Jayce ‘continues to make an impact’

A Minnedosa family whose lives forever changed when their infant son died last year chose to honour his legacy by giving back to the Neonatal Intensive Care Unit at the St. Boniface Hospital.

Emma and Colton Spraggs spent 40 days in the Winnipeg NICU with their son Jayce, who was born at 25 weeks and three days old, weighing one pound and eight ounces.

“When you think about it, he was essentially the size of a pound of butter, and we really weren’t sure if he would survive the birth or not,” Emma told the Sun. “It took the health-care team roughly six hours to stabilize him on the ventilator after being delivered.”

The family said their time in the NICU felt scary and uncertain.

Emma experienced complications early in her second trimester and had an emergency C-section on March 2, 2025.

Jayce struggled to get enough oxygen, and his lungs weren’t functioning properly, Emma said. He was diagnosed with cystic periventricular leukomalacia — an injury involving damage to the white matter tissue around the brain’s ventricles, causing small fluid-filled cysts to form.

The parents were told that Jayce was likely to develop the most severe case of cerebral palsy and would have visual, hearing, motor and cognitive impairments.

“Based on what we knew would evidently be his future, we decided to palliate him, and kind of withdraw that life-sustaining support,” Emma said.

Jayce took his last breath on April 12, 2025, in his mother’s arms while surrounded by family and a dedicated team of doctors and nurses, she said.

“We have a lot of distressing memories and moments in that building, obviously, but it’s really the place that provided the utmost love and care for him. It’s really all he knew, and it’s something that we won’t really forget,” Emma said.

The Spraggs family wanted to give back to the St. Boniface Hospital NICU to show their gratitude and continue Jayce’s legacy. They held a memorial golf tournament fundraiser on June 6 to mark the one-year anniversary of his celebration of life and original due date.

More than 160 golfers registered to play an 18-hole, four-person scramble at the Minnedosa Golf & Country Club.

The generosity of the community that continues to rally behind the family in their healing “blew us away,” Colton said, noting they had raised more than $58,000 through the tournament.

He thought they would fundraise between $10,000 to $15,000, but community support poured in through donations, sponsorships, a raffle draw, live auction and 50/50.

Emma said raising that amount of funds exceeded their expectations and they feel grateful they can channel their grief in a way that makes a profound difference for families in the NICU at the hospital.

“He continues to make an impact even though he can’t be with us today, and that’s kind of our greatest wish as parents experiencing child loss,” she said.

She believed many of those who donated could connect with their story because they had a child in the NICU or knew someone who did.

The family plans to meet with members of the St. Boniface Hospital Foundation this month to discuss how the funds will be spent, Emma said.

“We know that there are many different areas of need on the unit,” she said. “We want to make an impact on the staff that are caring for the babies and how they’re best able to carry out their job, knowing that that in turn impacts the care that the babies receive and the support that the families have there.”

Although the family’s life was uprooted for several weeks during their NICU stay, they were able to lean on relatives living in Winnipeg and tried to maintain a consistent daycare schedule for their three-year-old daughter, Robyn in Minnedosa.

Not every family in the NICU has the ability to stand at the side of their baby’s incubator 24-7, she said.

The nurses and doctors went above and beyond to care for Jayce, Emma said, adding that when he died, some staff attended his funeral and the memorial golf tournament. These heartwarming gestures have comforted the family as they plan to welcome their third child at the same hospital next month, knowing there’s a chance they may need to access the NICU again, Emma said.

“I was very adamant that, you know, if I’m delivering a baby again, I want it to be there because we feel safe there despite everything,” she said.

Emma said she and Colton feel “terrified” and “scared” as they prepare to take this next step.

“There was obviously a lot of feelings about how to move forward after a big loss like that, and not wanting to replace Jayce, or, you know, pretend none of this ever happened,” she said.

Sharing their experience of child loss has helped them grieve and connect them with others who can also relate. Their healing journey hasn’t been linear, but regularly talking about Jayce and telling people they have two children helps, Emma said.

“Yes, it might look a little bit different in person, but you know, he really is our son, and always will be, and so we’ve kind of really leaned on that,” she said.

“There’s nothing that anyone can say or do to make what we’ve gone through better, and I think that it was just our family and friends that, you know, put their own discomfort aside to really just sit with us in that.”

The Spraggs family plan to honour their son’s legacy by hosting a memorial golf tournament annually to donate funds to the NICU.

» tadamski@brandonsun.com