Child Birth and A Miracle called My Daughter

Almost six months after my husband and I married, I became pregnant with our first child. I had just turned 35. My pregnancy was typical for the most part. I suffered from the normal morning sickness for most of the first half of my pregnancy. At 16 weeks, I was given a blood screening which showed that I was at an increased risk of having a child with Downs Syndrome. After having an ultrasound which showed there were none of the typical physical signs of Downs, I decided that I wouldn't undergo any further invasive testing like an amniocentesis. Putting our faith in God that everything would turn out as it was suppose to, my husband and I prepared for the birth of our daughter. We anxiously awaited her birth. My due date came and went as we continued to wait. For almost a week after my due date, I underwent daily ultrasounds and stress tests. All of which showed a healthy baby girl that the doctors estimated to be about 7 lbs 12 oz. The waiting continued. Then the day finally arrived when it was time to induce labor. I arrived at the hospital on Monday morning and the slow induction process began. The next day the nurse injected me with pitocin to move along my labor. Within five minutes of it's injection into my IV, the nurse noticed the baby's heart rate dropped. She immediately gave me another injection to stop the induction. Suddenly the slow waiting turned into world wind as I was informed by the doctor that he needed to do a cesarean section because the baby was showing signs of distress. I was rolled into the operating room, as the Anesthesiologist walked along side of my bed reading the list of possible complications and asking me to sign one form after another. Within a half hour I was on the operating table, prepped and ready. My husband was brought in. He sat beside me holding my hand with a curtain between us and the doctor who was delivering our baby. Having been given a spinal block, I was fully awake and aware of everything that was going on. The nurse told me I would feel some pressure as my daughter was born. I could hear the doctor counting...one, two, three. Then I could hear the first cry of my baby girl. The nurse held her up beside me so I could see her and give her a kiss. Then they carried her away. After I spent a little time in the recovery area of the hospital I was wheeled to my room where my husband, family and friends were waiting with my daughter. She was so tiny...at 5 lbs 10 oz. She was not as big as I had expected. Later, I found out the counting that I heard during delivery was the doctor counting the number of times the umbilical cord was wrapped around my daughter's neck. Wrapped three times around her neck, the cord was stretched so thin that it was only the size of a small pinky finger. Normal cords are the size of a thumb or larger. One of the nurses who came into the room later to check on us said "Your daughter is a miracle", explaining that often when a cord is rapped around a baby's neck that many times the outcome is usually not good. She told us that it can be common for the cord to be wrapped one or even two times, but more than that often ends up in the loss of the baby during birth. She confirmed what I already knew...my daughter was a little miracle. I was so thankful to the doctors and nurses that took wonderful care of both of us.

After the birth of my daughter, I often wondered if I had been pregnant in a different time in history or in a different country what would have happened. Being curious about this and being given this task as part of my current child development class, I looked at the incidents of caesarean section in other countries and found that countries like China and Mexico actually have high rates of C-sections. I also researched a little about child birth in South Africa and found that there has been an increase in the mortality rate of mothers and children during child birth whereas the mortality rate throughout the rest of Africa and the world is actually decreasing. Curious as to why, I found that 50% of the mothers who die during labor are a result of treatable complications like an obstructed birth. I have also read that a mother's access to private or public health care in Africa may result in very different experiences for a pregnant mother. For example, poor pregnant women with HIV in South Africa are often mistreated and physically abused in public hospitals that have little to no oversight or accountability. After my research, I am even more thankful for the prenatal care and the skilled doctors and nurses that assisted me in delivering my baby girl...who today is a bright and happy kindergartener.   

 

Reference

. Christian Nordqvist. "The Shocking Truth About Giving Birth In South Africa." Medical News Today. MediLexicon, Intl., 8 Aug. 2011. Web.
6 Sep. 2012. < http://www.medicalnewstoday.com/articles/232413.php>