After 30 weeks of a completely normal, healthy pregnancy, I found myself waking up November 6th with contractions and blood stains at 2:30 am. Before bed I had felt the baby drop; after some reading I thought this was normal enough and expected to spend the next 10 weeks feeling lots of extra pressure. Part of me felt like something was wrong, but part of me always feels like something is wrong so I let it go. I had been experiencing Braxton Hicks contractions very regularly for weeks, something the doctor reassured me was normal. so at first the tightening I was feeling didn’t worry me; I assumed it was just more uncomfortable because she was sitting lower.

The sight of blood upset me enough that my husband woke up. We called the advice line and started getting ready to go to the hospital. While I was on the phone the contractions increased in frequency; in the car I timed them at 3 minutes apart. Our almost 16 month old son Roman woke up with us happily at 2:30 am, seemingly excited that for once we were getting up for some action in the middle of the night. He was happy to watch Blues Clues for the whole ride.

T H E  H O S P I T A L

The frustrating thing about arriving at the hospital was the absolute panic I was feeling from what I knew was an emergency being greeted very casually by nurses who sent me to a room to wait another 15 mins for someone to come see me. When the resident arrived she checked my cervix and I was 4-5 cm dilated, so she directed them to have the attending Kaiser doctor come immediately.

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They started me on mag and gave me shots to strengthen the baby’s lungs. My contractions were increasing in strength while all this was happening. My pain and worry were upsetting my son so my husband walked him around the halls. We called my parents to come from NJ, since we had no one in the area to come watch him. Then the contractions seemed to stop, or at least the pain did. We were moved from triage to a labor and delivery room, and we became hopeful that they were successfully halting the delivery. My son played with clean plastic pee cups and resisted all attempts at sleep. His pleasant behavior through the whole experience on only one 30 minute nap amazed us.

Then the contractions came back, more intense but less frequent. The doctors seemed to be seeing more action on the monitor than I was really feeling. They ordered me an epidural in case of an emergency c section. They directed the anesthesiologist to administer it while I laid on my side so as not to put more pressure on my cervix and rupture my waters. This made things very difficult for him — it took about 45 minutes and was very uncomfortable, a completely different experience than the brief painless epidural I received with my son’s birth.

My husband had to take our son out to the car to get some diapers. The epidural wasn’t kicking in so they hadn’t catheterized me, and I asked to use a bedpan. I noticed more blood. They came back and checked me again and I was fully dilated. Suddenly the room was full of people — people moving and speaking very quickly and nervously. I was alone and I felt panicked and couldn’t stop crying. All of the panicking people kept telling me to relax. They rushed me down the hall. The epidural still wasn’t kicking in. They moved me onto the operating table. I heard hem considering delivering her vaginally;then they could see her leg coming down the birth canal and finally put the mask on my face to administer the general anesthesia.

During my first pregnancy, with my high hopes of a natural birth, this was exactly my worst nightmare. Obviously a baby born this early is a thing worth fearing, but just the idea of being asleep for my baby’s birth, not seeing them or holding them, missing that experience… that was my worst fear. But as they wheeled me down the hall all I wanted was to be put under. I didn’t want to hear them panicking, I didn’t want to suddenly feel like things might be about to go horribly wrong.

P L A C E N T A L  A B R U P T I O N 

It all happened so fast. Just two weeks prior we had a perfectly normal ultrasound. As it turns out, I had a placental abruption. I have no risk factors for a placental abruption, and I will never know why this happened. What I do know is how incredibly fortunate we are that the doctors brought our 30 week 3 day old baby out into the world safely. She was placed on a ventilator, but by day 2 is now off of it, breathing on her own with some oxygen tubes in her nose and handling it well so far. She was born at 3 lbs 2 oz, 16 3/4 inches long. Her heart is strong and her tests have been coming back fine.

I feel strange and helpless. When my son was born I experienced such an intense rush of hormones and attachment being separated from him for his brief visits to the nursery for tests (which my husband always accompanied him on) felt unbearable. He spent all of his time lying on my chest and I felt like I had to be watching him always to make sure he was breathing, as if he couldn’t do it without me.

This experience is completely different. The first day they brought me to her for 10 minutes while they moved me to my recovery room. I wasn’t allowed to go back to see her until after they could take out my catheter at 8 pm. I almost wasn’t allowed to see her that night at all — news that brought that same rush of panicked tears back, so they had a doctor come talk to us and she was happy to approve of the steps necessary to allow us to visit. On the second morning they had taken her off the respirator right before we arrived at the NICU so I was able to hold her for the first time.

I need to hold her more. I’m eager for the coming days when she’ll be ready for kangaroo care. When we can bond. Right now she has a full head of dark “preemie” hair and the sweetest little feet and hands I’ve ever seen. I feel rushes of emotion sometimes. I feel sad that she has to go through this. I feel guilty and confused. Mostly, I truly feel grateful. Grateful to live in a place with access to medical care and technology that allowed my daughter a life that otherwise would have been lost. I feel optimistic. I haven’t actually allowed myself to think about anything but positive outcomes. I feel surprisingly comfortable taking things day by day, which is probably due to how good the NICU staff is at easing our worries. It is very strange having to put your child completely in someone else’s hands, the complete trust necessary, but I do trust them. I trust them to take good care of her, I trust her to keep pulling through, I trust my son to adjust to the upheaval of the challenging weeks ahead. We were told to expect her to be here for 6 weeks. They say the estimate discharge around their full term date. We don’t have a plan yet, we’re taking things day by day.

This is my very fresh birth story update, and I hope to be sharing more of our experience and good news soon.

I love hearing and reading stories about other preemie experiences, so please do share, we are grateful for advice!