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3rd Trimester
Bhobbsdz
member
Long Birth Story- Stroke in utero
Bhobbsdz
member
I wanted to write this post, not to scare you all, but let you all know that God was on our side during and after delivery. I have not written this before, so I hope it is easy to understand. Here it goes:
I was induced on the morning of Feb. 9th starting at 7:00am. I got the epi when I reached 5 centimeters and believe me, I needed it. By 5:00pm I was fully dilated and at a station 1. I was trying to wait until I reached station 2 before I started pushing, but the contractions were just to strong and the only thing that made me feel better was to push through them. I started pushing around 5:30 pm and ds was born at 7:54 pm with the vacuum suction used. He was not breathing or crying. He was gray and I knew something was terribly wrong when my OB did not let dh cut the cord or lay him on my stomach. Within 45 seconds, the delivery room went from 5 of us to 15 of us in there. After what seemed like forever, I heard my son start crying and then I started balling. They had to perform CPR, which was so scary to watch. Afterwards I was taken to surgery, because I could not deliver my placenta, it was stuck inside my uterus. DS also weighed in at 9 lbs 9 oz 21 3/4 " so I had 3rd degree tears again,(also had 3rd degree with dd, who was 7 lbs 19 1/2"). Therefore, I was also "cleaned out" and stitched up while I was under anesthesia. I finally got to hold ds around 11:30 pm once I was out of recovery and into a room.
Here goes the rest of the story. Ds was jaundice. He bilirubbin count at its highest was 13.8. Which on an almost 10 lb baby isn't that high, but his pedi. decided to do phototherapy. I was discharged on the 11th, but ds was not, which was very hard. I was in the nursery feeding him on the 13th around 8:00am and I felt him twitching. I asked a nurse who came by and she said it was normal, baby's central nervous systems caused this in newborns at times. Well, he continued, so when I went to put him down for phototherapy, I mentioned to his nurse. She told me she would watch him and if she noticed anything that seemed off, she would contact the pedi. on call. About an hour later, the nurse called me and told me she called the pedi. who was on her way to check him out. After the pedi. stayed with him almost 2 hours, she decided to do an ultrasound on the brain. The pedi. told me that this is sometimes a sign of a seizure that has occurred or about to occur. While waiting for the results, she started him on phenobarbital, just to be on the safe side, through an IV. I went home so dh could go to the hospital. While home, the hospital called again to get a consent for a CAT Scan. I gave the consent, called dh who was on his way and told him. Around 30 minutes later, dh called to see if I could get a sitter for dd, the pedi. wanted to talk to both of us. When I got to the hospital, I saw dd's and ds's pedi. and the pedi. on call, which put me into a straight panic mode. I walked into the bonding room where dh was holding ds. The pedis came in and said that the CAT Scan showed some shocking information. DS has a stroke while in utero about a month prior to delivery. We were stunned, the drs. were also stunned. Who would have guessed. He's perfect, so signs or symptoms of a stroke. The CAT Scan also showed bleeding on the brain, meaning a seizure has occurred. The bleeding on the brain was caused by a hard delivery on the baby. Him being such a large term baby was the cause for that. The u/s I had at 39 weeks showed him at 7 lbs 8 oz, which is off 2 lbs either way, so in other words, I should have had a cs, but who would have known. Ds was transferred that night to a hospital that is about 45 minutes away that has an amazing NICU. We got there about 2:30 am and once they got him settled and we fed him, we checked into a hotel around 4:30 am. We met the attending neonatal specialist the next morning around 9:30 am. He was talking to the fellows and then talked to us. Reminder, at this point, we have not been answered as to if this is a life threatening situation or not. So the attending Dr. talking to us, was telling us things and mentioned when he's 3 mos. old. I stopped him mid sentence and said, "you are telling me Jackson is coming home?" He said, "of course, why wouldn't he?" The tears started flowing again. I had never been so happy. The pediatric neurologist came in later that afternoon and met with us. She said that the stroke affected the right side of his brain, which is the motor skills. Since newborns brains are not "wired" yet, Jackson can learn to re-route the things that part of the brain controls to another part of the brain. We may never see any signs of the stroke. If we do see signs of the stroke, for example, him curling his left hand, we know why now and can take actions to help him correct this. He had an MRI on Monday morning, which just showed a clearer picture of what the CAT Scan showed. We were able to bring him home that afternoon, which was a huge blessing and answered prayer. He will go into a early intervention program at 6 mos., when he should become mobile, to have him tested and see if the stroke has caused any damage. If so, then we will start whatever type of therapy we will need at that point. Hopefully everything will be fine, but if something is found, we have a great team of drs. working with him. He is on Phenobarbital twice a day, which is a preventative measure so he does not have a seizure.
Strokes while in utero happens to 1 out of every 4000 babies born. There is not a reason why, it is genetic. We are very lucky with the way things worked out with phototherapy and so forth, because if it were not for him still being in the hospital for jaundice, the nurse taking action after me feeling him twitch, we would not know all this. Most of the time, baby's and children are anywhere between 12 mos to 2 yrs old before the stroke is found. I am thankful to God for everything happening the way it did so we now know. We found out when he was 4 days old.
He is so beautiful and we are so in love with him. His big sister is amazing and it is awesome to watch her nurture him, such as bring him a blanket and wrap him up. She brings him stickers, plastic play food, and anything else she can find. We have included her on everything we do with him and it shows, because she wants to help with everything. I am proud of her. For those of you who have a young child at home, don't worry, he/she will adapt and just fall in love also. I was worried, but she definitely proved me wrong.
Good luck to you all!
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Re: Long Birth Story- Stroke in utero
I am so sorry that you had to go through all of that! T&P sent, it sounds like he will be just fine though
Congrats mama and welcome to the world baby boy!
Also thank you for the words of encouragement for us already moms
I always hear the horror stories but not always the positive stories. Your siggy pic melted my heart, and I cannot wait for DS to have his baby sister!
Congrats again!
Congrats on your beautiful boy and I'm so glad that he's okay!
Thoughts and prayers that he continues to do well. What a scare-sounds like he's in perfect hands!
You sound like you are handling everything really well; that's so great. My daughter also had a stroke in utero (some doctors have said it looks like it was very early in my pregnancy; others have said it was around 30 weeks). We do know it was ischemic (blood clot) though and not hemorrhagic (brain bleed), but to say it's genetic isn't totally accurate since DH has the same clotting disorder as DD, but he did not have a stroke in utero, KWIM? And in your case, your DD did not have a stroke in utero. There are so many things that could cause this; unfortunately doctors just don't know much about them. So sad considering they're more common than childhood leukemia and brain tumors, and those get tons of research dollars...
Either way, you are SO lucky you got the diagnosis early and can advocate for Jackson right off the bat! Babies can actually begin receiving therapy (OT and PT) as soon as birth; he doesn't have to wait until 6 months. Had we known DD had a stroke, we would have begun therapy immediately. Unfortunately, we didn't start until about 9 months. I think it would have made an even bigger difference. But she is thriving and shows very little signs of her stroke (she's right side affected, mostly her hand, not so much her leg/foot). Oh, and they said her speech would be severely affected (3/8 of her brain is damaged) and she hasn't qualified for speech therapy since she turned 3--she actually scored above average on the tests LOL. So, yes, the brain definitely rewires. It's pretty amazing.
Sorry for the long message. If you ever need someone to talk to, feel free to page me (I'm usually on PgAL), email me at tosa28 at hotmail dot com or visit my blog: www.babystrokesteps.blogspot.com.
Congrats on your baby boy! He will amaze you more and more each day.
Prayers for your little boy! Glad he is ok and home! Congrats!
Thank you! It would be nice to have someone to talk to that is going through the same thing. I am going to go to your blog and read. I will save your email. I am so glad everything is going well for you and your dd. We go back to the pedi. neuro on Feb. 26th and I am sure we will find out more then on an action plan. We go to his pedi. again on March 1st. The Drs. appts. are crazy, but so worth it.
Hi @ckstokes
How is your nephew now? That was born with microcephaly? Has he been adjusting well and what kind of treatment is he on?
LFAF Summer 2016 Awards:
Friends for 17 years. Married 10. TTC since Jan 2009.
2013: IVF#3/FET#4 Elisabeth CJ born April 30, 2014
Cerclage, P17, and 3 months of bed rest brought us our Rainbow.
Dum spiro, spero.
LFAF Summer 2016 Awards: