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Thursday, Sept. 09, 2004 at 6:11 a.m.
I'm struggling today. Hubby asked me if I wanted to go to stepdaughter's balloon release at her first football game(she's a cheerleader) like we did last year. It hit me like a ton of bricks.
This time last year, I was developing the first signs of preeclampsia during my pregnancy. I was 22 wks along and getting excited about buying things and picking out names, etc. We knew we were having a little boy and my mom had already bought him Chicago Cubs socks.
My blood pressure shot up on Monday and my feet were swelling, which I thought was normal for pregnancy(being my first one), only they didn't go down at all at night. On Thursday, I started developing a horrible headache and it woke me up in the middle of the night along with a stiff neck. Friday, we went to s.d.'s game and I felt terrible the whole night. My head hurt so bad and when I tilted my neck to the sides, it just felt stiff and ....just not right. We went to bed and I woke up again, crying because of the pain. Hubby took me to the emergency room while my mom watched my s.d. This was probably 2 am.
I was sent in an ambulance over to the bigger hospital 1/2 hr away. At first they told me I wouldn't be leaving until I had the baby. I WAS 22 WKS!! I started panicking then. Eventually they confined me to the bed because I had too much protein in my urine. It was all horrible. The following morning, the doctor told me the baby was going to start showing signs of trauma and I was being watched for seizures and possibly a stroke. BUT I FELT OKAY! I had a horrible headache and I was tired....but this couldn't be happening right?? They finally told me they were going to have to take my baby from me...my organs were going to start shutting down if they didn't. How does a mother deal with that? The wracking guilt??? A year later and it's still here. I still feel selfish even though they told me that the baby wouldn't have lived even if I tried to wait it out and I probably wouldn't have either. It's a year...I am thankful I have a place I can go visit him. He has a beautiful headstone with an angel boy on it and we leave him little gifts and flowers. This wasn't supposed to happen.