Elliot, 31 Weeks
Miracle mum Susan share's the story of Elliot's early arrival.
On January 13th, our beautiful boy Elliot was born via emergency c-section, just over two months before his due date.
I hadn't felt much movement the day before heading to the hospital, but my obstetrician did an ultrasound and said that everything looked fine, so I waited, thinking things were okay but knowing in my heart that they didn't feel right.
The next day, anxiety began to set in even worse as it had now been a good 24 hours without any movement, so I called the maternity unit at the hospital to see what I should do. They had me come in and put me on a doppler to check on Elliot's heartbeat. Every 20 minutes or so, it would drop very low.
They sent me for an emergency ultrasound and confirmed that he wasn't moving as he should be, so they proceeded with the c-section. When he was out, he was whisked away to the NICU section of Dubbo Base Hospital and had the paediatricians working on him to stabilise him.
He was incredibly pale in colour and after multiple blood tests and tests on my placenta, they discovered that I'd had a feto-maternal haemorrhage, meaning that Elliot had been losing blood. The doctors suspect it was a slow leak of blood and believe that he would have adjusted to the lack of blood throughout the pregnancy. He had a haemoglobin level of 25 (the normal level is between 140-240 for a baby!) and he required two blood transfusions.
His lungs were also underdeveloped and he had to be resuscitated at birth and put on a ventilator to help him breathe. After being stabilised over his first 8 hours of life, the doctor and nurses from NETS (Newborn and Paediatric Emergency Transport Service) flew with him to John Hunter Hospital in Newcastle and he spent nine days with their wonderful nurses and doctors in their NICU. Throughout this stay, he was on and off the ventilator and the c-pap machine multiple times, put under the blue lights for jaundice twice and had so many tubes and cables connecting him to the machines.
Once he was able to breathe on his own and didn't require as much vital support, he was transferred back to Dubbo Base and spent just under four weeks in the Special Care Nursery, establishing his feeding and putting on weight. He finally got to come home on February 16th!
It was Elliot’s due date on March 15th and he is thriving! He has only just started to fit into 'newborn' size clothes and nappies and is just over 3kg now. He continues to get stronger everyday and we're so incredibly thankful to the nurses and doctors who have cared for our precious boy throughout this incredible journey!".
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