Silver lining

Well, since its Tuesday, I think it's finally safe to say something's for sure: this weekend was very unexpected and dramatic....Though I say that with some irony, since WHEN have we had an expected day during the last few months?!

So to back up, many of my Facebook friends started getting status updates on their feeds late Saturday evening, basically saying things like Tabitha's heart was decelerating, delivery could be eminent etc etc. so now I'll tell you what a status never does....

A 27 week old baby's heart does not just beat like a little drum, perfectly in rhythm all the time, they are just not mature enough for that-every so often they their heart rate will spike or go really low, but the important thing is that it doesn't stay that way. On Saturday night it did. Tabitha had four major decelerations of the heart while I was having my routine evening heart monitoring ( I have 3, 30 monitoring of her heart and movement a day). The floor was having a slow evening, they only had three patients so, I literally had 3 nurses in my room, putting me on oxygen, trying to stick me for an I.V. ( incidentally it took SIX needles In. MY. ARM. to finally get an IV going. ), it was a bit crazy. And Amy ( thank goodness The Lord had my oldest friend there with me...) and I were just part of the craziness....honestly at first I wasn't scared, Tabitha had some decelerations before, they went away... No biggie. But then my doctor showed up and pulled out his ultra sound machine and we waited patiently ( only outwardly) for him to tell us what was up.....

In the end nothing could be determined for sure, but my main doctor arrived straight from the airport ( coming back from a meeting in Chicago) and sat down by my bed to say that he felt like we couldn't afford to let such a long lasting deceleration happen again that night, that it would be considered a sign of distress and so he would do a c-section right away if she had another episode. I needed to call Brett and tell him to come, but that he probably wouldn't get here in time ( by now there were no more flights from Atlanta to Houston, and the earliest he would arrive was 9am the next day).....

Then we had to pack up my room and move down to Labor and Delivery. Two words I did not want associated with me or my baby.

 Oh, and incidentally, do you know how much stuff I had acquired in my 3 weeks in the hospital? An EMBARRASSING amount. Poor Amy and two nurses had to pack it all up...and normally I would have fixated on that,  but at this point all I could think about was that I was going to L&D 4 hours shy of 28 weeks pregnant. Not the worst thing ever, but as it sunk in I realized I was SO NOT PREPARED to give birth that night! Also, while her heart has been miraculously healed, she still has some residual effects of that initial trauma that have not completely recovered-making delivery still a bit on the extra scary side...

Sure, my first goal had basically been met, Tabitha was sooooo much better off physically, as far as prematureness goes I felt like she'd make it... But I wasn't ready and I sat in my new MEGA ( seriously the Labor and delivery room was MASSIVE ) room and cried to The Lord that He would keep Tabitha safe inside me.

And then began a super duper long night. I got put on a Magnesium Sulfate drip to help prevent labor and more importantly to help fortify Tabitha's brain if she was born early. ( which, ps, is AWFUL stuff.... ) and I got another round of steriods for her heart and lungs.....was told I couldn't eat or drink anything till further notice and then there I was to wait...
Because I was on a fluid IV I was having to pee like every three minutes, and because I was plugged into all kinds of monitors it took a good 10 minutes to unplug and replug myself back in every time. Luckily ( haha) there was no sleeping for me anyway....the thought that at any moment Tabitha's heart could plummet and we'd be off to delivery. Yes. I was not sleeping. Plus anytime she moved and thus came off the monitor, the nurses would come in, turn on all the lights and want to chat with me....Not cool, not cool. ( especially for poor Amy who was ALSO trying to sleep.)

But, through all that my baby's heart held strong. And the hours slowly passed. And strangely enough, an event from earlier in the day helped me through it.

My parents had brought Ransom up to visit me for the day, however it became apparent rather quickly that he was not feeling well. A major bummer, but also a major blessing for a selfish, cuddle deprived Mama. Ransom climbed into bed with me and read books, and then snuggled down and put his head on my belly and went to sleep.  Now you may know children that will fall also p&p ANYWHERE, or want to be in bed with you...but my kid....not one of them. I can count on my one and how many times he's fallen asleep on me since he turned one....this was not normal. But, boy did I love it!

So, it was the sleeping head of my son and the memories of getting to stroke his hair, and admire his long lashes- all very comforting things- that got me through my moments when anxiety would rise up quickly.....Later I've thought about how in the same way, The Lord was allowing me to rest my head, fully of worry and stress, and yet for a moment at peace, on Him.

We did miraculously make it through the night, and I was able to celebrate 28 weeks in style with Brett....another gift that came from such stressful circumstances...so far Brett's visits have been both rushed, but also a little stressful, since we also try to have Ransom here when Brett is in Texas. But this trip was unplanned, and Ransom was sick...so in the end Brett and I got much needed time together without R. I don't think I even knew how much I needed it, but it is another thing I am grateful that The Lord gave us from this rough scare.

The other thing was, all discussion about me leaving the hospital ( something that was definitely still in the back of my mind!) has gone off the table! Hahah! We'll see what happens, but for the time being it looks like room 1111 is back to being my home.

Today's Echo of Tabitha's heart showed that she continues to slowly heal, and as the cardiologist said, now we just need to keep me from going into labor for a other 2 weeks at least. I'm up for the challenge...the next party is for 30 weeks...but this time I'd like for the night before to be a little less exciting.