Lana Part 2 - 28 weeks & 5 days

The nurse practitioner informed us that the hospital visit will only be a one-hour observation. They want to make sure that Kelly’s BP would not stay elevated, and also to see if Lana is being affected. Our prior ultrasound showed that Lana is a tad smaller than expected. However, they also said the same thing about our first daughter, Hailey. In fact, Hailey weighed barely over 5 pounds when she was delivered at full term.

One hour, turned into two hours. Kelly’s BP was still pretty high and they decided to administer a beta blocker (Labetalol) to see if it would respond. Another 30 minutes went by, and by then, her BP has started to trend downwards. We were all smiles, and thought we would soon be ushered out of the hospital.

It was at this point when our nurse, Sherita, noticed something on the monitors that would change any hopes of leaving the hospital that day. “I don’t like how that looks like”, she said to herself. She explained to us how Lana’s heart rate would decelerate randomly.

These decelerations are usually seen when the mother is having uterine contractions - except we’re only 28 weeks & days into our pregnancy. Another possible reason for the decelerations is that Lana isn’t getting enough blood flow via placental exchange. Which means she isn’t getting the oxygen she needs (intrauterine growth restriction).

Our doctor said that the plan is to keep Lana in the womb for as long as possible assuming that she is getting enough oxygen and nutrition. At the time, her decelerations didn’t occur too often and he advised us that Lana staying inside for a few more weeks is a good (and also probable) scenario. He said to stay put in our room for a little longer to make sure it doesn’t occur more frequently, and so we did.

Less than 30 minutes after last speaking with our physician, he comes barreling through our hospital room. We thought we had at least a few more days to at least give her time to grow and mature. However, that clearly wasn’t going to happen based solely on our doctor’s concerned facial expression. He stated that Lana’s heart rate has been decelerating more frequently in the last half-hour than it ever did the whole time we were there. Essentially, if we waited any longer, Lana probably wouldn’t have made it through the weekend. “It’s time to have this baby!”, he declared.

And with that, Kelly was whisked away to another room, and I was wrapped with a surgical gown by 2 nurses working almost in unison. One of them asked me what my name and date of birth was. I was only able to answer one of her questions, and that was because I had my work badge on.