We didn't plan for this to happen

We didn't plan for this to happen

I almost died on July 28th of this year.

First off, my husband, Chris, and I did everything right. We’ve been together seven years, and married for five. We own our house, my husband has a well paying job, and our marriage is stable. We agreed that we wanted a child, and when I became pregnant with our daughter, Cadence, we were thrilled.

I was seven months pregnant on the morning of July 28th .I woke around 8:00 but I was feeling strangely. I was dizzy, with some serious vertigo, and when I tried to grab the doorknob to go into the bathroom, I kept grabbing air instead. My depth perception was way off. I was frightened, and went back into the living room and lay down on my couch. As soon as I lay down, my eyes began to dart back and forth rapidly, and I couldn’t stop them. Then my arm began to thrust back and forth, and I couldn’t stop that either.

I screamed for my husband, and that’s the last thing that I remember.

I came to a couple of times. Once I was in a hospital room, and there were several people staring down at me. I became frightened and tried to move, but I was restrained, which only terrified me even more.

The next time I came to I was about to have an emergency C-section. I roused just in time to have a massive needle stuck into my spine.

The third time I became conscious, I was in the ICU. I realized that my daughter was gone. My husband was beside me and I could see the worry on his face. I asked him what happened to Cadence. He said she had been life-flighted to a children’s hospital in Kansas City. She was born 11 weeks premature, at only 1 pound, 9 ounces.

I didn’t know it at the time, but I was on the verge of death. I have a rare condition called Eclampsia. During pregnancy my body produced chemicals that caused my blood pressure to skyrocket. My blood pressure was so high that I had three massive seizures. If Cadence had not been delivered immediately, we both would have died. I was still in critical condition. My body was swollen, and my husband was afraid to touch my hand because he thought my skin would split. (Eclampsia is mysterious, no one knows what causes it or how to prevent it)

After three days in ICU, I was moved to a regular room. I had IVs and a catheter, and I was high on morphine and liquid valium. If it hadn’t been for the drugs, I would have been in a serious panic. I cried everyday because I was worried about my daughter, and I wanted to see her.

Finally after six days I was released, but my blood pressure was still too high. I had to take blood pressure meds because I could potentially have a stroke. My doctor warned me not to go to Kansas City to see Cadence just yet, because he was afraid the stress of seeing her would give me a stroke.

I waited three long days but I couldn’t wait any longer. We were in constant contact with Cadence’s nurses, who said she was “feisty”, but I still had not even seen my own daughter.

The following entries are from my private journal (a black spiral notebook with tear stains)