Thursday, October 8, 2009 started out just like every other day for the last 10 days had. The doctor came in said to keep doing what I was doing and that I would be having an ultrasound again that morning. My dad had came the night before and stayed with me and he would be heading home and my mom was on her way to stay for a night. I was feeling pretty bad because I was missing Neil's 30th birthday. His mom and dad threw a party for him but I didn't like the fact that I couldn't be there with him.
The radiologist came in and did my ultrasound and estimated the babies at 1 lb 8 oz each. Kirsten (baby a) was hard to get good measurements on because of the fact that she had low amniotic fluid so she was very far down in my birth canal. One of the nurses had came in a few days before and was checking the heartbeats and checked Kirsten's and said that the boy is doing good, checked Kynlie's and said the girl was doing good. We hadn't wanted to know what we were having so Neil and I just looked at each other and shrugged our shoulders. I asked the radiologist that did my ultrasound that day if she could confirm that but Kirsten was too far down to see anything. I was 24 weeks pregnant.
I had got moved from a labor and delivery room into a smaller surgical recovery room that morning because the floor was so busy that they had run out of rooms. My doctor told me that they had already delivered 2 babies in the recovery rooms that day. I didn't have room for all the stuff I had acquired in the smaller room but the bed was a lot more comfortable.
My mom and I were watching our Thursday night shows, Grey's Anatomy and Private Practice and my friend had called so I talked to her on the phone through both of the shows because I knew I would have plenty of time later on to watch them online. My nurse came in to give me my night meds, antibiotics and sleeping pills. I took them, got up to go to the bathroom and my heart sank when I looked in the toilet bowl and the water was pink. (TMI- sorry, this is how the story goes)
I called the nurse in, she looked and said it was probably just my amniotic fluid turning color, which I guess it'll do. She told me to just relax and go back to bed. Well for those of you who have ever been pregnant, you know how often you have to go to the bathroom so by time I had got myself calmed down, I had to pee again. This time, I knew things weren't right. The water was bright red. I called the nurse in again and when I saw the look on her face, I knew it was bad. She called the doctor and he ordered an ultrasound.
Remember that I had already taken a sleeping pill so I was getting pretty loopy! I don't remember all of this, but I had quite a few lengthy chats with the nurses that were on that night sometimes when I would go up to visit Kynlie.
When they did the ultrasound, Kirsten did not have a heart tone. The nurses debated amongst themselves what to do, the sooner they got Kirsten out, the better. They decided that they were going to have me push Kirsten out before my doctor even got there because they didn't know how long she'd been gone, maybe they could revive her. There were two nurses, holding me open because I wasn't in labor, I wasn't dilated or effaced. I pushed Kirsten out and I remember seeing a bald head at the end of my bed, who was Carl, Kynlie's NICU nurse and he ran Kirsten down to the NICU.
The nurses said they tried to revive her for 20 minutes but she was gone. She had gotten the infection that caused her water to break and even if they had been able to revive her, she would've never been able to beat the infection. Kirsten Hope Moore was born at 10:53 pm CST weighing 1 lb 4.3 oz, measuring 12 1/4" long.
My doctor and the neonatologist came into my room and told me that Kirsten didn't make it and that we had two choices. Option one was to leave baby b (Kynlie) in and hope that I didn't go into labor from my body just delivering a baby because Kynlie wouldn't survive contractions. Option two was to do an emergency c-section and have Kynlie that night. They told me I had a half hour to decide.
I asked them what they would suggest and they said that they couldn't tell us that because it was pretty much a crap shoot either way. I was 24 weeks pregnant, to the day, the earliest she would be viable outside the womb. I could also keep her inside me until I was term without any problems, but of course, they couldn't foresee the future.
My mom had already called Neil and told him a little about what was going on, but she hadn't told him about Kirsten. He had called his parents and his dad and sister said they would come to Bismarck with him. They were somewhere between Baker and Wibaux when I tried to call Neil to tell him what was going on and see what he thought we should do. I had to try calling quite a few times because there is very patchy cell service between Baker and Wibaux, but Neil finally got on a hill and I got through to him. I told him that Kirsten didn't make it and what our options were with Kynlie. I was pretty out of it from the sleeping pill and his reception wasn't great and he wasn't understanding a lot of what I was saying but we decided to do the c-section and have Kynlie that night.
The nurses began prepping me for surgery. I had to be put out because they had left Kirsten's placenta inside me to act as a plug in case Kynlie wanted to come out so I couldn't set up for the epidural. Everything from there is a blur. I don't remember being wheeled to the OR or anything. I do remember them telling me that I needed to be prepared for Kynlie to not be alive when I came out of surgery and the last thing I remember was Dr. Danielson asking me if I was sure this was what I wanted to do.
I woke up, freezing, in recovery, which was weird because I had been SO hot before. I remember asking the recovery nurse for more hot blankets, I couldn't quit shaking. I remember Dr. Ocejo, the neonatologist coming in and telling me that I had absolutely made the right decision, that Kynlie was doing wonderfully in the NICU. Kynlie Faith was born on Friday, October 9, 2010 at 12:22 am, cst weighing 1 lb 4.5 oz, measuring 12 3/4" long. She missed being born on her daddy's birthday by 22 minutes and that's because we were in North Dakota!
I got wheeled back up to my room on the labor and delivery floor and as I was getting wheeled in, I saw Neil and his dad and sister walking through the doors. They had just got there. I was so thankful for his dad and sister riding along with him so he wasn't driving by himself at 10:00 at night.
The nurses came in and took Neil down to see Kynlie. I couldn't go that night because of the surgery, but they wheeled me down the next morning. He brought back pictures of her and her tiny hand holding his finger that night.
My doctor came in the next morning and told us what had gone on in the OR. We were both kind of out of it. I was on some good pain meds and Neil had been up all night. He said that when he went to do the c-section that he had to cut my uterus vertically. He said when he got in there that Kynlie was too far up to get her out with a horizontal incision. My incision on the outside is horizontal but on the uterus is vertical. He said that it killed him cutting me that way because I will always have to have a c-section now, I can't ever even have a contraction because my uterus could rupture. He said that it definitely wasn't the way he wanted things to end up. He said that I had lost a lot of blood, which explained why I was always freezing.
Dr. Ocejo came in and talked to us and once again, answered more questions than we could've ever thought to answer. He said that the first seven days were the most important we needed to get through those first days with no major comlications. That man, we would find in the future, is amazing. He will always hold a very special place in our hearts. He said Kynlie was doing amazingly well, she was on the ventilator and had an umbilical line which was her iv and was also used to draw blood. She was hooked up to a blood pressure cuff, temperature monitor, and had her heart rate leads. It was very overwhelming at first but it all became second nature very quickly. Her eyes were still fused shut, kind of how a kitten is born with theirs fused shut. She had on goggles to keep light off her eyes though because light is stimulation and stimulation is very stressful for preemies. She also had a bubble wrap blanket, which is used because it traps the heat underneath the plastic, but they can see her because it's clear. Kynlie's nurses were amazing, they answered any questions we had, which were a lot those first few days, many of the same questions over and over. They were great about explaining everything to us, all the machines, what they were doing and why.
From there on out, our life will never be the same, for those of you who followed our caring bridge site, you know, for those of you that didn't, if you have some spare time, like a few days maybe, you can read it at
www.caringbridge.org/visit/moorebabies.
The love and support we recieved from our friends, family and our community was amazing. We are so blessed to live in such a wonderful place. Our prayers were answered. Kynlie Faith will have her first birthday tomorrow, a day we didn't know if we would ever be able to celebrate with her. She is PERFECT.
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