Pierce, sting, burn, itch, bruise.
Anything for my child.
I can take the pain.
The battle of prematurity didn't leave us after the boys' NICU stays. We knew that because our twins were born 8 weeks premature, we would be at higher risk for a premature delivery should we decide to have another child. So, when that time came last summer, and we celebrated the joy of becoming pregnant, we also braced ourselves for the possibility of going through the traumatic experience of preterm delivery, a lengthy NICU stay, and then the 2 years of specialized follow-up healthcare should our baby be born too soon.
While almost everyone I spoke with on the topic quickly dismissed my worries with "Oh they were early because they were twins! Don't worry about this baby!" I couldn't help but think of all the very many friends I now have who are moms of twins and who carried their children to full term--37, 38, even 39+ weeks! While multiples are at higher risk for preterm labor, they are not by default delivered early. My boys came even earlier than many do, and I couldn't shake the concern that there was more to it than simply being multiples. But how could I prevent this from happening again? Give my uterus and unborn child a daily pep talk?
Well, in our initial high risk consult, I learned that there was, in fact, a medical treatment to help prevent subsequent preterm labor. The complication was that there was not much research into the likelihood of premature delivery in a singleton pregnancy after a premature delivery of twins. But, of course, we decided to take the precaution and give our baby the best possible chance at cooking all the way until her due date. After all, as healthy as my twins were for 32 weeks, they still spent a month in the NICU. A month that was the longest and most challenging of my life. What would I do if I had to experience life as a NICU mom again, but this time with two toddlers at home?
So we started treatment. Beginning at 16 weeks, and continuing through week 36, I received a weekly injection. To get a sense of what this injection was like, I want you to think about the last flu shot or similar vaccine you received. A pinch, maybe some stinging, and perhaps a little sore spot for a few days. Now take the needle you remember and double it in size, then fill the syringe with a thick oily solution and inject it into your lower back over a slow count to 10. To give you some perspective on how comfortable it was to receive this injection, consider this: Each individual to ever administer my injection apologized to me.
One nurse, in fact, told me: "I can't give anyone this injection without feeling guilty. I might as well be slowly injecting you with Aunt Jemima."
The solution had to be injected slowly, and the 10-20 seconds it took each time felt like an eternity. But that was just the beginning. Hours of massaging the injection site followed, so as not to develop a knot of solution in one place. Then a sore, itchy, tender, hot, and sometimes bruised injection site cleared up just before the next injection had to be given. We alternated sides so as not to aggravate one site too much. And I spent weeks also alternating one side to the next for sleep as it was too painful to lay on the side where I had received my most recent injection. The one silver lining to these weekly dates with injectable syrup was the gracious time and talent given to me by a dear friend and a special cousin who took turns administering my adversary.
While I spent most of my nearly 40 weeks truly enjoying my pregnancy, the 20 weeks I spent dealing with this pain and discomfort served as a daily reminder of the challenges and risks of prematurity.
I prayed each day that this treatment would work and my baby girl would arrive as close to her due date as possible. But I never stopped preparing myself for the possibility that she might not.
This progesterone treatment, I later learned, was made possible by research and funding of the March of Dimes--whose mission it is to help babies be born healthy and not too soon. We began fundraising for this wonderful organization as a way to pay it forward after our sons were given a great start to life despite their premature births. I didn't know then that we would benefit yet again from their research efforts during a healthy, full-term pregnancy. But how glad I am that we did!
I would go through these 20 weeks of pain again in a heartbeat to give my child the best chance of being born at a healthy gestational age. And I would bet any mother who delivered a child prematurely would tell you the same. My hope is that with the continued research that we are fundraising to support, more babies are born healthy, and fewer mothers have to endure the sting of prematurity and all of its implications.
Please support this year's fundraising efforts to support research into prematurity and how we can prevent it.
Join Our Journey: http://www.marchforbabies.org/ChiuBabies
Follow me on Instagram @merrymommyblog
Anything for my child.
I can take the pain.
The battle of prematurity didn't leave us after the boys' NICU stays. We knew that because our twins were born 8 weeks premature, we would be at higher risk for a premature delivery should we decide to have another child. So, when that time came last summer, and we celebrated the joy of becoming pregnant, we also braced ourselves for the possibility of going through the traumatic experience of preterm delivery, a lengthy NICU stay, and then the 2 years of specialized follow-up healthcare should our baby be born too soon.
While almost everyone I spoke with on the topic quickly dismissed my worries with "Oh they were early because they were twins! Don't worry about this baby!" I couldn't help but think of all the very many friends I now have who are moms of twins and who carried their children to full term--37, 38, even 39+ weeks! While multiples are at higher risk for preterm labor, they are not by default delivered early. My boys came even earlier than many do, and I couldn't shake the concern that there was more to it than simply being multiples. But how could I prevent this from happening again? Give my uterus and unborn child a daily pep talk?
Well, in our initial high risk consult, I learned that there was, in fact, a medical treatment to help prevent subsequent preterm labor. The complication was that there was not much research into the likelihood of premature delivery in a singleton pregnancy after a premature delivery of twins. But, of course, we decided to take the precaution and give our baby the best possible chance at cooking all the way until her due date. After all, as healthy as my twins were for 32 weeks, they still spent a month in the NICU. A month that was the longest and most challenging of my life. What would I do if I had to experience life as a NICU mom again, but this time with two toddlers at home?
So we started treatment. Beginning at 16 weeks, and continuing through week 36, I received a weekly injection. To get a sense of what this injection was like, I want you to think about the last flu shot or similar vaccine you received. A pinch, maybe some stinging, and perhaps a little sore spot for a few days. Now take the needle you remember and double it in size, then fill the syringe with a thick oily solution and inject it into your lower back over a slow count to 10. To give you some perspective on how comfortable it was to receive this injection, consider this: Each individual to ever administer my injection apologized to me.
One nurse, in fact, told me: "I can't give anyone this injection without feeling guilty. I might as well be slowly injecting you with Aunt Jemima."
The solution had to be injected slowly, and the 10-20 seconds it took each time felt like an eternity. But that was just the beginning. Hours of massaging the injection site followed, so as not to develop a knot of solution in one place. Then a sore, itchy, tender, hot, and sometimes bruised injection site cleared up just before the next injection had to be given. We alternated sides so as not to aggravate one site too much. And I spent weeks also alternating one side to the next for sleep as it was too painful to lay on the side where I had received my most recent injection. The one silver lining to these weekly dates with injectable syrup was the gracious time and talent given to me by a dear friend and a special cousin who took turns administering my adversary.
While I spent most of my nearly 40 weeks truly enjoying my pregnancy, the 20 weeks I spent dealing with this pain and discomfort served as a daily reminder of the challenges and risks of prematurity.
I prayed each day that this treatment would work and my baby girl would arrive as close to her due date as possible. But I never stopped preparing myself for the possibility that she might not.
This progesterone treatment, I later learned, was made possible by research and funding of the March of Dimes--whose mission it is to help babies be born healthy and not too soon. We began fundraising for this wonderful organization as a way to pay it forward after our sons were given a great start to life despite their premature births. I didn't know then that we would benefit yet again from their research efforts during a healthy, full-term pregnancy. But how glad I am that we did!
I would go through these 20 weeks of pain again in a heartbeat to give my child the best chance of being born at a healthy gestational age. And I would bet any mother who delivered a child prematurely would tell you the same. My hope is that with the continued research that we are fundraising to support, more babies are born healthy, and fewer mothers have to endure the sting of prematurity and all of its implications.
Please support this year's fundraising efforts to support research into prematurity and how we can prevent it.
Join Our Journey: http://www.marchforbabies.org/
Follow me on Instagram @merrymommyblog
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