At 00.55 on the 5th july 2008 i gave birth to my son, Marcus. It should have been a magical time but it was just filled with worry.. You see my son was born at only 25 weeks and 4 days weighing 1lb12.. Although this was a good weight for his gestation he had a lot of problems.

It all started on the 1st july. i had terrible back pain and tightenings in my bump.. i didn`t sleep at all that night. the next day i went to the hospital.. i was told it was a urinary tract infection (UTI) as i had the smallest amount of protein in my urine. i was sent home with no medication after the pharmacy had closed. On the 3rd July at 8.40am i woke with my waters breaking.. i was 25 weeks and 2 days pregnant. I was took back to the hospital and kept in. i was told i would likely have my baby in the next 48 hours.. i was given 2 steroid injections. On the friday my discharge had started to turn green which meant infection.. i also started bleeding, when examined they could feel the head.. My son was born a few hours later. After having him i was told i didn`t have a UTI, it was the onset of labour that the pains were coming from.

He had two moderate bleeds on his brain and was took to NICU straight away as he had respiratory distress. he was put on a ventilator straight away.. It was 3 hours before i got to see my son.

He was on a high frequency oscillating mode and popped his lung that night. he had 15 chest drains in all together..

at 3 weeks old i had my first cuddle,.. It was short lived though, He caught NEC and was rushed to birmingham childrens hospital where he had emergency surgery. he had 24 cm of his gut removed and a stoma formed.. He was sent back to wolverhampton 3 days later. at 6 weeks he was given steroids to get him off the ventilator.. he came off it 3 days after they were started on the 20th august. he was put onto CPAP. On the 17th September he came off oxygen completely.

On the 25th September he ended up back in intensive care and on a ventilator.. He had septicemia and just wouldn`t breathe by himself. He was given strong pain killers and 2 days later he pulled the ET tube out himself.

He`d been poked and prodded that many times they couldn`t get a vein to put a canula or longline in to give him nourishment. he needed TPN as his stoma loss was too much. Everything that went in came out. He was transferred back to BCH so they could try sort him out. On the 30th october he had a tunneled line put into a main vein in his neck so he could have TPN. He came off oxygen or a second time a few days later.

Two weeks after having the line put in he had his surgery to reverse his stoma. He was down at theatre for an agonising amount of time. i was sure something had gone wrong. he had to have an epidural as the incision was a lot bigger than they intended. it stretched the whole way across his tummy.

Overall Marcus had 18 blood transfusions in his 5 month stay. He has still not been discharged but i have him on home leave. he came home 1 day before he was 5 months old. He still needs regular eye checks as he has signs of ROP. He has chronic lung disease but is luckily off the oxygen. his PDA was closed by medication twice but has luckily stayed closed this time. He only weighs 5lb11 at 5 months old.

more research needs to be done on premature babies and the reasons for premature birth.. to this day i still do not know why my waters broke. I am scared to have another child incase this happens again.. I have no answers to my questions so i feel my body has failed me.. i could not do the most natural thing. There is nothing more heart breaking than leaving your baby on that ward. and although most the staff are brilliant some need to take a kinder approach. I also think if someone gos in with a supsected UTI they should be given the steroids as i met many mums on the neo natal ward that were told they had a UTI and it wasn`t.

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