Shooting stars & hospitals

On 1st March 2010 when my waters had broken we made the mad dash to the nearest hospital. My hubby and I sat in silence, neither of us able to comprehend what was happening & both fully believing that our fairytale was over, yet not wanting to say it out loud as it would make it all that more real.

On our trip we saw a shooting star - i'm not usually one to put my faith in god so much, but i made the biggest wish of my life on that shooting star and from that moment i had hope - hope that the lord would help us through.

On arrival at hospital and being poked and prodded by a midwife and the ob on duty it was confirmed that my waters had completely ruptured, but my cervix was still fully closed and no signs of labour at this stage.

I was given my first steroid injection and the midwife on duty made sure that i was aware that at this stage of my pregnancy, although not ideal, things could still work out ok.

I was then popped into an ambulance and taken to the nearest airport for a flight to RHH (the nearest NICU) and then in another ambulance to the hospital. By this stage it was almost 2am and i was sick and tired of telling my story to every ambulance officer, nurse, ob, gynae, midwife etc. I just wanted them to LEAVE ME ALONE!!.

Tuesday morning a scan was arranged to double check that bub was doing ok and to check measurements. All was still going perfectly well, although no water!!

I had the paediatrican come and talk to me about statistics. I told him i was not interested in the odds & that i would cross each hurdle as it happened. At no stage did i want to look at the negatives - for my own sanity i refused to believe that anything could, or would go wrong.

I was on complete bedrest & on Wednesday when i hit 26 weeks i started to relax slightly (not sure why, but think it had something to do with my pregnancy book at home stating that babies born at this gestation would generally be ok).

We did a tour around the NICU to see other babies that were around the same size as our unborn baby, just to give us an idea of how she would look if she was born at this stage.

Friday rolled around with no hiccups, although i was having a fair bit of back pain - i had not been to the toilet all week, so it was put down to constipation pains and i was given some medications to help. My mum and cousin spent the day with me & they were leaving late that afternoon to head home and my husband was supposed to be coming down. I don't know why, but i sensed that something was wrong & that my back pain was not constipation after i had been to the toilet and the pain had not eased, although as the pain was irregular etc the midwives still did not believe it was anything to worry about.

My mum & cousin left late arvo and i cried and cried - i think mum cried most of the way home. My husband decided that he was exhausted and that he didn't feel safe driving, so stayed home and was going to come down early in the morning (a 3.5-4 hour trip).

So i was all on my own. My back pain continued to worsen and at 2am my midwife called the doctor to come and check me out. They had huge trouble finding the babies heartbeat, so decided to bring the portable ultrasound machine in to have a look what was happening - alas, they could hardly even find the baby! Next option was for an internal (last resort as this increases the risk of infection hugely) and guess what the doctor saw......

A head!!! So at approx 2.20am we were wheeled to the delivery suite.

The perfect pregnancy

In Aug 1999 my husband & I decided it was time to start a family. Why not....we had been married for a few years now, had bought a new house in 1998 & were financially in control. We were lucky enough to fall pregnant in just our 2nd month of trying.

At our first scan at just 8 weeks we got to see our tiny baby & see the heartbeat. No morning sickness at all, the only symptom I had was that I was so so tired all the time. Falling asleep on the couch after work each day became the norm.

At 12 weeks we had another scan & all was going perfectly to plan. 19 week scan revealed that we were having a little girl & so the perfect pregnancy continued. A friend was due a couple of days after me so it was great to be able to share our stories while we were going through much the same things.

Then, something went so terribly wrong - at just 25 weeks & 5 days, my waters ruptured completely .........