Christmas more than a miracle for Carver family

12/22/2023

The Carvers gather for a summer portrait (from left) daughter Harlow, son Huxley, father Zach, daughter Sadie and mother Autumn.
(PHOTOS COURTESY 604 STUDIOS)

By Steve Page
Correspondent

For Autumn and Zach Carver, Christmas is much more than giving presents.

It’s all about giving thanks.

And the family from Franklin has more to be thankful for than anyone could know.

So much more.

They’re thankful Autumn and baby Huxley are alive and well.

That’s because they survived the Covid 19 crisis, when so many people were dying.

According to the World Health Organization, the disease has afflicted more than 100 million people in the United States, and it has killed more than a million of them.

That it did not take Autumn and Huxley is considered a miracle by the Carver family.

“We’re super blessed,” said Zach Carver. “The good Lord is looking out for us.”

“This certainly gives us a different outlook, not only on the holiday season, but every day,” said Autumn.
Those who helped keep the family going will be present at Christmas.

“We spend Christmas eve with my family,” said Zach, the son of Tony and Anita Carver. “I have younger brothers who are married with kids of their own. We meet at our house for dinner. We also sponsor a family to help with the community.

“Christmas morning, we’re with Autumn’s parents (Chi and Robin Lau). This is the first time we’ll have her parents and brother. We purchased a new home. We’re having Christmas here. Autumn likes to host. We’ll have a spread, I’m sure.”

This day was a long time coming.

“We think about where we were a couple years ago,” said Autumn. “We’re thankful for where we are now and what could have been.”

Autumn, then 35, was about to give birth to their third child in 2021 when she was struck down by Covid 19. Her case was severe enough that she was put on a ventilator and not expected to live.

Doctors performed an emergency Caesarian operation to deliver Huxley. Still, the odds appeared long.

“We were told in Indianapolis that in 50 or 60 days, she was going to die,” Zach said of Autumn’s chances. “She did die several times, but they brought her back.”

After starting her hospital stay on a ventilator, Autumn was clinging to life while hooked up to something called an “ECMO” machine. It’s an extracorporeal membrane oxygenation machine, which takes the blood, removes carbon dioxide and replaces it with oxygen before returning it.

Still, those odds remained long.

Until the first break came their way.

“Long story short, a gentleman who Autumn works for (at Northwestern Mutual) had clients, some in Chicago,” said Zach. One of them was Dr. Ankit Bharat, the chief of thoracic surgery at Northwestern Memorial Hospital in Chicago.

“It was not the best experience in Indianapolis, so we were anxious to get to that hospital,” Zach continued.

“Dr. Bharat was already famous. He had done the most Covid lung transplants in the world, all successfully. Dr. Bharat said get her here as soon as we can.”

They were hoping he could do a lung transplant for Autumn.

“He said regardless of a lung transplant or not, she was going to be fine. That was very exciting for us,” Zach said.

Dr. Bharat said even so, the odds remained frightful.

“When we took on Autumn, the probability was pretty low that she would get better because she had been on a ventilator and ECMO for an extended period of time,” he told People Magazine. But Autumn slowly recovered, and did not need a lung transplant.

“Dr. Bharat was amazing; the whole staff was amazing,” Zach said. “He helped save her life, no doubt.”

That’s just one part of the story.

Autumn was first hospitalized in late August. After the C-section, she did not see Huxley again until Oct. 19.

“It was pretty amazing!” Zach said of the emotional reunion that day. “The doctor said we can bring our son into the room. My mother-in-law was in tears. There wasn’t a dry eye in the ECU. It was much needed.”

“I remember that day; I remember the excitement in the staff,” Autumn said. “They were taking me out of isolation. Everybody was buzzing around, excited. I didn’t have a lot of strength. So I held him for a bit. That wore me out pretty quickly. Mom laid the baby on a blanket on me. He snuggled up and went to sleep. I’ll never forget that.”

Autumn kept improving so much that she was released from intensive care. She was then transferred to the Shirley Ryan AbilityLab in Chicago for rehabilitation.

Finally, after 100 days, Autumn returned home to her children, Harlow, Sadie and Huxley. While mom was hospitalized, the girls lived with Zach’s parents and Autumn’s parents cared for Huxley.

“I prayed every second of every day,” Zach said.
“The Lord opened lots of doors for us. God played a big role; so did our friends and family. Our parents were raising our children as we were fighting this.”

“Thankfully for me, I don’t have any memories of a lot of it,” Autumn said. “Unfortunately for those with me, they’re carrying those memories.”

“Luckily, we have an amazing group of friends and family.” Zach said. “Both our workplaces are amazing. They helped us go through what I call hell. It was tough, absolutely tough.

“Our faith was critical, no doubt.” The Carvers are members of the Rocklane Christian Church in Greenwood. Zach is an Army member who is a police officer in Indianapolis.

“This changed our lives. I was very career oriented,” he said. “I was always gone with deployments, chasing stuff at work. This grounded me. I’m not very far from her at any time.”

The Carvers believe there was a purpose to all this.

“To this day, we’re running into people who are bursting into tears,” Autumn said. “They say their faith has been strengthened, their life has changed.

Like Zach said, it was hell going through it. But good things are coming.

“It was nice to have a happy ending for some dark days.”