Amanda’s Story

March 16, 2004

This week we had an ultrasound scheduled to find out the gender of our second child. March 16th started like any other day, rushing around to get everyone dressed and ready so we were not late! We expected to leave the doctor’s office with happy news of a boy or girl. We didn’t have a preference either way. The most tragic thing we thought could happen was that they wouldn’t be able to tell us because the baby wouldn’t cooperate.

Instead we left the doctor’s office in a whirl wind of confusion. Though at that time we didn’t realize how serious things were. We were told something was most likely wrong with the baby’s kidneys. You will need to see a specialist to confirm. There was no amniotic fluid and very difficult to get a good picture of what was going on.

The appointment for the specialist was set up for March 19, 2004. For the next two days I drank more water than I thought humanly possible praying that the problems were as simple as being dehydrated. I was on self-imposed bed rest with the hopes that when we got to the specialist that she would say everything looked fine.

March 19th came and I truly don’t remember anything before the ultrasound. I am sure I was nervous but I didn’t know what to expect. I knew kidney problems could be serious but I wasn’t willing to think about that. When the doctor told us that our baby was missing one kidney and there was no blood flow to the remaining kidney. We were thrown into a world of questions with very few answers.

We were given two options

1. Continue the pregnancy and the baby will most likely die before born. If the baby survives the pregnancy he/she will die shortly after birth.

2. End pregnancy now.

Neither option was an acceptable one to me! I could not imagine spending the next 5 months carrying a child that was going to die. Nor could I even consider being the one to decide when this child would die. I wanted a 3rd option but there was none.

We spent the next few days talking, crying and praying! We had a follow up ultrasound on March 26th. Though our prayers were for the first ultrasound to be wrong and everything would be alright. Either way we had made our decision. We would carry the baby as long as God would allow. If this meant I would miscarry in the next few weeks or that we would carry the baby to term, we knew we would give this child the chance at life he/she deserved.

July 7, 2004

Today I had my final regular doctor appointment. Little did I know in 6 days I would be giving birth to our perfect Angel. The last month of Amanda’s pregnancy was very emotional, both good and bad.

Dr B. wanted to do the C-section at 39 weeks. I wanted it earlier as I was getting concerned with loosing her before she was born because she was growing so well despite all the problems. He was going to be out of town during my 37th week which really concerned me but there was nothing I could do. I wasn’t going to ask him to reschedule his vacation. So we agreed on doing the c-section around 38 weeks. This was 1 week earlier then he wanted to do it and 1 week later than I wanted to do it.

I was excited to see this part of our journey end but not so excited to start the next phase. With about 3 weeks to go until the planned C-section date a part of me had come to accept what the outcome was going to be. In my heart I knew there was a chance the doctors were wrong and she would be born perfectly healthy. But I also knew after all the many ultrasounds  that possibility faded every time we got the “no change” response from the Doctors.

At this point in the pregnancy I became almost obsessed with her being born alive. During the first weeks and months after we found out she was sick I prayed for the miracle everyone wanted for her to be healed and healthy. As time went on my prayers changed to wanting and needing her to be born alive. I needed to hold her say my hello’s and goodbyes to a living breathing child. Inevitability this was the prayer that was answered she was born alive.

At this last and final doctors appointment we scheduled the C-section date. When I got home and received the phone call with the confirmed date and time July 28, 2004 at 8am I hung up the phone and had the worst (maybe the only) panic attack I have ever experienced. I suddenly realized I just scheduled the day my child was going to die. That completely freaked me out. So much so that I now believe my stress over scheduling the C-section sent my into early labor. Over the next few days I started to have contractions in increasing frequency. My stress level just continued to climb. I was so worried about how I was going to handle the next 3 weeks of knowing almost to the hour when my child was going to die that my body completely rebelled. Which in retrospect was a good thing. Though the few days of contractions and calls to the doctor were scary and unnerving to say the least, I was given a reprieve. I didn’t have to wait 3 weeks. She came on her time not mine not the doctor’s. I did not schedule the day she was going to die. She chose her Birthday and chose the moment she would leave this earthly existence and enter a Heavenly one.

I am not sure how I would have handled the next 3 weeks had I not gone into labor early. Though I would give anything to have had more time with her, stressing for 3 weeks would not have been calm quality time. It is so much better that it happened this way.

Saturday July 10, 2004.

I had been up most of the night with contractions.  I believe I woke Tony up but they are about 10-15 minutes apart.  Not close enough to call the doctor but close enough where I couldn’t sleep.  Saturday during the day we had some errands to run.   I was at this point still in complete denial that I was going into early labor.  But Saturday afternoon I lost my mucus plug. When I was pregnant with Alex I lost my mucus plug 24 hrs before he was born. This development was concerning to me! So I called the on call doctor. I believe this was the first time I actually got Dr B after hours. He of course told me not to worry about it and the contractions were not a concern until they were much closer together. He said the mucus plug was no indication about when I would go into labor. Ok we went about our business and tried not to worry. I didn’t have contractions during the day, just at night when I wanted to sleep.

Late Saturday night early Sunday morning

I awoke again with contractions. This time they were 3-5 minutes apart but they were sporadic. Some were 10 minutes apart some were 15 and then I would have one 3 minutes later. So at 4am I called again. By this point Dr B had to be thinking I was crazy. He told me to calm down and try to get some sleep they were not regularly 3-5 minutes apart so I didn’t need to worry. But that he did want me to come into the office on Monday to check and make sure everything was ok. That made me feel a bit better. By this point I was beginning to think I wasn’t going to make it 3 more weeks. But never really let myself think about what that meant.

July 12, 2004

I had been having contractions for a few days now.  Dr. B wanted me to come in the office for a check to make sure everything was ok.  Dr B wasn’t there due to a patient at the hospital I believe.  I saw Dr. S  she was always very nice.  She did the normal stuff check the heartbeat still sounded very strong,  and she checked me.  I was 3 cm dilated so the contractions I had been having were having an affect.   Though this by itself wasn’t a huge concern.  I was 3 cm dilated with Alex for 2 weeks.  So I had some hope that we would make it close to the C-section date.  The longer she stayed in the better chance her lungs had to develop.  Though we new that was a extreme long shot.  Dr. S offered we could go ahead and deliver anytime I wanted.  We declined as we had an ultrasound appointment that afternoon and wanted to see what Dr L-Z said. Dr. S gave me a prescription for Ambien and said try to get some sleep but she didn’t think we would make it to the end of the week. I don’t know if that was encouraging or not! She did say she was on call that night and don’t hesitate to call if we needed her.

Monday Afternoon

We had our last ultrasound. At the time we didn’t know it was our last. We thought we were going to have at least 2 more. Dr L-Z measure the baby and she was measuring 5 pounds 12 ounces. We asked him about doing the c-section early and he advised us to wait as long as possible. As the percentage of babies that need assistance before 37 weeks is fairly large and it drops dramatically after 37 weeks so he advised us every day we waited gave her a better chance.

So we went home that afternoon knowing we would probably not make it to the c-section date but were willing to go as long as we could.

July 13, 2004

At about 1:00 AM early Tuesday morning, I woke up having contractions again. I had been dreaming about having contractions, and when I woke up I was still having them! At first I didn’t think anything of it because this was the 5th night in a row I had been woken up with contractions. So again I thought I was just having Braxton Hicks contractions just like previous nights. I got up to use the bathroom, and realized these were a whole lot more painful that the ones I had been having previously and a whole lot closer together.

I woke up Tony to time them. He was not exactly happy about this since I had woken him up the last few nights to do the same thing, but once he started timing them he realized the contractions where much longer and closer together than the nights before. The contractions were 50 seconds long and 5 minutes apart. Without me telling him this was real, he got up and started to get dressed.

We called the doctor, and I finished packing. I did not have my hospital bag finished because I was scheduled to have a C-Section in 2½ more weeks! I thought I had more time! We got Alex up and headed to the hospital.

Tony called my Mom, and I called my friends Amy and Tiffany. I was unsure about calling them at 2:00 AM in the morning, but I knew they would want to be there and would practically kill me if I didn’t call. On the way to the hospital Tony called Vicar Robb. We realized we didn’t have his correct home phone number and accidentally woke up some poor unsuspecting guy… twice. We ended up calling Robb’s cell phone and left a message. At this point I became a bit worried that he wouldn’t make it.

We made it to the hospital at about 3:00 AM, but not without hitting every bump on the road! My Mom was already there. Tony and I walked up to Labor and Delivery while my Mom got Alex and his stuff out of the car. We get checked in and were taken to a Labor and Delivery room. I was being hooked up to all the monitors and getting an IV started when Amy arrived. Dr. S, who was on call that night, came in and checked me. I was still only 2 cm dilated.

At this point we began discussing what we were going to do. I half jokingly asked if we could call Dr. B (my normal, and favorite, doctor). To my surprise Dr. S mentioned that she could call him for us, but that he had been on call all weekend and was really tired that day at work. I must have looked sad at that news cause Dr. S mentioned that since I was only 2 centimeters that she would be willing to wait awhile and plan the C-section for around 6:00 AM. This would give Dr. B time to finish getting some sleep and then she would call him. I was totally willing to wait. But the contractions were getting a tad annoying.

Dr. S offered to give me some Demerol to help with the pain until we could do the C-Section. I was glad to accept it. Once the Demerol took affect I don’t remember much because I became rather spacey and sleepy. Some time later, the Demerol was either wearing off or the contractions were becoming much stronger because I was in pain again.

I have no idea how much time had passed (the clock in the room didn’t work), but Dr. S came back in to check me, and I had become 4 centimeters dilated. I believe this was around 5:00 AM. She started talking like we weren’t going to be able to wait any longer on the C-section, and she started getting things ready and set up. She also went ahead and called Dr. B. I was OK with not waiting because I was in serious pain at this point! A few minutes later Dr. S came in and told us Dr. B was on his way.

I don’t know how to explain why I wanted Dr. B there. He delivered Alex, and he is my main Dr. and that would be enough, I guess, but there is something special about him. He answered all of our questions, and at every appointment he kept me grounded in what our expectations should be about the outcome of this pregnancy. He was always able to do that without squashing our hope that things would some how work out.

There was some discussion on whether they were going to put the epidural in while still in the Labor and Delivery room or in the OR. It took a little bit for everyone to get stuff together. Most of this I don’t remember very well because the contractions were taking most of my attention. They finally decided to do the epidural in the operating room. So down the hall we went.

The epidural was easier this time than it was with Alex. I don’t know why. Maybe it was because I knew what to expect. The epidural took effect very quickly.

I was laying on the operating table just hanging out while everyone was busily getting ready when I heard Dr. B say, “Hello”. I felt totally at ease because he had made it. And I was very appreciative that he got up early to do this for me when he didn’t have to!

At some point Tony came in and the surgery began. I don’t remember much until finally Tony stood up to see Amanda being born. She was born at 6:01 AM.

I heard her try to cry… a sound I will never forget. I heard someone say it’s a girl. I knew by the sound of her trying to cry that she was alive but not as healthy as we had hoped. I started to cry… happy because she was alive… and sad because I knew she wasn’t doing well.

She was taken over to the team waiting to work on her. They worked on her for a little bit, and Tony went over to see her.

Dr. B leaned over and told me that her head was a little squished but other than that she was perfect. Until he said that, I didn’t realize how worried I was about how she would look. Every specialist we had talked to told us the worst case would be she would have deformed arms and legs and squished face because of the lack of amniotic fluid. She had none of these deformities.

Before she was taken to the NICU, she was wheeled over to me so that I could see her. She was beautiful. Tony was torn; he wanted to stay with me but he wanted to go with Amanda, too. I told him to go with her, which he did, but he later came back since they were working on her in the NICU.

The doctors finished closing me up, and I was taken back to the Labor and Delivery room. Tiffany was there and so was Vicar Robb. My Mom had gone home with Alex at some point during the surgery… or before… I can’t remember… (Demerol!!!)

I got a new nurse. Her name was Marian, and she was amazing. She got everything ready for Amanda’s baptism and in general made sure we got everything we wanted that we had stated in Amanda’s birth plan.

Dr. Johnson came in and told us the initial test results on Amanda’s lungs. They were not good. The best I can recall is that her oxygen levels were in the 60?s and her carbon dioxide levels were over 100. He asked us what we wanted to do. We decided to wait until the second set of results came back.

During this time Tony and Vicar Robb went to the NICU to see Amanda and take some pictures. When Dr. Johnson came back the numbers were getting worse. Her carbon dioxide was in the 180?s now.

We decided to have her removed from the ventilator and brought to us so that we could spend as much time with her as we could. Tony had taken the hat and blanket that I had crocheted for her and a white jumper that I had bought for her to be dressed into the NICU. She was wheeled in still having oxygen pumped into her lungs with a bag. They removed everything and handed her to me.

She was perfect… and beautiful. Vicar Robb performed her baptism. I was completely oblivious to anything else going on in the room. My complete attention was on Amanda. I unwrapped her from her blanket. She had perfect little hands and perfect little feet. When we took her hat off for the baptism I noticed she had Tony’s hair. It was dark and wavy. Other than deciding she didn’t look like Alex, we didn’t know who she favored.

At 8:37 AM Dr. Johnson came in to check her heartbeat. She was silent. Official time of death was 8:37 AM.

Tony and I spent the next few hours holding her and taking pictures. We did footprints and hand and foot impressions with the amazing help of Tiffany, Amy and Nurse Marian.

Within an hour, my Mom, Dad and Alex came to the hospital. We were a little unsure of how to handle Alex seeing Amanda. We didn’t know how he would react and we didn’t know how we should react to him.

It was amazing. He walked over to her and said “Shhh baby sleeping, So Cute”. We all melted. That was the only reaction he had to her. He went about his business checking out the rest of the hospital room, innocent to what had happened.

At about 11:30 my regular hospital room was ready. We decided to leave Amanda in the care of the staff when we left the Labor and Delivery room. It wasn’t easy to leave that room with out her but we felt that was the time to say our good-byes.

I cannot say enough about the hospital staff at Piedmont Hospital. Everyone was totally amazing. During my required 3-day stay in the hospital, everyone was very considerate of us, and what we were going through. A special card was placed on the door to my room to alert the staff of our loss. Even though I enjoyed talking about Amanda to anyone who wanted to inquire about her, it was much easier if the staff already knew about our loss.

For the first 24 hrs I was on a clear liquid diet. I only received juice and orange Jell-O. I wonder if this is why I dislike orange Jell-O. Because I had my gall bladder removed after Alex was born, there are many things I can’t eat, so hospital food just was not great for me. Tony had to go get me alternative things to eat.

Family and friends visited while I was in the hospital. We also received many very pretty flowers that brought comments from all the nurses. Marian our nurse in Labor and Delivery stopped by on Thursday to see how we were doing. She is one amazingly sweet lady.

My mom was watching Alex while I was in the hospital. She brought him up to the hospital a few times, so we didn’t have Alex withdrawals too bad.

July 16, 2004

I knew I was going to be released on Friday morning, but I didn’t know how early that would be. Dr. B showed up early on Friday. I was still half asleep. We went through all the discharge instructions and he said we could leave anytime we wanted, but there was no hurry. Well I had been in the hospital long enough! So Tony and I wasted no time getting out of there. We left about 9:00 AM Friday morning.

Leaving the hospital with out a baby after having a baby was probably the hardest thing I have ever done.  Even though we left Amanda in the care of the staff at 11 am on July 13th, I don’t think it really truly hit me that I was going to walk out of that hospial with out a baby until I had to do it.   Alex was still at Nana and Pawpaw’s house and Tony and I left the Hospital alone.   Leaving that place knowing she was not coming home with us was so difficult.

From the time we got home that Friday afternoon until Monday afternoon after the Memorial service I don’t remember much of anything.  I was in shock, numb and completely just a walking Zombie.  Which totally makes me glad that we made all the arrangements ahead of time.

Tony’s family came in town at some point and went home after the service.  We did go to church on Sunday.

The thing I remember doing is becoming very protective of Alex.  All I wanted to do is sit and hold him all day.  And thankfully he was a fairly cuddly kid and let me do that as much as I wanted.   At 2 years old he didn’t understand anything that was going on, but on some level I think he did understand that Mommy was sad.

This is not the end of the story. As it is an ongoing journey.

Kim