A BOY who weighed just two and a half pounds when newborn and wasn't expected to survive is now set to start at school.

Aaron Lewis looks like any other new start with his shiny new uniform at King's Oak Primary but this is a day his mum never thought she would see.

Five years ago his mum Lauren McDaid was in an ambulance en route to the Royal Alexandra Hospital in Paisley when she unexpectedly went into labour.

Paramedics kept her precious son attached to the umbilical cord and carried out CPR until they got to Inverclyde Royal.

The brave tot spent four months seriously ill in hospital but he survived - and is now fighting fit and ready for P1.

Lauren said: "We didn't think we would have had a couple of days with him, never mind see him go to school.

"I feel quite emotional.

"I never thought the day would come when he would be ready enough.

"But he's come through nursery and made lots of friends.

"He's surprised everyone, even the paediatricians.

"He's a miracle baby.

"I think that's why I didn't want to let him go - for the first four months of his life no-one else could even get to hold him."

The mum-of-two’s pregnancy had been plagued with difficulties before her waters broke at just 20 weeks.

The condition Lauren had is called pre-term pre-labour rupture of membranes (PPRM) and means that the baby and mum are more prone to infection once the protective barrier is broken.

There is also a risk of a premature birth, as happened with Lauren.

She says she was advised three times by doctors to have an abortion, to avoid a stillborn birth.

Lauren said: “At 20 weeks my waters had broken — so I had no fluids to protect the baby.

"Doctors were keeping an eye on me at the start and I spent weeks in the RAH — I only got out three days before giving birth.

“I was told the only chance of him surviving was to hold on until I was 30 weeks - and I gave birth at 27 weeks.

"I was told three times by doctors to abort the baby because I was told there was no chance of survival.”

The young mum was determined to give her unborn child a fighting chance but admitted she was terrified when he arrived in an ambulance three months early like 'a floppy doll, blue and not breathing'.

Once at IRH medics inserted a tube to clear his airways to try to get him to breathe.

A team of doctors battled to save the tot, with neo-natal experts drafted in from the Southern General in Glasgow, where he was later transferred.

He spent four months in intensive care being treated for chronic lung disease and a heart murmur before he was strong enough to go home.

She said: "Aaron was very very poorly at the start of his life.

"For 16 weeks he was given oxygen and all kinds of different treatment including hernia operations.

"In the first two or three years of his life he was in hospital 25 times to get oxygen."

Aaron also has a hernia in his belly button and suffers from reactive airway disorder bt nothing can hold him back and it has just taken him a big longer to reach his milestones.

Lauren said: "He is delayed in some ways in his writing and with some of his words but he gets there in his own time."

But the youngster, who has a big sister, seven-year-old Kaydey, managed to learn to ride his bike in time for school.

Lauren said: "I took the stabilisers off and within 48 hours he'd got it."

Like most mums she will be shedding a tear at the school gate.

She said: "I'm super proud of him. He's fought everything out of the park by a mile.

"The doctors kept telling us he might not survive and the odds were stacked 70/30 against him even after he was born.

"I'm so excited about him starting school and becoming a big boy.

"His dad Bryan is very proud and so are his grans, uncles and aunts.

"Look where he is now - we couldn't ask any more of him."