Fever

Fever Pt 53

Megan POV

"Stop! Gimme back my baby!"I cried as the nurses tried to calm me down.

"Megan, we just have to make sure nothing is wrong since she is premature."

"What're the chances that she'll be okay?"Nicki asked.

"Almost all premature babies end up with a birth defect which is why they are born early."

"Birth defect?"I asked.

"Yes. Something that went wrong during the pregnancy."

"Nothing went wrong. I was doing everything I was supposed to. I was taking my medication and watching what I ate—,"I started but the nurse stopped me.

"Half the time it has nothing to do with the mother. Anyone in your family bloodline have any medical arrangements? It could be genetically induced. Ya know, some conditions skip a generation and end up going to the kids. I promise you, everything will be fine."

"I want my baby!"I cried. I literally just had her forty five minutes ago and the doctors had already taken her away from me. "In the mean time, we need you to fill out her birth certificate."the nurse tried to give me the document but I was so shaken up that I couldn't grab it.

"I'll take it."Nicki took the document and began filling it out while I just sat there, crying. "As the biological mother, we need you to sign off on this."The nurse handed me back the birth certificate so I could sign my name. "Everything is right."I nodded, wiping my eyes.

"Missa(mee-sa). That's pretty."The nurse smiled. "I'll go file this out."

"She's gonna be fine, like they said."Nicki got in the bed with me, cradling me as I cried on her shoulder.

~~~~

Ever since midnight, I had been up all morning, crying my eyes out and Nicki stayed up with me, holding me the entire time. "Good morning. We bought Mommy some breakfast."A nurse came in around six thirty with a tray of breakfast burritos.

"I'm not hungry. I just want my baby."

"The expert won't be here for another thirty minutes to talk you through the situation but we have come to a conclusion on Missa. However, we can not disclose any information until the expert arrives."

"What? That's my child!"

"We deserve to know."Nicki backed me up. "Yes, I understand. But we don't have that many details on what's going on and don't want to give you guys the wrong information."She said. I took a deep breath, about to break down again.

"I promise, we are doing everything in our power to keep her alive but we can't—,"She tried to say.

"Keep her alive?"Nicki and I yelled in unison and shock.

"I'm going to call the police! Bring me my baby right now!!"I demanded.

"Please, Megan calm down."

"I'm so sorry it took so long for me to get here. There's so much traffic on the interstate."A tall, white man said, entering the room, making all of our heads turn in his direction. "I'm Doctor Thompson, here to talk to you about Missa's condition. I have a PhD in—,"

"I don't give a goddamn what your level of schooling is just tell me what's wrong with her."I spat, angrily.

"Okay."He eyed me as if I was crazy. Dr.Thompson pulled up a chair.

"First, while we were in the ambulance, the paramedics found that Missa was having trouble breathing."

"She seemed fine at the house although she didn't cry when she came out of the womb."Nicki said.

"A lot of babies don't cry. That can easily be fixed with a light tap to the backside. If she wasn't able to cry after that, then the situation would get more complicated. Has she cried since she's been in the NICU?"He asked the nurse.

"Yes. That's not a problem."The nurse told him. "Good."He responded before turning back to us.

"However, we came to the conclusion that Missa has respiratory distress syndrome also known as 'RDS' which is a breathing disorder in newborns caused by lungs that aren't fully formed yet. This condition is rare in the state of Texas and can be fixed if treated right away. As soon as she begins breathing on her own, she'll be off the machine. This should take a few hours to a day since it isn't that critical. You can visit her at any time during the day or night. Now, onto the bigger fish that needs frying..."He inhaled deeply and exhaled slowly before continuing.

"We also found that because of the respiratory distress, between the time that I was contacted and the time that I got here—I went to visit the baby before I came to speak with you—, a form of newborn epilepsy has developed. We're currently doing screenings and multiple other tests to see what's going on in the brain. We've narrowed it down to one cause for the epilepsy which is lack of oxygen. I'm making it my duty to walk you two through the whole ordeal up until Missa is better and can go home. Would you like to see her?"

No words could explain how I felt right now. It seemed as if my pregnancy was going so well up until today. And now I'm find out that my baby has Respiratory Distress Syndrome and epilepsy. This doesn't make any sense. I don't understand where I went wrong as a mother...