Being the one percent

Being the one percent

Every day around seven babies are born Sleeping! And that’s just in Australia!

Completely Concealed Placental Abruption is a condition that happens to 1% of the population in the world.

A Completely concealed placental abruption claimed the life of my first daughter Isabelle Mara on the 16^th of September 2010, forever changing my own and the lives of those around me.

Born at 36 weeks and 1 day, weighing a very healthy 6 pound 14 and ½ ounces our little sweetheart died only moments before she came into this world.

I never knew that I showed only one of the symptoms of this condition during my pregnancy. I had a small bruise like feeling just above my bellybutton and thought nothing of it as being as stretched as I was in the third trimester of my pregnancy I thought I had simply knocked it as I was passing by a bench or table.

The baby never showed any signs of complication such as low birth weight, or distress until I went into labor early hours of the morning, I got up from my bed at 5am and as I went to walk to the bathroom door I heard a pop I at the time thought was my waters breaking. As I reached the toilet and turned on the light I was shocked to see a small amount of blood on the bed and as I removed my pajamas I saw that I had passed a blood clot the size of a large roma tomato.  I panicked and as we were living with my in laws at the time, whom I have an amazing relationship with; I yelled at my husband to get the one person I thought might have any understanding of what was happening. I told him to get his mum!

On the drive to the hospital I had talked myself into the probability that my baby was dead, as I had not felt her kick for hours. As we pulled up the amazing team at our hospital were waiting at the doors for me with a wheel chair and a smile helping to calm me ever so slightly. We were taken to a examination room in the maternity ward and a doctor I didn’t know came to take a look at me as my obgyn had gone on holidays for two weeks. They placed a monitor on my belly and a squeezed my eyes closed and possibly also squeezed the blood from my husband’s hand as we waited for them to tell us she was gone, but what we heard was a tiny heart beat that we were told was fairly normal showing little distress. I took a deep breath and prayed that she would be ok, but unfortunately god had already made other plans for her.

A little under an hour later my precious baby girl was placed onto my chest, not a sound was heard from her, not a movement was felt, the only thing I remember is how I felt my heart shatter into a million pieces with no hope of ever being put back together and the constant thought running through my head, ‘why isn’t she crying’. Hubby cut the cord and she was whisked from the room. As cpr was performed just outside the door, we waited for them to tell us she was not coming home with us like we had planned. As we waited the doctor worked on me, pushing down on my stomach to remove a belly full of blood clots. In the days later I found that those blood clots saved my life.

When she was put back in my arms she was adorned by a bruise on her forehead where they had used a vacuum to help deliver her and a bruise on her chest where the CPR had been done.

She had been bathed at our request and no longer had a thick stickiness to her and smelt just like a new baby was meant to after its first bath. As I held her in my arms I looked at my husband and we discussed if we would still give her the name we had decided on earlier in the pregnancy, the answer we came to was yes because we had been calling her by Isabelle for months and it fit her perfectly.

We took the time to do what all parents do. We discussed who she got what body part from, her dark curly hair, her wide but cute nose and her puffy lips, all signs of perfection to us.

We made the necessary family phone calls and as we waited for our parents to turn up we discussed the one thing that was on our minds. What would we do about having more children and how did we feel about it. It may seem strange to some people, but for us we had prepared for so long to bring this tiny little person home, we had all the furniture and clothes and we felt ripped off. We felt empty. We decided right then and there that we would keep having babies and we would do it as soon as possible, and we would pray that eventually we would get to bring one home with us. 

Our eight year old son came to the hospital at our request and held his sister close. He cried and he told her he loved her, that he would miss her and that he didn’t want to say goodbye. He was very brave and we felt this moment was needed so he could also start to heal and so we could teach him to grieve. We told him to cry whenever he felt he needed to, because he would see us doing it too. We told him as much as he wishes it would happen, his sister would not be coming home and her diagnosis would not be changing.  I had heard of children who sat at home and waited and waited for dead family members to come home and be ok, and we didn’t want that for our little man.

It was about two in the afternoon when we called for someone to take our little girl away. We knew that if we left it much longer we would never be able to let go, and it was and has been so far the hardest thing I have ever had to do. 

We were moved from the birthing suite just after Isabelle departed our room and due to the shock my body was in after having to birth a baby that did not help with her arrival I had to have a catheter put in and was told to get some sleep. I was so exhausted that I should have been able to drop straight off but alas it wasn’t to be. My husband and I talked and comforted each other for a little while before I fell asleep, only to be woken half an hour later by the nurses to see if I needed pain killers or anything else.  By seven that night I was itching to leave the hospital, I just couldn’t stand listening to the phone calls that were being made in the halls about babies being born, ones that would be crying, breathing and going home with their parents. I had proven my ability to have the catheter removed and just waited for my doctor to pay us a visit as he had said he would. 

God Bless that man! That doctor who had never met me before that day, who helped me give birth to my beautiful little angel, who told us the news that she was unable to be resuscitated. God bless him for walking into our room timidly and asking me if he could hug me.

I think in a way everyone, including him had been waiting for the screaming, the blaming and the cursing and when none came they waited still. He was so heartbroken that one of the souls he was welcoming into this world was so quickly taken and he was not afraid to show it, he helped us realize that our little angel had already touched so many lives and it was truly amazing.

He asked us what we wanted to do and was very supportive of our decision to leave the hospital. I didn’t know if I would ever see him again and all I hoped was that everyone who had come into contact with us that day had taken with them new signs to look for, we hoped that our situation could mean that one day another woman with the same problems would be taking her baby home screaming, because we knew that if that happened to even just one person then as heartbreaking as it was, it was worth it.

 

Before this day I had never even heard of a Placental Abruption, let alone know what the symptoms of one were. So for those of you who are interested, and just because every person who sees this may leave the page with a little more understanding of this condition than what they started with here are some of the symptoms and a definition of what a placental abruption actually is.

Placental abruption: The placenta has detached (come away) from the wall of the uterus, either partly or totally. This can cause bleeding in the mother, this can mean free flowing, small amounts of spotting or in my case a development of numerous clots that build up between the lining of the uterus and the detached placenta. It may also interfere with the unborn baby’s supply of oxygen and nutrients.

-  Bleeding,

-  Continuous abdominal pain

-  Continuous lower back pain

-  Painful abdomen when touched (a bruised feeling)

-  The baby is not growing at the correct speed

-  Abnormal baby heart beat

The worst part of this condition is that the majority of the time they do not know what caused it.

Thankfully not all cases result in a stillbirth and in most mild cases a little bed rest and knowledge of the condition is all that is needed to reduce the risks even further.  

I was amazed and shocked all at the same time when I first started my research into this topic. Especially when I found out that the statistics said I had a high chance of finishing up dead myself due to hemorrhaging if my body had not turned it all into clots, or unable to have any more children due to a high percentage of patients needing full hysterectomies.  

My daughter was perfectly formed and shaped. I had spent what felt like a life time getting to know her little soul and even though it was in actuality only eight months I will never forget all the times she would kick her daddy in the back, or curl up as close to his warmth as she could without leaving her cozy house. I am thankful that unlike a lot of couples I will never have to wonder what she looked like, or how it felt to hold her close. I will always know that she had her daddies blue eyes and her grandma’s perfect lips and such a look of peace on her face I almost felt bad for wishing she would open her eyes and cry.

I thank god that I have had the opportunity to continue having children and that I have had the most amazing group of Doctors, Midwives and hospital staff that any pregnant woman could hope for, and that above all I have had the biggest family and friend support system to help me continue to, well, continue!

Little Isabelle would be turning 9 in just a few short weeks and i still take her birthday off for self care, to remember her. She has many siblings now and i will never stop wondering what she would be doing with them all, what kind of personality she would have and what she would look like all grown up. I continue to share my story to help the 1%.

Trins xxxx