All She Ever Knew Was Love
Dezirae's MomI have always had two dreams in my life; one, to become a nurse and two to become a mother. By the time I was twenty-two years old I had fulfilled my first dream and I was excited to move onto my second.
Getting pregnant was not as easy for my husband and I as it is for many. After seeing doctors due to my menstrual cycle irregularities my husband and I finally started fertility treatments. My doctor told us we would "try" clomid and metformin for three months before moving onto something more invasive. By the third month I was skeptic that the drugs weren't working and I switched doctors. This new doctor prescribed an injection of HCG to jump start ovulation. He stated that if this injection didn't work we would move on to intrauterine insemination.
Being a nurse I thought that it would be easy injecting myself. When the day came the injection was all I could think of. I attempted to give myself the injection early afternoon and succeeded about 6pm before I was scheduled to go to work.
With HCG you cannot completely rely on a positive pregnancy test until about two weeks after the injection. Since I had months and months of negative pregnancy tests I thought it would be 'cool' to see what a positive looked like. I started taking tests about a week after the injections and by the third week of getting positives I had a looming thought in the back of my mind that this just might be the real thing!
My first ultrasound was so very exciting. I was finally going to be a mother! Up until this time I didn't fully accept the fact that I was pregnant but there was no denying the little flicker of the heartbeat on the screen! My pregnancy went without complications. I was so excited when my eighteen week ultrasound finally came around; I was finally going to know the sex of my first baby! My twin sister and her husband along with my husband were all there for the occasion. I remember the ultrasound tech navigating my belly and how beautiful my baby was. We learned that we were having a little girl and left that day ecstatic and trying to think of the perfect name for our daughter.
A little less than two weeks later I had my twenty week OB appointment. Everything checked out fine and the doctor stated they did not have the ultrasound results back. I didn't think anything of it as I was convinced if there had been something wrong I would have known at the ultrasound.
Four weeks later at my twenty four week OB visit I saw one of the midwives and we went through the motions I was already used to. Everything cleared out fine, as it had done with every prior visit and as I was walking out the door to make my next appointment I remember her flipping through my chart. She called out to me and had me sit back down where she then told me that six weeks prior at my ultrasound they found "something slightly abnormal with the baby's brain". I was flabbergasted!
Being a Registered Nurse working on Mother/Baby I knew that this news was not good. She then said "Lucky you! All this means is you get to have another ultrasound!" She gave me the information for the maternal/fetal medicine at the local hospital and I was dialing their number as I walked out the door. It was just my luck that my doctor's appointment was on a Thursday and the next week all of the doctors at maternal/fetal medicine would be out of the office for a conference. My appointment was set for two weeks.
My husband and I researched everything we could about ventriculomegaly and were confident that our little girl would have the 'mild' form and we chose not to worry. Then, late Sunday night around 11pm after my husband got home from work we were sitting down watching some TV when I got up to the restroom. It was there I noticed that I was bleeding bright red blood. We rushed to the hospital and by the time I got there the bleeding had subsided and the nurses could not tell me the cause. I was released around 3 am with instructions to be on modified bedrest for the next 48 hours. We went to bed and I woke up around noon the next day. Upon going to the bathroom again I stood and noticed that I was bleeding much heavier and I called out to my husband that we had to go back to the hospital.
I was scared out of my mind driving to the hospital because I knew this time that something really wasn't right. This time when we got there I was still actively bleeding. I was monitored and the nurse explained to my husband and I that I would be having the ultrasound that day to figure out the cause of the bleeding.
Around 3pm we finally got taken down to maternal/fetal medicine. After one ultrasound tech preformed an ultrasound she stated she would be "back". Shortly thereafter another tech came in "just to check on a few things" and this is when I got concerned. I finally asked "what the hell is going on!" He then looked at my husband and I and stated "I'm going to go get the doctor". The neonatologist came in along with the genetic counselor where then they told us that our little girl had severe ventriculomegaly, hydrocephalus and a possible heart condition. We also learned that she had a three vessel cord six weeks earlier and now she only had a two. The doctor explained that our baby would not have a normal life and she would have very, very severe mental deformities, she stated that she basically had "no front part of her brain".
The doctor recommended that we do an amniocentesis because she stated that usually when they see these symptoms it is almost always associated with a chromosomal abnormality. I remember sitting in this dark room with my husband after they left to go get prepared for the amniocentesis just crying and thinking how much I wanted my daughter. It was then that I knew that given this news we could not bring her into the world like this. I wanted a baby so bad but it would be so selfish to continue to pregnancy just to have her be born, endure many surgeries and then have a good chance of dying. I asked my husband to question the doctor about termination.
The amnio was preformed and we were then given information about termination by the genetic counselor. We were told that the hospital would not perform the procedure because my daughter wasn't dead and there wasn't a risk to my life if we continued the pregnancy. We were also told that we could wait another two weeks and a fetal MRI could be done but when I asked what the MRI would show that the ultrasound didn't I was told "nothing".
That night my husband and I stayed awake talking and crying. I knew in my heart what we had to do and the next day we called the clinic in Boulder. My family came up and was by my side for the whole procedure. I thought the third day (the day my daughter would be born) would be the hardest day for me. The first day after watching a video about the procedure I learned that they would administer a "shot" to make my daughter's heart stop. I was happy for this because I didn't want her to be born and then have to watch her struggle to breathe and then die. When I was watching the video I truly thought that they would give me the shot but I soon learned differently as I was laying on the exam table and the doctor was injecting my abdomen with an anesthetic, it was then I knew that they were injecting my daughter.
This was so overwhelming for me. I remember sobbing and the doctor telling me "we don't have to continue". It was then I looked at the picture on the ceiling of snowcapped mountains with a river and I realized if Dezirae was born and she saw these mountains she probably would not even know what she was looking at, and I gave the doctor the go ahead.
The second day there was protestors outside the clinic. Luckily, they didn't say anything to my husband and I. The doctor changed the laminaria from the day before. I was told that if my water broke or I had regular, painful contractions to come back to the clinic. I also got the okay from the doctor and staff to have my family come to meet my daughter after the procedure and for my sister to bring her camera so I could have pictures of my daughter. I didn't think this would be allowed due to the security at the clinic and them only allowing one visitor and no electronic devises. I also made the plans for my daughter to be cremated.
By that evening my contractions started. My husband knew that there was something wrong and wanted to take me back to the clinic. I told him I was not going back before my scheduled time the next day "unless I was bleeding to death!" I had contractions silently without my family knowing all night. By the next morning (September 25th) I had come to peace with everything and I decided today wasn't a day to be sad, it was my daughter's birthday.
We arrived at the clinic in the early morning expecting to be there for the remainder of the day. I was quickly taken in the back room where my IV was started and pitocin was administered. The doctor came in and broke my water to move things along. I remember him telling the nurse to "send that clot to pathology". I asked him what he meant and he said I had a pretty large clot in my amniotic fluid.
After he left the nurse placed a pad on me and I scooted up in the bed. Upon moving I thought more amniotic fluid had been expelled and I explained to the nurse that I needed a new pad. She checked me, her face turned white and she went to get help, I was bleeding heavily. The doctor came back in and told me that the procedure was going to have to be moved along and went to talk to my husband. The nurse was also told to start the process to transfer me to the hospital just in case the procedure couldn't be done or I needed blood replacement. My husband was then allowed to come into the procedure room for a few moments while they got everything ready. It was then my husband told me that most likely we would not be able to see our daughter as we had planned. They were going to have to "do whatever it takes" to get my bleeding to stop.
By the time the doctor came back into the room my bleeding had become much lighter. Once he started he stated I was dilated more than he thought and my daughter came into this world without much difficulty at 10:05am. It was then I was thankful for the contractions I endured silently. My husband met me in the recovery room where he then called my family to let them know Dezirae had been born and they were welcome to come. About a half hour later my family arrived and by this time I was dressed and my post-procedure instructions had been given.
My mom had given the staff a blanket that my grandma made for Dezirae and she was brought into the room swaddled and handed to her daddy. It was then I got to meet my daughter for the first and last time. She was so very perfect. She had the tiniest little hands with crooked pinkies and her feet so very small still seemed big for her body. She had her daddy's nose and dark black hair. She weighed 1lb 4oz and was 13 1/2 inches long.
I told her silently how much I loved her and how much she was wanted. I looked at every part of her and realized with her obvious deformities (she had a very large head for her age due to her condition) that I had done the right thing for my daughter. All she ever knew was love.