Holding My Breath: My ECMO Baby And Me
“One last breath and your baby will be here”, the nurse encouraged me. So I did what she said took one last breath and I haven’t let it out since. It worked you came out but you took only one last breath to and silence.
I held onto my breath saving the gasp for when you did it. But it did not come. Your skin turned a horrible grey colour instead of the pink blush that should have glowed from your chubby cheeks. They gathered around you like a pack of wolves hands hurriedly trying everything. Where is that breath?
I still held on when they whisked you away. I still had to hold my breath for a few hours. I could not breath. Lying there in silence waiting for the call. He is gone, or he is fine just a hiccup. Nothing came as each hour passed by. I silently began to pray, but still holding onto that last gasp of air that filled my lungs. As I sat in the shower with the nurse washing me trying to chat to me, I heard nothing. Just white noise, just a murmur. I had to hold onto that breath just in case, if I let it out everything else would spill out and I would never be able to shut that door again. If I could not hear anything they could not tell me anything, no bad news would get past me.
As I tried to dress and prepare myself for the unveiling of such a sick baby, my only thoughts were they were preparing me to say goodbye.
This would not be a way to meet him in the real world. This would be our only hello and goodbye. Somehow I believed this was my fault, I had done this. The past nine months flashed by. That one glass of red wine was that it? Hosing down the decking was that it? Carrying on as normal while he grew inside me was that it? Should I have rested more? Maybe insisted more when he became so uncomfortable nearly unbearable to carry near the end. The nine days overdue was that the reason? Or was God just playing a cruel trick? We had many conversations over the few days and I made an agreement with him, that I would put my trust in him.
The unveiling was horrific. He lay there, a big boy, all wires coming from every part of his body.
Oxygen been pumped into his little lifeless lungs his heart over compensating for everything. My heart breaking, never to be mended again. The only man who ever broke my heart. I didn’t see this one coming.
A little white room so tiny. We sat opposite the two doctors I didn’t hear much, my husband took control and listened. His lungs were closed due to him inhaling the Meconium. The only option was a team to come from Sweden and fly him anywhere in Europe that had a bed available and put him on ECMO. Seriously I think I have been transported into a True Movies film. Team, Sweden, only chance? The words slipped off me had no meaning, numbness.
So we waited for the miracle team to arrive. In the mean time I deteriorated needed antibiotics but could not leave him. Midnight the lights began to brighten they had arrived. We are still in the movie here; they walked in with an air of confidence dressed in what looked like skiing gear. Five of them like the A-Team. A team of professionals who did this for a living transporting sick people around the world to give them one last chance to live. I was going to hand my baby to these strangers, I don’t trust easily, but I trusted these strangers to fly my child across the ocean to Denmark. They would put him on the ECMO machine here in Dublin before they could transport him. What is ECMO you ask? The simplest way to explain. A surgeon makes a small incision in the baby’s neck and inserts tubes into the heart. Through these tubes oxygenated blood is provided to the heart and into urn the body to keep him alive. It gives his lungs a chance to rest and try recover on their own. It is like a big washing machine for your blood. The chances slim but it is his only chance.
We wait till 5am to see if he makes an improvement before he’s put on the machine but his stats don’t change no improvement. Prayers not working right now. I am put on a drip of antibiotics and they promise not to do anything until I am back.
Three ambulances outside the hospital to take this very special cargo on his first holiday abroad little passport and all in hand. We wave them off after a thousand kisses feeling deeply we would not see him again. We followed the next day. The dreaded drive home with an empty baby seat was crushing an image that will always stay with me. Still in the movie here.
Arriving in Copenhagen at 1am with a two-year-old in tow was exhausting, keeping in mind I had only had a baby (Big baby) 48 hrs previous. We were shown to his room, no sorry I don’t know that baby it’s not mine. That was my reaction, trauma had set in. I turned and left the room just wanting to curl up somewhere and not exist anymore. My husband was distraught at my reaction. His only way to bring me back was to hit me where it hurt, no not physically, emotionally.
He questioned my ability to be a mother.
Now that is like a red rag to a bull for me. All I ever really wanted to be was a mum and I gave up a career to be just that. He knew he was risking us, our marriage, our friendship but he was the stronger one in the end. The flame reignited fuelled by my hate for my husband I marched back to the hospital with the attitude ‘I will show him’. And yes for those few hours I planned our divorce!
The ECMO worked, the damage began to reverse. Brain damage recently found also reversed but we never expected a perfect baby. I told the big man above just give him back to me, he’s mine you’re not getting him I don’t care what disabilities he has he’s mine. Honestly I would have fought anyone for him. Back to Dublin and it just kept getting better. The best day ever the first time I had seen his little face in 7 weeks without a tube. He was feeding breathing going nearly he was a miracle. The funniest part is when a nurse who had been present when he was born walked by one day and asked was he the ECMO baby I smiled and said yes. Her reply “Oh I thought he had died” my answer “Well he didn’t” and I smiled like a Cheshire cat.
Now a healthy, clever, athletic, gorgeous, nearly nine-year-old with no setbacks. One lucky little boy. A very happy mammy!
