My Baby Girl

I’m going to preface this post by saying it’s very long and emotional.

My daughter, my baby girl....

She is one tough little cookie.

She has quite the story to tell. I don't know if it's because I was told today at her preschool that she was going to be "moving up" to the 3 year old room, or if it's simply been on my mind a lot lately, but I am amazed by her daily. I also read Lori’s story of her babies over at http://hahnathome.com/, and it brought back a flood of memories.

To the casual observer, my little girl looks like any normal almost 3 year old. She talks all the time, she has blond curly hair, she is super active and is constantly on the move. This is a miracle to me.

When I first found out I was pregnant with her, I was completely terrified. I had been told by my doctor not to have any more kids. I became so sick with pre-eclampsia with my son, that they were worried for my life if I were to have any more kids. I felt very lucky to have one baby. I was happy with that.

Then one morning, I woke up sick. I remember this so clearly. I was exhausted. My husband jokingly said "maybe you are pregnant". I know I shot him a look. That day, I went out to lunch with my friend and told her I thought I might be pregnant. She knew what that meant for me, as well as I did. I remember her saying that maybe I should get a test and find out. So after lunch, I went to Target and bought one.

Next stop, the pharmacy to get my birth control pills. I put in my refill prescription, and thought I might as well take the test before I spent the money on my pills, so I went into the bathroom while I was waiting, and peed on the stick. Not to be too graphic, but before I even got the stick up to see it, both lines had already turned pink. Defiantly pregnant. I walked out of that bathroom in tears, birth control pills completely forgotten. I got in my car, drove home and handed the test stick to my husband.

We really didn't know what to do. I was more scared than I had ever been. I immediately thought, I can’t have this baby. I am going to have to terminate this pregnancy. I told my husband this, and he agreed with me. I called a clinic that day and made an appointment to go in two days.

When I went to the clinic, Planned Parenthood. I went alone. My husband was not able to go with me, because of our baby. We had absolutely no one to leave him with that day, and so I had to do this alone. I’ll never forget walking in that clinic. I don’t know that I’ve ever felt that vulnerable, or that sad. I filled out all the paper work. I sat there in that ugly blue room, on the ugly grey chairs and waited for my turn to go back.

Finally this very nice woman came and got me. We talked at length about why I wanted to terminate this pregnancy. She did an exam on me and then an internal ultrasound to determine how far along I was since I had no clue. ( I had been on birth control pills as well as still nursing my son). It turned out I was 13 weeks pregnant, and she said they could still do it.

I was then called into another room, to talk to the nurse. At that point, I accidently saw the ultrasound picture. I made my appointment to have the procedure done, and left. I didn’t make it to my car before I was in tears. I then called my husband and told him, “I can’t do this”.

Instead of being angry at me, he started calling insurance companies to see how our coverage would work (we had already bought a house in MT and were weeks away from moving and changing insurances). This was obviously going to be a high risk pregnancy. I’ll always be grateful to him for handling it the way he did. We were never opposed to having another child, but we had been told, by more than one doctor that it could be life threatening for me.

When we had made the decision to have this baby, I got in to see my OB very quickly, both because of my history, and because we were moving. They did another ultrasound on me, and the baby waved at me. I knew right then I had made the right decision for me. I’m not a religious person, but I am a spiritual person. I finally just prayed, “please take care of us”. I turned it over at that point, I had to trust that it would all be OK.

Fast forward 2 months. We were newly in our new home. I was 22 weeks pregnant. It’s funny, when you have had a preemie once, your expectations the next time around are completely different. I prayed to get to 28 weeks. I wanted more, but I knew that 28 weeks was when the baby really became viable and had a reasonably good chance at survival with minimal problems. I never expected to go full term, I just wanted to get to 28 weeks. Anything more, was frosting on that cake.

When I moved here, I had a new doctor, and looking back, I’m not pleased with the calls he made. At 22 weeks, I began spilling protein in my urine. I became even more terrified than I had been. This pregnancy really was not joyful for me. I talked to my baby, and told her to hold on. To wait. I prayed as I have never prayed before that we would make it through this.

I leveled out at that point for a about 5 more weeks thankfully. I was doing home urine dips and was running trace amounts of protein, but nothing super alarming. I was having weekly ultrasounds and was beginning to have weekly non-stress tests. The weekend before I was to give birth, I began getting sicker. I started dropping more protein in my urine.

I finally went into the hospital on Monday. I had a non stress test, and my doctor’s partner came in and basically told me that I wouldn’t be going home. I called my husband and told him. I told him to start packing our trailer, that we were going to be going to another city with a better (read: higher level) NICU in the morning.

I was being monitored constantly, and here is the part I don’t know that I’ll ever fully forgive my doctor for, I had to ask him for the Beta Methadone Steroid shot. He told me that if he gave it to me now, I wouldn’t be able to have it later. I know, in my best sarcastic sick voice, I asked him “what later are you talking about”?

I got the shot, but not soon enough it turns out. In case you are wondering what this shot does, it matures a baby’s lungs. I’ve been told, that in order for it to work the best, you really should have 72 hours on it. We got 20 hours.

I asked my doctor if I would be able to drive with my husband to the new hospital. He shook his head and said no, they were going to fly me. I don’t think I really realized how sick I was at that point. I still felt relatively OK. I was putting on weight though, at a rapid rate. I gained 40 pounds in less than 24 hours.

It was at this point, I was beginning to freak out. I was having blood drawn every 15 minutes, and my kidneys were starting to shut down.

Finally the morning came, and I was beyond terrified. I was being given medication for my blood pressure almost every 15 minutes as they were afraid I was going to stroke out. My blood pressure reached a high of 225/110. While they were getting me ready, I was a complete mess.

This woman came into my room. She was the student nursing instructor. She sat with me and held my hand. She helped me meditate. She rubbed my back and she told me that the doctor they were taking me to was an angel.

She said that he had saved more women and babies than anyone in the state of Montana. She told me he was really a human angel and I would be alright, that my baby would be alright. She saved me, that woman. I don’t know her name. I have no way of find her, but she saved me that day.

Finally, the air ambulance people got there, and the rush began. I was transferred to a gurney and taken to the ambulance. I remember I was so concerned they would forget my pillow and my cell phone charger and phone, since that was the only way I had to contact my husband. I was driven to the airport in the ambulance, and then put on the plane. The ride is a blur to me. I just remember them asking me questions constantly, as well as injecting my IV with medication constantly.

When I finally arrived at the new hospital, I was wheeled up to my room, and my new doctor came in to meet me. The nursing instructor was right. He was an angel. He sat on the side of my bed, and took my hand and held it. He smiled at me and said, you are going to be OK. I will take care of you. I instantly trusted him. He had kind truthful eyes. He had soft manner about him.

I told him that I wanted to wait until my husband got there, and he told me he would wait until 5:00 PM, but that if he wasn’t there by then, we were going to do it. I was too sick. He told me that. He told me that I was too sick to wait much longer. It was 3:30 PM at that point. I called my husband to find out where he was, and he was on his way. I told him what the doctor said. He told me he would get there. He was pulling our trailer, and had our 2 year old son in the back seat. His cousin was meeting him at the hospital to take our son. He made it into my room at 4:45 PM. He made it. I found out later that he basically threw the keys at the security guard who said he would park our truck and trailer, handed off our son to his cousin and ran.

My daughter was born at 5:11 PM on June 8th 2005. She should have been born on August 14th. She came into this world weighing 2 pounds 5.6 ounces. She had a hole in her heart. But she was the healthy one of the two of us. I bled out after the c-section and they had to go back in and do a second operation. I remember vaguely the doctor saying they might have to do a hysterectomy, and I said good, do it and I’ll never have to do this again. Needless to say, my tubes were tied during that c-section.

Our time in the NICU was hard. I didn’t like the baby’s doctor, I didn’t like the NICU, the one I had my son at in CA was much more progressive. One day I went in to see my baby, and the nurse on duty said to me, “oh, you are the one that almost died”. I looked at her, and told her I didn’t know I had almost died, and her mouth dropped open.

That NICU ruined the breast milk I worked so hard to provide for my daughter by unfreezing it for another baby. The doctor and I fought constantly and there were a few nurses I really disliked. I had them taken off the care of my baby.

Then there were the nurses that got me through it. The ones that I knew, when I left, would take care of my baby girl. I could go home and relax for a bit, I trusted them. But they were few. One was Jane, and one was Linda. They got me through this time. Your day can be ruled by which nurse you get. A good nurse, you can relax and get some rest, a bad nurse, you are at a vigil by your baby’s bedside, fearful and angry.

One night I went in, and the nurse on duty told me that I wouldn’t be able to hold my baby that night as she had a hard day. I broke down on her in hysteric’s. It all felt like too much.

She told me she knew I was upset, that she knew how I felt.

This was a nurse I didn’t particularly like, and I yelled at her, “you have no idea how I feel”!

In a very quiet voice, this young nurse took my hand, and said, “yes, I do”. I had a baby in the NICU for 7 weeks. I started crying and hugging her. I felt such relief to know she really did understand my pain and agony and feelings of being completely out of control.

I spent 3 days in ICU and 10 days in the hospital. I made it, and so did my beautiful little baby girl. She spent 8 weeks in the NICU and we camped the entire time so that I wouldn’t have to leave her. We brought her home on oxygen, apnea monitors, and constant medications. But we brought her home. I got to sit on my deck in the sun and hold my baby girl on the day she was due to come into this world.

I’ll never be sorry for what I went through to get this beautiful child. She is a joy to me. She is spirited. She is a fighter. It’s like, somewhere deep inside of herself, she knows that she has already fought the biggest battle of her life, and she knows she is strong.

So, when I was told today that she was going to get to move up to the 3-year old room, before she was 3, you can understand how proud I am of her. How lucky I feel that we came out of this as unharmed as we did. I don’t know that I’ll ever really get over the trauma of the whole thing, it changed who I am, but in the end, it gave me faith that I can make it through even the hardest, toughest times.

One thing I want to make clear, is that even though I chose not to abort this baby, I am very pro-choice. I have voted that way my entire life, and believe strongly that is a right. I don’t want anyone who might read this to misconstrue why chose the way I did. I chose what was right for ME. That is the beauty of choice in the end. Being able to choose what is right for you.

So there you go, that is the story of my second child’s coming. We made it.

Peace,

OC