DANIELS — Three months before his due date, Dakota Shane Bragg was born with fused-shut eyes and little black toes.

His mother, Hollie Bragg, gave birth to the 11-inch, 15-ounce boy at only 25 weeks’ gestation.

“He was due June 25, 2009, and was born March 13,” said Bragg, who lives with her husband Daniel and three children in Daniels.

“I had two seizures from eclampsia on the 12th, but had shown no signs of it,” she explained. “I went to the doctor a couple days earlier and everything was normal.

“I just had a bad headache.”

Bragg was taken to Raleigh General Hospital, where she was stabilized and sent directly to Women and Children’s Hospital in Charleston.

“The baby had to be born,” said Patsy Dunigan, Hollie’s mother.

Dunigan says in spite of a grim prognosis, Dakota is doing fine.

“Of course, they tell you about all of the things that could end up being wrong with him, and he has had several surgeries” she continued, “but he has done really, really well.

“He had a lot of prayer, everywhere, and I feel like God has really blessed us.”

“The whole thing was just unexpected,” added the boy’s father, Daniel Bragg. “One day everything is fine, the next day it’s life or death.

“The doctors pretty much wrote him off before he was born, so to see him come through all of his surgeries and grow and develop to be perfectly fine, well, it’s just a flat-out miracle.”

Bragg says he knew Dakota would make it all along.

“I know doctors are the best at what they do,” he said, “but sometimes you have to look a little higher than medicine to find the true answer.”

According to his mother, doctors feared Dakota would be mentally impaired, deaf and blind.

“He sees, he hears, he’s almost crawling,” Hollie Bragg said. “He’s doing everything a boy his age should be doing.

“He’s our little miracle.”

Dakota, who was discharged from the hospital on July 6, 2009, has not been admitted since.

He will celebrate his first birthday this month.

“We are excited because he’s not been allowed of the house,” his mother said. “They told us to wait until he was at least a year old because he could catch a cold and end up back in the hospital.”

Turning 1-year-old on March 13, Dakota now weighs about 12 pounds and goes for normal visits to his pediatrician in Beckley.

“He’s doing great,” his mom said. “He has blond hair, blue eyes and, most importantly, a big smile.”

— E-mail: cclark@register-herald.com