Extra Special Boy

Birth and a Near-Death Experience

Six agonizingly long weeks went by after my husband left. I mentioned the bedrest. Well, the doctor had no clue what he was asking of me. My shower and bed were upstairs, the food was downstairs, I had gestational diabetes (so I had to eat and take five blood sugar readings every day) and something that resembled pre-eclampsia, though it was never officially diagnosed. I had dizziness and double vision until after th babies were born.

One day, I called my dear friend from across the cul-de-sac to help me down the stairs because I was too dizzy, and felt like a weeble wobble, to go down them by myself. So I slept on the couch during the day, and then went to bed at night. I would shower before going downstairs for the day. It worked out okay, I guess.

At thirty-six weeks, I was being checked twice a week. The doctor had told me the week before to come in on Wednesday to make sure evertything was going okay. Truth be told, I was miserable. I felt like I was the bowling alley conveyer belt, with very heavy bowling balls rolling around inside me.

He asked if I was okay. I said, "Not really!"

After talking a few more minutes,he decided I needed to be scheduled for a c-section for that Friday. I asked "What's wrong with today?" I had to have a c-section because baby girl's behind was down, and baby boy's head was down, but her behind was further down than his head, so the doctor said c-section was the best way to deliver.

While I waited in the OB/GYN waiting room for him to come back with the paperwork, I talked and read my book (I'm good at both). I shifted my bulky weight from one hip to the other, and one of my waterbags broke (fraternal twins each have their own).

Have you ever heard the phrase, "be careful what you wish for?" Yeah, I got them that day instead of Friday.

When I went in for the c-section, the doctor was really sweet. He put our foreheads together and told me about the cross his mother or grandmother had given him, all the while the anesthetist was putting in my spinal block. I'm sure it hurt, but I don't remember. I just remember him being a very kind and compassionate doctor.

I found out that he was on his ninety day rotation for the Army Reserves. He was an OB/GYN from New York who has three practices. He got there in time for me to need him, and literally left less than two weeks after the twins were born. I know God does things for a reason. I truly believe he was meant to be there just for me.

We spent eight long days in the hospital because both babies had high bilirubin and were quite jaundiced.

We did finally get to go home. I didn't get to visit with my mom much because she was at home with my older three boys. She made it to Kansas the day after they were born, and left the day after we were discharged. My sister came with her son, and stayed with us for nearly three weeks. It was a wonderful thing to have a second adult in the house.

Three days after she left, exactly one month after the twins were born, Katie started having trouble breathing. I called my neighbor over to check to make sure I wasn't imagining it, and she agreed that baby girl needed to go to the E.R.

An hour later, I had to call emergency. She'd stopped breathing. She'd take sudden gasps about every twenty seconds it seemed. By the way: if you call emergency and tell them you have a newborn who isn't breathing, they send out the Cavalry. Okay, not literally, but we did have a fire engine, a police car or two, and of course, an ambulance (this part chokes me up, even six years later).

I arrived at the emergency room and went in the Ambulance only doors straight to my baby. She apparently had a seizure, and they almost lost her before I ever arrived. The doctor sent a Red Cross message to my husband, already in Iraq, to try and get him States-side quickly. I stayed with her, but out of the way, while the Life Flight crew intubated her and prepared her to go to Children's Mercy Hospital in Kansas City. I was not allowed to fly with her. At a month old, she had her first helicopter ride.

My dear friend from across the cul-de-sac drove me two hours to the hospital. I stayed, but didn't sleep much, in the waiting area. My husband called me around four in the morning. We both tried not to cry over the phone, but it was difficult to hear him sounding upset knowing how close we were to losing her.

The next day, I qualified to sleep in a room sponsored by the Ronald McDonald house that was in the hospital. The day after that, I was given a room at the R.M.H. which was brand new and only a few blocks from the hospital. She was in the hospital twelve days. On day six, Jimmy was due to fly into KCMO airport. He arrived at midnight, and we went straight to the hospital.

Let me back track and give you the specifics of the last phone call we had. He had called and reached me while I was in the room with Katie. The phone was breaking up terribly. I was trying to tell him that Katie was down to twenty percent oxygen, and the rest was on her own. He heard, or he thought he heard, me say that she had a twenty percent chance of survival. That misunderstood conversation had him on the next plane smokin'. That was Sunday afternoon. He arrived Thursday at midnight. We borrowed a friend's camera to take a picture of him holding her for the first time (choking up again). He had to wear mask, gown, and gloves, like we all did when in her room. I think the mask hid his tears. It was a very sweet moment.

Anyway, the day before he arrived, Katie had come off the ventilator, and was only receiving oxygen by nasal canula (the tube that had two holes that does up to your nose. If you ever see older people with oxygen tanks, that's what the tubes are called. I hope you learned something today. Okay, that was a joke. Back to my story). My husband jokes, even today, that she decided to "hold my breath until I see Daddy!" I say she was thinking, "I don't want Daddy to meet me with this tube in my throat!"

She was discharged and sent home in good health. She got Daddy for two weeks and then he had to go back.