Cooper's Story

Posted On Wednesday, May 18, 2011  by Kristy

May 20, 2011 would have our Cooper’s First Birthday.   My pregnancy with his older brother Davis could not have been more perfect.  No swelling at all, my BP actually decreased 10 points during pregnancy, went two days past my due date before I was induced because Davis was on the large side.   So naturally I was expecting the same with Cooper’s pregnancy two years later.   From the beginning, Cooper’s pregnancy was harder for me.   On April 30, I had a monthly checkup.  One ankle had just swollen up which I thought was odd and I even talked with the doctor about my BP readings being higher than they were with Davis’s pregnancy.  The doctor looked at my chart and assured me that while they were higher they were still well within the normal range and my weight gain between pregnancies was the culprit because everything else was fine.  By the end of the weekend, the other ankle was swollen.  The next few weeks were pretty miserable but I kept blaming it on “payback” from a perfect pregnancy.   Monday May 17, 2010 I woke up and there was blood. I was two days short of 24 weeks.  We rushed to see my OB.   She confirmed there was a small tear in the placenta that I needed to be hospitalized for but that she wanted the high risk OB to give a second opinion.   After a Level II ultrasound, it was decided that I needed to be transferred 45 minutes away to UNC Hospital because of the higher level NICU there.    My BP was in the low 150 range which is high but we really thought that was due to stress of the moment.  

The next few days were stressful but the bleeding stopped, my BP returned to mostly normal stage with a few peaks in the 140 range. By nighttime Wednesday, my husband and I were ready for a long hospital stay. He was returning to work and prepared to be a “single dad” to Davis for the next few months.   While this was not ideal for our family, everything was looking stable and we were optimistic that Cooper would not be delivered for a while.  We even were telling Cooper that it was not football season yet so he could stay in a little while longer because he was not going to miss anything important.  Thursday morning (24 weeks, two days), the entire Maternal Fetal Medicine department entered my room.   Even though my BP was fine and the bleeding had stopped, overnight tests showed that my kidneys and liver were not functioning properly.  I had severe preeclampsia and that the steroid shots given on Monday and Tuesday had been masking what was going on with those organs.   If morning tests came back the same or worse, then they would need to deliver Cooper that day or the next morning.    I was wheeled back to the OR by 4:30 that afternoon.   Our little boy was one pound, five ounces and 12.5 inches.  We knew that his time here was short so we did the best we could by holding him and talking to him.  We were expecting a few hours with Cooper at the most.  He gave us 22 precious hours.   My husband and I met had met eight years earlier at UNC and are proud Tar Heel alumni that return to Chapel Hill for every home football game.  I remember a moment when I was fighting against the magnesium drip to stay awake and somewhat aware of my surroundings , watching my husband show Cooper UNC’s football stadium out my room window  and breaking down because there were so many experiences that our son would not have because of this evil disease.  I still have trouble understanding why this disease chose my family.  How everything was perfect and now is a large void in my heart cannot ever be filled. I doubt the “Why me?” question will ever be answered so all I can do is keep moving and living my life for my little boy.