Transcript
WEBVTT
00:00:01.723 --> 00:00:05.189
Hello, today I have with me Sabrina Fletcher.
00:00:05.189 --> 00:00:09.441
Sabrina is the mother of three, with two living children.
00:00:09.441 --> 00:00:16.362
Sabrina's birth journey includes experiencing a wanted pregnancy that was terminated for medical reasons.
00:00:16.362 --> 00:00:22.541
The acronym for that is TFMR, which we will be referring to throughout the episode.
00:00:22.541 --> 00:00:28.600
That experience profoundly shaped her life and inspired her to become a TFMR doula.
00:00:28.600 --> 00:00:36.061
To connect with Sabrina, you can find her by the handle at the TFMR doula on all social media.
00:00:36.061 --> 00:00:38.689
Sabrina, welcome and thank you for joining me.
00:00:39.119 --> 00:00:40.624
Hi, thanks a lot, kelly.
00:00:40.624 --> 00:00:54.781
I'm very honored to be here and to share my story in a space that is for all birth journeys, because even myself, for a while, I didn't know well, it was a loss.
00:00:54.781 --> 00:00:56.304
My child isn't here.
00:00:56.304 --> 00:00:59.712
I had to have a DNC, I had to have a procedure.
00:00:59.712 --> 00:01:02.021
So is it really a birth?
00:01:02.021 --> 00:01:03.365
Do I fit?
00:01:03.365 --> 00:01:05.829
And I feel like I fit.
00:01:05.829 --> 00:01:11.891
You've invited me onto the show and it really means a lot to be able to share my story in a place like this.
00:01:12.200 --> 00:01:21.329
Yeah, it's really important to me to validate all mothers and recognize mothers of children who are still with us and children who are not with us.
00:01:21.329 --> 00:01:30.462
Thank you, I am anxious to hear your story and how it has shaped your life, so I am going to sit back and listen and let you proceed.
00:01:30.983 --> 00:01:33.909
I can begin before the loss.
00:01:33.909 --> 00:01:39.430
So I had a pregnancy that ended up with my daughter, who is now 10.
00:01:39.430 --> 00:01:43.882
And that pregnancy was all smooth sailing.
00:01:43.882 --> 00:01:52.522
I was so innocent and nothing went wrong and I just thought, oh, this is just the way things are so close to go.
00:01:52.522 --> 00:02:01.506
My then partner he's now my husband and I even spent part of the third trimester traveling.
00:02:01.506 --> 00:02:03.390
We were so laissez-faire.
00:02:03.390 --> 00:02:08.813
It's just, you know, have fun, enjoy each other, enjoy this pregnancy, enjoy this baby.
00:02:09.014 --> 00:02:10.098
Everything was fine.
00:02:10.098 --> 00:02:15.171
I was cleared through all the ultrasounds, all the different checks, all of my blood tests.
00:02:15.171 --> 00:02:27.646
I was 29, 30 at the time and we even traveled on boats, backpacking like crazy stuff that I did not do in my other pregnancies.
00:02:27.646 --> 00:02:33.711
And we both look back and we think we were nuts really to be that happy-go-lucky.
00:02:33.711 --> 00:02:34.614
And yet we were.
00:02:34.614 --> 00:02:43.473
We were very happy-go-lucky in that birth and that pregnancy and birth and the birth ended up being it went pretty smoothly.
00:02:43.473 --> 00:02:44.644
It was a home birth.
00:02:44.644 --> 00:02:47.914
We had planned for it to be a home birth.
00:02:47.914 --> 00:03:00.344
There were two midwives and a doula, so I did have a doula at that birth and the active labor was about 12 hours, so maybe a little bit more, maybe 14.
00:03:00.344 --> 00:03:08.826
The contractions started ramping up around midnight and then she was born at two in the afternoon.
00:03:08.826 --> 00:03:14.680
I was pushing on my bed in a what's the position?
00:03:14.680 --> 00:03:18.663
Like I'm only thinking about in Spanish because I live in and the knees?
00:03:18.663 --> 00:03:25.423
No, no, your knees are up, you're like crouching, oh, squatting, Squatting, squatting.
00:03:25.423 --> 00:03:27.229
Yes, I was only thinking the word in Spanish.
00:03:27.781 --> 00:03:28.963
I can't remember the word in Spanish.
00:03:28.963 --> 00:03:31.088
I speak Spanish too, and now I got.
00:03:31.088 --> 00:03:31.751
I got Jada.
00:03:31.751 --> 00:03:33.423
Yeah, that was the right-.
00:03:34.164 --> 00:03:37.192
Yeah, that would be good so you can help me out if I forget.
00:03:37.192 --> 00:03:41.507
Yeah, excellent, and it was really lovely.
00:03:41.507 --> 00:03:48.181
My husband caught her, or helped catch her, and I had a midwife on each side.
00:03:48.181 --> 00:03:59.748
I felt the power of the ancestors and all the help of these women and birth workers throughout the ages and it really was a very magical experience.
00:03:59.748 --> 00:04:05.106
It wasn't without pain, I did tear, but it was beautiful.
00:04:05.548 --> 00:04:17.036
There was a part in my labor where it wasn't progressing and then, when I got to the pushing part, something switched because my husband took out his flute.
00:04:17.036 --> 00:04:27.420
So he's Mexican and there's a, there's a lineage through his grandmother, corandero healers.
00:04:27.420 --> 00:04:32.430
He does sweat, lodge and massage and other sorts of ceremonies.
00:04:32.430 --> 00:04:43.487
And he took out his flute and he started playing and singing and saying we're waiting for you, we're waiting for you, and we had actually conceived that baby.
00:04:43.487 --> 00:04:44.791
It was a surprise.
00:04:44.791 --> 00:04:47.120
We were only dating like six months.
00:04:47.120 --> 00:04:51.293
So I didn't know you know where do we stand, me and him.
00:04:51.293 --> 00:04:59.863
I didn't know how strong our relationship was, if we would be able to continue, if we were, you know, if we would make it through becoming parents.
00:04:59.863 --> 00:05:05.120
But in that moment I fully felt his commitment and I was able to then give birth.
00:05:06.245 --> 00:05:09.939
So there's a scientific reason for that, I imagine.
00:05:09.939 --> 00:05:19.766
So studies have shown that the oxytocin, the internal oxytocin, is released when a woman feels safe and so, and also when you feel loved.
00:05:19.766 --> 00:05:33.579
And so, in that moment, when you felt safe and loved, your body was able to release that hormone that helped you give birth, which I've had multiple friends and people on this show that have experienced that same thing.
00:05:33.579 --> 00:05:35.509
Thanks for sharing that.
00:05:35.509 --> 00:05:36.415
I'm tearing up.
00:05:36.514 --> 00:05:41.199
I know this will be a podcast I forgot my Kleenex but we're going to tear it up a little bit in this episode.
00:05:43.488 --> 00:05:45.538
So take your time and you can continue your story when you're ready.
00:05:48.526 --> 00:05:50.411
Sure Thanks, my daughter.
00:05:50.411 --> 00:05:51.634
She was born no issues.
00:05:51.634 --> 00:05:52.877
She grew up into a little kid.
00:05:52.877 --> 00:06:01.278
When she was maybe two, three, somewhere around there, she started asking for a little sister, a little brother.
00:06:01.278 --> 00:06:04.492
Well, specifically, a little sister.
00:06:04.492 --> 00:06:06.059
She really wanted to have a little sister.
00:06:06.059 --> 00:06:08.685
She really wanted another girl.
00:06:08.685 --> 00:06:15.468
And I would tell her well, we can't really choose because we weren't going IVF route where you already know.
00:06:15.468 --> 00:06:21.589
So I would tell her well, you can't choose, but you know we'll love any baby that comes into our family.
00:06:21.589 --> 00:06:23.903
They'll be your brother, sister, they'll be your sibling.
00:06:25.204 --> 00:06:28.430
And my husband wanted to wait more time.
00:06:28.430 --> 00:06:48.500
I had a pretty rough go after she was born, with postpartum depression, and I think he wanted me to be really well and really ready to go into, you know, another pregnancy and to be able to face that if I needed to face it again.
00:06:48.500 --> 00:06:57.331
And he also wanted our younger daughter to be old enough, a little bit more independent, because she still, you know, really needed me when she was really really little.
00:06:57.331 --> 00:07:00.822
So we decided that we were ready.
00:07:00.822 --> 00:07:02.908
I mean, we weren't ready, Like you're never ready.
00:07:02.908 --> 00:07:12.394
We were ready and we were ready and I took a whole fertility course with you may know the podcast Fertility Fridays.
00:07:12.394 --> 00:07:14.141
I took one of her.
00:07:14.141 --> 00:07:28.278
It's not FAM, she does another method, the Justice method, but still you're checking your temperature and the mucus and all of the signs and you're tracking.
00:07:28.278 --> 00:07:30.062
So we started doing that.
00:07:30.062 --> 00:07:40.490
I had my IUD removed, but we were using that method as birth control so that my uterus would heal, before then conceiving again and having another child.
00:07:41.312 --> 00:07:45.125
And during this time we also decided to get married.
00:07:45.125 --> 00:07:49.798
So then the timeframe got pushed a little bit longer.
00:07:49.798 --> 00:07:57.908
We thought, oh, you know, even if you're, if I was going to be pregnant at the wedding, that would have been fine, but we can also wait until after the wedding.
00:07:57.908 --> 00:08:04.564
And our baby was conceived during the honeymoon period, after our wedding.
00:08:04.564 --> 00:08:20.182
It's really magical that we consciously went into that pregnancy and I took all of that time to learn about my own fertility, my own cycles, different supplements, nutrition.
00:08:20.182 --> 00:08:25.110
I was quote unquote doing it all right.
00:08:25.110 --> 00:08:28.843
I thought, oh, I've got this, we're doing it all right.
00:08:28.843 --> 00:08:29.704
We got married.
00:08:29.744 --> 00:08:36.863
This time I'm drinking the green sludge or whatever, whatever it all was.
00:08:36.863 --> 00:08:43.003
I'm taking all of the prenatal stuff, even the most organic, chelated.
00:08:43.003 --> 00:08:47.236
There's like all this, all this stuff, and but there was something.
00:08:47.236 --> 00:08:49.222
There was something with that pregnancy.
00:08:49.222 --> 00:08:49.844
Looking back.
00:08:49.844 --> 00:08:51.869
I know hindsight can be 2020.
00:08:53.133 --> 00:09:08.533
But looking back, there was a sense of dread and even even on the night that we conceived her, I could feel her baby spirit, her spit, the like, the spirit baby in that form.
00:09:08.533 --> 00:09:14.807
And this has happened in all three of my pregnancies that I feel them and they ask, and I say yes.
00:09:14.807 --> 00:09:24.873
And so she was there and she asked to you know, to come in to be conceived through me, and I said yes.
00:09:24.873 --> 00:09:32.840
And she said something along the lines I mean it's not really like straight out English or sentences, it's more of a feeling.
00:09:32.840 --> 00:09:37.626
But there was this sense of but it won't be easy.
00:09:37.626 --> 00:09:41.807
This was her message to me and I thought, okay, well, what's easy?
00:09:41.807 --> 00:09:47.793
You know, I didn't know how hard, hard was going to be in this pregnancy, but I said yes.
00:09:47.793 --> 00:09:55.332
And I said yes even to the difficulty that she was expressing in her spirit baby form.
00:09:56.220 --> 00:10:01.491
And then, when we got a little bit more into the pregnancy, there were the ultrasounds in the tests.
00:10:01.491 --> 00:10:17.791
All my blood work was fine, so the maternal health side was fine at this point, but I had this dread still of the upcoming ultrasounds and I've recently been going back through my draft.
00:10:17.791 --> 00:10:46.020
I'm going to turn this whole story into a memoir, just on this pregnancy loss part, on my second pregnancy, and I was reading back on notes and journals and just of that whole time and there was an ultrasound appointment coming up and I had mentioned it so many like, reminded my husband so many times that he was starting to get frustrated Like what?
00:10:46.020 --> 00:10:49.610
Why are you reminding me so many times?
00:10:49.610 --> 00:10:51.725
Do you think something is wrong?
00:10:51.725 --> 00:10:56.868
Is what he asked me and I had to admit to him.
00:10:56.868 --> 00:11:01.668
At that point I said yes, I have a feeling, but I hope it's wrong.
00:11:02.740 --> 00:11:05.509
And we went to that ultrasounds.
00:11:05.509 --> 00:11:07.827
There was a dating ultrasound that looked fine.
00:11:07.827 --> 00:11:11.149
That's like six weeks or five weeks or seven weeks, something like that.
00:11:11.149 --> 00:11:14.447
That one was fine but it was in the 1114.
00:11:14.447 --> 00:11:18.948
And they did actually find something wrong, but not with the baby.
00:11:18.948 --> 00:11:19.591
That one.
00:11:19.899 --> 00:11:26.393
They found that I had a hematoma, so it's like a bleed subchorionic hematoma.
00:11:26.393 --> 00:11:28.846
So it's in the in the placenta.
00:11:28.846 --> 00:11:30.750
He showed it to me.
00:11:30.750 --> 00:11:39.543
The doctor showed it to me on the screen and said could be a problem or it could resolve on itself.
00:11:39.543 --> 00:11:43.220
He put me on moderate bed rest.
00:11:43.220 --> 00:11:50.991
He said I could still walk around, I could still go out if it was easy stuff and he put me on progesterone.
00:11:51.860 --> 00:11:58.211
So at that point I thought, okay, maybe this is what we have to overcome.
00:11:58.211 --> 00:12:08.264
And then I, when I got home, of course I got on all the baby blogs and forums and freaked myself out.
00:12:08.264 --> 00:12:10.384
But there was also a lot of hope.
00:12:10.384 --> 00:12:12.947
There were a lot of stories that everything was okay.
00:12:12.947 --> 00:12:17.510
There were other stories that there was bleeding throughout the whole pregnancy.
00:12:17.510 --> 00:12:19.827
There are other stories that they had lost the baby.
00:12:19.827 --> 00:12:28.991
So, okay, well, whenever is coming is coming, and I will just have to confront it and it'll take it really easy.
00:12:28.991 --> 00:12:32.309
I couldn't carry my daughter any longer.
00:12:32.309 --> 00:12:34.466
I wasn't supposed to carry stuff.
00:12:34.466 --> 00:12:35.725
I tried not to cook.
00:12:35.980 --> 00:12:49.373
We did a lot of ordering in and the doctor scheduled us for two weeks out for a follow-up ultrasound because at the time the baby was measuring small.
00:12:49.373 --> 00:12:53.370
I think that this has to do with the problem that they found later.
00:12:53.370 --> 00:13:07.073
But she wasn't at the point in development where he could fully do the 1114 scan, which they look for different potential markers of chromosomal problems or even the beginning of some other conditions or heart condition.
00:13:07.073 --> 00:13:16.653
So two weeks later we went in and that appointment is seared in my brain, heart and body.
00:13:16.653 --> 00:13:27.650
It just felt very different from any other scan I had ever gotten and this is my second pregnancy, so I had been through a fair amount of them with the silence.
00:13:27.650 --> 00:13:40.740
I just remember the silence and furrowed brow as he was trying to take more and more and more pictures, just so many pictures, and that went on for felt like an eternity.
00:13:41.061 --> 00:13:55.270
It could have been two minutes, it could have been five, and then he said your baby, something looks very different since the last time you came and he started to explain all the different things that he was able to see on the ultrasound.
00:13:55.270 --> 00:14:05.850
There were two sacks, cysts on the back of the baby's neck and the baby had swelling pretty much all over her.
00:14:05.850 --> 00:14:21.813
We called her we don't really know what sex the baby was, but I'll call her her for the rest of the interview and telling the story and all around her body, and maybe he would have had an even higher resolution ultrasound.
00:14:21.813 --> 00:14:29.067
There may have been swelling already in the heart and the different organs and she was also missing a nasal bone.
00:14:29.067 --> 00:14:31.664
So all of those markers put together.
00:14:31.664 --> 00:14:42.966
He said that he had seen cases like these and that most of these babies almost all didn't make it to term or really wouldn't live more than a few minutes or a few days.
00:14:42.966 --> 00:15:05.870
The doctor explained that it could be linked to a genetic issue or it could have been a heart condition, that sometimes babies at this stage in development have high drugs, Maybe if there's something wrong with their heart, and my baby could have also had a heart condition on top of having a genetic condition.
00:15:05.870 --> 00:15:08.503
So it could have been all of the above.
00:15:09.304 --> 00:15:18.291
And it was also there while I was still laying on the table getting the ultrasound that he asked us.
00:15:18.291 --> 00:15:20.486
It was just me and my husband there in the room.
00:15:20.486 --> 00:15:23.080
He asked us what our beliefs were.
00:15:23.080 --> 00:15:25.248
I don't remember exactly how he worded.
00:15:25.248 --> 00:15:40.113
He was very kind, he was very open and he did not push either way, and even with his questions they were not leading.
00:15:40.113 --> 00:15:50.105
He just asked us what our religious beliefs were on termination and we weren't making a decision right then.
00:15:50.105 --> 00:15:53.823
We had just found out two minutes ago.
00:15:53.823 --> 00:16:02.903
We were still in shock, we were in crisis, we couldn't decide anything right then, and he also knew that he did not push us to the side.
00:16:02.903 --> 00:16:15.306
But he also did say that because of the laws and this is very relevant for many places in the world if we did decide to go that route, that we needed to make a decision.
00:16:15.615 --> 00:16:29.326
He wasn't pushing us to make a decision, he was just stating facts of the situation, which is dire, and I asked him what that would look like in this state.
00:16:29.414 --> 00:16:33.958
So we're in the state of Morelos, which is outside Mexico City State province.
00:16:33.958 --> 00:16:46.624
It's not really a state the capital area it's own thing, but in this little state that's right outside Mexico City, he said that it would have to go through a committee.
00:16:46.624 --> 00:16:53.243
An ethics committee, Like some other people, would decide for me some random doctors that I don't even know.
00:16:53.243 --> 00:17:01.365
And he knew who my gynecologist was and he said well, you can talk to her and she would have references for you.
00:17:01.365 --> 00:17:17.546
But since we were in the state of Morelos and because he's a doctor in the state of Morelos, I think that that was pretty much all that he felt like he could legally say without potentially getting in trouble, which I understand, his hands were tied and we needed support.
00:17:17.546 --> 00:17:22.767
That doesn't change the fact that we needed support in that moment.
00:17:22.767 --> 00:17:32.101
He did also say that if we decided to continue the pregnancy, this was now a high risk pregnancy and he would be seeing us every week, that's a lot at that stage.
00:17:32.214 --> 00:17:33.480
That was how many weeks.
00:17:33.875 --> 00:17:50.666
Well, looking through my notes I saw that we were at 12 weeks and six days on that day, so almost 13 weeks, and he said the cutoff was 14 weeks.
00:17:50.666 --> 00:17:57.578
So we literally had eight days to decide and there were weekends in there and I didn't know.
00:17:57.578 --> 00:18:02.502
Are there three day wait periods, just like crazy places in the US?
00:18:02.502 --> 00:18:03.256
I?
00:18:03.256 --> 00:18:15.164
It's very unfair because of course there are emergency health issues that come up with anybody who has a body and sometimes you need to make quick medical decisions.
00:18:15.164 --> 00:18:35.204
But with something like a genetic condition, you need more time to research and decide and figure out and learn more and talk to people who live with it, families who live through it, families who lost their children to it.
00:18:35.204 --> 00:18:37.801
I wanted more information.
00:18:37.801 --> 00:18:45.460
I spent many nights not sleeping trying to smash all that information into my head over the next few days.
00:18:45.460 --> 00:18:56.526
But when I left that doctor's appointment I left with a little sheet of paper that said Turner's syndrome and the whole, ultrasounds and everything, all the findings, all of that.
00:18:56.755 --> 00:19:05.464
But that gives you a label that may or may not be true, but right, we don't know and, oh, and I also asked is there any way to find out?
00:19:05.826 --> 00:19:08.823
you know, what kind of prenatal testing could we find out, to find out more?
00:19:08.823 --> 00:19:20.126
And he said well, you could do an amniocentesis, but you have to wait until you're 18 weeks and at that point in time, this was in 2018, very early in 2018.
00:19:20.126 --> 00:19:25.807
But the NIPT testing it still is in standard practice here in Mexico.
00:19:25.807 --> 00:19:30.946
So I know that some other folks who have this happen to them at this point.
00:19:30.946 --> 00:19:38.344
They get offered the NIPT testing, which is also not a diagnosis, but it can screen and it can give you some more information.
00:19:39.057 --> 00:19:41.945
So I know this would just add stress to the situation.
00:19:41.945 --> 00:19:43.982
You had another child at home.
00:19:43.982 --> 00:19:50.644
Did you consider going back to the States and finding more information, or is that just completely not a possibility?
00:19:51.115 --> 00:19:59.846
I didn't want to give birth or lose my baby or, you know, I didn't know of getting on a plane with like cause a miscarriage either.
00:19:59.846 --> 00:20:04.885
He's saying this pregnancy is very delicate now and this is a high risk pregnancy.
00:20:05.595 --> 00:20:15.923
Yeah, I just feel like when people hear stories like this, their brain starts going in that pathway where they're like well, did you think of this, and did you think of this and did you?
00:20:15.923 --> 00:20:30.167
Think of this, you know, and so I really want a different level of understanding for things like this, where we can kind of hold space for the fact that not all the options are always available.
00:20:30.454 --> 00:20:51.268
This is so fast and we're learning so much very quickly and everybody is trying to make the best decision possible and the most merciful decision possible, and having laws that are very restrictive does not allow for the time to make informed decisions in the way that they should be made in this type of situation.
00:20:51.615 --> 00:21:06.348
No, I kept thinking this is pro-life, that I have to rush this, that I can't even find out what the real diagnosis is, that I can't use resources that are available in other countries or other states or with a longer time table.
00:21:06.775 --> 00:21:16.586
Yeah, and then I assume and maybe I'm projecting that your goal was to be merciful to your daughter and to do what would cause the least amount of suffering for her.
00:21:16.755 --> 00:21:31.825
Yeah, we had to consider all of the outcomes and sort of extrapolate decades into the future without even knowing you know a piece of paper with Turner's syndrome on it and this ultrasound, and decide now.
00:21:31.825 --> 00:21:42.105
And I had to consider I mean, I had to go and read all the different stories, read people's different experiences.
00:21:42.105 --> 00:21:49.028
I found out that high drops can lead to a condition in the pregnant person.
00:21:49.028 --> 00:21:56.422
The pregnant person can get high drops as well, swelling in their own organs, which is called mirror syndrome.
00:21:56.422 --> 00:22:01.682
Though it really was a high risk pregnancy now, yeah, and I was and my health was at risk.
00:22:01.682 --> 00:22:19.300
And I also learned that many of these babies, if they do make it closer to term, if they do try and save them I don't even know how long saving is, if it's just a few minutes, if they can live for a few days, if they're, you know they have a breathing.
00:22:19.441 --> 00:22:32.402
So many different factors I don't know it's going to be different for each individual case, right, but I was looking at you know how extreme my daughter's high drops already was at this very early stage and the other markers that she had.
00:22:32.402 --> 00:22:40.088
It just felt like insurmountable odds for her to even overcome living through a cesarean section.
00:22:40.088 --> 00:22:42.462
Yeah, and they're not even a cesarean section.
00:22:42.462 --> 00:22:51.182
It's something called an exit strategy where they have to open you up this would be vertically and remove the baby and the placenta all at once.
00:22:51.182 --> 00:23:06.336
And you know, I didn't know if it would be worth it to my body and her body and the whole everything that was going on, to go through all of that trauma just to have her live an unknown amount, yeah.
00:23:06.845 --> 00:23:21.490
And then I think something else that isn't always considered when reflecting on some of these stories and the people that go through them is how is that going to affect the next child that might be conceived, the next child exactly?
00:23:21.490 --> 00:23:24.305
Are we putting that child at risk?
00:23:24.305 --> 00:23:27.888
Are we making it so that we can't have another child, which I'm not sure why?
00:23:27.888 --> 00:23:43.056
That's sometimes not considered when thinking about these decisions, but I just want to pose that as something that parents are thinking about, because if you're the vessel for this child to enter the world in a healthy manner, that needs to be cared for as well.
00:23:43.056 --> 00:23:51.199
Otherwise, it's going to affect the health of the next child also, as well as you and your ability to care for your children.
00:23:51.199 --> 00:23:58.258
So there's just so much more that goes into this than just choosing in an eight-day span, how to proceed with this pregnancy.
00:23:58.758 --> 00:23:59.259
Exactly.
00:23:59.259 --> 00:24:08.200
We had already decided that we were going to go through with determination and we had to cross state lines.
00:24:08.200 --> 00:24:16.659
We were in then in Mexico City, because I just said no to the ethics committee thing.
00:24:16.659 --> 00:24:21.074
I said no way, I'm not putting myself through that, no way.
00:24:21.074 --> 00:24:30.578
And I know that I'm privileged we were privileged to be able to travel, to be near enough to another state that would see us at that point.
00:24:30.578 --> 00:24:39.325
And I ended up it was on the day Like that was the cut-off day, but perhaps the doctors didn't worry because the baby was measuring small.
00:24:39.325 --> 00:24:42.074
But I think she was measuring small because she was very sick.
00:24:42.074 --> 00:24:54.748
But we were in Mexico City and my husband's family is from there, many of them still live there, and his nephew, who is my age, he's an adult, he is.
00:24:55.329 --> 00:24:56.574
What was he doing at that point?
00:24:56.574 --> 00:25:06.825
I think he was in labor and delivery, but he had been in NICU nursing, so he was a NICU nurse and then they had moved him to labor and delivery nurse.
00:25:06.825 --> 00:25:08.752
So he knew each side.
00:25:08.752 --> 00:25:24.333
He knew the baby side, pregnant person side, all the different factors, and he looked over our scans and he heard what the doctor had said to us and he said, oh yeah, these babies.
00:25:24.333 --> 00:25:33.214
If they even do survive to a certain point, you'll have to have what I just explained the exit strategy he said very traumatic to your uterus.
00:25:33.214 --> 00:25:47.948
He said if it was me I would choose this too, also for the health of your uterus, because your first pregnancy was a vaginal regular in quotations, what's regular but a vaginal birth.
00:25:47.948 --> 00:26:01.308
You can do that again through helping this baby die and having it was a DNC, so they say surgical, but it's not even really a surgery, it's a procedure.
00:26:01.845 --> 00:26:09.311
Yeah, and it's one of those procedures that I had a doctor come on and explain kind of staging for some of these procedures.
00:26:09.311 --> 00:26:14.285
But if you're early enough in the process then it is a procedure that's still an option.
00:26:14.285 --> 00:26:16.305
And it felt like you, were early enough in the process.
00:26:16.305 --> 00:26:28.325
So it is it's difficult, but it's also one of the factors that makes it important to have the option to make these informed decisions early enough to reduce the trauma.
00:26:28.726 --> 00:26:36.712
Yeah, I did want to vaginally deliver my baby, though, but it was not given to me as an option Right at that cutoff point.
00:26:36.712 --> 00:26:48.825
I think in places like Australia and the UK, right around 14 weeks is when they do induce people in these cases, and from around 14 weeks onward they do recommend labor and delivery.
00:26:48.825 --> 00:26:57.560
So that's the natural form of the uterus, then through the vaginal cavity, it's the system.
00:26:57.560 --> 00:27:01.194
That's the system, so it's not sticking a tool up in there.
00:27:01.194 --> 00:27:10.083
I did want to do that and I thought well, I've had a regular delivery before, so I know I can labor and deliver her.
00:27:10.083 --> 00:27:13.785
I know I could, but at every turn it was no.
00:27:13.785 --> 00:27:16.203
And no because of this and no because of that.
00:27:16.203 --> 00:27:20.325
No because you're early, no because you know the laws.
00:27:20.987 --> 00:27:40.825
No because you know it could be three days on pitocin you still might not even give birth Having experienced losses at the stage where they could be at labor and delivery and just because, for the most part at the facilities where I work, we don't have the ability to do determination just based on our facilities.
00:27:40.825 --> 00:28:11.740
When I witnessed the livering of the losses and this is a loss, this was a long time ago I feel like there is the ability to have closure and more space to honor that child that has been let go or has, in most of my cases, has passed, and I'm wondering if maybe you felt like that wasn't something you were able to experience because of the rushed nature and the procedures that were available.
00:28:11.924 --> 00:28:12.665
Definitely.
00:28:12.665 --> 00:28:20.955
I definitely felt like that part of grieving was ripped from me and not even given to me as an option.