Baby Born Without Brain Celebrates Birthday!!!

Little Nicholas Coke is his family's Christmas miracle. The one-year-old from Pueblo, Colorado, wasn't expected to live after being born without most of his brain.

"He's a miracle," Nicholas's mom, Sheena Coke, told Southern Colorado NBC affiliate KOAA. "He's changed so many people's lives...read more contine

"He doesn't have a brain -- he just has the brain stem," Coke told the TV station. "He can't see, he can't hear, he can't suck … he doesn't have teeth for being a year. He doesn't crawl, he doesn't sit up."

But Coke said she sees emotion in her son. "He's smiling," Coke told KOAA. "We even got him to laugh for the first time and that was wonderful."

It's unclear what caused Nicholas's condition. Various birth defects can cause babies to be born missing most of their brains. For example, children born with anencephaly may have a brain stem, which controls breathing and certain reflexes, but no "higher" brain capable of thinking or emotion. Children born with the disease usually are missing a skull cap and die within hours or days of birth, according to the National Institutes of Neurological Disorders and Stroke.

In another condition, hydranencephaly, the skull covers a fluid-filled sac where the brain is supposed to be. Most children with hydranencephaly die before age one, but some may live several years or longer, according to the National Institute of Neurological Disorders and Stroke.

Both conditions occur when development of the embryo goes awry, possibly due to genetics, environment or nutrition, according to the American Association for Clinical Chemistry. Although this condition is particularly, taking 400 to 800 micrograms of folic acid before and during pregnancy may cut the risk of similar disorders -- known as neural tube defects -- by 50 to 70 percent, according to the Duke Center for Human Genetics.

As she celebrates Nicholas' first birthday, Coke said her happiness is fragile. "It's hard to know that I'm going to be burying my son soon, but it's wonderful to know he's made it a year," she told KOAA.

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