Terrible 2 Tuesday: The story of K

K @ 23 weeks

K is a very special girl. What makes her special isn't because she was FIRST born, or has blond hair, or anything like that. While I consider BOTH my girls to be special to me, K is special because she's my miracle baby.


**side note: I have NO pregnancy pics of myself during this time. Didn't really think about taking belly pics, although I can tell you I didn't get very big at all. I MAYBE looked 16 weeks pregnant.**


I found out I was pregnant the DAY I moved out of my dad and stepmom's house. My then fiance (now ex-husband) myself, and my bestie had gotten an apartment together. This was definitely a "whoops" type situation and I was PETRIFIED. I was only 19. I didn't really know if my fiance and I were ready for this. Well he, of course, was the first person I told, and he was so happy. We slowly told everyone else too, and no one seemed UNhappy with it. So at least that was ok. 


We decided that since we were planning on getting married anyways, why not just do it sooner than expected? Yeah, looking back, BIG mistake, but I won't get into that here. That planning for that was SO super stressful, and it ended in divorce anyways. MOVING ON!


Jump to about week 18. I go to see a specialist to handle the ultrasounds and other MISC tests that my regular OB didn't handle apparently. Throughout my pregnancy my blood pressure had slowly creeped up. Everything else was normal, including the morning sickness. JUST in the morning. After I ate, it was all good.  And after the first trimester, it went away. So this visit didn't go so well. My blood pressure was dangerously high, so they sent me to the hospital. I was there for a few hours before my blood pressure finally went down. And so began the onslaught of saving my pee for protein testing, ultrasounds weekly, medication, bed rest, etc.


Jump to week 24. Time for my weekly ultrasound! They notice that K is measuring small for her gestation age and that my fluid is REALLY low. I'm a little worried about this, but they assure me things could change, but for the time being it was time for STRICT bed rest. And a few rounds of steroid shots to help her lungs develop faster. Ouch. More medication as well as my blood pressure still showed no signs of going down. I loathe bed rest. I got SO bored. I probably got out of bed more than I should have.


Jump to June 27th, 2005. Time for my weekly ultrasound visit. I'm happy that I get to see K so much and hoping to see some progress. So the tech comes in and does her thang to my semi-round tummy. We see little K just chilling. I don't really like the look on the tech's face very much. She excuses herself and runs out. A few minuets later, a doctor who I've never seen before comes in and says he's going to take a look. After he takes some measurements and looks around for a few minuets, he puts the probe down and helps me get cleaned up. After I'm all situated he says "You're going to need to get to the local hospital. I've called them and told them you're coming. [Little K] isn't acting the way she should be and your fluid is still very low. We're going to get you on some oxygen and see what happens." So at this point I'm shaking. Something was wrong. REALLY wrong. So my husband and I climb into the car and make the drive to the local hospital, which wasn't the hospital I was supposed to deliver K at. He was trying to re-assure me that everything was ok and that we would probably be going home in a few hours. But that didn't help much.


We arrive at the hospital and make our way to the L&D floor. It was a REALLY nice hospital. The birthing suits were pretty nice. Hardwood floor. Roomy. So I get into those horrid robes and get strapped up to to the monitors. I also got stuck with an IV and an oxygen mask strapped to my face. Let me tell you, having an IV, an O2 mask, monitors and laying on your left side is NOT comfortable. And I was NOT ALLOWED TO EAT!!! How could they deny a pregnant woman food!? What's worse is my parents, and my husband's mother showed up with FOOD. So after a few hours, the clock was approaching 10pm, the doctor on duty came in and looked at the chart of the fetal activity. He left the room and came back after a few minuets. He sat down on the bed with my husband and I and had a dreary look on his face.


"Well... right now, things aren't looking great. What I want to see on this sheet is fluctuations of the heartbeat. I'm not seeing any." How it was explained was that when they're more active their heartbeats will go up and down. Little K's was steady, which meant she wasn't very active at all. "So we have 2 options. You can go home, be on bed rest, come back in a week and hope for the best, or we can deliver her now." NOW!?!? WHY NOW!?!? He then prepared me for what would happen. Being that she was only 28 weeks along, she MAY have to be on a respirator and all kinds of tubing and that it could be traumatic for a parent to witness. He left and I looked at my husband. I honestly didn't know what to do. She had a really good change to survive since she was 28 weeks and her lungs were considered to be developed by this point in the pregnancy. We had to weight our options. I decided I couldn't live with myself if I went home and she died inside me. We chose to deliver.


We informed the doctor and not 5 minutes later, I was surrounded by nurses who began prepping, poking, shaving (in front of MY FATHER!!! EMBARRASSING!!!) and lead away to the OR. I had NEVER had surgery. Never WANTED to have surgery. And here I was... getting ready for surgery. Wide-awake-while-it-happens surgery. The thought alone was intimidating enough and then I see the table---that looks like a freakin' cross. Great. I get in the room and hop on the table. No epidural for me. Straight spinal. After a few minutes, I'm laying down, husband by my side, curtain up and can hear the doctor and nurses mumbling words I don't understand along with the horrid suction hose sounds. At least I can't feel a thing.


After 10 or 15 minuets, a nurse tells me she's going to be pushing down on my stomach. Yeah. With her ELBOW she pushes in and down on my stomach. I think that hurt worse than anything that happened so far. After a few moments more of sucking noises... I hear it. The most beautiful sound in the world to this very day. A little gurgle at first... and then a high pitched squeal of one VERY pissed off baby girl. She was breathing! On her own!

K's first picture JUST after she was born.

She weighted in at 1lb 14oz and was 12.5 inches long. I didn't get to see her, but my husband went over and snapped a few pictures of her. They did all the regular baby stuff and rushed her off to the NICU. I didn't get to see her. I told my husband to go with her to the NICU and that I would be fine while they sewed me back up. My life would never be the same after that night. I didn't get to see K until the afternoon the next day. The spinal basically paralyzed me and I couldn't walk right away. The doctor came in and gave me more devastating news later that day in telling me that he had to cut me "classical", meaning I would ALWAYS have to have a C-Section birth. Yes. That was devastating to ME. I will NEVER be able to have a NORMAL birth and was told I shouldn't have more than 3 children. I will always have to be strapped to a table and cut open.

K's dad's hand

The next 2 months were nothing but ups and downs. I couldn't produce enough breast milk for K. I wasn't producing more than an ounce. A day. Yeah. It was bad. I gave up after a few weeks. Which made me feel like a failure. Then after a week, she was diagnosed with a grade I head bleed. You can read more about that here. Thankfully it went away after a few weeks. While all of THAT was going on, she developed a urinary tract infection!!! JEEZE!!! We also had to deal with the ups and downs of her possibly being moved to the normal baby nursery, but then she'd have a DeSat and have to stay in the NICU for a few more days. Plus not to mention the added stress of the hospital being LITERALLY on the other side of town. It took us an hour each way to drive. It was nice to be able to visit during my lunch breaks though as I worked on that side of town. But the weekends were brutal and difficult. Especially when I had to be away. I had an overwhelming case of the "what-if's". What if something happened and I wasn't there? It definitely took an emotional toll on me. I ended up on Zoloft to help with depression. 

K in her incubator

After almost 2 grueling month of the ups and downs, it was time to bring her home. I've never been more scared in my LIFE! She was still so tiny, and barely fit into her carrier. She suffered from reflux REALLY bad, but that was really the only thing we had to deal with after we brought home. She was such a good baby. 

Welcome home, K!

Today she is 7 and thriving. Looking at her now you wouldn't even think she was so tiny! Here she is throughout the years:

K- 1 year old

K- Halloween 2006

K- Halloween 2006

K- Christmas 2006

Spring 2007

K- 2 years old

K- 2 years old

K- 2 years old

K- Halloween 2007

Spring 2008

K- 3 years old

K- 3 years old

K- Halloween 2008

K-Halloween 2008

K- Christmas 2008

K- Feb 2009

Spring 2009

Spring 2009

Spring 2009

Spring 2009

K- 4 years old

K- 4 years old

K- Winter Olympics Opening Ceremony 2010

K- Easter 2010

K- 5 years old

K- Summer 2010

K- Kindergarten

K- 6 years old

K- 1st grade

K- Halloween 2011

K- Easter 2012

K @ Ribfest 2012. D is photobombing.

And I took this video last night of my special girl at her finest. I sure know how to raise them!




Tomorrow is Weigh-In Wednesday! I'm totally dreading this since I didn't do very well this last week. X_X

Till tomorrow--Have a happy and SAFE 4th Of July!!!