In 2017, Chris Nesin, a pilot for a private jet company, learned he had Stage 3 colon cancer a few days before his daughter was born.
His family’s troubles multiplied when baby Effie suffered a traumatic brain injury, apparently due to a lack of oxygen flow, during the birth. She remained in intensive care for more than a month.
Fast-forward seven-plus years, and the life of the Nesin family is still being shaped by those weeks in early 2017 when the walls seemed to be crashing in.
“Initially, it was devastating and chaotic and overwhelming,” Chris Nesin’s wife April Nesin said in a recent interview at the family’s home.