I remember how hard it was for us to get pregnant; we had thought it would be so easy when we finally decided. I was diligent about taking my temperature every morning before I got up, so after several high temperature mornings and no period, I was ecstatic!
I was so careful about everything I did, I exercised and walked everywhere and ate only the healthiest foods. Since I was over 35 years of age when I got pregnant, I had to have an amniocentesis done. I was scared to death – there was a risk of complications, but we went ahead. My doctor at the time was amazing, explaining everything along the way – no surprises. Although I was only 15 weeks along, I had a lot of movement going on inside me. The results came back and we were told everything was great; we wanted to know the gender, so we were told we were having a girl.
By 32-34 weeks everyone kept asking me when I was due because I was so big. The baby was growing very well; I was just running out of room and I had 5 more weeks to go!
Apparently, she had other plans and wanted to make an early entrance. One night, I told DH that I was having horrible pains but they were not contractions, so we went to the hospital. Once we got in and settled they hooked me up to the monitors to check the baby. She was fine, turns out that her weight [she had just dropped] was compressing one of my ureters and that sent them into spasm so eventually my contractions started, although I never felt them.
Instead of going home I was put on a drip to help everything along. I had a great team of doctors, and although my own doctor did not deliver my baby, I was in the very capable hands of his wife [who is also a doctor]. We had a team of paediatric doctors and nurses standing by, as was procedure because my baby was 5 weeks premature. They were there through a fair chunk of the last 10 hours of my labour. When I finally delivered, I had a beautiful, very healthy baby [I think the paediatrician was a little put out that the baby was so healthy, since he had been there so long and wasn’t needed].
I was anxious to get home with the baby but wasn’t sure if they would let us go because she was a preemie [she weighed in a 6 lbs 5 ounces and was 21in long] and she did not have a very strong sucking reflex; we had to feed her with a syringe. My doctor discharged us, but we were to come back within a couple of days and have the baby’s bilirubin checked because of her prematurity and inability to suck really well. Turns out it was a little high, we were told to have her lie on top of one of us without anything on, in front of natural light[phototherapy]. My DH took this job on as he generated a fair bit of body heat and lying down in front of the window without his shirt on would cause a little less sensation than if I did it.
As I mentioned, my doctor was amazing. He called every day, and he even came and made a house call to make sure everything was going well. I was very lucky, things could have turned out differently, but my doctor was always there to make sure I had the help I needed.
Not every mom gets the care that I received; I would love to see more moms get the care they need for themselves and their babies. That is the reason for this post and several others that are being posted simultaneously today on behalf of Moms4Moms and EveryMotherCounts.org to spread the message, hopefully globally.
Some Staggering stats:
Did you know?
• One maternal death every 90 seconds — in the U.S.!
• 15% of all pregnancies result in complications during labour and delivery and sometimes are fatal.
• Pregnancy is the biggest killer of girls ages 15-19.
• for every woman who dies in childbirth, 20 more suffer from debilitating complications.
• we have the knowledge to prevent 90% of all maternal deaths.
EveryMotherCounts.org is a campaign to increase education and support for maternal and child health.
Moms4Moms is an initiative started by Holly Pavlika, founder of the blog Mom-entum, and executive vice president and managing director of Big Fuel that asked “what if moms got together and said “Instead of a big gift, buy me a small present and donate the difference to the cause.”
Read more here
As moms, we have a very powerful voice, let’s make a difference.
Heartwarming story! That was no preemie. that was the size of my kids! You’re lucky you had such a wonderful doctor; you had excellent care.
Thank you, I was lucky! I know, you should have seen the look on the pediatrician’s face when she was born. He was a little annoyed she was so healthy and big! At one point they thought I was diabetic because I was so big, but no. According to the dr. if she had been full term she would have weighed in almost 9 lbs! Yikes!