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Due date: September 18, 2003:: August 21, 2003 ::
We finally brought Roya home today. We wished we could bring her
to her freshly painted and furnished room at the new house, but are
ecstatic to have her in the corner of our box-filled bedroom. This
will mark the last entry in the Kuchulu chronicles as she finally enters
our lives as a full-time member.
:: August 16, 2003 ::
Another disappointment. Roya was due to be released today, but she
choked on some milk yesterday and now they want to keep her for an extra
week to make sure she doesn't have breathing problems. We're
beginning to get frustrated with all the delays. Kuchi is now over
five pounds (2.3 kilos).
:: August 13, 2003 ::
The doctors had told us that she may be released today, but her
temperature fell outside of the incubator so they will hold her for a
few more days.
:: August 5, 2003 ::
Kuchi is now off IVs and is feeding mostly orally and partially through
a tube. She is still in an incubator most of the time as she gets
strong enough to maintain her body temperature.
:: July 31, 2003 ::
Both Sandee and Roya have been improving in the last few days. The
improvement isn't in a straight line and definitely not as fast as I
would like it, but I'll take whatever I can get. As of now, Sandee is
due to be discharged sometime on Friday. She has lost more than half of
her red blood cells, so she will take at least a month to regain her
strength. Roya will stay in the hospital for another month or so to
continue her growth and development. She is already feeding from her
mama's milk.
We hope to all be together at our new home sometime in late
August.
Thank you all for the kind eMails you've sent and I'm sorry that
I didn't have the time to answer all of them. I printed all of them
and read them to Sandee at the hospital (although she may not
remember this due to the multiple drugs that she was on).
Roya is beautiful and strong just like her mother.
:: July 27, 2003 ::
At around 5am Sunday morning, I woke Sandee up because she was
breathing heavily and she said that she could now feel the contractions.
We went to the hospital at that time and things began to unravel very
fast: Her contractions got stronger, she had pain in her upper belly,
her blood tests showed dropping clotting agents and other abnormalities.
After a while, her belly pain became the biggest issue. The best way I
can describe this is that delivery room nurses and doctors couldn't
stand watching her in pain... and I'm sure a woman in pain a pretty
common sight for them. They couldn't give her any pain relief until they
knew what the cause was.
At this point, her case was kicked up a couple of notches and another
OB/GYN, a pulmonary specialist, a general surgeon and a whole slew of
other doctors on the phone were trying to figure out what was wrong with
her. The options they looked at and discarded (that I know of) were: her
pancreas, inflamed gallbladder, gallstone, ruptured stomach, pulmonary
embolism, pulmonary edema, detached uterus, appendicitis and more. They
took X-Rays, used sonograms and a ran CAT scan, but all they managed to
do was eliminate the options. The latest blood tests showed that the
clotting agents were falling like a rock, but they also showed that her
liver functions were failing. This, and the elimination of the other
options, was a clue that she probably had
HELLP Syndrome. It apparently
hits 0.5% of pregnancies here, but (as we found out later), Sandee is
firmly outside the high-risk group and no one had seen it hit so hard
and so fast. The only known cure for HELLP is delivery of the baby, but
with Sandee's condition failing, going into surgery was a big risk in
itself.
Sandee went in for an emergency c-section at 6pm on Sunday. Roya
Kinton Minovi was born at 6:19pm.
The biggest risk to Sandee was that her blood would not be able to clot, but thankfully, the doctors were able to stop her bleeding and bring her out at around 7pm. They were both put under intense observation after the surgery. Sandee's condition worsened (as expected) for a few hours, but she began to stabilize and then, very slowly, improve. Roya was put on a respirator, but perhaps because of the steroid shots given on Friday and Saturday, she was eventually moved to an oxygen tube and a couple of days later, was breathing on her own.
:: July 25, 2003 ::
Sandee had a scheduled doctor's appointment on Friday, where her OB/GYN,
Dr. Schaffel, noticed some indications that she had early signs of
labor. After a number of tests, they confirmed that she was having weak
contractions (that she couldn't feel) and sent her to Sibley Hospital to
get checked out and to get a couple of steroid shots. The shots were to
help the fetus better develop her lungs in the event of a premature
birth. She was released after 24 hours and sent home for a few weeks of
bed-rest. She was 32 weeks along at this time and Dr. Schaffel wanted to
prolong the pregnancy to at least 36 weeks to ensure a healthy baby.
:: July 2, 2003 ::
Back from a vacation at the grandparents' in Spain where Sandee started
looking like a full-fledged expectant mom (in a bikini). Another
doctor's visit and everything again checked out with Kuchulu logging in
at 150 beats per second. She kicks around like a soccer player and
Sandee's belly looks like something out of Alien when she's swooshing
around.
:: June 24, 2003 ::
By popular demand, a picture of Sandee's belly, sweeping away the
competition from Shiva.
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:: June 6, 2003 ::
Week 26 doctor's visit. Mother and daughter are both doing great.
Kuchulu's heartbeat was 140 beats per minute.
:: May 1, 2003 ::
We went for the second sonogram today and... It's a Girl!!
Shiva was a bit disappointed, because she was hoping for a little brother
that she could "scare and boss". Sandee, Darya, Shokraneh and I were
ecstatic. They also checked the measurements for half an hour and
everything was as it should be. Now on to picking a name.
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:: April 18, 2003 ::
You won't know what this means unless you've had a baby recently, but the
standard AFP screening test came back negative. That's good.
Vote Here!
:: April 11, 2003 ::
Doctor's appointment today. Heartbeat at 140 and everything else is
fine. Definitely lots of kicking going on in Sandee's belly and even
I felt it tonight.
:: April 8, 2003 ::
Seventeen weeks now!. Sandee has been showing (a bit) in the last
couple of weeks. Last night, she thought she felt Kuchulu move
around a bit, or it could've been gas.
:: March 14, 2003 ::
Regular doctor's visit. Sandee heard the heartbeat again (130 beats
per minute) and everything checked out OK. Kuchulu is about 4 inches
(10cm) tall from crown to rump right now.
:: February 24, 2003 ::
Sandee got her first sonogram! Kuchulu was bouncing around the whole
time, but the nurse managed to take a few shots of him/her. She said
that based on the size, Sandee is 11 weeks along and it may be a few days
early (September 15th). Heartbeat was 164 beats per minute.
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:: February 7, 2003 ::
Sandee and Kuchulu's first doctor's appointment. Everything checked
out fine.
:: February 2, 2003 ::
Don't take these seriously, but a fancy machine at Dave & Buster's merged
our faces and guessed what our kids would look like.
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:: January 9, 2003 ::
After four home pregnancy tests came out positive, we finally believe that
we are expecting a baby! Sandee had a blood test later for good
measure.