Today is the day it all began. After not feeling any movements for over a day, I went to the doctors for a stress test. My appointment was at 1pm. The stress test indicated that the baby was under stress. Her heart rate was sinusoidal. There was no indication of activity. The doctor performed an ultrasound at the doctor’s office and the sent me to the hospital for further tests. The hospital ran another stress test and did another ultrasound and drew some blood for lab work. The lab work came back showing there was 113cc’s of the baby’s blood in my blood, which meant she was losing blood. They performed an emergency cesarean and Monique was born at 6:21pm weighing in at 2 lbs 9 and ½ ounces and 14 inches long. The doctors immediately gave Monique a blood transfusion. She received a total of 6 transfusions. Once she was stabilized, she was wheeled away to the Neonatal Intensive Care Unit.
After the epidural wore off, Dave and I went to visit Monique for the first time. It was a difficult but happy visit. She was connected to a ventilator and lots of IV’s and monitors. It was difficult to see her like that. The visit was a happy one because she was here with us!
No one knows just yet what went wrong. There was a breakdown in the membrane surrounding the placenta that controls the flow of nutrients from me to the baby. Apparently that membrane was allowing a reverse flow from the baby to me, causing her to lose blood.
