Sometime in July, 19 weeks pregnant, I woke to my 2 year old at 6am knowing she just wanted a cuddle I picked her up and took her to back to my bed. I sat her down and all of a sudden I felt water gush out of me, I ran to the bathroom and as soon as I sat my waters had broken. The rest of that time was a blurr I was taken by a special ops ambulance to the nearest hospital 40 minutes from where I was staying. I was rushed in and given an ultrasound just to be sent home and told everything was fine. 1:30am the next morning after fighting to be at the hospital where I knew I needed to be the remaining of my waters had broken. I was rushed to the “butterfly suit” where I had scans, bloods etc. It was then I was told that my beautiful baby was going to be born in 48 hours and there was nothing they could do to stop it. But 48 hours turned into 5 weeks. Strict bed rest, steroid injections, heparin injections, antibiotics 4 times daily kept my girl alive and pushing to be here.
It was at 24 weeks we were transferred to a hospital 2 hours from home so we could have the best chance of taking Evanna home. The night I arrived I started bleeding and I was admitted to the hospital until I gave birth. Days passed and I still bleed. Then on a Tuesday afternoon I was taken to the delivery suit after getting really sick within minutes, I had gotten a life threatening infection and it was time to bring Evanna into the world. 18 hours it took to try to establish labour and body wasn’t responding. At 9:30am I was rushed into theatre and by 10:13am Evanna graced the world with her presence a mere 700grams but also breathing on her own for 10 minutes.
She then developed a severe chronic lung disease due to lack of fluid, she was mechanically ventilated for 18 days and for those 18 days we weren’t able to hold our baby. She was then placed on steroids which she remained on for 4 weeks as her lungs just weren’t at the same growth stage as a premature baby without PPROM.
Just recently we’ve moved to high flow and are looking at heading back to our local hospital in the next few weeks. Due to our circumstances no one thought we’d be at the point where we are now to discuss going home.
Evanna defied all odds to be here. From 0% survival to 7% to now 97%. Never did I ever think we’d be able to take our daughter home.
