When little Grayson was born three weeks early, his oxygen levels were dangerously low. After staying in the prenatal incubator at the hospital for a few days, Grayson’s parents told him he was doing well and could go home. The family was blissfully relieved and thought they could go about their new life raising their child without fear – which, sadly, was not true. Only six weeks after taking Grayson home, his mom was sitting on the couch watching TV, holding her baby in her arms. When she looked down, she saw that Grayson had stopped breathing.

Luckily, his mom managed to turn Grayson over and pump on his chest in time. After a few moments, Grayson regained consciousness and began to breathe again. It was a close call and the family considered themselves lucky that Grayson’s mom had managed to revive him at all.

No matter how lucky they got, the one thing the family knew was that they weren’t going to let this happen again to Grayson. They were far too nervous to leave the baby by himself for even the briefest of moments – and that left them in a little conundrum when it came to sleeping. How could the parents let their baby sleep in his crib knowing that he could stop breathing at any moment?

After going to the doctor, the family made the decision to invest in an invention called the Owlet Baby Sock. Although the tool looks like an assuming sock, tiny for a babies’ foot and downright adorable, the piece of clothing is so much more than meets the eye.

The Owlet Baby Sock is actually a monitor that keeps track of a child’s vitals, mainly their heart rate and oxygen levels. The monitors in the sock are attached to a disc, which is set up on the parents’ bedside table and will light up in various colors when different things happen. For example, when a babies’ oxygen starts to drop, the disc will light up red and beep, alerting the parents that something is amiss.

Grayson’s own alarm has already gone off four times; each time his parents were able to reach him before it was too late. His parents credit the invention with having saved their son’s life on multiple occasions.

Not only does the sock have the ability to monitor babies and alert parents, but all of the babies’ information (from each night, no matter if there was an incident or not) is uploaded to the parents’ iCloud so they can track their babies’ progress.

Since Owlet launched in October of 2015, over 40,000 units have been sold and not just Grayson’s family has credited the invention with saving their child’s life. The product works best for babies who were born premature, like Grayson, who might have lingering problems with heart rate long after they leave the hospital.

Considering that 1 in every 10 births are premature, it’s clear that this amazing invention is going to be able to help thousands of vulnerable babies worldwide.

What do you think about the Owlet Baby Sock? To learn more about this revolutionary baby monitor, check out their website here.