Parents Were Told Their Baby Born Without a Nose Wouldn’t Survive. 28 Surgeries Later, He’s Thriving (Exclusive)

Gray Canales, who defied the odds 22 years ago when he was born without a nose, now has a whole new life – and a new nose to go with it.

In this week’s issue of PEOPLE, Gray and his parents share his incredible story of survival and how the love of his family and their unwavering Christian faith got him through the toughest of times. “Nobody ever treated me any differently,” Gray says of his tight-knit church community, where he grew up with the same friends he’s had since childhood.

Gray’s arduous journey began when his parents, John, a minister, and Mary Jo, an office manager at their church, found out they were expecting their first child in 2001. Mary Jo’s pregnancy looked normal until her 20-week sonogram.

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“The technician was taking longer and longer, and then he went to get the doctor,” recalls Mary Jo, 53. “That’s when we knew something was up.”

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Even so, they were not prepared for what came next. Doctors told the distraught parents that they could not open the baby’s nose, and the chances of their son being able to breathe on his own, let alone survive, were slim. Further testing confirmed that the baby had no nose and was likely to have brain damage. He also had problems with his legs and feet.

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Gray Canales 4 weeks old, after skin graft surgery where his nose should have been.

Courtesy of the Canales family

They decided against terminating the pregnancy. “That wasn’t an option for us,” says John. Mary Jo adds, “We thought, ‘This baby is still our gift and our joy, and you don’t refuse a gift.’ But I kept crying. I had no idea if I was going to meet my son.”

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Four months later, Harrison “Gray” Canales was born five weeks early by emergency C-section. As expected, there was a gaping hole where his nose should have been, and he had no eyelids; his legs were turned more than 90 degrees and his toes were missing.

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Doctors also discovered he was born without the right frontal lobe of his brain, leaving his left side with partial mobility. But he was breathing on his own and miraculously, after only a week in intensive care, he was able to go home with his parents.

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“Every hour of the day was filled with something we had to do for him. There was a lot of worry,” Mary Jo recalls.

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She and John exercised their son’s legs and feet (Gray wore casts on his legs until he was 2), cleaned and dressed his nose area, and kept his eyes lubricated day and night until doctors were able to surgically attach his eyelids when was 6 months old.

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Gray at age one, with mother Mary Jo.

Courtesy of the Canales family

He is now 22 years old and has undergone almost 30 operations (11 on nose reconstruction alone). Despite the painful processes underway, Gray is a well-adjusted young man who enjoys watching baseball, listening to music, and helping out at his church. “I watch movies with my friends, play video games,” he says from the family home near Dallas. “No one has ever treated me differently.”

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Gray Canales in a basketball camp at the age of 13.

Courtesy of the Canales family

His parents, who educated Gray at home, devoted all their time and savings to ensuring that their “gift” had the best and most normal upbringing possible. “People say, ‘God gives children with special needs to special parents,'” says John. “But we were like any other parent, just dealing with each day as it came.”

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They instilled the same steadfast perseverance in their son. “We taught him not to feel sorry for himself,” continues John. “Because many other people also face disabilities. We told him: ‘God made you like this. That’s all.'”

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Mary Jo adds: “When Gray was younger, he hung out with everyone. He would go to people and say, ‘I was born without a nose!'”

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Although the family “drained their savings” over the years due to medical bills, “it was worth it,” she says. (To help donate to Gray’s nose reconstruction fund, visit: https://www.gofundme.com/f/gray-canales.)

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Rebuilding Gray’s nose was a complicated process involving a series of painful procedures, including grafting cartilage from his ribs and skin from his thighs and inserting skin expanders into his forehead so they could use the stretched skin during reconstruction surgery.

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Gray Canales, who plays the piano, has just two more “shaping” surgeries before his reconstructed nose is finally complete.

Cooper Neill

“Very, very few people have had to do full nasal reconstruction,” says Dr. James Thornton, a reconstructive surgeon at UT Southwestern Medical Center who first met with Gray in July 2021. “Just to make a base. [required] An 11-hour operation to transfer skin tissue from his hand. It’s very difficult.”

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Thornton’s colleague, Dr Jessica May, added: “It’s been amazing to see their commitment for over 20 years. His mom is always with him.”

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With two final nose jobs ahead of him, Gray — who plans to pursue vocational training with the Texas Workforce Commission to help others deal with disabilities — is ready for his future.

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“I can’t wait until my life is no longer interrupted by operations,” says the young man who, together with his parents, decided to shape his nose after his late paternal grandfather, who was an artist from New York. “I can finally start planning ahead.”

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To read more about Gray Canales and his arduous journey, pick up the latest issue of the magazine PEOPLE, now in the stands.

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