Due in June, Born in May!

[CarmenH]

Hello! Just wanted to announce the birth of my beautiful daughter Laura Isobel. Laura Isobel was born at 7.20pm on 08/05/06 32+6 weeks (edd 27/06/06)

I had been having my urine and bp checked as my bp had once been up a bit and I had had some protein in my urine. On Monday morning (OMG 1 week ago already!!!) I had to go to the maternity assessment unit to hand in another 24 hour urine collection. They checked my BP and monitored it over the next couple of hours and each time it was high, then my urine result came back and showed that i had over 20 times the normal amount of protein in my urine. I still felt ok although I was quite swollen and puffy but I had been for the previous few weeks. They decided to admit me to the antenatal ward for further monitoring.

Once on the antenatal ward I started to feel ill. I got a really bad headache and tummy pain and then vomited everywhere. Each time they checked my BP it was getting higher so the consultant came and whipped me round to delivery suite. DP got a bit of a shock when I rang him to tell him to come to the hospital asap. I had a catheter put in and some big drips with drugs that made me feel a bit odd. My BP was still out of control so they took me to theatre and I had an emergency c-section.

Laura weighed 1435grams (3lbs 3ozs) and was taken straight to SCBU. She is lovely beautiful gorgeous scrummy ! I was too poorly to see her until the next day as they still couldn't control my BP and my kidney and liver function went haywire as did my blood counts and clotting. I had my BP checked every 15minutes on Monday night and my does that hurt your arm after a while !

I finally escaped from hospital on Saturday but Laura is still on SCBU. She is getting some support with her breathing and has a heart problem called a patent ductus arteriosus that is common in prem babies. She has started some medicine for it and hopefully it will close up, if not she will need an operation.

I can't believe that a week ago today she was tucked up inside me. DP and I are so in love with her already. I can't wait until she gets strong enough for home.

I'm recovering well but still on a cocktail of pills and really tired as severely anaemic. Scar is healing ok but I've got a big blood clot behind it and I'm bruised to my knees ! I look like I'm wearing purple cycling shorts!

Sorry if this is a long post.

OMG, that all sounds scary but you sound incredibly upbeat. Well done you and welcome to little Laura Isobel. I hope you are all home as a family very soon. x

Congratulations and welcome to Laura!

I hope she is home with you very soon.

Oh congratulations. But your poor thighs!

I bet you can't wait to bring little Laura home with you.

Congratulations CarmenH of the safe arrival of Laura. My thoughts are with you as you recover, and I hope you can bring your tiny bundle of joy home soon.

How very scary and dramatic Carmen
Glad Laura is doing well in SCBU and that you're recovering finally.
And congrats on your little girl
xxxxxxxxxxx

That must have been so scary for you all.

Welcome to little Laura. Fingers crossed that she'll be home asap. :)

Blimey, Carmen. I guess that's one way to get a section.

Congratulations and welcome to the lovely scrummy Laura Isobel.

Ah, congratulations, over 7 weeks early must have been a bloody big shock but you seem to be doing just fine with it all, well done

Wow what a shock!! Congratulations, and wishing you all the best, Hope she's home soon! :)

have posted on june thread, but just wanted to say congratulations again! you been through the wars and come out the other end

hope laura is doing well and soon to be home with you

well done! and congratulations again to you and your family

Congratulations :) Hope you can bring her home soon!

Crikey - that sounds so scary. I hope you recover soon and that Laura Isobel is home with you sooner.

Welcome Laura

Oh, and please come back and give updates on Laura when you can. Hope you have lots of great support at home.

Congratulations on your new baby daughter.
Let us know how things are going.

Gosh what a story!

Big congratulations to you and hope Laura comes home soon.

Many congratulations on the birth of Laura, and hoping she is back home with you really soon Carmen. You sound astonishingly strong after such an ordeal - the power of motherhood I guess :)

It's been awfully quiet here. How are you? How is Laura?

Have been meaning to update you all but have been busy as you will see! Thanks for all of your kind words and congratulations

Laura is now doing well. Her patent ductus arteriosus has closed and she is taking full feeds by a tube. She is off all breathing support and oxygen. . She is still in an incubator but looks absolutely perfect. Still just can't believe how much we love her. Having her out of her incubator for cuddles twice a day and hopefully soon she will be able to go into a cot.

I on the other hand seem to lurch from disaster to disaster! Basically on Monday after my stitch came out my wound started to open up to reveal the huge hideous haematoma behind it. Saw one of the registrars on Tuesday who said it would still be ok. Didn't believe her and so saw the consultant on Thursday who then said that I needed to go back to theatre to have it (the haematoma) removed. Was warned pre-op that they might not be able to join the wound up again but kind of didn't really listen when they said this. In theatre (under spinal) they explained that they couldn't join back the wound so I had to have a vaccum dressing applied. Afterwards explained that once they had taken away the haematoma and trimmed dead tissue away from my wound I didn't have enough spare tissue to pull together. Said that possibly they could have done but at least 10% chance that wound would open up again. I now have a big whole in my abdomen that goes down to muscle . I have to have a dressing on constantly with a strange suction/vaccum device attached to it. This needs changing twice a week and I may need it for several weeks! If it still hasn't healed/ not able to pull together then I may need a skin graft to sort it out! I am being referred to the plastic surgeons this week. I have apparently been "extraordinarily unlucky". Bloody tell me about it! On the positive side it is all actually a lot less painful than it sounds, only really hurting when they do the dressing changes when I got to try out gas and air but decided that it just made me feel sick.

Have told dp that he can have any siblings for Laura. God knows what might go wrong next time!

congratulations!
Hope the lovely Laura is home very soon.

and hope you get sorted soon too!

Carmen, you poor thing! So pleased that Laura is doing well but yes you have been really unlucky yourself. I had a wound dehiscence with my first c-section that went down to my bowel :( but it wasn't caused by a haematoma and the restitching went OK.
Really hoping the vacuum dressing does the trick for you and a skin graft is not required.
Thanks for the update and wishing you both safe home soon.

Just wanted to let you know that Laura came home on Sunday 4th June and it is just great having her here with us . We are just so completely in love with her.

I'm also doing well, my wound should be healed up in a week or two, the plastic surgeon is happy with it and I won't need a skingraft!

Great news :)

Excellent news! I missed your update - poor, poor you. You sound so upbeat about everything - that must be helping.

Glad Laura is home with you. I hope you continue to recover speedily.