From Kaleo’s mother, Hil Hart.

At nearly four months old, Kaleo passed away on May 14th, 2016. He had received his first set of vaccinations only the day before.

My son Kaleo Dale NoRunner passed away May 14th 2016. He was 3 months and 22 days old. It was a beautiful warm Saturday when he went to heaven. The 1st warm day if the year. I’m a mom to 5 boys. Kaleo is my 4th son. I’ve since had a rainbow baby (baby boy #5). This picture was taken by a dear friend who was with us at the ER after our son passed away and she captured this very raw picture. I can feel my pain in this picture. We spent hours with Kaleo after he passed. Just me and my husband. It was so hard to leave him there and not bring him home ever ever again. Kaleo was vaccinated the day before on May 13th. He was vaccinated late. He was almost 4 months old but was receiving his very 1st set of vaccinations ever that are usually scheduled when a baby is 2 months old. Kaleo’s death certificate says “unknown” which I’m told is SIDS according to the medical examiner. I’m apart of a huge FB support group of other parents who too have lost their babies to SIDS and the number of babies who died from SIDS within 72 hours of being vaccinated is astounding and Heartbreaking.

I lost my son in a matter of minutes. I was laying with him cuddling and playing with him one minute. He was smiling at me and holding my finger and I was giving him nose kisses. He began to doze off to sleep and my husband peaked in the room and asked me to help him get our then 2 year old ready for bed. So I got up and walked in our kitchen and started washing out soppy cups for our older baby. My husband walked passed me and said he was going to bed since he goes to work at 5am. The water in the sink was still running and a second later I hear my husband scream for me. I didn’t think anything since he always yelled for me from the bedroom and would ask me for a glass of water or the remote. So I didn’t even answer him.

Seconds later he came running into the kitchen screaming with Kaleo. He was blue and limp. My husband kept trying to hand him to me but I was froze. I just stood there staring at him thinking it was a sick joke or something. My husband stuck his finger in Kaleo’s mouth to gag him thinking he might be chocking. Kaleo threw up breast milk and his color wasn’t blue anymore. He began CPR. Our oldest son came running into the living room to see the panic and asked where a phone was to call 911.

I finally snapped out of it and we couldn’t find a phone. So me and my oldest ran out the front door to neighbors houses to ask for help to call 911. No one would answer thier door. Finally my son got someone to answer. I was a couple doors down and see my son literally yank this man out of his house and beg him to help his brother and to call 911. I ran towards them. This man happened to be a doctor. He was so calm. His wife backed my husband away from Kaleo so that her husband could take over.

I swear it felt like a lifetime before the firemen and ambulance got to our house. But in reality it was just a few short minutes. When the ambulance left with our baby they said they had a faint heartbeat and they were breathing for him. I thought he was going to be ok. I honestly thought he was going to be ok. When we got to the ER there was cops there and they separated me and my husband to take our statements. After an hour and a half of waiting a nurse came and got me and said I could come back now. He warned me there was a lot of people working on him so not to be scared.

We walked back to the ER and I could see nurses flowing out into the hallway. Some holding each other’s hands. Some crying. Some praying and even some smiling at me like they were trying to reassure me. The two curtains were closed. I remember peaking through the little slit between the curtains and I could see my husbands shirt. I felt relieved he was already in there. I walked in but I couldn’t see Kaleo. Just his feet because how my husband was standing I couldn’t see him. I heard people counting backwards. 6-5-4-3-2-1. I didn’t know what they were counting at the time but I now know that they tried the very last intervention they could and if his heart didn’t start beating within a certain time frame they had to pronounce him dead. After the countdown the doctor looked at me and said “I’m so sorry” and my husband turned around and I seen my baby. Tubes in his throat and connected to so many IVs and machines.

I grabbed Kaleo as fast as I could and nurses hurried to unhook him from everything so I could hold him freely. I’m not sure what I was thinking at the moment but I turned to run with him out the door and this tall strong nurse grabbed me and hugged me and Kaleo. I dropped to my knees with my son and this nurse slowly set me down on the ground and sat there with me. I remember looking over to find my husband and he too was on his knees next to the hospital bed. Nurses were so good to us. We are Native American and we have certain customs and they were so respectful. We sat with him until about 4am. For hours and hours we sat and hugged him. We then had to go home and tell our older boys their brother was no longer with us.

In my statements to the detective and to the medical examiner I mentioned vaccinations and it was never taken seriously. When asked if the autopsy would tell us if it was a vaccine related death the examiner said that it was a separate panel and would cost us $2,500 out of pocket. We didn’t have that. Our sons funeral was close to $10,000. No parent who’s planning their child’s funeral is going to have an extra $2,500 laying around to get those tests done. Why is it not included in the normal autopsy? Why have to pay?”