The Early Days

This blog is started for everyone who kindly asks how we're doing along with Baby Ava. Thank you to everyone that has helped out in so many ways. We can't thank you enough and hope that some day we can either pay it back or pay it forward. =)

Ava's story starts on Labor Day weekend when we find out on Labor Day that I'm pregnant. We just moved into our house about 15 days before this. New house = new baby. Same thing with our other home in Buffalo - New house = Alexandra. The house is pretty much not settled in, and I become pregnant. We are hoping that this pregnancy can be easy on all of us and will go more smoothly than the other 2.

At 6 weeks, I start to bleed and I go to my obgyn. I have bled during my other pregnancies around 7 or 8 weeks, but not as early as 6 weeks. I see a nurse practitioner who has me go and get a blood test to check my HCG levels. I have to get another test in 48 hours to see if the HCG levels go up. The NP calls me late on Friday afternoon to tell me that I "without a doubt" am going to have a miscarriage because my HCG levels didn't double within 48 hours. At that time the levels did go up (they were 7500), but she felt because they didn't double that I was going to miscarry. (Note - I have since found out from Doctor #2 that once HCG levels are beyond 2000, that you can't diagnose a miscarriage.)

I continued to bleed and was probably in the doctor's office every couple of days. At 12 weeks, the obyn office had me go to a specialist's office for a sonogram. I had been to her office with my two other pregnancies. They checked the baby for down syndrome and her nuchal fold (spine) was a good measurement and so was her nose bone. For the first time, she took my blood to see if there was a chance for down syndrome. A week later, the specialist called me to tell me that my blood came back that I was 1 out of 78 women to have a down syndrome baby. It doesn't mean that the baby does have down syndrome, it just means that there is a chance. Typically for my age, the stats are like 1 in 200 or something higher than that. The specialist was very concerned by this and wanted me to have an amniocentesis at 16 weeks or another test you can take at 12 weeks. I told her that I didn't want to risk the baby just to find out if the baby had downs. She wanted me to still come in for a sono at 16 weeks to discuss.

At 16 weeks, I went in and they tried to talk me into having an amnio. I told them no. They continued with the sonogram and they couldn't decide without a doubt that the baby didn't have downs. They had me in tears and were totally scaring me. They told me to return at 18 weeks and they should be able to get a good view of the heart. I am still bleeding at this point and did continue to bleed until 20 weeks and a bit afterwards. I also was very nauseous and sick until 20 weeks with this pregnancy. My poor children were tired of mommy being sick. They also planned on having an EKG of the baby's heart at 22 weeks.

Also later in my 16th week, (this actually happened 2x, the first time a week prior), I awoke in the early am to feeling a rush of liquid come out of me. I would get up just in time to hit the bathroom, before (warning - this is gross) an enormous amount of blood would hit the floor making the bathroom look like a murder occurred. The first time this occurred I went to my obyn to make sure the baby was ok - and she was. Both of these situations were incredibly scary, but I actually did have something close to these incidents occur with my other two pregnancies.

At 18 weeks, after hauling my two ladies all over the 4 Disney Kingdom's by myself, Anthony and I returned to the specialist for a sonogram. The sonographer barely spoke to us, so we knew that something was wrong. All she said to us was "Have you had a fever or been feeling sick at all?" I had not, but was feeling rather well. The specialist came in soon after and told me that all of the amniotic fluid was gone. Our poor baby was squished, but her heart beat was strong. We still did not know at this time if the baby was a boy or girl. The specialist proceeded to tell me that the baby could die at any time and gave me many of the risks that could happen to the baby. She then said the words that will forever be embedded in my heart "You should just end this pregnancy and start a new one." She also told me that if I were her daughter that is what she would tell me to do. But Anthony and I felt that if the baby's heart was going to give out that it would do it on it's own and that we could never end the pregnancy. We left that office with an extremely heavy heart. I had an obgyn appointment a bit later that afternoon, so we figured that they would have a plan of action for us.

At the obgyn office, my appointment ends up being with a nurse practitioner again and not a doctor. At this point of the pregnancy, I was 18 weeks and had only seen a doctor once despite being a high-risk pregnancy. This nurse practitioner even had to leave the room to get advice from a doctor.

A day later, I was speaking to a good friend of mine, and she suggested that I get a second opinion. She recommended her doctor, so I decided to call the next day to see if I could get an appointment. I called in the a.m. and got an appointment later that afternoon. Because Anthony was out of town for work, my friend went with me to the appointment. I got in that day to see the doctor and get a sonogram. The doctor told me that you can't decide that a pregnancy isn't viable based on one sonogram showing the loss of liquid. He told me that he would recommend getting a sonogram every week to check the levels. I decided to switch to this doctor since I could be seen right away and that he didn't believe that the prior specialist's word was the way it would go.

At 19 weeks and on Christmas Eve day, I returned to my new doctor to find out that the amniotic fluid had an increased to a level of 8. A typical fluid level is between 12 - 24. The doctor did say this was good and that a baby can be sustained to full term in that amount of liquid. They also said that they baby was a girl. Anthony felt as though they could be wrong since it was still hard to see.

At 20 weeks, and a week later, the fluid fell to a level of 4.

At 21 weeks, the sonographer couldn't get a measurement of fluid because it was so low. We were heartbroken but we still had hope. All this time, the baby's heartbeat is strong and is only measuring a bit smaller than normal. The heart had 4 chambers and there seemed to be amniotic fluid in the kidneys and stomach indicating that those organs were working.

At 22 weeks and on Monday morning about 4 am, I awoke to another rush of liquid. I ran to the bathroom to see clear fluid this time. The doctor had me get some PH test strips to test the fluid to see if it was positive for amniotic fluid. The fluid tested positive for amniotic fluid. I immediately called the doctor's line, and the other doctor called back. They said they would call me in the morning and that I didn't need to go to the ER. The next morning came and I still hadn't heard back from the obgyn. I called and begged them to check and make sure the baby was alive still. They told us to come in and they would check. We went in, and a doctor quickly checked to see that the baby had a heartbeat and that there still was no amniotic fluid. Afterward, my obgyn came in and said that my membranes probably had ruptured for sure. He wanted to do an internal exam and double check. He then checked with the PH test strips which came back positive for amniotic fluid. The obyn then proceeded to tell us that I would need to go into Millard Fillmore Suburban Hospital to have the baby as soon as possible or I would get an infection and lose my uterus.

We really couldn't believe that it would happen as fast as the doctor said and he wanted us to come in that night and deliver the baby. He told us that I would lose my uterus and Anthony became very worried since he was so concerned about me. The doctor even talked about us having another baby and if I lost my uterus we would need my mom to be a surrogate mother for us. I told the doctor that I could feel the baby kicking me right now and how was I supposed to go in a deliver her, feeling her alive. He replied that he could have them give me a spinal. I don't think he understood what I was talking about. We discussed what would happen and that I would deliver the baby on the labor and delivery floor of Millard Fillmore Suburban Hospital and they would induce me and I would push the baby out. We had to ask him a lot of questions since he was not telling us what would happen. I told him that I had seen women on the internet that had ruptured their membranes as well, and they were in the hospital. He didn't want to go that route and he said that because my membranes had ruptured so early that there was no way the baby would be viable even at 24 weeks. He did not want to wait the 10 days. He repeatedly told us that the baby would never be viable at any point. Finally, because I was exhausted and had a headache from crying, I told him that I wanted to go home and take a nap and then we would decide what to do. We figured this was the only option, so we said that most likely we would be doing this since we don't want myself to get sick and die like he described or lose my uterus. He said that after he had another surgery that we would call us at 5pm and then we would meet him at Suburban.

We left and I called my friend Jessica about the situation. She asked what would happen to the baby and I said that I didn't know. We didn't know what they were physically going to do with the baby after she was born. Being that Suburban does not even care for preemies of that early gestation. Jessica also wondered why he wouldn't send me to Sister's or Children's hospital since they can care for babies that premature. Jessica was racking her brain trying to think of something she could tell me that would help, and she then remembered our friend from MOPS, Rachel, who is an obgyn nurse out of Sister's.

After I got home and was in bed, I called Rachel and left her a message. She immediately called me back and said that she didn't think we had to go this route and that she was going to talk to the doctor in her office. I only had to wait a few minutes, until she called back to tell me that the doctor said that he has plenty of patients with the same situation and you don't have to go this route. He said we should just come to the hospital to get looked at. I immediately got up and told Anthony we were going to the hospital. I called my doctor to tell them that we were going and he told the nurse to tell me not to go to Sister's and that they would torture me there.

We still decided to go there, but the doctor basically said that if we went there, he would drop me as a patient. He did tell us he would get an appointment with the sonogram doctor to get a second opinion tomorrow. He called that doctor and got me an appointment. He called back and told us that doctor agreed with him, which we later found out wasn't true.

We were outside of Sister's at this point, so we went in and waited for Rachel. She told us that we should go into the ER and that she probably could get her doctor to take me on. At this point, we were so unsure of what to do, because you want to trust your doctor. Rachel tried to get her doctor to see me, but he was on a conference call. We decided to go home so I could get some rest.

We went home and I went to sleep for a couple of hours. I woke up and went downstairs. In the meantime, my mother-in-law called and told Anthony to get me to the hospital. I also called Rachel and she said the same thing. She said that she could get me in with her doctor (whom I hadn't met yet) and he would take me on as his patient. She also called the other doctor that was on-call in Labor & Delivery. Since I felt better and ready to fight, we decided to go into Sister's.

We went in thinking they would just admit, so I had a bag packed and my parents had the girls. Sister's found at that time that I wasn't leaking fluid through the fern test and the PH strips and I also wasn't contracting. The baby's heartbeat was great but there still was no fluid. Since I had an appointment the next day for a sonogram, they told me to go home and come back for the appointment. We left relieved and happy that we didn't have to end the pregnancy that night.

That day (Monday, the January 11th) is one of the many miracles that has happened to keep Ava alive. It's also one of the reasons that has kept my faith that God wants Ava alive. It was the worst day of our lives, and the darkest. You could feel the evil of it, but the miracles that had to happen that day make it all worth while. Rachel (who rarely eats at her desk in the office) got my phone call on her cell, she caught her doctor just before he went into an all-day conference call to ask him his opinion. He also took me on as his patient without a question. Praise God for this day, despite how dark it was.

The next day we went to the sonogram appointment. That doctor told us there was very little fluid, virtually none, but the baby's heartbeat was strong. She told me the risks again if the baby was born soon - that she may not have any lungs and may not live. She did see some space for the lungs and they would for the next few weeks check to see if the heart took the whole space in the chest, meaning the lungs weren't growing. She also said that the baby would not be able to develop the sacs needed to breathe. She said that she would talk to my new obgyn and that they would probably admit me when I was 24 weeks, which was next week Saturday. She also said that they saw women every day with this problem, so that made me feel like was in the right place over the prior doctor. They set up appointment with my new obgyn for that Thursday where we would discuss our options.

That Thursday, we went in to see my new obgyn. I immediately liked him and he comes from the philosophy that everything is in God's hands. This is so much different than the other obgyn's. I never thought I would have to find a Christian doctor just to fight to keep my baby alive. He also warned me of the risks. I still felt that the baby was going to live. I never doubted. I was going to get two rounds of steroid shots for the baby's lungs. He told us that they would admit me at 24 weeks until I had the baby. He said that we could come in that Saturday, or if we wanted to wait, even that Monday. He then suggested possibly coming in that Friday to get things going. He said that we could discuss next Thursday at my next appointment.

We also spoke with a wonderful woman who does counseling and bereavement counseling. She listened to us and told us where our prior doctor was coming from. That most doctors don't want to see us go through the terrible situation. She also gave us some materials about making difficult decisions and preemies with immature lungs.

The week went by quickly since I purchased an iBook so I could work while I was in the hospital and I needed to set it up and also pack. We celebrated Anthony's birthday and Ariana's half birthday. I was losing fluid every day, but not large amounts. I did have a very large blod clot come out, which I had no idea what it was and it scared me.

The next day I went to the obgyn appointment. My doctor was off because his wife just had a baby. I saw the nurse practitioner and we planned on coming into the hospital the next day. She did have to find out when we were supposed to come in. Later that day she called and said that we should be in at 9am.