Tuesday, March 17, 2009

What started off as the most terrifying day of my life, turned out to be the most miraculous

Getting these babies was not as easy as it should be, and after our first failed round of invitro we had almost given up hope of ever having a baby of our own when I decided to give invitro a try once more. A couple days before my Dr Appointment to see if the invitro worked I decided to sneak and take a test at home. I was all by myself just staring at the test. It took the full 3 minutes until a tiny thin 2nd pink line appeared. It was not convincing enough so I jumped in the car drove to the store and bought 5 more tests, all different brands. One by one every test was positive. I was in total shock. I grabbed a shirt from the back of my closet that I had bought for invitro round one and almost threw away. It said BABY on it with an arrow pointing to my belly. I waited patiently for Jason to come home. If the invitro is successful, you do 2 more weeks of injections. If it is not, then you can stop the injections. When Jason got home I said "I have bad news..., I am going to have to do the injections for 2 more weeks." Then I unzipped my jacket to reveal the "Baby" shirt. He picked me up and swung me around. We were screaming!


2 days later, already knowing I was pregnant, I went to the Dr to get the official blood test taken. You want the test result Beta number to be 100. I got the call from the nurse while I was at work. She said "Jessica, are you sitting down, and are you ready for what your number is?" "I'm ready". "It is 1536!!!!" “What does that mean? Am I pregnant with 1500 babies?” She said, "you are definitely having AT LEAST two!" So now comes freak out mode. I was so worried. I always wanted twins, but I knew all the risks involved with having multiples.


At 33 weeks pregnant, and after 5 weeks of being confined to bed rest, I had a strong nesting instinct. Jason helped carry me into the nursery. I was sitting in a rocker folding their baby clothes. I stood up, lost my balance and fell. I felt a sharp pain in my stomach, but didn't think anything of it. Turns out, it caused a placenta abruption 7 hours later. It was Monday Oct 1st 12:30 I was asleep when suddenly Jason heard me yell "my water just broke!" He jumped out of bed and turned on the light. I knew something was wrong when I saw his face. He said “that's not water, that's blood!” I jumped up and ran to the bathroom where I continued to hemorrhage - A LOT! Jason called 911 and within a few minutes paramedics were rushing in my room. I was hemorrhaging so bad that the paramedics were putting large IV's in my arm preparing for a blood transfusion. I was panicked and scared to death thinking I was losing my two babies. What started off as the most terrifying day of my life, turned out to be the most miraculous.


When we got to the hospital the nurse said they would try to slow down my contractions and there was “no way” I would be delivering that night and I would be bed ridden at the hospital for at least 3 or 4 more days if not weeks. We decided it would be best if Jason went home so he could pick up some things to bring back to the hospital. It was 5:45am by now. Everyone left and I decided I would try to get some rest. About 15 minutes later I started to feel contractions. They were coming hard and fast. Pretty soon they were so strong I couldn't even talk or breathe. I looked at my contractions monitor and each contraction was hitting the 100 mark (the highest mark on the graph!) It was one right after the next bam bam bam. I was still gushing blood. I pushed the nurse button and the same nurse that told me there was "No way we would be having these babies tonight" came in to check me and yelled out "Call her Dr at home and tell him to get here right now!" It was 6:45am and she told me my Dr lives 10 minutes away, and he will be here in 10 minutes- We are having these babies at 7:00 am in 15 minutes!The nurse said "where's dad?" I cried "He's at HOME!" I called Jason who was already on his way back and said "Get here right now we are having these babies in 15 minutes!!!" He slammed on the gas. Within 10 minutes the Dr was there, the Anesthesiologist was there, all the nurses, interns, neonatologists, were all there ready to wheel me into the operating room for my emergency C- Section everyone was just waiting for Jason!!6:55am Jason comes running down the hall. The nurses throw a white jumpsuit, hat, mask, and booties at him and say "put this on now." I look at jason and say "It's baby time", he looks back at me out of breath and panicked still and says "it's baby time babe".7:00 am I get the epidural I am numb a few minutes later. At 7:37am we here the Dr say "Baby!" We hear a tiny weak yelp, yelp without even showing her to us they pass baby Josselyn right thru the window into the waiting NICU. 1 minute later Dr says "Baby!" again and a little louder baby squeal, as they pass Jaxon threw to the NICU window, this time Jason glanced over just in time to see them passing Jaxon. So he got a quick glimpse. As soon as we heard their first little yelps we both let the tears roll down our faces, looked at each other and smiled.Jason asked for a baby update and they said they were still working on them. They were getting them hooked up to all the monitors still. A few minutes later they came in and said both babies are on oxygen but are doing well. They let Jason go in to see them, and wheeled me into recovery. I still hadn't seen my babies. About 45 min later Jason came in my room and showed me pictures on the digital camera and told me they were the tiniest, most beautiful perfect babies he had ever seen.


There is nothing like holding two precious tiny babies to make 5 weeks of bed rest, and a total of 240 thick viscous shots worth it. I would have done those shots while standing on my head if I knew what the outcome would bring. I am so grateful for my precious angels. They are two miracles I will never take for granted. I have loved every minute of being a mother. I will take the good with the bad. The 4 weeks they were in the NICU and the 15 hour days I spend there, the exhausting days and nights of nursing every 2 hours. The 12 diaper changes a day, Jaxon screaming with colic for hours at a time, and the hundreds of sleepless nights.
I love you with all my heart Jaxon and Josselyn. We are one happy little family and I wouldn't trade this life for anything in the world.

Jessarella

3 comments:

said...

Hi Lani...thanks for dropping by and posting a comment. Kind words from people all over the globe do a world of wonders for me - I am currently battling endometriosis and diabetes. You have a wonderful family and an inspiring blog! I wish I can give you a hug...thank you. =)

beckylbranch said...

These pictures are just precious! I love seeing/meeting other twinkies, I have a twin sister :)

Ashleigh said...

the last picture is cute :)