#30DaysofBrave - Cathy

"Our story begins on 9.18.19 when I went into labor with our second daughter. We headed to the hospital when I could no longer talk through contractions. Once in the hospital I was in triage for over 6 hours because the hospital did not have a room available. Which meant I didn't have many "tools in my toolbox". Around midnight a room finally became available and we headed upstairs. Labor had stalled so the staff recommended starting a low dose of pitocin to move things along. Around 10 am I could no longer handle the exhaustion and decided to get an epidural so I could sleep. I was checked a little while later. I was 6cm and my daughter was +2 station. Yay! Were making progress. I, then, decided to take a nap. This was around 12 pm.

Around quarter of five my husband said I abruptly woke up and yelled, "My heart is racing!" He left the room to get my nurse and as they returned, my husband saw my eyes roll in the back of my head and he believed I had a seizure. My nurse then checked for a pulse. Nothing. She then grabbed my shoulders, shook me, and yelled my name several times. When I didn't respond she pressed the staff assist button. This calls the L&D and NICU teams.

After several more minutes I was prepped for an emergency cesarean and the code blue team was called. They performed it right there in the L&D room, which I believe saved my daughter from further trauma. She was born lifeless and limp. She had to be resuscitated and was intubated for several hours, then moved to a cannula.

My daughter and I survived an amniotic fluid embolism (AFE) during labor. It's quite miraculous that she is doing as well as she is because AFE babies still in the womb have a 40% fatality rate and an even higher rate of brain injury due to loss of oxygen. She has hit all of her milestones thus far and some even before! The only scar she has from all of her trauma is about a 2 inch scar on her right shoulder from a cut the surgeon made.

During her hospital stay my husband did have to advocate for her to get my milk. I was quite a bit sicker than my daughter and my husband (along with the advice of our family friend/pediatrician) decided not to pump me while I was on life support. However, I was just weaning my first daughter and for some reason I decided to continue pumping and freeze some of my milk. The hospital staff explained that my daughter needed to go on formula. My husband said No, we are using the frozen milk.

The doctor then explained the hospital doesn't allow unscreened milk into the hospital. So then my husband said open the milk bank. The doctor explained that is only for preemies (as it should be). Given that this was such a unique situation, eventually the doctor caved and allowed my daughter to get donated colostrum from the milk bank and my frozen milk. Once home, we had hundreds of donors offer support and were able to get a full year on donated milk. Looking back it would have been fine if our daughter received formula (as many babies do) but my husband really wanted to respect my wishes because he knew how important nursing was to me.

I recognize that our NICU journey is quite unique in that my daughter "only" had to be resuscitated and spent "only" 4 days in the NICU. But I still think it's important to talk about. There needs to be awareness raised for AFE and milk donation!"