Background Pregnancy

On April 1, 2009 - I had my first ultrasound. They determined I was 9 weeks and 5 days. Parker was one inch long at that time. April 23rd - I had to have another ultrasound because I had some spotting and they were not able to find a heartbeat. Baby looked fine. May 3rd - We made our first trip to the ER. An Ultrasound was done and they said I had placenta previa. I was released and told to take it easy. May 10th - The bleeding increased greatly. Another trip to the ER. Baby looked great, but the bleeding was cause for concern. May 15th - My regular Dr. appointment was moved up because of bleeding. The ultrasound found that there was no placenta previa. At this time they could not determine what was causing the bleeding. May 26th - Another increase in bleeding. Dr. said stay in bed and come into the office asap in the morning. May 27th - Dr. appointment and yet another trip to the emergency room. A furn test was done and determined that my water was in fact leaking. I stayed over night in the hospital and was released the next day. The baby looked great and my fluid level was perfect. I was to be on bed rest for the remainder of my pregnancy. June 12 - I had a level three ultrasound done and they discovered that the leak had sealed up and the placenta had an extra lobe. If you look this up on the Internet it is pretty interesting. It is also called a twin placenta.

July 20th at 10:00pm - We made our last trip to the ER. The bleeding had increased and I was having contractions every 30 minutes. The nursing staff was great. This was a long week for me. I was on all kinds of meds to stop the contractions and received steroid shots to help Parker's lung development. The first couple of days I lost a lot of blood and ended up fainting with my nurse standing right there. I hit my head on the wall and had a huge knot on my forehead, a cut on my eyebrow and a bruise on my cheek. I had a blood transfusion the next day. July 21st - Another ultrasound was taken and it was determined that he was 2 lbs 1 oz.

July 28th - Parker could not wait any longer. I labored for 2 1/2 hours and they could not stop the labor. When they finally checked, I was 10cm and ready to go. They quickly did an ultrasound after Parker's heart rate dropped. They rushed me into an OR, but I was able to deliver Parker vaginally. There were a ton of Doctors in the room. A whole team for Parker and another whole team for me. Lance walked in right as Parker was entering the room. They quickly handed him off to the NICU doctors to get him stabilized. All things considered, the delivery went extremely well. It is truly amazing that he made it as long as he did.

Parker was born at 12:01 am on July 28th. He weighed 2 pounds 1 oz. and was 13 inches long.