Virginia Hughes didn’t get the same start in life most other children get. Born at just 23 weeks, she weighed 13 ounces and was given a five-percent chance of survival.

But now a bright 5-year-old, Virginia is in pre-kindergarten at Oakland Elementary School. Asthma is the only health issue she will have to live with.

“Developmentally, she’s advanced compared to any of the other students in the class,” said Erin Hughes, Virginia’s mom.

“She’s ahead of where they’d expect her to be, even if she was born normal.”

Before going to Oakland, when she was in private in-home day care, Virginia would get sick a little more than normal.

“She was exposed to more children and her immune system was not quite that of a normal child,” Erin Hughes said.

“This year has been better than last year, which means her system is keeping up. She’s getting better at fighting those illnesses.”

A previous Suffolk ambassador family for March of Dimes, Erin and Josh Hughes credit the organization with helping Virginia survive.

Virginia came early after her mom went to the emergency room and learned she had eclampsia, which causes seizures.

Despite doctors’ attempts to stall the delivery, Erin Hughes went into labor and gave birth to a baby girl shorter than a Barbie doll.

Not long after she was born, doctors reassessed the alarming five-percent prognosis and increased Virginia’s odds to 75 percent.

The preemie was given steroids to strengthen her lungs and surfactant to keep them open and working.

During her 18-week stay in The Children’s Hospital of the King’s Daughter’s neonatal intensive care unit, the Hughes did everything they could to keep the situation as normal as possible.

“We treated it as if we had a baby and we sent out birth announcements,” Josh Hughes said.

“I still had my baby shower after she was born, and we still continued with the normal things,” Erin Hughes said.

“On Halloween, we dressed her in a Halloween costume. The nurses helped us. We did family pictures at Christmas.”

The Hughes family still works hard to support the March of Dimes, which will be held at Constant’s Wharf Park on April 27 to raise money for the special treatments and devices that keep premature babies alive.

They help set up before and clean up after the annual event, Erin Hughes said.

“We do our best to try to raise money, because we know that the research is truly life-saving, because without it she would not be here,” she said. “There’s no doubt in our minds.

Registration for the event is 9 a.m., and the walk gets underway an hour later. For more information, email jstump@marchofdimes.com or call 383-8824.