So
here's MY STORY (in a pretty novel-like nutshell..lol) :
I was 37 weeks pregnant with my 1st child, Jaxon, while driving down an old country road, March 29th 2013 around 11:30 p.m., when we spun out of control. During the crash my placenta detached and his oxygen supply was completely cut off (to the point that when they delivered him, the cord was COMPLETELY DRY). I remember in the ambulance they tried to find his heartbeat and couldn't bc the driving was apparently "too loud" so I had to wait until getting to the hospital to finally hear that he was OK. That wooshing heartbeat made me feel 110% better!!! Once there, DH and I stayed in the hospital for about 5 days and then once discharged, we stayed (LITERALLY didn't leave this little room for 8 days!) in the NICU with Jaxon. The first few days were a BLURR, as you can imagine. We were so doped up that it was hard to tell what was going on. I was allowed to do "Kangaroo Kare" which is naked chest to chest with baby. So I did this for 8 hours at a time, all night and day for days on end, only getting up if I needed to pee so bad I couldn't hold it. They fed him my breastmilk through a tube twice a day once he got a little better. They told me his brain had bled from the oxygen deprivation, so there were holes in his brain where the blood was absorbed. He was basically a "sleeping baby". Beautiful, 38 weeks (so technically full-term), weighed 8 lbs and was perfect. But only because his brain stem was attached, which is what allows you to BREATHE/have a HEARTBEAT. He was on a ventilator all of his short life. He also had liver/spleen issues. All of these combined would have made it so that we'd have to feed him through a feeding tube his whole life and he would always be "sleeping" as they called it. But we didn't mind that a bit. Throughout the entire time, they told us he would not make it. We hoped and prayed as hard as anyone could, but it was not what God had planned for him. On April 10th, in the evening, my sister wanted to hold him. Everyone else got to, but her.. so we thought we'd give her a chance before he got too fragile. Once he was on her chest, the nurses ran in to tell us that his vitals were plummeting and that this, he had chosen, was his time. He was switched to my chest so daddy and I could hold him for his last moments. We then took out his dreadful breathing tube, his life suposrt, and our beautiful boy slowly went.. in the comfort of our arms. Daddy sang to him. Then, after a short while, we clothed him and
I kissed him on his lips for the first time. He'd always had a neonatal bar, to hold in the tube, so that was one of the moments I will never, ever forget. (OR the time when we changed his diaper, and my baby- with no brain function- peed all over us!!! ) So finally after we said what would be the most painful goodbye of our entire lives, we handed him to our WONDERFUL nurse, whom I will NEVER forget!!, and walked out of the hospital like
zombies. After all of that, we just get in the car and drive home?! It seemed too unreal. So yes, this is the nightmare I have to remember everyday. We had an open casket funeral, but neither DH or I looked. He looked better plump and juicy, the way I remember him. He is buried about 500 feet down the road from where we crashed, it's a cute little town, way out in the country. There is a beautiful cross that my step father made at the crash site, so we'll never forget. It will be a place we'll take our family someday, to tell all of his brothers and sisters what an amazing little fighter their big brother was.
https://i39.tinypic.com/54jayf.jpg
