I wanted to share with you a paper I wrote this past semester about our loss. The paper is about what our sweet gal had, ya know the medical side of the story, and since I've been saying that I'll share with everyone the story (& haven't) I thought I'd share something about her for today! So, I apologize that it will be in a paper format and it is very long but I'll share some of it anyway...
The next Tuesday I had a Dr’s appt at around 11 or so. It was the glucose screening test appointment and I was also to receive the Rhogam shot then also. I brought my step-mother and young son along with me that day, so I decided to get there a wee bit early to see if I could get started on everything so we wouldn’t have to wait too terribly long. It turns out, on that particular day, my Dr. was behind and it really didn’t matter that I was early or not. So after waiting about ten minutes after my appointment time I went to complain, because quite frankly I was in pain and getting tired and ill (remember I was still very swollen & getting bigger by the hour), and because we’d been there for about an hour already. The front desk lady was nice but not moved much; she did however get me the drink so that I could drink it and be ready for the testing when the time came.
Not too long after I was able to get the drink I got called back to the exam room. The nurse kindly took my weight, blood pressure, and asked what drugs I had been taking. She also took note of the swelling in my lower extremities. She then gave me the Rhogam shot as well as letting me listen to my gal’s sweet heartbeat. Everything was going ok until she measured my belly, I was measuring 42 weeks at only 29 weeks and she quickly said something isn’t right and went to go get my Dr. My thinking was that it was the end of the world because I was carrying twins and didn’t know it, boy do I ever wish that was the case because it was much worse than that! I was whisked to the clinic’s ultrasound room where the nice tech just stared at the screen for a while and I knew something wasn’t right when she wouldn’t let me see. She quietly got up called the Radiologist that was there that day and came back to wait for her. The Radiologist came in, looked at the screen, and then quickly left leaving the poor tech with me. It was awkward and quiet in that room while waiting for my OB that late morning and I just wondered what was going on. My Dr comes in and looks at my sweet child while standing over me and he is telling what is going on with her while I looks and moves the wand across my belly. Then he says the three magic words that catch my attention; “I’m admitting you.” And to make it even scarier he adds: “I’m releasing you to the high risk department.” Really?! Is it that bad? And will you please tell my step-mother that is sitting in the waiting room with my oldest child was my only responses. He answered some of my questions then but mostly when he was talking to all of us and then the wheeled me over to the hospital. I was quiet, wondering, and fixating on what had happened to my sweet girl and about the future.
By 7:35 that night our sweet Haley Joe was born via c-section due to the fact that she was dying in the womb and they needed to take her to save “both” of us. We heard her cry as she entered this world, but then she could not take a breath by herself so she passed as soon as they had cut the cord. I had them make pictures of her, an autopsy done so we could know for sure what had happened to her and requested to be able to hold her. We got to hold her for a very long time; I think it was after midnight before they took her lifeless body back to prepare her for the pictures. I remember feeling 90% better after she was born and everything but the morphine had worn off; it was a very strange feeling for sure.
By the time I went back to see my Dr, 4 weeks post-partum, the autopsy report was back. Haley had a blood vessel that popped in the placenta very early in the pregnancy- like at around 3 months. By the time she was 7 months gestation she became anemic and severe anemia does cause hydrops fetalis among some other things. We feel very blessed to have known our girl even if it was for just 29 weeks inside the womb and we are glad we got to know what happened to her.
In conclusion, fetal hydrops due to any medical condition can cause hurt, pain, loss, and usually ultimately death. There is a lot of help out there for a loss of a child & if you know anyone going thru this the best you can do to help them is to steer them to seek correct counseling and give them your love and support not just the days and months after but the years later.
