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Challenge: NICU Parenting

31 weeks

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Early on in my pregnancy (by 15-16 weeks) I first told my husband I think our baby is going to be here early. I had a weird feeing never did I imagine though she would 9 weeks early and only 3.8lbs.

Before my pregnancy I was relatively healthy had no history of high blood pressure or anything else really, but at only 9 weeks I first started having pains I rushed to the hospital fearing The worst thankfully everything was okay a few weeks later the pain was back and came back even worse many tests later still no answer to the cause of the pain. Hospital visit number three I was told to call my husband we were about to do an emergency surgery to remove my appendix, but not to worry about the baby. Before my husband could get there they decided to just watch it. After this point I had no more issues with the pain.

Around 20 weeks I started having major blood pressure issues and was put in and out of the hospital 6 more times at 30 weeks I was admitted again and asked to pee in a cup for about the 5th time that week (I was already seeing my doctor three times a week at this point). About an hour later the nurse came back with a steroid shot and told me I would get one tonight and one tomorrow night to help my baby's lungs finish developing and that my levels were 600x the normal the on call doctor was worried I would go into help syndrome so I spent he next few days getting my blood pressure taken every 15 minutes had a magnesium drip I was already on the max dose of lebatalol and procardia. 2 days later I was wheeled back for an emergency c section because my baby was breach and my blood pressure had spiked even higher.

Laying on the table was the scariest moment of my life I felt like I had failed my baby. After they took her out she was rushed to the nicu and we did not see her for hours. When I finally did though I couldn't believe how amazing and strong she was only three pounds and connected to so many machines she still smiled and grabbed our fingers any time she could. After four weeks of driving 2-3 hours a day to see her no matter what after four weeks of fearing every call from the nicu and four weeks of spending many nights sleeping in The parking garage afraid to get to far away she got to come home.

That day I finally felt like a mom

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