 Ainsley's BlogUltrasound
| Ainsley Kristine Hunsaker |
Ainsley was born 5 weeks early on March 18, 2009 at 5:18pm. She weighed in at 4 lbs 15 oz and was 16.5 inches long. Ainsley's early entrance into the world came about by an interesting series of events.
Because my first pregnancy resulted early due to a severe bout of pre-eclampsia, the doctors decided to stay on top of things the second time round by starting weekly Non-Stress tests at week 30. A Non-Stress test is where they monitor the baby's heartbeat and mom's contractions for a period of time to make sure baby is doing well and tolerating mom's contractions. They also check baby's amniotic fluid levels and other things to make sure the placenta is doing it's job.
At about week 32 I started having pretty intense and frequent contractions that lasted about 24 hours and then quieted down. However, it seemed to jump start my uterus and I began to experience Braxton Hicks more frequently than I probably should that early in pregnancy. I had an average of about a dozen mild contractions per day. Still, nothing intense or frequent enough to cause alarm.
On St. Patty's Day, March 17th, around 9 am, I went in for my 6th or 7th non-stress test. During this particular test I experienced a moderately intense contraction that seemed to have a distressing effect on the baby's heartbeat. They called it a "healthy deceleration" or decel. This concerned the attending nurse who was required to show the perinatologist (a doctor who handles high risk pregnancies like mine.) The perinatologist decided that I should stay on the monitor a little longer to see if the decel happened again so they could rule out a fluke. I had another mild contraction, but nothing like the first. It had negligible impact on baby, but they still decided to do an ultrasound just in case and take a closer look at the placenta. The placenta looked fine with the exception that it seemed to be working just slightly harder than it should be, but was still healthy enough not to be worried. The perinatologist updated my OB and he decided that I should stay a couple of hours in labor & delivery for further observation.
So for the rest of the afternoon, I spent 2 hours being monitored for more contractions while they kept an eye out of more decels. The doctor seemed to be satisfied I was ok and sent me home around 3pm, but when I got home, the hospital called and said the perinatogist still had some concerns and asked me to come back right away for further observation. So back to the hospital again, I was monitored for another 2 hours while I watched "Who's the biggest loser!" ( A foreshadowing perhaps?) Again, my attending OB, Dr. Broberg, sent me home after my hours of monitoring yielded a perfect strip. Everything looked healthy and great. I went home fully expecting an April baby.
The perinatologist had me set up a follow-up non-stress test for the following morning, just to be on the safe side. So on Wednesday March 18th at 10am, I show up for my test. While I'm being monitored, again I had another contraction, a little more intense than the day before and possibly more uncomfortable. Again, baby reacted badly and her heartrate dipped too low for too long. Again, they monitored me a little longer to see if it happened again and sure enough I had two healthy decels in an hour's period. I didn't wait to long before the Perinatologist poked her head into my room and asked to visit. (In my experience, you never see doctor unless something is going to happen, or some serious decisions need to be made.) I immediately knew something was up.
Dr. Townsend sat down and expressed her concern that because of my history of pre-eclampsia, she believed that my uterus wasn't compatible with my placenta and the placenta just wasn't doing its job and eventually baby would suffer if we didn't act soon. (Apparently I don't have the recipe for a good placenta.) I asked her what she meant by "soon" --next week, a few days? "No, I mean by tonight if possible." (gulp) "TONIGHT?!?!?" Wow, this is more serious than I really believed. A few minutes later mom walked into the room and I spilled the news through nervous tears. She just smiled because she had already predicted a March baby and knew it was coming. (She could've warned me!)
I took a deep breath and called LeGrand at work. I had just send him off an hour ago with reassurances that nothing big would happen today. (Every time he misses an appointment, I seem to end up in the hospital.) When I called him he said: "I knew I should've come, I knew it!)
So after discussing it with Dr. Townsend, she discussed it with my OB ( who happened to be Dr. Gamette that day) They both decided that a C-section that afternoon was not too soon to deliver my distressed infant. By the time they had me nice and settled in room 517, right across the hall from the surgery room, LeGrand shows up and we both heave a heavy sigh. Shortly after LeGrand got there, Dr. Gamette shows up and discussed our options. We could wait for a few days and see if we could give baby some more time or we could deliver now and remove her from my "hostile environment." There was no right or wrong options. Both options could result with a healthy baby and delivery. However, I didn't want to wait and wonder which of my contractions would end up harming baby even more. For my sanity, let's just get her here, right now.
We told Dr. Gamette we wanted to go ahead with the surgery and less than 2 hours later, I was on the table across the hall delivering my second child and first daughter! They pulled the curtain down in front of me and lifted up my head so I could watch her coming out of me. Little Ainsley Kristine came plump and with quite the lung power. Her apgars were 8 and 9, both very healthy numbers. (Talmage I believe was a 2, quite the difference.) Although she had a healthy cry, she soon showed signs of distress and struggled to get oxygen into her system. Her body continued to turn blue. So after a brief glimpse of her to say hello up close, they whisked her away to the NICU where she was put on ventilators for at least a couple of days.
To Follow Ainsley's progress check out Ainsley's Blog!
MOM'S UPDATE BELOW
MOM's UPDATE (March 26th):
Three days following Ainsley's birthday, I developed a post-partum case of Pre-eclampsia. Although this is no fun at all, I'm hoping to recover soon so we can get the family home together at last. Meanwhile, my face is getting fatter. If you look at the pics of me directly above, you'll notice my face in the upper left is slimmer than the one in the lower right. :( I'm also forced into modified bedrest to keep my blood pressure down. We'll see how long that lasts.
MOM's UPDATE (March 28th):
I went to the doctor on Tuesday for a blood pressure check and it was 145/100. "That's pretty normal," the nurse said. Excuse me?!? How on earth can that possibly be normal when my average high is 110/70 ?! Especially when my high pressure is accompanied by yucky swelling, chest pains, stomach ache and visual problems. "Normal," she says? "Let me see the Doctor," says I. Instead, they have me go home, take it easy and schedule me for another BP check on friday to see if it goes down (and to rub in my face when it does, I'm sure). So I come in again on Friday and it's still the same as tuesday. "Hmm, that's still pretty high, let me get the Doctor" Yeah, thanks. (That's what I said on Tuesday.) So they send me over to the lab for lots of fun tests and schedule me to come in saturday morning to go over results and another BP check.
So this morning (Saturday), I went to the Dr.s office again and my blood pressure was 146/105. The nurse practitioner says my results are ok, none of my organs are dying, (yet). But it's definitely post-partum Pre-eclampsia (like I needed a professional opinion to figure that out, when the symptoms are so classically obvious and I've already had it before so I already knew what it was.) Anyway, she orders me to strict bedrest and prescribes a blood pressure med to keep it down.
So it looks like I'm gonna be bed-ridden for a few days, at least until my blood pressure problem goes away (which could actually take weeks). This also sabotages my desperate attempts at increasing a pretty much non-existent milk supply and prohibits me from multiple visits to the NICU to take care of my newborn daughter that desperately needs her mother. She can't come home til she learns to eat and I can't teach her to eat when I'm not there and when I don't have any milk to give her anyway. ARGGGH!!! ....I'm going to bed. I'm supposed to be there anyway, but how many of you who know me, have known me to do what I'm told.
MOM'S UPDATE (March 29th):
J Just after I went to bed yesterday, I started getting shivery, shaky and bad stomach ache. By the time I woke up around 5 pm from a nap, I felt terrible and spent a lot time in the bathroom. I continued to feel sickly throughout the evening and I blamed it on the blood pressure medication that I had just started taking that afternoon. By 2:00 am in the morning, I felt lie my body was trying to do a thorough detoxification. i spent the ENTIRE night in the bathroom trying to clean out my stressed system. There's nothing like a good bout with the stomach flu to remind you of how easy you had it before. High blood pressure? -not a problem. Low milk supply? -I can deal with that. Having a baby in the NICU? -been there, done that. Major surgery? -I'll survive. Stomach flu? -What are you trying to do?! KILL ME?!?!
