Monday, August 24, 2009

The Story...

Many of you have been asking about the baby, so I thought I'd fill everyone in on what went on this week!
Monday morning I went to see the doctor because I realized over the weekend I hadn't been feeling her move as often as I had in the past. They did a non stress test, which showed the baby had a strong heartbeat, but it wasn't accelerating like it should with movements (which could mean a lack of oxygen). My midwife sent me to triage for more testing and an ultrasound. The tests were all showing the same thing, but she appeared completely fine on the ultrasound. They sent me home and told me to come in again Thursday for a follow up.
When I got there Thursday, the baby was responding the exact same way and the nurse told me they were probably going to send me to triage again. I went to use the bathroom, and when I came back they had a wheelchair waiting for me and the doctor told me they would monitor me for a bit and if things didn't improve they would have to do a c-section. It wasn't until then that anyone made a big deal out of it, so that was a bit frightening!
My appointment was at 2:30pm and I sat in triage until about noon the next day. They monitored the baby through the night, but since none of the charts were showing any sign of distress, the doctors couldn't decide what to do. They didn't want to bring a 36 week baby into the world, but they didn't want to risk her life by keeping her in there! The next morning a specialist decided it would be best to bring our little girl into the world. Thankfully, she was still strong enough that they thought I could be induced and deliver naturally. They induced me around 1pm, and she was born at 6:58pm. She did so great, and her heart rate stayed at a healthy rate almost the whole time.
After she was born, the NICU doctor checked her out and said she looked great! As the night went on however, she never really got a lot of color, so they took her for a few tests, finding that her hemoglobin level was dangerously low. She was sent to the NICU where they gave her a blood transfusion and tried to figure out what had happened inside my womb to make her heart not accelerate and why her hemoglobin levels were low. Thankfully the doctor told us all along that it wasn't life threatening, but had to be fixed. After blood work on me, they came to the conclusion that her blood was moving through the placenta into my bloodstream (apparently it happens briefly during childbirth normally, but it had been going on for a while with her). When they looked at my blood, it was full of her blood cells as well (there is a much better explanation, but I can never remember the medical terms). It was the right decision to induce me, as this could have been deadly to Elliana.
She is doing WONDERFULLY in the NICU and they plan to release her tomorrow! Her hemoglobin levels are staying where they should and everything else is looking great!
It was hard to not have her in the hospital room with us, and bond with her in that way, but the NICU is great with allowing us and guests to see the baby. As hard as it was to be released and come home without her, I am thankful that I will have two night of sleep before I jump into the whole newborn stage again. I'm feeling great and am honestly grateful for this time to recover and prepare to bring her home. We hadn't expected her this soon, but I'm very glad to not have another 4-5 weeks of pregnancy. We can't wait to have her home!

2 comments:

Unknown said...

God is good!! Thanks for the update! I'm sorry all this is happening but God is a good leader! We're praying for you all!!

Christensen 5 said...

thanks for the story. We will keep praying for all of you! We are so glad she is here safely.