Here is our team at the preemie paradox. We believe the more people know you, the better we can communicate. Michael had never wanted kids his whole life and thought he'd never have to worry about it until his wife told him the news. The baby they got was tiny and he knew she wouldn't make it but she did, 89 days in and he had no idea what to do or how to help. After seeing nicu children perish and see those who didn't leave on oxygen and ng tubes, he started looking for a way to get answers. He only found a few places and none of them really helped dads. He decided then to season himself into the life of having a preemie child. It was years before he decided that it was time to start the preemie paradox.
Kirsten was a model who would shoot with Michael as he is also a photographer. When she had her son Jayce in the nicu, she got the run around from some of the staff because she was younger and was treated like a single mom with no insurance. She had many problems to overcome inside and out of the nicu. She also had many specialist to see 2 hours drive from her home so making appointments and the expense of travel made life difficult. Her son continued to have other illnesses and is still undergoing treatment and monitoring. Kirsten's initials are K.K. so we call her KayKay instead.
Kari is the most interesting of the team. She's been in nursing for two decades and knows so much about the nicu and picu units. She is a neonatal nurse practitioner at Vanderbilt Hospital in Nashville Tennessee and does many top level procedures there. She also does fixed wing airplane and helicopter rescues where she flies to other cities and takes a preemie child back to Vanderbilt for further testing and care. Kari also has a french bistro in her town so she gets very little time off but she finds both jobs very rewarding!
About Us - Our great team at the preemie paradox!
Michael
Michael and his wife Tara had a micro preemie daughter Alana in December 2016. She was born 14 weeks early at 26 weeks 2 days and weighed only 1lb 13oz at 13.5 inches long. Michael observed a system of design principles in the NICU and would rely on these elements outside the NICU. During his 20 years working in engineering he seen product flow and information systems work like a machine. A parents ability to think clearly is hard in the NICU but simplifying root cause mechanisms was paramount to his new methods he shares in his course lessons.
Kari
Kari is the only NICU professional at The Preemie Paradox with 17yrs experience. She is currently a Neonatal Nurse Practitioner at the Vanderbilt Children's Hospital in Nashville TN and lectures on maternal issues within the industry organizations she serves. You might have seen Kari on the news as she does the media spotlight pieces. She might also be in an ambulance, helicopter, or fixed wing airplane picking up NICU babies so you never know where our Kari may be. Kari deals with the hospitals side of the NICU and it's system of care for The Preemie Paradox.
KK
Kierstin is mom to her preemie son Jayce. He was born at 34 weeks in March of 2017 and still has a few problems she has to deal with. Kierstin studied psychology at Columbia State Community College and works on the parental care portion of The Preemie Paradox. Most of the topics and design courses were made and put together by her. Kierstin also has her own YouTube show and deals with parental issues that fall outside of the issues discussed on The Preemie Paradox. Currently she is with child #2 and is hopeful that she avoids the nicu all together with this one.
preemie paradox going home
Tara Pilkinton
You will see Tara and Alana in the photos because they are part of Michael's family. He took the camera and chronicled their experience and story to remember the moments. Tara is also a 10% owner of The Progeny Adventure Group LLC who owns The Preemie Paradox. You will see her in the photos on this website as they are real, unstaged, unaltered photos.
Alana walking up from the flower fields.
Alana Pilkinton
Most preemie kids do not care about their hardships as a baby. Alana is all girl and loves nature. She is full of energy and is what they call - moderately autistic. A doctor at Vanderbilt diagnosed her when she was 2yrs old and we didn't believe them. Today we seen they were right and we were blind to the realization that she is special needs. She is homeschooled today and doing great!
Our logo and banner image with our motto!
Images are said to speak 1000 words so we wanted to create an image that represents the preemie life in a realistic manner. We went through several designs before settling on this one. We know its not a happy image of a bright baby and a happy mother but we feel this image matches the post nicu life that we feel the most passionate for. The preemie paradox logo was made by Caleb Slater at Disney and shows the left foot as the letter "P" in Preemie, the two feet are in pink and blue representing the girl and boy colors while the purple is the color of prematurity.
The word paradox means in 4 parts from Dictionary.com 1. a statement or proposition that seems self-contradictory or absurd but in reality expresses a possible truth. 2. a self-contradictory and false proposition. 3. any person, thing, or situation exhibiting an apparently contradictory nature. 4. an opinion or statement contrary to commonly accepted opinion. We feel that a preemie parent who's child is in the nicu doesn't usually feel like a parent since they rarely get to hold them or do anything other than look at them in the isolette. The parental relationship is a paradox because the pseudo position you're in where the nurse is more of a parent than you are. We feel a nicu parent is in the preemie paradox so we settled on the name.
The brick wall of grey represents the seemingly immovable amount of obstacles that are stacked against you by the milestones your child is expected to reach. The grey color represents the emotional state preemie parents are in during their stay. Most preemie parents eel like they hit a wall in the nicu.
The arrangement of the preemie paradox members are represented as those who turn away from the spotlight or attention seekers to concentrate on their children. Michael is holding his daughter up and away from him while KK is holding her son down but close to her. This represents the space you must be able to hold them out and the closeness you must be able to provide when caring for a nicu preemie. Kari is smiling and center because in the nicu, a child is front and center and #1 in their care with their nurse.
The Preemie Paradox as a group strives for accuracy as a whole and bases it's positions on the most common of nicu/picu experiences. We try to represent the parental role as authentic as we can. Unfortunately this paradigm may be hard for some to bare and very triggering to others but we feel we should give an accurate depiction of the nicu and post nicu life. So we can so we can help in the best way under the most likely expectations. We really do want to "help make parents better so they can guide their kids well" this is our motto
See other shows an websites owned by the Progeny Adventure Group LLC
Older Dad Show
This website and show is for fathers ages 36 and over before having their first child. This number makes for 18 years after your 18th birthday and well after most men have kids. We talk about being an older parent and things that interest men in this period in our lives. (And we also get moms over here too)
About the Preemie Paradox Team
Summary
Read more about Mike, Kari, and KK in the About Us – great team. Tell others about them in your review!
