Stories of Lost Children
Alex's Mom
by Joannah Matheson, Belle Ewart, Ontario, Canada
My name is Joannah, and this is mt story. I found out that I was pregnant on Oct 3, 2010, with my son and when I told my husband that I was pregnant we were excited but nervous. We had been through several miscarriages that all ended around the 10th week, so when the 10th week passed and all the other weeks passed we started to get excited. We even started celebrating, the milestones. My pregnancy was going well, that is until I reached my 24th week when I woke up bleeding. I had a doctor’s appointment that morning and when I got there I told that my doctor what was happening. She tried examining me and couldn't. As it turned out, I was 3cm dilated and I had no idea. It came as a shock to everyone when at my last ultrasound, I showed no signs of delivering early. She called an ambulance and sent me down to Mount Sinai hospital where I was put on bed rest. Two days later at 25 weeks, I delivered my son Alex. He was whisked away to the NICU, and my husband noticed that the nurses could not get any blood from the placenta or the cord. They said Alex took it all and I found that strange; that there was no blood. When I got to see him, he had wires hooked up to him and a tube down his throat. Later on in the day when we went back, he was on a ventilator and in an isolette. He weighed only lb 9oz at birth. He was so small but he was ours. After a week, he came off the IV’s and started eating only breast milk. He was getting bigger and gaining weight; he was doing so well, this went on for two full weeks, he doubled his birth weight. We were so happy that we were even making plans to take him home. It was in the third week where things started to change. We always knew his lungs were premature because he was premature, but actually they had stopped growing at 23 weeks (but we did not know that until much later). The Friday before Alex passed away, they stopped feeding him and put him back in the IV’s to help his lungs but that compromised his heart. So they gave him medication to support his heart that went on for Friday and Saturday. By Saturday, his circulation had stopped to the lower part of his body. Everything had turned purple and by Sunday his heart rate dropped from the 150's to 120 and kept dropping from there. He crashed twice and was brought back twice by the third time. He crashed at about 3:30 and we made the decision for them to stop chest compressions. We just wanted to hold him while they were still doing chest compressions. I sent my friend a text to call my mom that I needed her, but she missed the call. She called me back a couple of minutes later and asked if I wanted them to come down. That was 4:30 and after that they stopped chest compressions and gave him to me to hold. They put him back on the ventilator so someone didn’t have to stay there and keep bagging him. My husband and I traded off holding him for just over 4 hours. After a long fight, at 9:03 p.m. on March 13, Alex passed away in my arms. The hospital was excellent and let us have as much time with him as we wanted. Our family and friends that were with us got to hold him and say good bye. The hospital even kept him in the NICU for the next morning when we were coming back to spend some more time with him. We miss him very much, but are not giving up on having our family. Alex was to be our first, the first child in 11 years and the only boy. I would like to know if anyone has been through the same situation or similar. You can contact me at joannahmatheson@hotmail.com
|
