the lungs because it was open. It was surgically closed at eight weeks adjusted and his heart has been doing great since," Fedak shared via email.
After being monitored in the NICU for 194 days, the little boy -- still with a feeding tube and on oxygen -- was able to travel to Escanaba with Storch and Fedak.
The parents are yet unsure of how long Levi will need oxygen, but use has decreased; he now only has it at night. During the daytime, when people are awake and monitoring the baby, he is off oxygen to encourage his lungs to build stronger tissue.
Levi has now been home for a little over five weeks.
"Other than the feeding tube and him having chronic lung disease from being on breathing support and having that PDA open, he is doing great," said Fedak in June. "(It is) a true miracle that there is nothing majorly wrong with him, considering he was born so early with the potential of having so much wrong with him!"
On June 23, the child weighed 12 pounds and one ounce.
Family and doctors will be keeping an eye out for developmental delays due to his prematurity, and depending on his lungs, Levi Storch may need inhalers throughout his life.