Happiness is holding your healthy baby after listening to her heart rate drop every contraction for hours. I never thought that I would have children. I was diagnosed with Polycystic Ovary Syndrome, PCOS, when I was 18. Over the course of the next six years, I grew accustomed to hearing stories of other women with PCOS who were told by their own doctors that they would never have children.
It was a strong enough belief that when I met my future husband and we started going out, I told him after 3 dates that it was very unlikely that I would ever have children. He had made it clear that he really wanted to have kids and I didn’t want him to waste his time.
Trying for our miracle
When we decided to start trying to have kids after a year of marriage, I told my OB that we were going to start trying after our trip to China. She thought that was great timing, it would give us a year of trying before my next yearly exam, and then when I came back for that exam we could start talking about other options to help me get pregnant. Neither one of us believed it would happen without scientific intervention.
Two months after I stopped my birth control we were pregnant. Turns out we didn’t need science to intervene, we just needed God to answer our prayers for a family.
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Roses my tiny little bean
Roses was tiny from her conception. I had terrible morning sickness and I was managing a dog daycare that averaged over 100 dogs a day. I was terrified that I would lose my job if I let being pregnant affect my job in any way.
I worked just as hard, breaking up dog fights as needed, cleaning with the harsh chemicals, and did not miss a single day of work during my pregnancy.
If I felt sick at work, I used a trashcan where we tossed dog waste. I tried to keep snacks by the register to supplement the many times I had to skip my lunch. My doctor couldn’t believe I was staying so active, and I never gave her any idea how truly demanding my job was at the time.
All through my pregnancy Roses was small. I had several ultrasounds checking her growth before they sent me to a specialist. The specialist could see nothing wrong with her development, other than the size. She was growing according to the proper rates, just staying consistently in the tenth percentile. The entire time I carried the knowledge that she was my miracle baby, and I could not lose her.
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Labor worth every minute
The day I went into labor I went to work with my contractions slowly starting. It was a Friday, our busiest day of the week, and the doctor I talked to before going in said I was in the really early stages of labor, and it would be a while. She said that I could go to work if I thought it would help take my mind off of the early part of labor. She of course didn’t realize what my job entailed, but I went to work and labored through my shift.
It wasn’t until the next afternoon that my life changed forever, I became a mom.
My labor was fine, normal, except for Arielle’s heartbeat. It turned out that her umbilical cord was wrapped around her shoulder and under her arm so each time I had a contraction, the squeezing cut off the blood flow through the umbilical cord.
Roses was 5lbs 12ozs when she was born. One once less ounce and she would have been admitted to the NICU. She was full-term though, born just four days before her official due date.
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She was perfect.
I knew it was all my fault
Why am I sharing all of this? Because until my son was born, I KNEW her hearing loss was my fault. Nothing anyone said could convince me otherwise. I had done this to her.
She was so small.
I was so sick.
The dogs were so loud.
I was around chemicals like bleach all the time.
It was the price God demanded from me for my miracle baby.
I think it is important to share this because I know you think it is your fault too. That if you only got enough sleep, ate more broccoli, and took better care of yourself, your baby would be fine. Every mom believes that it is their fault.
In my experience, dads don’t seem to have the same feeling of guilt. Whether it is the fact that they can see the rational aspect of the diagnosis, and don’t have to deal with the post-pregnancy hormones or because they haven’t had to carry the baby themself for the last 9 months.
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I remember raging at my husband when I was really down and saying it could his fault, not just mine. He would respond calmly and say of course it could be something he did, and he never blamed me.
Your child will be alright. You will be alright.
My husband now says that at that time he just knew things would be fine. He saw me doing everything for our daughter to set her up for success. We loved Roses and he saw me fighting for her. He knew she would be all right.
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