Told by: Stephanie
I found out I was pregnant with twins at my six week ultrasound, and I was really thrilled! I just knew it was twins because I was looking like I was five months pregnant when I was only four weeks pregnant.
I was looking at the ultrasound screen and saw only one sac and one fetal pole. Then the ultrasound technician moved the trans-vaginal probe and there were two little sacs and two little fetal poles. The technician looked at me and said “How does twins sound”? I said to the technician “I knew it was twins, I look huge”.
Everything went great through the whole pregnancy.
At my thirty first week into my pregnancy all chaos broke loose. I went into pre-term labor and had to be admitted to labor and delivery. I was dilated to one centimeter and had to be put on a magnesium sulfate drip. When the nurse lowered my dosage I went back into full contractions and ended up dilating to two centimeters. I ended up having to be left on a high dosage of magnesium sulfate for 24 hours. After 24 hours of the magnesium sulfate drip I was taken off of it. Everything was going well in the hospital I was on a contraction monitor the whole stay and a non stress test every four hours. I had an ultrasound done at thirty two weeks into my pregnancy in the labor and delivery and both babies looked great, heartbeat was wonderful, they where weighing wonderfully. The scan showed that my daughter which was baby B had placental aging, the technician who did the scan thought she would be brought into the world early due to this. Unfortunately, no one did anything about this, nor did the doctors put my twins on a fetal heartbeat monitor except the every four hours, I was just left on the contraction monitor.
On April 16th 2009 at 32 weeks the nurses couldn’t find two heartbeats during the non stress test in the morning, and they failed to do an ultrasound at that time as they thought just one was hiding behind the other. Later, when the nurse change occurred it was time for another non stress test in which the nurses couldn’t find the second heartbeat of the other twin. So, they talked to the doctor and the doctor ordered an ultrasound right away.
The nurses came into the room there was about four nurses and a ultrasound technician who followed with the ultrasound machine. I was looking at the ultrasound screen looking at my twins when I noticed the nurse squeezing my hand, I looked at her and smiled, then I looked back at the ultrasound screen and realized that there was no color to the placenta. The nurse kept squeezing my hand the whole time she asked “Are you okay”? I replied “Is there a heartbeat”? She responded “No sweetheart, I am sorry”.
We all thought that I was going to be induced that night to keep anything from hurting my son baby A who had his cord wrapped around neck three times. Unfortunately, the perinatologist wouldn’t do this, and said that the longer the baby is in the better, and only 1% chance the same thing would happen to him.
On April 17th I had an ultrasound early in the morning to check on my son. I was so used to seeing both of them on the screen but the technician only showed my son. He was doing great and all the perinatologist said to me is “See he is okay”! I took a nap around one pm and I was woken up to “sweetheart I need you to roll over” by the nurse, and the nurse looking at the heartbeat screen. At this point I was on the monitor 24/7. My son’s heart decelerated. I said “go tell the doctor to take him out now!”
The doctor was called and told what happened. The nurse came back in and said “we will induce you.” I received an epidural and my water was broken. I waited on the contractions to start, but after two hours my contractions where not coming as fast as they wanted; at 2:00 am on April 18th 2009 they started me on pertocine to jump start labor faster. I was dilated to 7cm when my son started to crown so I started pushing at 4:50 AM and welcomed my son into the world at 5:00 Am. I stopped contracting after he was born so the doctor had to put her arm all the way up to elbow inside my uterus to get my daughter to turn somehow so the doctor could either grab my daughters feet to bring her out, or get it to where her head would go down. Finally, after 24 minutes of the doctors arm elbow deep I welcomed my daughter into the world . I was able to see my son for a minute before they took him back into the NICU.
I was able to hold my daughter whenever I wanted, give her a bath, put clothes on her. This by far was the worse thing ever in my life. I couldn’t see her eyes, hear her cries. I felt dead and empty. I was able to visit my son but not hold him since he was put on CPAP. He was able to go home after a week or two. But, I had to put my daughter in the ground .
Serenity was born at 5:24 am on April 18th 2009. 3 pounds and 12 oz and 17 inches long at 33 weeks.
Tristan was 5 pounds 8 oz and 18 inches long. There is never a second of the day that goes by that I never stop thinking of her and what she would have looked like today. How would her eyes look and her hair how long would it be. It never gets easier every year it gets worse around the time of the birth of her.
