(I don’t have many photos because well my body was changing so much and I was young so I was very self conscious)
For awhile I thought I maybe was getting the flu because I was sick all day, got carsick, was exhausted, I just knew something was going on. My husband’s grandma asked me “Are you pregnant?” At first I didn’t think so, then it hit me. I took a few tests and I thought they were all negative. I just felt off, so I ended up going and getting a pregnancy test done and sure enough, they confirmed I was pregnant. I just cried so hard, feeling so many different emotions all at once. I didn’t even know how to take care of myself, let alone a tiny human. So many questions, I was so scared. I knew God had a plan and this had to be apart of it. Dom was with me and he seemed pretty excited. Nervous, so so nervous but so excited. It reassured me we could do this together!
When we got home I READ the directions to the pregnancy tests I got and sure enough all of them were actually positive not negative (LOL i still laugh about this today)
Once we told all our family, everyone went crazy! Everyone was so excited even though we were so young! We knew before we even got pregnant that when we did eventually have kids (seriously always wanted to be a mom) We’d name a girl Aubrey and a boy would be a Jr. We couldn’t decide on spelling for Aubrey. I wanted it to be Aubree, Dom wanted it to be Aubrie. So we went with the “traditional” spelling Aubrey! Before we knew the gender, we called her DJ. (even though I had a feeling it was a girl and it’s so crazy since DJ was called a girl for 5 weeks by everyone! haha)
My pregnancy was pretty easy, I was tired all the time and suffered from headaches almost daily but we were both healthy! Once I hit 37 weeks I definitely started feeling off. Being it was my first pregnancy, my first baby, I thought the feeling was normal. She moved constantly, got the hiccups which meant she was practicing her breathing, all my checkups went well minus my blood pressure being a tiny bit elevated. Until July 31st, 2013. 39 weeks 5 days, I went to bed feeling very very off. I was exhausted but it was a different kind of exhausted. I felt sick to my stomach, I was having contractions but not to many, water made me sick. I thought this was just my body getting prepared for labor. I fell asleep, I woke up around 2am and I KNEW SOMETHING WAS WRONG. I freaked out, but tried staying calm at the same time. I woke up my husband, we got his grandma, we got all my bags ready. We got in the car and went straight to the emergency room. I was having back to back contractions at this time so thankfully the hospital was only 3 minutes away.
When we arrived around 2:45 am I was pretty pale, they got me all hooked up and got my belly all hooked up to hear my sweet girl. My blood pressure was VERY HIGH. Then, the worst words a parent could ever hear came out of the nurses mouth “She’s flat-lining” I honestly don’t ever remember my thoughts after that besides thinking “God won’t take my baby, He can’t. I need her, she needs me” Multiple doctors come in and tell me I have severe preeclampsia, they give me some medication (aubrey has swallowed her own poop in the womb making her sick and causing her heart rate to slow WAY down) I needed to be prepared for an emergency c section because they were worried I wouldn’t dilate fast enough. I’m not quite sure how at this point my body was able to accomplish the things it did, I’m just saying, we are seriously badass. Motherhood just took over me, just like that. I told the doctor I needed to push. This was literally minutes before I was suppose to go get prepped and go in for a c section. They checked and by some miracle I was 10cm and they allowed me to push. About 6 pushes and here comes my 8lb 3oz sweet sweet Aubrey Ann. She was purple, she looked almost bruised. You could tell she was breathing but i was hard so she couldn’t scream or cry. It was the worst just waiting for your baby to make a noise and scream. I just prayed for my baby to scream or make some type of noise!
When she didn’t cry immediately, that was obviously terrifying. Then they took her and I freaked out not knowing what was going on and by the Grace of God she let out a huge cry. She wasn’t completely out of the woods because of her swallowing her poop but she was alive, breathing and with us. I on the other hand wasn’t improving much. The biggest most incredible thing to happen to me and I was so out of it because of the preeclampsia, I almost passed out a few times and was still at risk for strokes, heart-attacks or possibly bleeding out. (Which I really thought I was going to a few times) Recovery was SO rough but I’d do it all again. She’s truly a miracle baby and she has taught me so much about myself, life and especially motherhood from the very moment I found out she was in my belly. Preeclampsia is so serious and I’m so thankful everyday that my baby and myself survived. Some of it was a blur, I can’t explain the feeling of almost dying. Almost losing my child before I even got to meet her. If you have a gut feeling about something, especially your children, LISTEN TO IT. I wonder what would have happened if I didn’t go in when I did. If I waited just a few hours longer. I’m so thankful she’s here, I’m here, we’re healthy. As my girl turns 6, this never gets any easier to talk about.
Motherhood is one hell of a ride, but I know and each of every one of us with our unique stories wouldn’t have it any other way! I hope this makes sense! It was a crazy, fast, intense, horrible, beautiful experience.. So my apologies if it’s all over but I’ve been asked multiple times to do blog posts on both my kids birth stories so here is one! Make sure to subscribe to my blog and other social media platforms ?
