At 15 weeks, my wife woke me at 3:00am
with the words ‘something’s wrong’.
Turning on the light, I saw the
outline of a large amount of fluid on
the bed sheet.
I’ll never forget her saying to me ‘I
think I’m losing the baby’ and how at
that moment I was both calm and
distressed. I looked at my wife’s
eyes and saw a similar expression – a
calm reservation thinly masking a deep
fear. We didn’t know quite what was
happening, or if we truly were losing
the baby.
I suggested that we ring our midwife.
For a minute or two, we wondered if we
really should call her at that time of
the morning. She had told us to call
her at anytime if we really thought
something was wrong, and at that
moment, we really thought something
was wrong. Our midwife asked my wife
a few questions, and said that she
wasn’t sure what had happened. She
had never heard of anything like what
we were describing having happened to
any of her patients before. She said
we could either go to Emergency then
or in the morning.
We decided to go then rather than wait
for the morning. As we stepped out of
our apartment, I noticed that there
was the lightest of rain falling – at
any other time, it would have been
beautiful.
At the hospital we were seen by a
young obstetrician who after scanning
told us that she was 95 percent
certain that everything was okay.
There was, according to her, plenty of
fluid around the baby, and whatever
fluid had been lost, she didn’t
believe that it was amniotic fluid.
Just to be sure though, she asked us
to make an appointment to have an
another ultrasound as soon as
possible.
We were lucky enough to make an
appointment for 2:00pm that day. When
we saw our baby, the heart beating and
arms moving, we both started crying
with relief. Even though we had been
told that everything was most likely
okay, it was such a relief to see him
in such detail. After 10 minutes, the
ultrasonographer said ‘I’ve just got
to check with the doctor to make sure
that there are no more images they
want before I let you go’.
When she came back, her first words
were ‘as you know, you’ve lost a lot
of fluid and they want you to go
straight up to the antenatal unit.
They’ll take care of you there and a
doctor will come and see you soon to
talk to you about your results’.
Although we had never completely
escaped the sense that everything was
not quite right, now for the first
time people were confirming that
something was seriously wrong.
It took some time for us to see the
obstetrician on duty. I remember when
she walked in to the unit, she looked
in our direction, and asked the
nurse ‘are they this one’, referring
to the notes she had in front of her.
The look on her face was as serious as
I had seen any face that day. I
turned to my wife and said what we had
both been thinking but hadn’t dared to
say since the night before, ‘something
is wrong’.
The obstetrician, when she saw us,
told us that there was ‘less fluid’
around the baby and that this wasn’t
good. She didn’t seem to move beyond
that level of detail for some time
until we asked her exactly what she
meant by ‘less fluid’ and ‘not
good’. She told us that they only
found one pocket of fluid (AFI 1.3)
and that it was likely that my wife
would miscarry in the next 24-48
hours. If the miscarriage did not
occur, there was a significant risk of
the baby being born without the
ability to breathe or with serious
neurological and physical
defects.
My wife burst into tears and
instinctively both myself and the
obstetrician reached out and held her
in our arms. The obstetrician just
said, ‘I’m sorry, I’m so sorry’.
After a few minutes, my wife stopped
crying enough to know that we had to
figure out where we went from there.
We were told to make an appointment
with their fetal medicine unit first
thing in the morning but to come in
before that if my wife felt any
contractions or experienced any
bleeding.
As we drove home, trying to absorb
everything we had been told, I started
sobbing while driving. My wife
comforted me and I saw that it helped
her to comfort me. Over the next
couple of days we took turns at
breaking down and comforting each
other. That night at 3:30am my wife
leaked again.
When we did see the fetal medicine
unit the next day, and had our care
transferred to a fetal medicine
specialist, we were told after the
scan that they had found two pockets
of fluid (AFI 3.2). One of three
things could happen: my wife would
miscarry; or the baby would be born,
but without the ability to breathe or
with significant physical and
neurological defects; or the rupture
would heal, fluid would re-accumulate,
and the pregnancy would progress and
the baby would grow and eventually be
born, though when, they couldn’t say.
We were told that a decision to
terminate didn’t need to be made until
the baby was 20 weeks, that viability
was 24 weeks and that the chances of
survival increased significantly and
continued to increase from 26 weeks
onward. If we could get to the 32
weeks, there was a very good chance
that the baby would be born with the
ability to breathe so long as the
fluid re-accumulated to the level
needed for lung development to
occur.
We were also told that if we wanted to
terminate then and there, that we
could, but we didn’t need to make that
decision at least for another 3 or so
weeks. We decided to wait and see
what both my wife and my baby’s bodies
decided to do. We desperately hoped
that the rupture would heal, that
fluid would re-accumulate and that
eventually we would have a healthy
baby.
When we went home and started to do
our own research, we realised the
chances of that happening were very
slim. Spontaneous ruptures, we read,
were less likely to heal than those
which occur after amniocentesis. We
also knew that the chance our baby
would make 24 weeks let alone 26, 28,
30, or 32 weeks was very slim, but we
didn’t want to give up on our baby.
There were moment, brief moments, when
I thought seriously about
termination. I don’t know if they
were moments of weakness – but I do
know that the desire to see my baby
make it, in the end, always obscured
any commitment to a termination.
That evening, my wife leaked again for
the third time in as many days. But
this leak occurred while she was
awake. On every other occasion, she
had been sleeping. It occurred to her
that the other leaks and this one had
happened after she had been lying on
her left. We decided then to avoid
lying on the left and thought that
lying on the right would be best.
The next day, my wife leaked again,
but after having gone beyond the
perpendicular while on her right. We
then decided that lying on her back
and with her left slightly elevated
were the only two positions to lie
in. The resultant back pain over the
next weeks was difficult to manage.
Massage helped, but the pain would
always return. The positive was that
my wife seemed to stop leaking
altogether after that point.
A week later, the fluid levels had not
increased. But neither had my wife
miscarried. Another week passed and
the fluid levels had increased
noticeably (AFI 5.4). Our doctor told
us that she thought the rupture had
healed and that she hoped we had
turned a corner. She told us to come
back in a couple of weeks. Two weeks
later and despite not having leaked,
the scan suggested that our fluid
levels were back where they had been
when this first happened (AFI 3.2).
We were thrown back into confusion and
uncertainty. Our doctor ordered
another round of blood tests. A week
later and the blood tests gave us no
cause for concern and the fluid levels
were up again (AFI 8.4). We were told
to come back in another three weeks.
Thankfully, this time the fluid levels
were the same as they had been three
weeks before (AFI 8.5).
We reached 24 weeks a week later. The
first of our milestones. A week
later, my wife woke early complaining
of contractions. We rang the delivery
suite who told us to come in straight
away. After the examination we were
told that the cervix was closed and to
go home. The contractions came and
went and then stopped about 12 hours
after they had first begun.
Two weeks after that my wife noticed a
larger amount of fluid in her
underwear. We went to the hospital
again and saw the obstetrician that
had first told us that she was 95
percent certain that everything was
ok. After an internal, she said that
she thought everything was ok but to
contact the fetal medicine unit and to
bring forward our appointment.
Our next scan suggested that the fluid
levels had been maintained (AFI 9.1).
We breathed a sigh of relief. Week
after week passed without incidence.
Our doctor believed that the leak had
certainly healed and that we could be
fairly confident that our baby would
be born without any serious problems.
There was a chance that he could be
born with dislocated hips. And there
was also a chance that our baby might
not be able to breathe – our doctor
simply could not rule it out.
Our baby was also in a breech
position. We hoped that the little
one would turn in time but in our
hearts we knew that the chances were
slim. We tried acupuncture, swimming,
walking up stairs sideways – nothing
worked. At 34 weeks we were asked if
we wanted to try External Cephalic
Version (ECV) once we reached 36
weeks. Having made it this far, we
declined. We just decided to have a
caesarean delivery. We were told that
an ECV had a 1 in 200 chance of
developing complications and for us, 1
in 200 was too great a chance to
take.
At 38 weeks and 2 days, we went to
hospital hoping that the caesarean
delivery would end with a healthy baby
entering the world, screaming and
breathing. Unfortunately our little
boy’s first moments were without a
heartbeat and not breathing. A code
was called. My wife could not see
what was happening and I had to talk
her through what was happening. All I
could say was ‘he’s struggling...
he’s struggling’. We both wondered
whether the initial loss of fluid had
occurred at that critical moment when
his lungs were developing and realised
that this might be the end of his
life. I can recall thinking that even
if it was, he had already brought us
much joy. The medical team hadn’t
given up on him though, and just
before the code team arrived, they got
his heat beating and his little lungs
working.
I saw and heard him cry and the
doctors started saying ‘he’s ok, he’s
ok’. In less than five minutes, he
was in my wife’s arms. He weighed
3165 grams. He was alive. Within an
hour he was feeding.
Tobias Micah is now four days old. He
did not need to spend any time in the
nursery. He is very strong, hates
getting his nappy changed but settles
almost immediately once he has been
changed. We can already tell when he
wants to be fed and when he wants to
be changed. There are two distinct
cries. Otherwise he sleeps very
peacefully.
My wife is expected to leave the
hospital tomorrow with our little
boy. We never expected to get this
far. We feel so blessed. Like so
many others, the stories on this site
gave us so much hope. Our hearts
equally go out to those parents and
families who have not been so lucky.
But to be able to hold on to hope is
so important. There were times when
our difficulties seemed insurmountable
but my wife and I would always fall
asleep and wake in hope that we would
get through another day and then
another. And somehow we did.
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