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This is pretty much unheard of when it comes to my family, Maliah was induced at 39 weeks and Addison was induced at 40 weeks so having an early baby, or the idea of having an early baby almost doesn't seem real to me. I had been dealing with tons of pressure, back pain and irregular contractions since before we went to California. I finally got up the courage to ask for an exam just to ensure that everything was okay. My nurse practitioner listened to my symptoms paired with my intuition and decided to do the exam. Her face looked so worried as she said "Your cervix is completely thinned out and you're two centimeters dilated." "We need to do an NST test to ensure our little boy isn't in any kind of distress." So we headed back to the room.. did the test, I was freaking out the whole time, I hate sitting there with those monitors on my stomach as my baby's heart beats. I feel like at any second it could just stop. In reality that could happen at any second whether I'm listening or not but this fear I believe comes from one of our previous miscarriages.
We've had two. In the first incident, I was 10 weeks along and just wasn't feeling "pregnant" so I went to the emergency room where they did an ultrasound, the screen was turned away from me so I couldn't see anything but the technician's face. They ended up taking me back for a second look where I could see the screen where the baby's heartbeat just faded... I watched our little baby die. That was probably the hardest thing I've ever gone through. I felt like I was completely alone, no one else felt my pain. Ryan cried, it affected both of us.. but me, more severely. Forever. I don't remember the date or time when it happened but it still struck my heart in a way that I just can't forget it. That was our baby and the beginning of major problems for us. I felt like we wouldn't recover from it. Obviously, we recovered from that dark part in our lives and for the most part it helped me mature as a person. Leaving the ultrasound room and getting dressed knowing that I wasn't pregnant anymore wasn't the hardest part surprisingly. My biggest worry was telling Ryan. He wasn't in the room when the tests were being done so he had no idea what to expect. I hadn't been bleeding so in his eyes there really was nothing to worry about. It was raining and I remember crying the whole way home. I didn't say anything, he just knew. I remember going home and laying with him on the floor hating myself but in reality when I look back, we weren't in any way ready. (We were laying on the floor because we didn't have furniture) I had just started a new job, he was staying home with Maliah, it just wasn't in the cards.
It's amazing how a loss can really change who you are as a person. The way we value things, the people we let into our lives after such a terrible occurrence. I never wanted that to happen to me because I felt like I failed Maliah, I failed Ryan, I failed myself. I wanted to just go back in time and do things better. That was the way things were supposed to be and over time, I have grown to accept it and love where we are now.
I've told a couple of people about how scared I was to hear that our baby may come early, I know any pregnancy can result in issues or problems no matter how far along you are when you deliver but knowing that we're at a point where he can come any day now.. it kind of scares me. We have two weeks until we are considered full term and I did the one thing you are never to do when a problem in pregnancy arises. GOOGLE. Some stories say people had their baby within hours of being 2cm this early, some people say their baby held on for two weeks, four weeks etc. I am predicting that he will go full term but that we will have him before August. I like the idea of my pregnancy being over before going the full 40 weeks but I still worry about him being born too early. I want another 8lb healthy baby like Addison. We go back for our second appointment on the 10th so here's to hoping that we make it to that appointment and that he hangs in there just another week or two.
Addison is starting to change a little, I feel like she is now sensing that things will be different. We made the mistake of allowing her to sleep with us consistently for the last couple of weeks instead of in her big girl bed. So last night she curled herself up into a little ball and slept between my shoulder blades while I was laying on my side. She was in the shoulders and our son was headbangin' to my heartbeat down in my pelvis. Yeah sleep.. its not happening these days for me!
