Oh baby boy! You are the baby we almost didn’t get to have.
First, getting pregnant with you seemed like forever especially when we were in the middle of grief and felt that our baby should have been with us. A few months of meds to help momma get regulated. And then finally, a positive pregnancy test! We were overjoyed and gut wrenchingly freaked out all at the same time.
We announced that we were pregnant “early” because having Millie taught us that every life is worth celebrating. Plus we knew we would have lots of people praying for you and us.
At 10 weeks along we did the genetic testing to see what you were. And you were a BOY! Didn’t see that coming at all. Anna was not excited at all. Poor girl still so badly wanted a little sister.
Pregnancy after loss is hard enough, but at 13 weeks I started bleeding big time. I thought I lost you completely just standing from the recliner where I was napping to walking to go to the restroom. We rushed to the ER in hopes by some miracle you were still there. I didn’t believe it when the doctor said that you were still there and was unsure of why all the sudden bleeding.
We started seeing a Maternal Fetal Medicine doctor that did regular ultrasounds to check on the placental bleed and to check on the progress of it healing. After 3 months of “modified bed rest” otherwise known as bedrest, but you can stand to shower, make a quick meal, and sit up for periods of time, I was able to roam the stores again without the electric scooter. Still supposed to take it easy though.
Every time we would go to the normal doctor, Dr. W., you would always be hard to find and I would nearly have a panic attack each time they would be looking for your heartbeat. At times they would give up and just look at you with the ultrasound machine. We had many stress tests just for good measure and the same, you would always get off the monitor. My belly was like a jungle gym to you. You would flip from head down in the ultrasound room, to side ways in the exam room, to head up in the stress test room all in one appointment. I was just so happy that you were alive and moving. But every time they couldn’t find you it took my breath away I swear my heart would stop.
After all the appointments including a very highly specialized LCSW (hello major mental struggles), dietician and endocrinologist (stupid gestational diabetes) we finally had a date down on the calendar to have you a few weeks early to try to prevent any extra bake time for unknown complications to arise. At our last appointment we found out that you were head up and needed to be flipped to deliver normally. So on the date of induction we would arrive early in the morning to have you inverted and then start the induction.
Not to our surprise, when we arrived and was checked by ultrasound you were turned the correct way! So the induction was underway, but just as you would have it, you were on the move and could not be found on the monitors for too long. It was a goose chase to find you every 5 to 10 minutes and it was terribly bad on my worries and fear. Every time I couldn’t hear your heart beating it drove me crazy. Finally, the nurses busted out their old school feeling techniques and determined that you flipped back head up! They rolled in the ultrasound machine to confirm and it was so scary watching them try to figure you out on their screen. They called Dr. W. just to come in and confirm for himself and yes they were right you had flipped head up. So then the options were to try to turn you back and keep going, or have you by cesarean section. I knew this was a sign that something could be wrong and I didn’t want to take that chance so cesarean is what I picked. I really didn’t want to be cut open, but I knew I couldn’t handle losing another baby.
Cruz was born via c-section at 6:49 pm weighing 8 pounds 8 ounces. The process of having a c-section honestly wigged my out, but if not for it I really don’t think Cruz would have made it as twisted in the cord as he was when he came out. To this day he still has markings on his arm from it.
Leave a Reply