My pregnancy with Paul seemed like a normal pregnancy. We were very happy when we found out we were expecting; everything was going so well, although I did tend to worry a lot. I was a preemie (32 weeks), so I always worried about something happening. I had an occasional problem here and there, but it wasn’t a big deal. A red flag for me was not gaining weight. I lost a total of 13lbs while I was pregnant. My "problems" were always brushed off as me being a worried first time mom.
May 10th started off as every other day. I got up and went to work as a federal officer at NASA. Throughout the day I had cramps that kept getting worse and worse. I kept brushing them off, but one of my fellow officers encouraged me to call my OB, so I did. He said it was ok. I got off of work and went home to lay down hoping the pain would stop. It didn't. I woke up, and the pain was worse-cramps about 2-4 minutes apart-and I had these weird urge to "push". My husband and I rushed to Holy Cross Hospital where we arrived after 30 minutes in rush hour traffic. I was taken to triage; I was so confused and scared. The hooked me up to monitors, but the monitors picked up no contractions at all. I will never forget the look on the doctor’s and the words that came out of his mouth "Get her to L&D stat, she is fully dilated and I see the baby’s head". At this point we were in complete shock. All I could think was “why me, why us?” But they kept reassuring me; everyone was trying to stay strong for me.
As they were prepping me for delivery they lost his heart beat. They found it again by time we got to the OR; he was in distress and they had to perform an emergency cesarean.
I remember waking up in recovery with my OB standing over me. The first thing I said was “Is my baby ok, is he alive?” I was so relieved when he said; “Yes he is in the NICU and stable.” Paul Daniel was born May 10, 2007 at 10:06 PM - 14 weeks early. He was 1lb 13.9oz and 12 3/4 inches long. The first time I met my son was 3 days later, Mother’s day. The next 80 days were a blur, some I wish not to remember. Paul did well, at 12 hours old he was extubated and did well for about a week, then he went in to full respiratory failure. They told us he was not going to make it through the weekend; words we never wanted to hear. We were so scared, depressed, hurting. We just wanted to help our baby, we would have done anything and everything we could to keep him with us. We had him baptized. For about two weeks he went back and forth, up and down, good days, bad days. Eventually he made a complete turn around and was extubated for good. From there it was mostly up hill. Finally after those 80- days he came home. He came with oxygen and an apnea monitor, but it was the best day of our lives; we were so relieved. The happiness was short lived when Paul quit breathing and turned blue. He had to be rushed to Children’s Hospital by ambulance where he stayed for 8 days. After that hospital stay it was all up hill improving more and more every day.
Paul is now a healthy, happy almost 4 year old. He does suffer from chronic lung disease, asthma, reflux and obstructive sleep apnea. He also has ear tubes from chronic ear infections. He is caught up developmentally.
To this day we still do not know why he was born early, but since then we have had another child who is now 14 months old. I found out with my second child that I have incompetent cervix. I was able to carry him to 37 weeks with the help of a cerclage, 20 weeks of strict bed rest and the 17P shot.
Paul has exceeded so many people’s expectations. We are so blessed to have him with us here today.
Heather Kane hkane@marchofdimes.com
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