Emily Faith's Story Part III

Here is another installment of Emily's story:

During the first 15 weeks, there had been some minimal spotting, but it had always been really light and only lasted a day or so. So, when I started spotting two days after my first progesterone shot and it went on for several days I began to get worried. When I went in for my shot at 16 weeks I mentioned the spotting and the doctor saw me that morning. He was not sure what was happening, but did not seem concerned. The spotting stopped that day and was gone for several weeks.

Then, the Saturday before Christmas I started spotting again. It was heavier and so I called and talked to the doctor on call. He did not seem very concerned since I was not having any contractions. He told me to wait until Monday and mention it to my doctor. By Monday the spotting had stopped, so I mentioned it to the nurse and let it go at that.

The next few weeks were fine, nothing happened and I began to think maybe everything was fine and it had just been my body adjusting to being pregnant.

Then on Saturday, January 7, 2011, I noticed some spotting and decided that I would take it easy the rest of the day. By 11am I was actually bleeding and had passed a blood clot. This really worried me and I called the doctor on call. The doctor didn’t seem very concerned about my bleeding since I was not contracting, but he told me if I wanted to come in and be seen it was up to me.

So, we went to the hospital. We were there for 4 hours, during that time they put me on a fetal monitor, did an ultrasound, and ran a urine test to see if I had a bladder infection (which I did not).

They had a hard time keeping the baby on the fetal monitor because she was so small. But since the doctor could not find anything wrong they sent me home and told me to follow up with my doctor. By the time we got home from the hospital the bleeding had stopped. I took it easy the rest of the weekend.

Reflection: During the ultrasound the tech measured my cervix. We found out two weeks later that the cervix measured 4cm. 4cm was a good place to be at 20 weeks.

Emily Faith's Story Part II

Here is part two of my pregnancy with Emily Faith.

At 10 weeks (October 25, 2010) we had our first official doctor’s appointment. The doctor did another ultrasound to confirm my dates, and we got to see our baby’s beating heart again.

At this appointment we talked to the doctor about our concern over having another preterm birth. Maddie was born at 35 weeks and we never had any indication that I would deliver early. No contractions or preterm labor of any kind. My water simply broke at 35 weeks, which meant she had to be delivered.

The doctor told us that I fall into a category of 10% of women that they have no explanation for why they deliver early. It is not very comforting to have your doctor tell you “we don’t know why it happened and we don’t know if it will happen again.” However, the doctor told us that research suggested that a weekly progesterone shot, starting at 15 weeks and continuing through 35 weeks, helped prolong pregnancy in over 50% of women. Ron and I decided that we were willing to do what we had to do to make sure our baby had the best chance possible.

So, beginning at 15 weeks (November 29) I got my first shot. I got my last shot at 22 weeks (January 17).

Reflection: Looking back, it seems to me that November 29^th was when we began our up and down journey of emotions, doctor visits, and hospital admissions.

Good and Bad Days

Lately I have been thinking about each day in terms of was it a good or bad day. Today, so far is a good day. I woke up ready to get things done, and I feel like I have actually accomplished something today. Yesterday was a bad day. I cried for more of the day than I did not. I could not really pinpoint one thing that started the tears, but I have decided I don't need a reason. Just the fact that I just had a baby and that baby died, is reason enough. There was some fun yesterday though, I watched the Super Bowl with just our family. It is the first time I can remember that I did not go somewhere or have people over to watch the Super Bowl, but that was just fine.
Friday started as a bad day, but ended  as a good day. I started crying in the morning. One reason for this was that I had just finished writing out Emily's birth story and so I had gone back over all the details, and to top it off Ron had to go out of town for the day and would not be back until Saturday sometime in the afternoon. This was the first time he was going to be gone for any length of time since we had come back home over a week ago.
I did have plans for the day so I decided to keep them, even though my eyes seemed to be "leaking" without warning. Maddie and I left the house with me somewhat under control and then I drove by the cemetery, they were setting up for a burial, and I lost it again. Just thinking about someone else having died broke my heart again and made me think about Emily. I did make it to my friend's house and proceeded to cry as I talked to her for awhile. But she was wonderful and just let me cry.
Then that night another friend came over to just be with me and she brought a bottle of wine. I had told her that now that I was not pregnant that I really wanted to have a glass of wine, so she indulged me and brought the wine. It was so nice to just spend time with a friend and have some wine.
So far the last two weeks most of my bad days do get better at some point during the day. But the same can be said of my good days; some of them do end on a bad note. But I guess this is to be expected. I have come to the realization that I just need to take one day at a time and take that day, one hour at a time and I will make it though this time in my life.
I know that some of my family and friends are worried that I am handling all of the grieving "too well," but I want to assure you that I do indeed have good and bad days and I am trying to just go with each day and with each emotion.

Emily Faith's Story Part I

I have wanted to share about my pregnancy and Emily's birth for the last few days so I began to write, with the intention to share it with you. After several days of writing I have six pages worth of information. I am going to share most of it with you, but I promise to do it over several posts so as not to overwhelm anyone with too much at once. 

The Beginning:

We took a pregnancy test on September 14, 2010, and it was positive. I had been feeling more tired than usual, to the point where I almost fell asleep at the first MOPS (Mothers of Preschoolers) meeting. Even though we had been trying to get pregnant, it was still a bit of a surprise. We were thrilled to be expecting our second child.

From the beginning, the pregnancy was very different from when I was pregnant with Maddie.

At five weeks (September 20, 2010) I started spotting. The doctor’s office got me right in to see the doctor on call. They did an ultrasound and said everything looked great. Seeing that little beating heart for the first time was such a reassurance. There was no reason they could find for my spotting and told me that it was probably just “old blood.”

Reflection: We continued to hear the phrase “old blood” many more times during the rest of the pregnancy. The way the doctors talked about the “old blood” always sounded like an okay thing.  At least it was not “fresh blood.” When I think about it now, I think blood is blood. During a pregnancy it is not supposed to be present.

To be continued...

Panic

Tuesday marked one week since Emily was born and then went to be with Jesus. The morning I was released from the hospital two of the nurses from the NICU brought down a box with some pictures, a CD, several things that had been Emily's, and a card with her footprints on them. They told me that the CD had pictures that had been taken of Emily during the day and that night before and after she died. I am so glad that we had the chance to get pictures of just Emily, but also so pictures of both Ron and me holding her in the last minutes of her life. Once we got home I decided that I was not ready to look at the pictures so I had just out the CD away. But on Tuesday night I decided that I wanted to look at all the pictures. I put the CD in my computer and began to look through the pictures. It was not long before I realized that there were only about 30 pictures on the CD. I knew that the nurse had taken a lot more than that, in fact there were no pictures of Ron and me holding Emily. It was in that moment that I began to panic. How could they have not given us all the pictures that were taken? I look over at Ron and said we need to call the hosptial right now. My wonderful husband called right then and there and talked to one of the nurses in the NICU. She told him she would have to send an e-mail and would get back to us. About 20 minutes later she called back and informed Ron that there was indeed another CD and the social worker should have told us that it would be mailed to us in a few days. Apparently the pictures needed to be converted to black and white and this has to be done on a computer. I am so relieved to know that our pictures did not just get lost.

I will be sharing photos of Emily Faith slowly over time. Here is one of my favorites.

Holding Mommy's Hand

A Very Special Gift

Several years ago when Ron and I moved to Washington we were introduced to a couple through a mutual friend. The friendship with the mutual friend has ended, but we have remained friends with the other couple. John and Jaime live in Olympia, not far from Seattle, where I was in the hospital. We were so blessed to have them in our life. They took time out of their busy life to come and visit me in the hospital on Tuesday night. Then when they heard that I was going to deliver on Wednesday they came right over to the hospital. They arrived about 20 minutes after Emily Faith was born and the spent the rest of the day with us. They had a chance to meet Emily and just be a support for both Ron and me through the whole day.

Today in the mail I received a package from Jaime. Inside was a little jewelry box and a necklace. On the necklace is a cross and an engraved circle with Emily Faith on one side and Forever and Always on the other side. I cried when I opened it, it was such a perfect gift. Here are several pictures of the necklace and the little box.

Emily Faith

Forever and Always

jewelry box and necklace

You Would Never Know it Was 20 Degrees Outside

For the last several days we have been spending a lot of time at home. This means that Maddie has developed cabin fever and has been asking to go outside. I have been telling her no since it has been so cold; but today I decided to let her run around for a little while. She had a blast despite the fact that it was only 20 degrees outside today. Despite the cold, it felt wonderful to be out in the sun for a few minutes. So glad we were able to get our vitamin D for the day, now I would be happy with a bit more snow. Here are a few pictures of Maddie enjoying the sun.

I asked her to smile and this is what I got

She is just too cute

A very nice smile

Pushing her dolly



Looking over the wall



I love the light and her sweet smile