I woke up Monday morning with some anxiety knowing we would find out more about what was going on with our baby.
I went through the day like normal... feed Kasen, dropped him off at my sisters, went to school. Then 1:45pm rolled around and I had to face it all. I was going to see what was wrong.
The nurse did a ultrasound on me. She didn't say much until the doctor came into the room. She quietly showed him a few things on the screen. One thing she pointed out is a clef lip, Then she found some abnormal thing with the kidneys. Then with his heart.
He explained a few things that could be the problem and suggested doing a genetic test to see what was really going on.
He made us an appointment for 5:00pm the same night with Dr Hales, a specialist. The doctors assistant did another ultrasound on me. This one took about 45 minutes. He examined everything over the babies body. Then he said the doctor would come in and explain the results. Devastating news was delivered to us.
Our baby boy was likely to have trisomy 18 or 13, a genetic disorder. He has numerous issues over the majority of his body.
He kept explaining more, but I was so frozen inside I couldn't understand anything he was saying. I just sat there crying. The doctor and Ray went in the other room and talked more. I couldn't hear anymore, it was already too much. We then headed home. I walked outside the doctors office and just completely broke down. I couldn't understand why something like this had to happen to my baby boy. I was trying to wrap my head around the past few hours, but I couldn't fully understand the reality of things going on. My body was just in shock.
The next day Ray and I talked about what we should do now. After thinking about it for a few days. The best option was to terminate the pregnancy. I feel it would be easier to lose him now, then to carry him to full term and lose him later.
We scheduled the appointment for Friday morning.
I already felt that I had such a strong bond with this baby boy. He had been living and growing inside me for 5 months. Seems so unfair that I spent all that time sick for nothing.. I dreamed and thought about how he would change our family for good and his life with his brother and sisters.
I was already looking forward to that "new baby smell" and being able to cuddle him all day long.
Friday Morning came. I hadn't slept much that night, knowing what was going to come in the morning.
We arrived at the hospital around 7:30. The doctor finally arrived around 11:00. He gave me the drugs to get labor started.
Finally around 6:30, labor had officially started as the contractions started getting more intense. I finally had him around 7:45 pm. We named him Ray Shilo Kounalis.
This labor was much more painful than my first and was completely different. The doctor wanted to monitor me for a few hours after to see how my body was. Finally around 11:00pm, we were able to start to sign papers to be able to leave the hospital. My nurse grabbed a wheelchair for me and we started to head outside. It seems so unfair that I helped my baby grown for 5 months, just to have him taken away and I had to leave him.
Monday the 16th we had a little service for Ray Shilo at the Washington cemetery. It was so hard to see that tiny coffin. My heart still aches and I know it will continue to, I just keep telling myself, "One day at a time".
