April's Life Adventures

Tuesday, November 08, 2005

Birth Stories

I had not planned on joining the recent craze of posting about birth stories, but here I am. I will not be including every detail because much of the story is quite personal. Here goes. My daughter is now five years old. She is a spitfire and loves life! We are so happy to have her as part of our family, especially when you hear the circumstances of how she came into the world. There you go... I have told you already that this story ends up happy, but know this, the ride to get to healthy was a rocky and tear filled time for me.

My husband and I were still in college when we became pregnant. Summer arrived and we decided to go live with his parents for a few months and get higher paying jobs. I saw my doctor before leaving and he did an early ultrasound just to make sure we would be fine for the summer. All systems go and we left.

While in California however, we still went into another doctor for office visits. He never indicated that anything was wrong with either me or my baby, so we assumed that everything was going well... How wrong we were. You see, this was my first baby, so I really didn't know what to expect. I was actually leaking amniotic fluid the entire pregnancy and I never even knew.

When we returned from our sojourn into the Californian wilderness, I immediately made an appointment to see our Doctor again. We were scheduled for an ultrasound to find out if we were having a boy or a girl. I was at 29 weeks genestation, I had plenty of time left before the baby was due. As the visit progressed, our Doctor became more and more quiet. He started saying very alarming things like "hmmm I can't seem to locate the babies stomach", or "now the baby should have kidneys there". Needless to say, he didn't have a strong enough ultrasound machine to figure out what was really going on, so he scheduled us for an appointment with a specialist the next day.

We didn't know what to expect when we got there. My Mom drove up and met us at the office and we were invited into the ultrasound room. Immediately the Specialist could tell that there was something wrong. He measured my placenta and the flow through it and deemed it "half dead". It was noticed that my blood pressure was spiked way higher than it should be, and I was labeled with Toxemia and Pre Eclampsia. They determined that we would be delivering within the next 24 to 48 hours.

I was taken into a birthing room to wait the two days. As soon as they strapped on the special stress test belt, they realized that my daughter was in serious peril. She was acting as if I were having contractions and I was not feeling a thing. Her tiny little body was under so much stress that they decided that I needed to deliver immediately or we may loose her. In the mean time, my blood pressure spiked again and they feared a stroke... One of those questions of how many strikes can you have against you and still live situations.

As I was whisked into the operating room, I was very nervous, and my husband was stunned into silence (which rarely happens). The first thing that I noticed was the feeling of peace in that room. The doctors had chosen to play a recording of The Three tenors which immediately put me into a relaxed and peaceful mood.

As the c-section progressed, they realized that my little one was smaller than expected. My placenta was not functioning as it should, so even though she was 29 weeks genestation, she was the size of a child at 24 weeks. We had lost 5 weeks of growth because I was not nourishing her enough. Also, she was tucked up under my ribs, so they had to cut me vertically as well as horizontally in order to get her out fast enough. For this reason alone, I will never be permitted to feel actual labor pains. If I ever feel labor, I am to immediately run to the emergency room.

We did not expect my little one to breath on her own at first. We were instructed before the birth that children born this early rarely breath on their own. She let out the most beautiful wail before she was whisked into the NICU. She did eventually go onto a ventilator. Several times in fact, but for the first 12 hours, she did it all on her own.

The rest of the story is filled with a roller coaster of ups and downs. Phone calls at 4 in the morning because another "procedure" was needed and I had to go sign a form to permit it. Everything from RSV to blocked intestines. To say that my little girl is a miracle would be an understatement. This is where I leave the story however because I need to keep some of the personal details out of this blog. Just know that I am so thankful for modern medicine. I and my baby would not have lived without it.

Posted by April_Mommy :: 2:36 PM :: 5 comments