Placental Abruption

If You’re Just Now Getting Here

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I probably should have done this sooner, but if you’re just now finding this blog via a tweet, Facebook share, or web search, then you should know that it all started with a series of posts detailing London’s birth. These posts are the foundation of this blog and, for their author, the hardest to write and the hardest to reread.

Feel free to scroll down through the archives, but if you’re looking for square one, and for getting a better feeling of how this family got its start, follow the links below. A quick word about the original posts, there are thirteen of them, but they aren’t very long posts so reading all parts is not a big ask.

London’s Birth Part I. 

Part II.

Part III.

Part IV.

Part V.

Part VI.

Part VII.

Part VIII. 

Part IX.

Part X.

Part XI.

Part XII.

Part XIII.

London’s Birth: Part XIII, That time I cried in the shower

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*This is the LAST post in an ongoing series. That’s good, because had I gone on a bit further I would have exceeded my knowledge of Roman numerals. Scroll all the way down or click to part I to get to the beginning.

Kate was able to sleep for an hour and a half after we got back to the room. I stayed awake and waited for Kate’s sister, Kendra, to arrive. She was driving down from Laramie. I know she got some sleep the night before, but it was minimal and she was not willing to wait another three hours for her parents to get to Laramie on their way to Denver. She would be showing up around 12:30. That is when London had another care time. I was back taking some pictures of London at 12:34pm. I took the first video of London. It’s a 15-second clip of London lying there, chest moving up and down incredibly fast as the vent pumps air into her. Her sternum and ribs are clearly visible. She is so skinny. Her eyes are still fused shut at this point. Her arms are out to tIMG_3101 - Version 2he side, they both have lines in them.

After London’s cares I went back to Kate’s room and Kendra had arrived. Kate was filling Kendra in with the details of the birth because when Kendra arrived she didn’t know that London had been born. I had been waiting to go home to get us clothes and everything else we might have brought to the hospital in three months when we were planning on having London. Now that Kendra was at the hospital, I could do that.

I told Kate my plan and she gave me a list of things to bring back. We were saying our goodbyes when she added, sort of jokingly, “Are you going to go home and break down in the shower?” I smirked, but as soon as she said it I knew that probably was where I was going to break down.

Once home, I grabbed some food. It was after 1pm and throughout the night all I had eaten was a small bag of salt and vinegar chips and a Monster energy drink. I was not as famished as you might guess though; I had more pressing issues than needing to eat over the last 15 hours.

I packed up a couple of bags for the next night and day. I looked in the mirror. I badly needed a shower and sleep. My eyes were bright red and a little puffy. Sleep had to wait, but at least I could try making myself presentable. Into the shower I stepped, and there I cried.

If you’ve ever been around someone who has just lost someone very close to them in a tragic, sudden way, you know how they cry. It is a heart-wrenching sob, which racks the body. This was the kind of cry I had in the shower. It lasted five seconds but then I composed myself and took several deep breaths because I had not lost someone. For me, Kate, and London, life was intact.

Prior to this moment, I had just wept, but finally getting to be alone and having the time to come to grips with the last fifteen hours launched me into a private expression of fear, sadness, gratefulness, and joy. Fear because there were times during the night I thought I would lose my wife and then at other times I thought I was going to lose my daughter. Sadness because I was mourning not having a full-term, healthy baby, one who did not face an arduous months-long stay in the NICU, where there are no promises. Gratefulness for the professionals who saved the most precious people in my life. Gratefulness for modern medicine. Gratefulness for health insurance. And joy, because after all that happened the night before, I was still a husband to an amazingly strong, smart, and beautiful woman and now I was a dad to a baby girl who I felt like I knew so much about so soon after her birth because of the way I had seen her fight for her life. All this had been building up and now emotions were overflowing.

I finished getting ready, grabbed the bags, and went to the hospital. Took elevator D to the fourth floor, Neonatal Intensive Care Unit. Settled into a chair next to London. Accustomed myself with my new home. Closed my eyes. Took a deep breath and exhaled. Opened my eyes and started an entirely new phase of life in the NICU.

London’s Birth: Part IX, What’s her name?

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*This is another post in an ongoing series. Scroll all the way down or click to part I to get to the beginning.

Throughout the operation there were tears slowly dripping from my eyes and my nose was a leaky faucet. I was aware that my snot had flowed through my mask and even in that moment I was mildly annoyed with the thought of having to ask for another mask. I would ask later, when the time seemed right. Until then, I tried to minimize the flow of tears and snot.

It may sound like my eyes were wandering once my daughter was out of Kate, but they weren’t. I glanced for split seconds here and there, but my eyes were essentially locked on the little human being in front of me. Vented now, the doctors seemed a little more relaxed with her and ready to move. They told me where we were going. It went in one ear and out the other. I would follow them anywhere. They started to roll my daughter a bit, making for the double doors I had come through to enter the OR. They halted for a second, one NP turning to me and asking, “What’s her name?”

I had not yet imagined when I would announce to those present in any room the name of my daughter, but if I had, it would never have crossed my mind that this would be how I would introduce her to the world. “Her name is London,” I announced. It sounded weird giving a name to her at this stage because when your child is born this small and fragile, they almost seem like a science experiment. I had started to become aware of a disturbing, but natural protection mechanism that sets in when you see your preemie like this. I wanted to protect myself from her in a way. I didn’t want to become so attached to her just in case I lost her in the next hour, but giving a name to her instantly made it harder to keep my distance.

London and the team working on her started moving out, rolling right by Kate’s face and slowing down a bit so she might possibly get a glimpse of London’s face. I saw Kate strain her head to try to see her baby before we went through the doors. I stopped and gave Kate a huge kiss, an exchange of tears cheek to cheek, and a word about how London is vented. I also checked that I should keep on walking with London and the team. Kate nodded yes and I was off through the double doors with an “I love you” and one last glance at the amazing team sewing up my wife.

London’s Birth: Part VIII, 18 People

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*This is another post in an ongoing series. Scroll all the way down or click to part I to get to the beginning.

I confirmed with Kate that I was to go be with the baby now. We kissed. I told her she was doing great and walked to the foot of Kate’s bed where the doctors had placed my daughter’s very small bed.

In front of me was an impossibly small baby girl. To call her a baby is not quite accurate. She looked more like a very, very small, skinny human being. There was no fat on her and she had none of the cuddly attributes that full-term babies have. There were seven doctors and residents attending to her, looking for signs of breathing, mostly. They seemed to poke and prod here and there with their hands and a few tools.

Immediately to my left, Kate was on the operating table, with her incision still wide open. I didn’t stare long, but I felt comfortable looking at the incision and the tissue and organs that were being rearranged so they could settle back into place. I turned my head ninety degrees right and continued to watch the doctors revive my daughter. I saw them prepping a blade to start the intubation when another doctor informed me that was exactly what they were being forced to do. She said this was very common. She was tall, had blond hair, and I remember a minute after my baby girl arrived on her miniature bed, she referred to her as a him. I clarified, “It’s a girl, right?” She looked again, “Oh, I’m so sorry.”

My daughter was successfully intubated a moment later. Her head and neck seemed impossibly flexible for the doctors to place the blade and insert the endotracheal tube. I looked left to Kate again. A nurse walked right in front of me carrying a metal dish with a big red blob in it that had what looked like puncture wounds. It was the deflated, tragic looking placenta that had prematurely detached from the uterine wall, aka placental abruption.

The OR was highly organized chaos to my uninitiated eyes. I took a moment, counting all the people in the room saving my wife and daughter. Eighteen. It was the beginning of a deep, new appreciation for the professionals around me. I was learning in the quickest and most explicit way possible that the quickest way to my heart was to save the two people dearest to me. It was early to have this revelation because I didn’t know if everything was going to turn out fine, but I still felt like I would love and cherish these people for the rest of my life because of their effort here.