By Carole Munday, Bude, Cornwall UK
PROM at 15 weeksDelivery at 31 weeks + 1 days.
Story added: 2003-09-18

At the 12 week scan the consultant noticed what might have been an enlarged bladder. I was sent to a specialist who confirmed this and advised that the bladder be drained or back pressure would damage my baby's kidneys. At 13 weeks a needle was passed through my abdomen and into the baby to drain what they now thought was either a kidney or the bladder. When I returned to the hospital the following week it was discovered that there was no fluid around the baby. I had an amnioinfusion. Most of the fluid was lost quite quickly. A week later I reurned and again there was no fluid. The conclusion was that my baby's kidneys were not working and therefore he (I had karotyping done on the drained fluid so I knew it was a boy) would not survive. Even if they were wrong about his kidneys then his lungs would not develop to sustain life, he would die from pulmonary hypolasia. I had 2 choices, terminate the pregnancy or continue and let nature take its course, on the understanding that the outcome would undoubtably be very sad.

My husband and I for various reasons decided to continue. From then on a fabulous consultant, Mr. Andrew Wheble, did everything he could for me to enable the pregnancy to continue for as long as possible. I had another amnioinfusion, bed rest in hospital, antibiotics to reduce the risk of infection, steroid injections to enable the lungs to develop if it were possible, bed rest at home, and each time I saw him I would discuss what I had found on the internet(this site was of tremendous support because although I knew it was likely that my baby would die I knew that it wasn't certain).

I also developed placenta previa! but this may have been a blessing in disguise because after I stopped bleeding I stopped leaking for just 10 days between 24-26 weeks.

To cut a long story short, Sam Andrew Munday was born at 31 weeks weighing 3lbs 13ozs. He was delivered by emergency caesarean (I went into spontaneous labour) on the 18th of july this year. He cried when he was born and had APGARs of 9. He was in special care for over a month but breastfed exclusively from 32 weeks. He has his right leg in a splint as it was squashed in the womb and bent the wrong way when he was born but it is repairing nicely and surgery seems unnecessary.

My advice is : stay positive, if you can visualise a happy outcome, rest as much as possible, accept all medical help but don't believe everything they tell you (especially if it's bad news), lean on family, friends and your faith.

We don't know why Sam survived, there is no medical explanation, but I feel that he is a blessing to us all and I hope that his story brings some comfort to anyone in a similar situation. Please feel free to email me if you want more details of my experience.