My Scary Welcome into Motherhood.

Everything was perfect. I had a wonderful pregnancy, beautiful bump and apart from being sleepy and tired, no real pregnancy symptoms at all. Lucky me!

People started saying "is all okay, your bump is so tiny?" And "does baby move around and that alright yeah?" .. Concern everytime someone spoke to me about my pregnancy. Then at my 28 week midwife appointment, she measured my bump - then measured it again. I was measuring 10 weeks too small and I didn't even plot on the graph at all, so I was sent straight to hospital.

At the hospital I had a scan, and CTG monitoring to check on baby's size rather than just bump and also baby's wellbeing. It confirmed that my baby was infact very small for gestation. So from then on I had CTG monitoring every other day for 40 minutes, blood pressure, urine check etc and every week a growth scan and check on fluid levels. Everything went fine at every appointment, until one day she said " Did you run in?" No, I had been sat in the waiting room for ages. My blood pressure was through the roof and I had +++protein in my urine. Preeclampsia. They spoke to lots of people deciding whether or not I was allowed home and eventually I was given medication and allowed home to continue with my monitoring every other day. After a couple of weeks, the medication wasn't keeping my blood pressure at a safe level and it just kept rising, so I was admitted. A growth scan also showed my baby hadn't grown since the last one. They wanted to get me to 37 weeks in hospital - I was 34 weeks at this point and it was Christmas eve!

On new years eve, they decided they could wait no longer and I would begin induction in the morning (exactly 35 weeks). They said my baby would be very small and need time in neonatal intensive care, but it was safest for us both, to begin.

So the next day, I had a pessary and was told that they wasnt expecting much to happen. I felt uneasy. My baby was moving and the CTG results were fine- but they looked a little different to what they had done over the previous weeks. A few more decelatraions- I questioned them but was told it was still within the normal range. Me, my other half and Mum sat chatting and waiting. They bought my dinner round - and they were just preparing to go home.so.they could eat too. After I'd had my dinner, I felt even more worried. My baby didnt have it's usually party in my belly like usual. I felt movements, but they were different. I decided I wanted to stay on my monitor to ease my mind, I wasnt due on it again for 2.5 hours. So pressed my buzzer, I had to argue my point a bit but eventually they allowed me to be strapped up to it. 6 minutes later, my babys heart just stopped. It beeped to alarm us. So I called for the midwife - that's when our nightmare began. She came in and tried to readjust the sensors then quickly decided to pull the emergency alarm. It screamed down the corridors and 13 people in scrubs ran in my room, stripped me of my clothes, had me signing papers, shouting to eachother 'No still can't find baby', putting cannula in etc, then my consultant came in and grabbed my baby in my belly and startled the heart back- but only at 55 beats per minute. So weak. I ran with them to theatre blew my mum and partner a kiss and laid down and was put to sleep focusing on the slow, faint heart beat.

I woke up. Not pregnant, but without my baby. I didn't know anything. Just that I had a girl, 3lbs 6. ♡ My daughter. I drifted in and out of consciousness, and the alarms were set off every 5 minutes by my blood pressure. Doctors kept coming and going bringing back different people. They couldn't get my blood pressure to stop rising. So they put me in preeclampsia protocol to stop me from having a stroke. I was only allowed a tiny syringe full of water once an hour and was given magnesium through my cannula. My body was on fire, from the inside out. I was trying to be sick, poison running through my veins into every part of my body. My body shook for hours, uncontrollably.

I wasnt allowed to meet my baby for 3 days, until I was out of one to one care. I was told she didn't start taking sporadic breaths for 6 minutes and needed rescuistating. I was scared to go to NICU, because the nurses wouldn't know me. I would have to tell them I was that baby that they have been looking afters mum, so they could introduce me to her. The day I met her I was told she had sepsis. Had to allow a lumbar puncture to be done to her tiny body that could fit into one of my hands. Among every other test, needle, painful thing that no baby should ever experience.

Asking to be allowed to hold your own baby is a difficult thing to do, leaving the hospital without your baby takes every ounce of strength you have left. It breaks your heart. It takes along time to get over and left me needing therapy and many other struggles but that's another story for another day.

We are so lucky that she has no lasting effects of her bumpy beginning. She's dinky dot, but a funny, clever and simply beautiful 4 year old. ♡ ALWAYS listen to your instincts and fight for what you want! Mine saved my babies life.