The Words I Never Thought I Would Hear
The last week before August 23, I had stopped feeling the baby move. I figured that he was moving while I was and assumed it was just a coincidence. I would feel him every few days but not as much as I had. Again, I am basically the opposite of a hypocondriac so I assumed it was nothing. On the morning of August 23, I called my Drs. office and said I had felt a decline in movement. They said to come in. Assuming it was nothing, I went by myself with a 22 month old. My husband was at work.
The visit started with my weight and blood pressure. I got on the scale and had gained 16 lbs. since my last visit 3 weeks earlier. I was beside myself. I really had not been eating a lot and could not understand. We even tried another scale. I waited for the Dr. to come in and worried about the weight gain. I was going to ask him to put me on a strict diet so I would not continue to gain like this. He came in and said he was worried about the weight gain and that my BP was up. He said he would want me to go to the hospital to be monitored. I panicked but didn't think anything was really wrong. He checked the babies HB and did he hear one. He brought in the sonogram machine and said that it looked abnormal, the baby appeared to have fluid in him. Again, this worried me but it never actually occured to me that something was REALLY wrong. He said that a specialist would have to look at the sonogram because he was not an expert. He sent me to Southside Hospital to be monitored. At this point my biggest concern was that I may be put on bedrest. I called my husband in a panic and asked him to meet me at the hospital. It was very hard to do this with a child under 2.
We met at the hospital and they monitored my BP and did bloodwork. I am still not really sure what was going on but they said that I was OK and sent me to a Perinatologist to look at the baby. We had been there for hours with a child who hadn't napped and was very cranky.
We went to the Pernatologists and they brought me in for another Sono. The Sono tech did it first and then the Dr. came in. They talked a lot and we could tell something was wrong but again it never occured to that anything was REALLY wrong. The Dr. said to us, I am going to get as much information as I can and then I will take you in my office and discuss everything with you. At one point we heard them mentioning the heart. My husband and I thought maybe something was wrong but they could operate after he was born. This was the worst scenario we envisioned.
After waiting in his office, he came in and said the words I never thought I would hear. "It doesn't look like this baby is going to make it." I will hear those words haunt me until the day I die. Everything he said after that seems like a blur. Something about fluid in the baby but not knowing what was causing it and not knowing what to do for him. He said we could go to the hospital and be monitored and possibly have an emergency c-section if the baby went into distress. The thought I had was, my 25 1/2 week baby needs to stay inside me to survive. That is a decision I still question. He was alive at that point and if he was born maybe he could have lived. In my heart of hearts I don't believe he would have lived and I think our suffering would have been far greater. However, I will always second guess if we should have given him that chance. If I had it to do over again, I would have tried to deliver him alive and prayed that he could take one breath. We chose the other route, wait it out and hope we could find out what was wrong in time to save him and wait until he was a little older to be born.
It was Friday evening and we would have to wait until Monday to have any tests done. Aaron's car was still at the hospital so we went and got it and somehow I drove my own car home with Noah in it. I don't know how I was even breathing at this point, let alone driving. The whole weekend seemed as if I was watching this happen to someone else. I called my Mom and asked her to come from Boston in case we needed her to watch Noah. I told my best friend that night but not many other people. I hardly even cried. I don't think I thought he would survive, but it didn't sink in. I kept saying, "if this happens, I will be OK". I was even afraid about how well I was handling it.
We debated trying to see another Specialist to get a second opinion. We also tried to research as much as we could on the Internet. I still can't believe that I survived this weekend (or even the 52 since).
Somehow I made it until Monday morning when we went back to the Perinatologist. This is where the inevitable happened. He said "I'm sorry there's no heartbeat". I had just let my baby die inside of me! A lot more than just my baby died that weekend. A part of me died with him. Sometimes I think the only good part of me died.  I wonder if I will ever feel like a whole person again.

Labor and Delivery

The Perinatologist called my OB who was at the hospital. We would have to decide how deliver the baby. We met him at the hospital. He mentioned that he had to check my BP because if it got to high, I would have to deliver immediately. He vaguely mentioned that if I was OK, we could wait for labor to happen naturally, possibly months. There was no way I could walk around with a dead baby inside of me. I still can't believe this could even be an option.
My first son was a c-section and I was hoping we could just do another one and get this over with. He explained that since I was not full term, a c-section would be more difficult and dangerous, etc. I agreed to try and induce labor. The next 2 days were a nightmare. My BP got very high and I had to be put on meds and have padding on my bed (in case of seizures). There were tubes and wires everywhere. I felt physically and mentally atrocious. By Wednesday morning (after 2 days in labor), my Dr. agreed to preform a c-section that afternoon if I had not started to dialate. During my stay in the hospital, I took Demerol whenever I could more to numb the pain, more mental than physical. I am not sure why but during this 2 days in labor there were times when I was not allowed to eat or drink. At 8:20 am on Wednesday, I took Demerol. Shortly after this, the contractions started to come closer and harder. By about 9:30, the Dr. said I was 3 cms and would only have to dialate to 6 because the baby was not full term. He said we were going to prepare for delivery. I asked about an epidural and don't remember getting an answer. As they were moving me the contractions started to get much closer and more painful. The Demerol did not seem to be working at all. I remember asking for something and they said that since it had only been 2 hours since I had Demerol I could not get anymore. This was probably about 10:30 am. The contractions were getting so bad. I told Aaron there was no way I could do this. The Dr. mentioned something about morphine but that never happened. I got ready to push and in about 2-3 pushes he was out. It was the most horrific pain I have ever known! My husband thinks the Dr. manipulated the baby more than normal to get him out faster which probably made the pain worse. I will never forget that pain. The placenta came just seconds later. The physical pain ended immediately after delivery though. I was bleeding a lot because the meds I was on. I remember falling asleep while grasping on to the side of the bed. Looking back now, I know my son was still in that room with us for a while. I never saw him. I did not think I could and the nurse came in and asked if we wanted to see him. She said he "wasn't in good shape" and didn't think I should see him. My husband saw him but didn't hold him. Again, if I had this to do over, I would have held him. I just didn't think I could handle it.
I stayed in the hospital for 2 more days to make sure by BP wnet down and everything was OK. I cried more that day after Kyle was born that I have my whole life. I have never felt so empty. The lyrics to a Smiths song kept going through my head. The line is "he was born and then he lived and then he died." That is not what happened to Kyle. Those words will haunt me the rest of my life as well.

I asked the Dr. for something before I left. He gave me a one month supply of Zoloft. I thought that would numb the pain. I figured if I could just keep holding off the pain, I could deal with it later.