My Sweet Emma Kate

Katie87 - 12:20am Apr 3, 2012 EST

Hello Everyone- I am writing a short story as oppose to a blog as I started a blog and cannot manage to keep up with it really so I figured getting my whole story out at once would be best. Before you begin reading please know that my comma key does not work so I apologize in advance

I am 24 years old and have always wanted kids. My husband and I were trying to wait at least five years after we were married to start a family but God had other plans for us. We were married in September of 2009 and Emma Kate came in October 2011. I can already tell you that this is by no means going to be a short story I found out I was pregnant on May 5 2011 after taking about five tests at a friend's house and then confirming it with a blood test at a local Patient First. I couldn't believe it as I was on birth control but somehow messed up I guess. I was scared mostly of what my family would think as we were still trying to get on our feet and living with my parents. When we met we both stopped going to school so neither one of us have college degrees. I was excited to be a mom but it was hard to share the excitement at the time. My husband and I quickly moved out as soon as we could to an apartment in July.
    The whole pregnancy I did nothing but get sick and it wasn't just the morning sickness it was all day everyday. I had changed jobs in May and we moved in July and I had started a very stressful job at a call center in May. Everything was happening at once so I thought for a while some of my sickness was nerves as I usually got sick each day before going to work. By June my blood pressure started to climb and I did the lovely 24 hour urine while out of town at a wedding. The results were ok and I started on a low dose of aldomet. I would say a few months went by and my pressure went up a bit more and my dosage was increased. By September the swelling began. I would put my feet up and it would go down. Towards the end of September it began to not go down and I was really sluggish. I went in on September 28th for a routine appointment and my OB was located in a hospital. My bp was elevated and she said she would like me to go upstairs for monitoring and some labwork. I was pretty calm as she didn't seem too upset about it. I called my mom and my husband and they met me there. By the time they got there labs were already sent and another 24 hour urine began. One of the nurses pressed on my leg and it was like play-doh. Observation turned into staying overnight. I was already a high risk pregnancy as I had a Pulmonary Embolism when I was 16 so I was going to a fetal specialist for ultrasounds frequently to monitor that as well as I had a cleft lip as a baby too. This doctor was also located in the hospital. They decided they wanted to do an ultrasound so they sent me to do that and the specialist gave us the grimm report that I was not going anywhere and that I was going to be delivering very soon. I was in tears as well as my mom and my husband was the rock that he always is thankfully. They told us Emma Kate was two lbs at this point and gave us the survival rates etc... I knew someone that delivered at 24 weeks twice and her boys are now healthy.

A night turned into days as protein was extremely high in my urine and my pressures were up and down but mostly up. I was on two bp meds now. I was a wreck and selfishly was thinking and expressing the whole time how scared I was for myself as my track record and family history is scary enough. I knew Emma Kate was strong and feisty as she was always active and loved to make me sick all the time. I thought she would have a much better chance then I would. I was scared of how long the doctors would wait; how sick would they let me get. Meanwhile; I was a human pin cushion with labs everyday and fortunately they had enough time to give me steroids for her lungs and rounds of magnesium which was nasty as some may know. A NICU doctor came to talk to us about delivering this early and I just could not concentrate on what he was saying at all at this point. They put me on heparin injections instead of the lovenox thinner that I was on in case they needed to deliver heparin would be ok to have with an epidural. I had decided though they gave me the choice of either; to have a c-section.
   My pressures were not going down and October 3rd I had worked myself up they loaded me as much as they could with medicine to calm myself down. I slept through the midnight vitals but apparently my bp was extremely high and the next thing I know the nurse says we are delivering at 8am. How could I sleep now? I was numb and nervous. I was in a fog that morning as they prepped me and then they came to take me back to the OR. Little did I know I was going in there alone to get the epidural and then they would send my husband in. I wanted to turn and run as I walked in and saw many people and tools. It took them three tries to get my epidural in and I was crying and could not hold myself up anymore; I said you guys are just going to have to knock me out I cannot take this anymore. Finally they got it; I was so swollen it was an obstacle and the doctor was about to make the decision to knock me out but fortunately was successful. So it began and my husband talked and asked questions the whole time to the anesteologist(sp) I was just laying there and it felt like they were ripping my insides apart. I knew I would feel pressure but this was the weirdest sensation I had ever felt. They pulled her out and I didn't hear her cry but my husband did and he was able to walk over and touch her finger. I saw her ride by in the isolette but that was it. The hardest part was sitting there while my whole family got to go see my baby and not me. I saw pictures only that first day.
  Bright and early the next morning they were ripping me out of the bed putting me in a wheel chair to go see her before another admission was coming in the NICU and I couldn't see her. I was in so much pain and discomfort and not steady at all. When I got down there and saw how tiny she was I began to cry and then I felt faint and everything the NICU nurse was saying I could not hear so I was taken out of there quickly.
   Emma Kate was intubated and has iv's and leads on her. She was under a billi light off and on for jaundice. I would say a week and a half went by and she was put on c-pap and we consented for a pic line which was hard because I hated for her to have to be pricked yet again. I forgot to mention that Emma Kate was 1 lb 14 ounces and 13 inches long. She had some retractions on the cpap after a few days and they talked about intubating her and that initiated breakdown #2 for me. The second hardest thing was to ask each and everyday if she was out of the woods; was she going to be ok and absolutely NOBODY could tell me! The next obstacle was Emma had a PDA and they were treating that with embicin in hopes that it would close and avoid surgery which completely freaked me out. Luckily it closed and then she began small gavage feedings. I was giving her my milk at this point.
  I was discharged from the hospital on October 8th and was extremely weak and sick. The day before leaving the hospital I lost my job that I had not had for that long and was also subject to a whole lot of lab work to make sure the hypertension was not something I had before pregnancy and did not know. When I got off the phone with my employer; in walks the lab tech to take about ten vials of blood! I was a mess and so bruised already that she could not find anything to poke but alas she did and I did well. Leaving the hospital was hard but I was so tired and weak I was also ready to go home. Leaving without a baby was hard and coming home with her ripped out of me and all alone in the NICU was a nightmare. We went to visit a couple of times a day and I called to check on her twice a day. I had to be wheeled back to the NICU as I was so weak I could not walk far at all. My husband returned to work and my dad came over each day to take care of me although I felt like most of the day I was held up in my bedroom pumping and getting hardly anything as some of you may know. I was pretty strict as to who could come to the NICU and eventually decided just our parents could come. I made everyone get a flu shot and stayed away from anyone who was sick. I did not let anyone hold her other then my husband and I .

The first time I held her was like holding a feather; she was all wrapped up and I could not see much of her little face due to the cpap and feeding tube. I cried of course. My husband took a while to hold her he was nervous. He eventually loved to do kangaroo care with her. It was so hard not to rub her but instead just to gently touch her. Emma Kate did not have too many setbacks fortunately other then a very sensitive stomach and reflux. Her stomach would become destended and they would xray and sometime stop her feedings or give her pedialyte. This went on frequently and caused her to slowly gain weight and also they were slow on increasing her feedings. Emma Kate moved to a high flow nasal cannula and was on that for a few weeks then moved to a low flow nasal cannula. Unfortunately I do not remember how long she was on each. Emma Kate was anemic and was put on iron and also they began to give her MCT Oil to help her gain weight. I hated change as in we were in the same bed spot for the majority of her stay and then they moved her to an annex of the NICU and I was upset thinking she would not have the same nurses and was just out of the comfort zone. Emma Kate was not as sick as other babies and the annex was used mostly for the overflow of babies that were not as needy. She did have lots of apneas and bradys associated with her reflux but before she graduated to a stepdown unit she was almost on room air. She was taking partial feeds by bottle and doing well! Her sucking reflex was strong from the beginning