My name is Jessica Grib and I died after delivering my daughter in September 2016. I crashed and coded in the post-op room after my C-section, was given CPR for 10 minutes by several different people, and paddled with electric shock until they brought me back to life. I was then placed on several life support devices and my family was told that there was little hope of my survival.
Pregnancy
I was 30 years old and pregnant with my second baby. My husband, Kevin, and I also had a 2 year old son, Noah. This pregnancy was different than with Noah. I was more tired, I got winded easily, and I had terrible headaches when I would lay down at night. In the few weeks before my daughter, Amelia, was born, my blood pressure began to rise. There were a couple of occasions where I was admitted to Mercy Hospital as an outpatient to monitor my pressure. Bed rest and blood pressure medication didn’t lower my blood pressure, so at 37 weeks gestation, the decision made to begin an induction. We were 12 hours into the induction when Amelia turned breech. Since this was now a breech birth, a cesarean section was scheduled. The C-section went without complications and Amelia was born on September 29th. Kevin, Amelia, and I went to the recovery room. This is when everything went wrong.
Chaos and Devastation
Suddenly, the staff urged Kevin to leave the room with Amelia because my heart-rate was skyrocketing, my oxygen was plummeting, and the room quickly filled with doctors and nurses. Shortly after arriving in the recovery room, I was taken to the ICU. I had a rapid heart-rate, low oxygen levels, fluid on my lungs, and unstable blood pressure (with some readings even as low as 49/37). Within a very short time, arrhythmias of my heart developed and I was paddled several times to get back in rhythm. Cardiologists in the Mercy system were called emergently. Kevin, my mom, and my mother-in-law were told that my heart was failing. It was one of the worst cases this cardiologist had seen, and I needed to be in cardiac cath lab immediately.
In the cardiac cath lab, my heart stopped beating and I coded several times. A 6-person team began CPR for a duration of about 10 minutes. The cardiologist was able to place the Impella device into my heart to pump the blood for me since my heart wasn’t beating properly on its own. The Impella device kept me alive long enough to be transferred to another hospital in St. Louis, Barnes Jewish Hospital. My family was told that the best chance of survival was to get to Barnes and to be placed on an ECMO machine. I arrived at Barnes on September 30th and was admitted to CV ICU (Cardio thoracic /Heart chest ICU). I was placed on the ECMO machine in addition to the Impella device. At this point, I was on a ventilator and two cardiac machines, I was in heart failure, my liver was failing, and my kidneys were failing. Amelia was receiving amazing care in the nursery at Mercy, I was on life support at Barnes, and Noah was at home. No matter where my husband was, he felt guilty for where he wasn’t.
When I was transferred to Barnes, my family was faced with the harsh reality of the doctor’s words. My heart was not beating. I was completely flatlined on the monitor for about 36 hours because the Impella device, ventilator, and ECMO were working as my heart, lungs, and kidneys. My husband was attempting to process the doctor’s words: that he was going to lose his high school sweetheart the day his daughter was born.
The Miracle That Let Me Meet My Daughter
Miraculously, after a few days, my heart began to beat on its own again. It was just a blip here and there on the monitor, but it was enough to give my family hope. Those blips slowly turned into more arrhythmic beating and I began to breathe on my own again. On October 5, 2016, I was taken off ECMO and the Impella device was removed. My ventilator came out on October 8th. On October 9th, I was celebrating our 6th wedding anniversary by sitting up in a chair and having my husband feed me ice chips one by one all night. My heart function (ejection fraction or “EF”) went from 5% at Mercy on September 29th to 40% on October 5th to 60% today (50-70% is considered normal heart function).
On October 11th, when my daughter was 2 weeks old, I was able to meet her for the first time post-delivery. Since I was under sedation for so long, I suffer from retrograde amnesia, meaning that I have memory loss even before my traumatic event. I estimate that I lost about 3-4 weeks of memories, some of which are the birth of my daughter, something that shouldn’t be erased from any mother’s memory. I have no recollection of her birth, my C-section, or the nurse placing her at my cheek minutes after she was born. For all intents and purposes, I did not meet my daughter until she was 2 weeks old.
I was also able to see Noah for the first time since being admitted to the hospital. Two weeks after giving birth, my family of four was finally whole for the first time. I received physical therapy and occupational therapy in the hospital because my fine and gross motor skills were so severely impacted. I was unable to walk or feed myself, and even needed assistance from my loving husband to place a pacifier in our newborn daughter’s mouth. I experienced several complications including blood clots in my heart and uterus and extremely elevated heart rate and blood pressure. However, after just three weeks in the hospital, I was able to return home with my family. Going home was both thrilling and terrifying – I was so afraid I was going to die when I got home without the help of my life-saving medical staff.
The Misery of Recovery
After being discharged, I still felt miserable. My blood pressure was out of control, even with my 10-12 medications per day. One night, my blood pressure rose to 195/115. I could feel it elevated as my head felt like it was about to explode, I felt extremely nauseous, and I was not able to stand up. My heart rate was also extremely high even as I was sitting still. I couldn’t walk around my house without stopping to rest. I could not take care of my children. I was not able to return to work. I was so discouraged that I was going to be this sick for the rest of my life. However, my peripartum cardiologist kept digging for answers. In November 2016, she detected the presence of a paraganglioma, a tumor located next to my adrenal gland. As scary as this new diagnosis was, I was told that it would be the answer to all of my problems once it was removed. It was possible to get my life back.
I had surgery to remove the tumor on December 7, 2016. To say I was terrified is an understatement. This surgery was extremely high risk and I didn’t want to die… again. Amazingly, the surgery was uncomplicated and I awoke from sedation with low-normal blood pressure and a healthy heart rate. I did not have to be sent to the ICU as originally planned and I was able to be discharged just two days later.
One week after surgery, I felt completely like myself again. I could pick up my son. I could care for my daughter. I had my life back! That tumor was the cause of my heart failure. Removing the tumor solved all my problems.
I returned to work full-time on February 1, 2017. My maternity leave was extended just 4 weeks longer than I originally planned. My heart rate and blood pressure stabilized to normal numbers and my stamina has returned. I was truly given my life back.
I survived Peripartum Cardiomyopathy (PPCM). This is a silent killer that is taking far too many new moms away from their newborns and families. I want to share my story to educate people about PPCM. The United States has one of the highest maternal mortality rates, even when compared to underdeveloped countries. I never thought I could lose my life during childbirth in an American hospital in 2016. Pregnant women, as well as health care professionals, need to know the signs and symptoms of PPCM as well as how it can be treated. If I can save just one mother from being taken away from her baby by PPCM, I know I will have succeeded in my goal.
Biography:
As I write this, I am exactly 37 weeks gestation with my post-heart failure pregnancy. My husband and I extensively researched the risks with heart failure and paraganglioma tumors with subsequent pregnancies. We spoke with every specialist we could think of, including a few of those who saved my life. Every doctor was supportive of another pregnancy and I am being followed very closely by my obstetrician and my peripartum cardiologist. I am having routine BNP blood tests conducted to determine if I am in any cardiac distress, echocardiograms have been performed before and during pregnancy, and hormone levels are being watched through bloodwork to ensure the tumor is not returning. All of my tests are coming back with healthy numbers in the average range. Still, my husband and I (and all of our family and friends) are waiting with bated breath for the birth of our third child. We are hopeful that we have an uneventful labor and delivery this time around.**Update- Jessica now has a beautiful healthy 6 week old!
A little background: I am a nurse and I currently work as the nurse educator at a busy OB/GYN office, so I tend to err on the side of “non-urgency” when it comes to OB situations. My birth trauma story is with my third and final baby. I had my first two babies vaginally and unmedicated, and was hoping to do the same with my third.
My Third Pregnancy
My third pregnancy was a BIG surprise. We knew we wanted to add another baby to our family eventually, but hadn’t really planned on it happening when it did. I was tracking my cycles and THOUGHT I knew when I was ovulating, but apparently miscalculated and I found out I was pregnant!
I decided to do the 10-12 week genetic testing and find out the gender as well. I hadn’t done that with either of my girls, but I am 33 and felt it was a good idea. Plus we would get to find out the gender earlier instead of waiting until the anatomy scan! I was SURE it was a girl. I was hoping and praying for a third girl. I had the name picked out and I already had all of the clothes for every season and size from my other two children.
I took the envelope with the gender to a bakery and had a large cupcake made with the color inside. I took it home and we cut into it with the girls. IT WAS BLUE. I was SHOCKED. I had to immediately hide my surprise and disdain, for the girls. I didn’t want them to think this was a disappointment. I left the room and SOBBED. I felt like a horrible person, crying over a boy. I should be thrilled! I just wasn’t.
Mourning the Birth I Envisioned
Fast forward to my anatomy scan. Everything looked good with his growth, except I was told I had a placenta previa. For those unaware, a placenta previa is where your placenta is covering your cervix, either partially or completely. It can be extremely dangerous for the mother and baby if labor and delivery is attempted with a complete placenta previa. Mom could bleed out. They told me, at 20 weeks, this still has the potential to move away from the cervix, so we will reevaluate in 6-8 weeks. I had another scan at 28 weeks and was told that I most likely would have to have a primary cesarean section because the placenta was staying put over my cervix, a complete placenta previa. I went ahead and scheduled another scan for 34 weeks JUST IN CASE it moved. I spent that day sobbing, crying, and mourning over the loss of the birth I envisioned for us. I had been going through this pregnancy ambivalent over the baby, this boy who I still didn’t feel connected to, and hadn’t even been trying for, and now I have to have major surgery? How would I recover with a newborn, a 2 year old, and a 4 year old at home? I felt cheated and felt like this was so unfair.
Panic at 34 Weeks
I never made it to my 34 week scan. The morning of the scheduled scan, I was 34 weeks exactly. It was a Wednesday. My alarm went off at 6am, and I got up to brush my teeth and take a shower before work. I gagged and dry heaved while brushing my teeth (not unusual for me in pregnancy), and I felt a gush. I thought “oh perfect I just peed my pants”. I took my pants down and my underwear was covered in blood. My shower was going, and I thought, okay I’ll jump in the shower really quick to make sure I get all the blood off. I thought I might just go to outpatient labor and delivery, and they would monitor me and maybe I would get some steroids to help the baby’s lungs develop before delivery. I knew bleeding with a placenta previa meant I needed to go to the hospital, but I didn’t think that today was going to be his birthday.
I remember saying out loud in the shower “don’t panic, don’t panic”. My husband goes to work at 3am so he wasn’t home. My 2 girls were sleeping. I got out of the shower and felt relieved because I didn’t notice any more blood. I got a pad and got dressed and called my husband. I was cool, calm, and collected. I told him I was going to go to the hospital. At this point, I planned on driving myself. Ha. Ha. I called my OB office (where I work). I knew the phones weren’t on but I knew I could talk to the answering service who could send a message to the providers at the hospital. I tried THREE TIMES and it just kept ringing. It never went through to anyone. It’s now 6:20. I started to feel uneasy at this point and started scrolling my address book for a provider I work with, who could call the hospital and give them a heads up that I was on my way in. I thought of a resident who I trust, and I had her number. I texted her.
As I walked down the hallway, I felt another large gush and I knew in that moment that I was going to keep bleeding. In the walk down the hallway, the blood poured down my legs and onto my socks and shoes and pooled on the floor. I started to panic. At that point, I called 911. The resident got back to me and she told me 911 was the right thing to do. She told me she was going to talk to labor and delivery and they would be ready for me.
One of my best friends, coworker, and fellow nurse lives about 5 minutes away from me. She was up and getting ready for work when I called her. She convinced me to let her come to my house. Additionally, my dad and stepmom were visiting from Florida and staying elsewhere. I called them to come to the house. By this time, the firefighters had arrived. I was sitting in a chair and blood was just pooling underneath me.
I went through moments of panic and deep breathing to try and relax. I thank God for this one firefighter. I can’t remember his face (he had a mask on because of COVID), but I so deeply remember his blue eyes and the way he just kept redirecting me to focus on breathing and staying calm each time I started to panic. Every time I felt a gush I would panic. The ambulance took 25 minutes to arrive to my house. I still think that is absolutely unacceptable.
Getting to The Hospital (Finally!)
My oldest daughter (5) woke up when the firefighters and my friend were there and she was confused and didn’t understand what was going on. I don’t think I was able to reassure her at all, but since then we have discussed this story in detail. I walked myself to the ambulance and repeatedly urged them to leave, it didn’t seem like there was any urgency to me. I asked for a Doppler to listen to his heart tones. They didn’t have one in the ambulance. How could they not have one??? I tried to take comfort in noticing every single kick and movement he made during that ambulance ride. I continued to bleed during the ride, and at this point the blood was soaking up my shirt because my pants were saturated and there was nowhere else for it to go. I continued to talk to the resident, and at 6:43 I sent a text that said “I’m panicking”. She told me at 6:53 to tell the ambulance drivers a specific bay to pull into, which I did. My husband was following us in his car at this point.
We rolled in through a bay at the hospital and the labor and delivery team was waiting in the hallway with an ultrasound. The resident instantly put it on my stomach and said “there’s his heartbeat, right there!!!”. That’s when it first really sunk in that him dying was a legitimate concern. There was a lot of things happening in this moment, people running, they were wheeling me into the OR. The attending said “we are going to take a look at your baby, and he needs to come out today”. I just kept nodding and saying “okay”. I was trying to remain calm. I was terrified. They put the monitor on, and his heart rate wasn’t doing well. They were taking my pants off, and the attending said “Is this how much you’ve been bleeding? How long has this been?” I looked at my watch and it was 7:10. It had been about an hour. She said, “Your baby’s heart rate isn’t tolerating this anymore, and you have lost a lot of blood. We just don’t have time to do a spinal. He has to come out, and we are going to have to put you under general anesthesia.” She was so calm and I trusted her. I know her from the office I work at and I know she is a wonderful physician. Once again, I just kept saying “okay”. Luckily, the paramedics were still there trying to get their stretcher out, and one paramedic asked me if he could call my husband. I gave him my husband’s cell phone number and he wrote it down.
An Unexpected Birthday
The next thing I remember was waking up in A TON of pain. I was in recovery. I had a catheter and I was told I had a very large incision. They told me he was out and in the NICU. They told me he cried a LOUD cry and everyone was so relieved to hear it. They worked on managing my pain and getting me a PCA (Pain button I could press), because I didn’t get a spinal. I finally saw my husband who told me he had been upstairs to the NICU to see our son. He was 4#11oz and 18 inches long. They told me he was transverse (in sideways) and they really had to yank hard to get his legs out from under my ribs. From the time they put me under and made the first cut, my son was born 8 minutes later at 7:28 am.
I later found out that when my husband got to the hospital he ran in. Because of COVID rules and regulations, they needed to get a name for who he was coming to see, he couldn’t just come back. He told them that his wife just arrived by ambulance and he gave them my name. They told him I wasn’t there. (I wasn’t registered in the system because they whisked me away to the OR immediately). He insisted I was there, and they still wouldn’t let him back. He paced back and forth for 15 minutes or so, not knowing anything, before the paramedic called him. I am so thankful he asked for my husband’s number. When my husband got back to the floor, they asked him if he wanted to meet his son. His son? He couldn’t believe I had surgery and that our son was here. That’s when he went to the NICU to meet him. We still didn’t have a name.
It took a couple hours to get my initial pain under control and the PCA hooked up. The nurse was unbelievable. I feel so honored to be part of this profession. She wheeled me up to the NICU to meet my son. She is the one who suggested to take a first family photo (thank you so much, I would never have thought of this). Once I saw him, laying on his stomach, with machines and tubes and wires, I felt so helpless. I couldn’t stop sobbing. I felt like I did this to him, my body failed me, failed us. My sweet sweet baby. We named him Reid Joseph (Joseph after my dad).
Recovery
I feel that it’s important to mention that my team was amazing. In no way, shape, or form, were they part of this trauma. Additionally, the surgeon who delivered Reid came and saw me in my room. She discussed with me that birth trauma is a very real thing, and that it may not be a priority now, but I will need to consider processing it down the line. And she was right. Reid was only in the NICU for 10 days and was able to come home. I got to spend those 10 days with him in a transition room together once I was discharged. It was divine intervention that my dad and stepmom happened to be here visiting – they were able to stay with my kids while my husband worked so I could remain at the hospital with Reid. Generally speaking, he was an extremely fussy baby. It was not easy. I remember saying “This has been the most joyless experience” while sobbing over his crying one day. That’s when my nightly flashbacks started. I started visualizing the bleeding and all of the things that occurred the day he was born. This happened every night that I put my oldest daughter to bed. I would lay with her, and as she drifted to sleep, I would obsess. That’s when I knew I needed to talk to someone. I have since been in therapy and learned a ton of tools to help me process the birth trauma. I knew putting our story into words was going to help. I felt the physical effects come into my body as I wrote this out, and used some of those learned skills to calm my body. As many others have mentioned, I also felt shame in this story. Like, “Other people have had it so much worse”, and “who am I to say this is trauma”. Trauma is trauma. I am such an advocate for therapy and wholeheartedly believe it has helped me with being able to talk about this 6 months later, without sobbing or feeling nauseous.
About The Author
My name is Emily, I am a mother of three and a nurse. I am a Michigander by birth, and have been happily living in NC since 2011.
“My body was designed for adoption.” That was a common statement I became accustomed to say any time someone asked if my husband and I wanted kids. Making a joke of it helped ease the sting of the reality that while we wanted kids of our own, we knew the odds were stacked against us. Over a decade before I even got married, I knew getting pregnant would be difficult, and that being pregnant could potentially be very dangerous to both a baby and my own life. I’ll get to my birth, but I have to first give you some background.
Preconception Concerns
When I was seventeen, I was hospitalized for bilateral pulmonary embolisms. Part of my left lung had collapsed and I also had a large DVT clot in my left iliac vein. The culprit was my birth control pill that I had just started taking, but that was only the beginning of the doctor’s discoveries. I learned I have a genetic blood clotting disorder that causes my blood to clot when Estrogen levels increase in my body. After many body scans, they also found that I have May-Thurner Syndrome which is why I developed the DTV. As if that wasn’t enough, they also discovered (by chance during one of the body scans) that I have uterine didelphys- TWO UTERUSES! When I was released from the hospital a couple of weeks later, I was warned by all my doctors that if/when the time came to start a family, I would need a strong team of doctors monitoring me every step of the way due to all my health conditions. As a freshman in college, babies were not on my radar, so I filed it away in a ‘re-visit this at a later date’ part of my brain.
Our Journey To and Through Pregnancy
Fast forward to 2019. My husband and I were 2.5 years into our infertility journey. We went through years of cycle tracking and negative pregnancy tests. I had multiple medical procedures including a hysterosalpingogram, and following that I went under anesthesia for a laparoscopy and hysteroscopy to try and figure out what was causing my infertility. I finally found out I was pregnant in January of 2019. I had a baby boy growing in my right uterus. My first doctor’s appointment was at 6 weeks. It was the most joyous and terrifying day of my life, because all my medical conditions came back to haunt me as the doctor re-explained to me all the risks my pregnancy carried. I knew what they were beforehand, but living it instead of just talking about it brought on a new type of fear. I still remember breaking down on the car ride home from my first ultrasound, pleading to my mom on the phone ‘What have I done? Why did I do this? My body wasn’t made for this. I am going to die giving birth!’
The doctor visits were intense and frequent. I had my OB, my MFM (high risk) OB, my hematologist, and my therapists. All were on board to make sure my blood stayed thin, my small uterus stayed hospitable, and baby and I were healthy both physically and mentally. Blood clots were the biggest concern due to my history. I was put on a therapeutic dose of Lovenox, which meant I gave myself injections in my belly twice a day, as well as baby aspirin. The next concern was preterm labor/birth, since my pregnant uterus was half the size of a normal one. There wasn’t much I could do to combat this, but I was advised to take it easy and not over exert myself too much. The main goal was to get to 37 weeks and have a planned induction. I would have to switch from Lovenox to heparin (a different type of blood thinner) a week before induction, because heparin can be reversed and has a much shorter half-life, meaning in an emergency situation my blood wouldn’t be thin and cause me to bleed out. I would also be able to get an epidural. This caused a great deal of anxiety my entire pregnancy. My biggest fear was that I was going to be caught with Lovenox in my system and facing an emergency c-section under general anesthesia. You cannot reverse Lovenox, and you cannot have an epidural with it since it stays in your system much longer, making it dangerous combination with any type of surgery.
While I wanted to enjoy and be grateful for my pregnancy after struggling with infertility, I was miserable. I was riddled with anxiety and the sense of impending doom. I lost 30lbs in my first trimester due to morning (more like 24/7) sickness. I had a couple bleeding scares that turned out to be from my other uterus and unrelated to the baby. My anti-depressants were barely keeping my prenatal depression at a bearable level and my anxiety was so intense I sometimes crumbled to the floor sobbing, thinking ‘these are my last months of life.’
Pregnancy Complications
When I was 31 weeks pregnant, my husband and I went to the movies. As I was getting comfortable in my seat, I felt a tear right under my rib cage below my right breast. It was sharp and obvious, but I didn’t think much of it, other than I may have stretched a bit too much and strained something. Over the next couple of days, the pain got worse. I called my OB, and they didn’t seem too concerned, saying it was probably a muscle tear or baby scrunched up against a rib. I could still feel baby move and felt fine otherwise, so I tried to not let my anxiety grab hold and stress me out too much. After about a week, it started to feel a bit better so I figured they were correct and I had just pulled something. Then about 10 days after that night at the movies, it got a lot worse. I was having sharp pains under my ribs on the right side when I took deep breaths. With my history of PE’s, I know to go to the hospital when you have pain breathing, so in I went. My OB wasn’t on call, so I got a random doctor I had never met before. He listened to baby, drew some blood, and then checked my cervix. Everything checked out normal. At the time, I wished he would ultrasound me to look at baby, but I didn’t say anything. I wanted to trust this doctor. Looking back on it now I regret that decision, because perhaps they could have seen a warning sign then and my birth story could have been different. I was discharged with no answers and the same amount of pain.
Three days after my ER visit, at 33 weeks, my husband and I were in Buy Buy Baby doing some shopping. I had to go to the bathroom and as I was finishing up and washing my hands, I felt something. I went back into the stall and that’s when my heart dropped and all my built-up anxiety around complications and bleeding out during birth came crashing down. There was so much blood. I panicked, wrapped up useless wads of toilet paper and shoved them in my pants and busted out of the bathroom. I saw my husband at the back of the store and screamed at him to ‘Come here now we have to leave NOW.’ Confused, he reluctantly left our shopping cart full of cute baby boy clothes and ran to me at the door. We were so frantic rushing to the car as I explained. He threw a bunch of shipping blankets he had in the back of his truck into the front seat to soak up the blood, and we sped to the hospital. We kept trying to remember the last time I felt him move- was it last night? Did my husband lay his head on my belly like most nights and hear him rolling around? Did he kick during breakfast this morning? I pressed firmly into my belly like I had so many times before but got no response. We were both terrified and I couldn’t help but think how careless I had been for not keeping better track of his movements.
I called the hospital on the way over and waddled my way upstairs to the delivery floor as fast as I could. I could feel the blood pouring out of me as I stood at the counter and the admin asked me if my address, phone, and emergency contacts were still the same. I knew she was required to ask me this, but I was panicked and so irritated so I kept saying ‘None of my information has changed since I was here three days ago! I am bleeding a lot and am on a high dose of blood thinners! I need a doctor now!’ They finally took me back and they immediately hooked me up to check on the baby. My husband arrived just in time from parking the truck to hear that beautiful sound of a strong, healthy heartbeat. A wave of relief washed over me and I felt like I could take at least one breath because I knew in that moment, my baby was still alive.
My bleeding started to slow, so my OB felt comfortable enough to move me to another room, hooked me up to various monitors, placed a catheter, and told me to rest. They still didn’t know where the blood was coming from, but what was important was it was slowing, my stats were good, and baby seemed perfectly content. MY OB told us she wanted to try to make it to 34 weeks, because at that threshold their lungs are much more developed. To be cautious, they still gave me a steroid shot to help develop his lungs in utero. Not 5 minutes later, I decided to roll on my side and try to take a nap. Before I closed my eyes, I asked my husband to check my ‘undercarriage’ because I felt something, but wasn’t sure if it was just the catheter. I’ll never forget the look on his face. His eyes widened and met mine and he said ‘DON’T MOVE’ and ran out of the room. The team of doctors and nurses flooded the room and everyone congregated at the foot of my bed. They all looked at each other with those same wide eyes but nobody said anything. I could tell it was bad, I knew I was bleeding out again. My OB (bless her for being so calm and upbeat) finally looked at me and said ‘Let’s have a baby!’
Birthing Our Baby Under General Anesthesia
Everything happened so quickly after that moment. Since I had Lovenox in my system, I could not receive an epidural. I had to face my worst fear and have an emergency c-section under general anesthesia, with a high dose of blood thinners in my system. As they were wheeling me away to the OR, barely giving me a chance to kiss my husband goodbye, I remember repeating to the nurses and doctors ‘B+, my blood type is B+, PLEASE make sure it they have it on standby in the OR!’ In that moment, I truly believed I was about to bleed out and die. This is the biggest trigger point in my EMDR party—truly believing you are about to die really messes you up. I was so scared and alone. My husband wasn’t allowed to be with me since I was going under anesthesia. We both have a big black hole in the memory of our child’s birth and it really rips me up that neither of us will ever be able to piece it together. I pushed on my belly, begging my boy to kick one more time. He was the only person I knew there that could comfort me in that moment. He kicked one last kick, they transferred me to the operating table, and I was knocked out.
When I woke up from anesthesia, I remember feeling shocked to be alive and instantly started yelling for my baby. My husband tried to calm me by showing me pictures and videos he had taken of our little bean in his incubator in the NICU, safe and healthy (for a 33 weeker). The emergency c-section went well, I miraculously didn’t have any excessive bleeding, and I didn’t need a blood transfusion. My son would be in the NICU for a couple of weeks with feeding tubes, oxygen, bili lights, etc., but was expected to be fine! I truly couldn’t believe we were both alive and going to be okay. While this is what most people like to tell me to focus on, I still can’t help but mourn all the things that I missed out on. It was so incredibly hard to feel like a mother at first – almost like I didn’t deserve the mom badge since I didn’t experience birth. I never got to experience a contraction or any type of labor. I didn’t get the excited feeling of ‘it’s time!’ – instead, sheer terror that it was all ending. I wasn’t conscious for his grand entrance into the world, I never heard his first cries (don’t even know if he did cry when taken out of me), I never got to see my husband meet our son. I didn’t get to experience the golden hour. My child was never placed on my chest. Family that rushed to the hospital when I went into surgery met my own son before I did. I didn’t get to hold him until he was 5 days old. For his entire stay in the NICU, I was only allowed to hold my baby for an hour a day, every other day. To not much surprise, my milk never came in. After a month of pumping 10 times a day, trying all the tricks and supplements and cluster pump sessions, seeing specialists and using all different shields and pipettes and tubes, I gave up trying and accepted I had a formula baby. I knew no matter how my baby was fed he was going to grow and be fine, but part of me was dying to succeed with breastfeeding so I could have just one physical connection to becoming a mother. I became a mother in the messiest, most unnatural way. I still remember when I was wheeled into the NICU on my hospital bed, shortly after waking up from my c-section, I met my son for the first time, but part of me didn’t trust it. How was I to be certain he came out of me if I didn’t witness it? It took months for me to bond to my baby, and I was miserable because all anyone ever says after you have a baby is ‘Don’t you just love it?’ ‘Isn’t it wonderful?’ ‘Was it love at first site!?’ No, how could it be, under these circumstances?
Journey To Recovery
My son will be two next month and I am nearing the end of my EMDR therapy to help process my birth trauma. While I have been able to get in a better headspace around the trauma of that day, I still struggle so much with the grief of all that I missed out on. How unfair it is that I didn’t get to experience so much. I cry any time a baby is born on TV and placed on its mothers’ chest, and I long for the day that doesn’t happen anymore. My husband and I aren’t sure about having another baby. The physical health risks are all the same, I would most likely have another preemie and we would be looking at another NICU stay. After going through our infertility struggles, a miserable pregnancy, a traumatic birth, a traumatic NICU stay, and terrible postpartum depression, I am not sure I can handle the mental health risks again. I worry about my husband going through this all again, but with a toddler thrown into the mix. I also wonder about how I would feel if I were to have another baby and the birth go smoothly. Something I wanted to badly with my first pregnancy, but now I can’t help but think of how guilty I would feel that I didn’t get that with my son. What I do know is that I am not alone on this journey, and that is thanks to Kayleigh and this group of Trauma Mamas she has brought together. It is so therapeutic to just be able to talk about it and share my story, so thank you if you have made it this far. Sending love and healing to all you trauma mamas out there, you are really the greatest gift to your kids, family and this earth <3
About The Author
Hi! I’m Jenny. I am originally from a suburb of Boston, MA but now live in Kentucky with my husband and son. We have a small hobby farm with horses, miniature donkeys, dogs, cats, and chickens! My hobbies are my family, my animals, and riding horses, along with some wine and cheese 😊
I went in for a routine appointment, on a Tuesday, at 36 weeks 5 days, and was told I had gestational hypertension and should go to the hospital immediately for further testing. By Saturday morning, I had been in and out of the hospital three times for testing and monitoring, and my OB suggested that I be induced that evening, around 8pm.
I decided to pamper myself that day and go to the nail salon for a manicure/pedicure around 4pm. I started feeling contractions at the nail salon and called my husband when I left at 5:30pm to tell him I thought I was going into labor. As soon as I got home, I called my OB and measured my blood pressure, and was on my way to the hospital by 6:30pm.
As soon as I was checked into my room in Labor & Delivery my water broke; I was given antibiotics immediately, as I was group B strep positive. I was only dilated a few centimeters but I was in so much pain already I asked for an epidural. Although the epidural slightly relieved my pain, I still had to breathe through every contraction and kept begging them to give me more.
Timelines get fuzzy here, but I know that I spiked a fever and almost went in for a c-section, but was administered antibiotics which helped lower the fever and regulate my baby’s heart rate. I was administered Pitocin, because I was stuck at 7 centimeters for 5 hours, and soon after my baby’s heart rate spiked. Again, I almost went in for an emergency c-section, but they lowered the Pitocin which regulated my baby’s heart rate, again. Finally, I was at 9.5 centimeters and my OB asked if I wanted to push or go in for a c-section. I opted to push, but my contractions slowed down to 5 minutes apart. I pushed for an hour with little progress, and I asked my OB what my options were – we decided to try the vacuum. As soon as we opted for the vacuum, what seemed like 20 more people rushed into my room which caught me off guard. As I tried concentrating on pushing, a nurse hopped on top of me and started pushing on my stomach. Little did I realize, my baby was stuck for 90 seconds, and was finally delivered at 1:18pm on a Sunday. As soon as she came out, I noticed she wasn’t crying – I panicked and screamed “why isn’t she crying?” – I pleaded with my husband to check on our baby. Finally, after an excruciating few minutes, we heard a cry. They brought my baby over, and I held her as my OB stitched me up for nearly an hour, as the epidural slowly wore off. Unfortunately, I had a third-degree tear that would require physical therapy to help fully heal. We were told that my daughter had suffered from a shoulder dystocia and had Erb’s Palsy as a result; she was taken to be x-rayed shortly after we held her for the first time. There was no break, but her arm was completely limp.
Again, everything seems so hazy after these moments – I tried to breastfeed and immediately had difficulty, as my daughter had severe tongue tie. A baby nurse came in to help, and gave me a nipple shield, but we ended up giving her formula as the breastfeeding was deemed unsuccessful.
The following days, we tried to piece together what happened. My husband and I both felt traumatized and wondered if our experience was “normal”. We soon found out that our experience was no where near normal and felt completely clueless as to what to do next, and what our daughter’s diagnoses meant.
The doctors were very casual about our daughter’s Erb’s Palsy diagnoses – they downplayed the severity and told us that it would heal on its own, and to take her to an orthopedic doctor to be examined. She had an issue with Jaundice, and they also thought she may have a heart murmur, so her arm took a temporary back-burner while we watched our daughter receive an echocardiogram before being discharged that day. Thankfully, her heart was healthy and we breathed a sigh of relief.
Dealing with Erb’s Palsy
My husband and I arrived at our first pediatrician appointment, frazzled, but excited that we had figured out how to get her there in one piece. The nurse came into the exam room, and immediately brought up my daughter’s Erb’s Palsy diagnosis. She mentioned that her nephew also suffers from Erb’s Palsy, and at 22 years old he is still disabled. She told us stories of how he could barely crawl, but seemed to manage, and showed us pictures of him as a child, post-surgery, with a large cast on his arm. She told us that her information was “off the record” and how we should speak to a lawyer. My husband and I were distraught, to say the least. We felt completely blindsided, and as I sat there sobbing in the doctor’s office, they handed me a postpartum depression survey to complete.
A few days later, we had our initial appointment with the orthopedic doctor that was recommended to us – he was very casual about her diagnoses and said that we should “let her be a baby” for the next 3 months and follow up. My husband and I both felt very uncomfortable about how to proceed, as our baby had no movement in her arm, and decided to get a second opinion. I did my research and found that Lurie’s Children’s Hospital had a Brachial Plexus program for babies and children with this type of injury. I tried getting an appointment, but was turned down; thankfully, I had some connections through work and was able to get an appointment within a few weeks.
At the initial appointment at Lurie’s, we were told that our daughter should begin physical therapy immediately to help heal her arm. They told us that the orthopedic doctor was incorrect, and that “doing nothing” would not help her heal faster. We were told that her progress would be monitored over the next few months to determine if she will need surgery.
At our weekly physical therapy appointments, I would ask the physical therapists a slew of questions to understand this diagnoses and what our future may look like to set expectations for us. I was told that if her injury did not heal itself within the first 2 weeks of life, that she would most likely not fully recover. I asked extensive questions about what her life would be like when she was older, how it would affect her daily life, and her physical abilities. My daughter just turned 4 months and is absolutely thriving, and healing more every day.
As frightening as our first pediatrician appointment was, I am happy that I was finally told how severe this injury could be if you are not proactive. I am thankful for our due diligence to do research, get second opinions, and fight for the very best care, but I often wonder what would have happened had we listened to that first doctor. I hope that my story inspires expecting moms to advocate for themselves, and for their babies as much as possible, to do their own research, and get multiple opinions.
Bio
My name is Maggie Daniels Dankler, and I am a Chicagoan, mama to my daughter Nellie Grace, wife, dog-mom, and in technology sales.
