I want to begin by telling you that it was raining. At least, It felt like it should have been raining – the classic cliché of rain pouring down, of sadness and despair falling around us with each drop. It felt like it should have been raining but it wasn’t. Instead, it was a sunny April morning. I was 24 weeks pregnant carrying an active baby boy, who kicked mightily, turned somersaults and always put on a show for the ultrasound. I was carrying my son. And I had just found out that he might not live past delivery.
In the first trimester of pregnancy, everyone tells you to be cautious. Don’t tell your friends and family for the first 12 weeks. A lot can go wrong in pregnancy. But now, at 24 weeks I was obviously pregnant and ready to celebrate it – we had followed all the rules, I was taking the vitamins, eating the right foods, exercising lightly, avoiding soft cheese… We had made it out of that grey period where life can be so delicate – the ground under us was solid now – wasn’t it? Everything, up until now had been fine. At 20 weeks, we didn’t want to know the sex, we said let it be a surprise. Then, at 24 weeks we changed our minds. We wanted to know. We were told we would have to pay for the ultrasound and that was okay. Smiling with anticipation, we held onto one another with excitement and watched the technician’s face crease with puzzlement and concern.
Later, I didn’t know what to say to people. If I said anything, it would become true. If I said anything, it would become real. But to pretend that everything was fine was almost worse. To pretend that everything was fine when any mention of my baby made me feel like I might shatter into thousands of pieces – my weak smile a cheap Band-Aid on a body that was breaking – was so much worse. So I said as little as possible, I carried on, and I pretended it wasn’t happening. I pretended I wasn’t pregnant. I stopped speaking to my friends. I stopped speaking to strangers. I didn’t want to hear gushing stories about pregnancy or the baby names they had thought of. I didn’t want to even think about the future. My future was on pause, because my future might be too much to bear.
A lot can go wrong during pregnancy. It doesn’t matter how far along you are. It doesn’t matter that you have a birthing plan, it doesn’t matter that you’ve already decorated a nursery, it doesn’t matter that you already love this little life so deeply you couldn’t imagine living without it. A lot can go wrong in pregnancy and no one talks about it.
During that fateful ultrasound to determine our baby’s sex, the technician noticed pockets of fluid inside our son’s lung cavity. We were told that our baby was a boy and then, instead of going to lunch to celebrate, to dream, to plan – we were immediately sent to the hospital to wait in nervous silence for someone to tell us what was going to happen. My son was diagnosed with plural effusions, leading doctors to believe it might be fetal hydrops. A very serious complication of pregnancy that we were told only occurs in every one out of ten or fifteen thousand pregnancies – numbers which really mean nothing when it is happening to you
First they wanted to determine the cause. They told us it could be a virus and took my blood to the lab. They came back with nothing. They said the baby could have a heart condition and brought in a specialist. They came back with nothing. They said the baby could have Down’s syndrome and inserted a needle into my belly. They came back with nothing. They told us that genetics could be the culprit and sent our DNA off to the United States. They came back with nothing. At last they said they didn’t know. By this point we no longer cared. We just wanted our baby to be okay.
Our options, the doctors said, required thought and knowledge. They gave us a medical study to read. They actually put on a power point presentation for the two of us to watch. The baby could be dead upon delivery. The baby could live for a few days. The baby could have severe mental and physical disabilities. All of these words were too unbearable for me to think about. They floated around, they filled the air. Their sharp reality poked at me until it was difficult to breath. But I refused to let them in. My son was safe in my belly. I couldn’t hear any of it. I just couldn’t.
Technology is amazing. A man, and then the woman he was training, inserted two tiny chest shunts in through my belly and into my son. These shunts, put in the right place, would drain the fluid that surrounded his lungs. Put in the right place, they would allow the lungs to develop so that he would be able to take a breath when he was born. The fluid in his abdomen, they hoped, would drain on its own. I didn’t understand any of this. I still don’t really understand it, but I believed their faces when they told me what they were going to do. I trusted them to take care of my son. This type of surgery is based on confidence, skill, technology and amazing grace – but I guess that is true of all surgeries.
After the surgery, they said with every week that passed our son’s chances of survival would increase. They said that with every week the lungs would be a little bit more developed. All kinds of statistics were thrown around the room. If you go into labor next week, the chances of survival are very slim, if you go into labor in two weeks, the chances are a bit better. If you can make it to 30 weeks it gets better…
Without trying to think about it, by pretending I wasn’t pregnant – I made it to 34 weeks and 5 days. My son was delivered by an emergency C-section. He was absolutely fine. He didn’t need oxygen to help him breath, he didn’t need special formula. He was absolutely fine. They say that anything can happen. They say that miracles can occur. I know that to be true.
A lot can go wrong in pregnancy and no one every talks about it. No one properly prepares you for it until it is too late. It is alright if something goes wrong. It does not mean something is wrong with you. It does not mean you are the only person this has ever happened to. It does not even mean it will happen again. All it means is that this is life. I didn’t know what to say when it was happening to me but, I know that my son would have died if it wasn’t for that chance ultrasound at 24 weeks, if it wasn’t for the talent at the hospital in my city, if it wasn’t for the technology they had access to, if it wasn’t for amazing skill, confidence and grace. I know we were lucky. Now I know what to say; life is fragile. Life is a gift. It plays out somewhere between the roots and the leaves in a thousand different shades of grey – and, miracles do happen.
Heather McLeod
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- A Chance Ultrasound Saved My Son - June 26, 2018