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Taylor's story
Colt Ryder
Colt Ryder born at 26 weeks
PPROM at 21 weeks
Taylor's story
Here's my story: Ever since I was a little girl I've always wanted to have as many children as possible. I wanted to have several of my own, have step children, adopt, etc. I wanted to be the hippy mommy who breast fed until the baby no longer wanted it. I wanted to be the mommy that pushed for delayed cord clamping. I wanted to be the mommy who held her baby for hours right after birth. All of it. I had thought long and hard about my birth plan, had it set up, ready mentally for a term pregnancy.
One night at 21 weeks however my water broke while walking in my home. Fear came over me. I screamed to my husband as I was in shock. I remember saying, "What's happening!?" He responded, "Your water just broke we need to get you to the hospital now". I started crying hysterically. How can this happen?! No one told me that this could happen. As the ER nurse wheeled me to L&D, they all sadly stared at this heap of a woman slouching in the wheelchair sobbing uncontrollably trying to keep her legs crossed thinking anything would work. They put me in a room and confirmed it with a test... My water had indeed broke. My husband, father in law, mother, and step father were all in the room when I screamed out in heart wrenching pain, "I can't lose my baby!" My body had betrayed me. It had let me down. The one thing a woman should be able to do is to have a child and protect it in and out of the womb. How could this happen to me... They told me to expect to go into labor within the next 48 hours. I had some anxiety medicine that helped me sleep so to this day I don't remember much of the following 4 days. They discharged me at 22 weeks saying there was nothing they could do for me and it'd be safer for me to be at home on bedrest than in the hospital. 3 days later I had back pains so readmitted myself to a different hospital with a Level 3 NICU. I was able to hold on somehow to my baby boy for an additional 5 weeks. There were many fears during that waiting period... I felt humiliated, I felt alone, all the negative statistics the doctors were giving me left me feeling helpless... I began getting spontaneous contractions at 26 weeks.
They became as close as every 4 minutes on the dot. They weren't pulling up on the monitor so the nurses didn't believe me at first because I was breathing through them, however after several hours they put me on magnesium. The next day, I started bleeding slightly so they wheeled me to the OR with my husband. While sitting up to get my spinal block for the c-section, I remember feeling a gush.
They laid me back down and said I was bleeding out... and fast.
They quickly pushed my husband out of the room and began sedating me. I refused to put on my mask, hollering at the anesthesiologist that he couldn't put me under until he promised to pray for my baby. He kept saying, "Ok now put this on" and I refused. I screamed, "PROMISE YOU'LL PRAY FOR MY BABY!" He finally promised. That was all I remember of my sons birth.
I started pumping as soon as I woke up. Fast forward several months in the Nicu and Picu. My son never had it easy. He got a bacterial infection when he was only a couple weeks old, he got pnuemonia twice, 3 trach gram negative infections, and a viral infection.
After it all, he was required to get a trach and g-tube/nissen. We are finally talking discharge. PPROM mommies... we all have horrific stories. We all are marked with the scars of memories we wish we could forget. But always remember, those memories make us stronger. They make us stand out from the rest because we know the true value of life. We make the small milestone into big milestones.
We know every smile, every kiss, every wiggle MEANS something. I hope we are able to bring PPROM awareness to more because I wish so badly to have known more about this when I was the scared new FTM being told all the negative statistics.
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