Click here to visit Julia's website
In June 1999, Robert and I
decided to let nature rule. We have always wanted children and we thought that
the time was right now. We both felt like we were ready, and able to give our
child a bright future, surrounded with our love.
And of course, we had to
share our enthusiasm with everyone. My parents reacted carefully: it might not
work out….
We were so happy when we
did the pregnancy test in November after we came back from our holiday to
Thailand. It was 3.30 in the morning and we woke up because of the jetlag. At
4.00 I called my parents to tell them the happy news. And again they reacted
carefully: it could go wrong… Don’t get too enthusiastic before the critical
first three months are over.
But everything went great,
we had a wonderful pregnancy. ! I did not get morning sickness and the check-ups
at the midwife were terrific (blood pressure, blood- and urine samples,
heartbeat of the baby).
Because we were not certain
of the baby´s due date, we had an ultrasound in December. We were thrilled when
we found out that I was pregnant one month more than we thought. Everybody said
I looked radiant and I felt great! Throughout the whole pregnancy I had no
complaints at all. Of course I slept less comfortable at the end and walked less
flexible but that is normal.
When I got my pregnancy
leave, four weeks before the due date I had enough energy left to paint the
house (inside) and do a lot of little jobs around the house which had to be done
before the baby came. I travelled throughout our country to visit my friends and
sister-in-law who had just delivered a baby of her own. On Wednesday, May 23, I
drove all the way to the south of the Netherlands (2,5-hour drive) to visit my
parents. I went shopping with my mum to buy the last baby stuff (clothes, a
photo album), and we couldn’t stop talking about the baby. The next day we would
drive back to Kwintsheul (near The Hague) and she would help me clean our house
and bring the baby cradle, which my mum and my dad had made themselves. The
whole family was very much involved in my pregnancy. They were actually a little
bit pregnant themselves. It would be the first grandchild for my parents and the
second one for Robert’s father, who had just welcomed his first grandchild 4
weeks ago. We had a beautiful picture in our heads of how our child would grow
up together with little Julian, the son of Robert’s brother, and how they would
play together.
But that night, from
Wednesday to Thursday, my water broke, at my parents’ house. I went to the
bathroom at 3.30 in the morning and noticed that I could not control my urine,
so I thought. Back in bed I felt fluid flowing down my legs and then I realised
that it could be amniotic fluid. My mother and I couldn’t sleep anymore and at
6.00 we got up and drove back to Kwintsheul. I phoned Robert awake. We were so
exited! It had started, we would soon be mum and dad.
The midwife came by when we
were back in Kwintsheul and she confirmed it to be amniotic fluid. The fluid was
clear as water with little dark hair in it: baby hair from our long expected
child!
If the contractions would
not start the next morning I would have to go to the hospital where they would
artificially provoke the contractions. Thy did this because there would be a big
chance of infection if we didn't do so. That day we were in a party mood. We
knew for sure that we would become mum and dad that particular day or the day
after. We asked my mum if she would like to be present at the delivery and she
was thrilled. Robert went to work that day to finish the current things and to
tell everyone the good news. We agreed that when the contractions started I
would immediately call him and he would come straight home.
I went to the greenery to
buy a fresh pineapple, which I ate completely, because there appears to be
something in the heart of the pineapple that starts the contractions, at least
that is what I read. But the contractions did not come that day, nor the night
after. Too bad, because we would have loved to deliver our baby at home. But
going to the hospital was extra save, we would have nothing to worry about.
There would be a whole team of professionals and thus nothing could go wrong.
On Friday morning, May 26,
we arrived at the hospital at 8.30. I had to lie down in the middle of three
beds in a row and got belly ties attached to measure the contractions and the
heart of the baby. The doctor came to introduce herself. It was a young
enthusiastic doctor (named Annemarie) who reassured us: getting into labour in a
hospital is great fun!
The heartbeat of our baby
was an example of how it should be, it was just perfect! When the
doctor examined me internally, I appeared to have an opening of 3 cm, which was
great. This meant that they could start the injection with oxytocine through a
tube immediately.
Before going into the
delivery room I had to go to the bathroom and I noticed a little bit of blood
upon the toilet paper. But they told me that it was normal after the internal
exam.
The delivery room was very
cosy, with a view on the forest. We put on a nice CD to listen to.
Then Annemarie came by to
insert a pressure meter to measure the intensity of the contractions, and an
electrode that they would screw on the babies head to measure the heartbeat of
the baby.
But when she inserted the
pressure meter, an enormous amount of blood came out of me. I was terrified and
tears started to roll down my face when I saw the look on Annemarie’s face. ‘Get
me the obstetrician, now!’ I heard her shouting. After a telephone call from the
assistant, doctor Milani came in, the obstetrician. Annemarie still had her arm
inside of me, she didn’t dare to pull it out. ‘Solution?’ she asked. ‘No, the
blood is too thick for a solution’, doctor Milani replied. When Annemarie pulled
her arm out of me a second stream of blood came out. The gynaecologist put the
electrode on our baby’s head anyhow and we saw the heartbeat decrease. For one
moment it looked like it was stabilising but then the heartbeat rapidly
decreased.
I was taken to the
operation theatre in a rush where they delivered Julia by C-section. This was
around 15 minutes after the blood came out for the first time.
Our baby came out of my
uterus at 10.01 without a heartbeat. The paediatrician took over and started to
clear her longs and apply heart massage. In the meantime they tried to bring new
blood into her blood circulation but they failed. After 17 minutes of
reanimation they gave up on her.
Robert was there, during
the reanimation and for ten long minutes he still had hope. The doctors were
working on her, it should be all right. He held our Julia in his arms while I
was waking up from the anaesthesia. I saw people in green coats all over me,
they were driving me across the corridor to the delivery room. They all looked
very sad. ‘How is my baby?’, I asked, but no one answered. I asked it again and
again. ‘The doctor will be here any minute’, one of them replied. And then I
knew. I started crying and suddenly I heard Robert crying heartbreaking.
‘No!!!’, I shouted and Robert put the baby in my arms. ‘It’s a girl,' I heard
somebody say. She was so beautiful! This wonderful little creature, our Julia.
Why? How is this possible?
Later the diagnosis was
set: Vasa Previa and velamentous insertion of the umbilical cord. This was
stated during the operation. While inserting the pressure meter they probably
have ruptured a vessel, which belonged to Julia and made all the blood in her
body flow away. A little baby only has 300 ml of blood, in contradiction with
an adult who has 5 litre. She was perfectly healthy, a beautiful girl of 3625
grams (which is a little more than 7 pounds) and 50 cm. She had everything
present to be able to cope with the world. But it was not meant to be.
Our whole world collapsed,
we had been looking forward to this baby girl so much, she was so welcome…
Suddenly your hands are empty and my belly too. And this while everywhere around
us perfectly healthy babies were being born. Why us, why our baby, she had
everything going for her. Why did they have to use that stupid pressure meter
while the ties around my belly also worked all right? Why didn’t they do a
check-up before, after which they would have performed a C-section immediately.
All questions without an answer.
The days that followed in
the hospital the three of us stayed together. We could hold Julia for as long as
we wanted, cuddle her and love her. That was wonderful. On Tuesday evening the
three of us went home and Julia slept in her own room. We have buried her on
Thursday: Ascension Day. The farewell was beautiful, a very personal divine
service done by our opposite neighbour, the priest. We chose our own songs
(Bright Eyes (Art Garfunkel), Lullaby (Billy Joel) and 2 Dutch songs). Our
neighbour (she is a florist) made some beautiful bouquets and Julia got a
beautiful place on the graveyard. Robert has put her in her little grave
himself.
She will always be our
first child, our Julia and we are her proud parents. We have beautiful pictures
of her that we love to show to everyone.
Life at home, after the
hustle and stir of the funeral, was empty and meaningless. Everything brought up
memories of her and the life we could have had with her, the life we desired so
much. The days were filled with tears, benumbedness, consternation and search
for distraction.
It will still take a long
time for us to deal with this enormous loss. Life goes on around while for us
the world seems to stand still, we do realise that. And we also know that the
tough edges of our sorrow will wear off. We also know that life will have its
new beautiful moments where we can get our strength from, although it is hard to
imagine that right now. It just takes time
We want to do something
with all our feelings of unbelief, anger and inability we have right now. We
want to prevent other people of losing their babies the same way as we did.
Internet taught me that Vasa Previa is a symptom that appears in 1:2500
pregnancies. I would say that is a whole lot! The mortality rate is 50-90%. With
a Doppler Ultrasound it can be made visible in advance and a C-section can be
made.
Besides this we are furious
about the insertion of the pressure meter that seems to have ruptured the vessel
of our little girl. From others we heard that the hospital of their choice did
not use any inserting material at all. They use the belly ties through all the
deliveries. Having used those, Julia would probably still be alive. Especially
because 50% of the babies that die because of Vasa Previa, most of all die
during the rupture of the membranes and they were already broken in our case.
Nature did his job right, it should have gone well.
We also found out about an
academic thesis named: The policy of premature broken membranes à term by P.
Ottervanger. She contradicts the words of the midwife and the hospital, in fact
she says that it is preferable to wait for the contractions for 48-72 hours and
that the chances of infections are to be neglected. When nature would have gone
its course, there would have been a chance that Julia would have lived now.
Besides this, Ottervanger wrote about Prostaglandin as the preferable way to
provoke the contractions, above oxytocine which involves inserting a pressure
meter. Why didn’t they use that?
We feel that the medical science has failed. We had 3 chances of bringing our baby healthy to the world. By waiting 48-72 hours before artificially starting the labour process, letting them investigate me through ultrasounds before inserting dangerous instruments, by using a belly belt instead of a pressure meter. We do realise that it will not bring our angel back but we cannot put it aside us.
Click here to visit Julia's website