I woke up during the middle of the night
to find out my water had broke. This
being my third pregnancy, I knew that's
what it was. We went to the L/D and was
seen by the doctor on call. He did an
ultrasound and said there was plenty of
fluid around the baby and every looked
fine. Go home, but don't have sex is
all he said. I knew I hadn't pee'd
the bed, but went home anyway. Three
days and several maxi pads later, I
called my OB and asked to be seen. If
it wasn't amniotic fluid, I wanted to
know what it was. A quick test done by
the dr. said it was and I was told to go
to the hospital. I was 20 weeks along.
After 3 days there, I met the
periotologist who said she would begin
seeing me after I got to 24 weeks, when
babies can survive outside. Go home on
bedrest and wait it out, but you'll
probably go into labor before then was
what I was told. I was seen by my OB
each week then and we could see pockets
of fluid, but no real accumulation.
Then came the day of the first appt with
the peri. She did a biophysical profile
and didn't like what she saw. Baby got
a 2 out of 10, which indicated immediate
delivery. That was the last thing I
expected that morning. We asked if we
could wait days or weeks, but were told
baby would probably be dead within a
couple of days. They didn't even want
us to wait the 24-48 hours for the lung
steriod shots to begin to work. Emily
was born at 1:15 that day (our
appointment was at 8:30 that morning)
weighing 1#2oz 11-1/2" long. We were
told her odds were 50/50 at that point.
After the first two critical days, we
were told that although she was still a
very sick little girl, she appeared to
be doing OK. She gave us 18 wonderful
days. On the last day of her life
(7-31-01), she had coded again and the
doctors told we should take her off life
support. She was on max life support
but was still slipping away. That was
an incredibly hard decision, but she was
fighting a battle she wouldn't win. We
didn't want to see her suffer anymore.
Her lungs were too bad. She had
several air leaks over the days prior to
her death. She has PIE and basically
just very premature and low birthweight.
We were at a level III NICU and the
doctors/nurses were very good and told
us everything we wanted to know and did
everything they could for her. The
first time I held my baby was the last
and that makes me sad. She is sadly
missed by us all. We're trying to move
forward but it's tough. I pray every
night for every other preemie or PROM
mom out there. Hang in there. There
are alot of success stories out there
and modern medicine is working new
miracles every day. Playing God isn't
easy.
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