Month: November 2010

Roshni said today that if I am not significantly better by Monday, they will talk to me about doing an “aspiration under guided ultrasound” – stick a needle in me for drainage while using the ultrasound to guide what they are doing. Sounds like all kinds of fun, and there are risks involved, but there are bigger risks involved in having these horrendous fevers that don’t stop.

Sorry if I owe anyone an email, I am just having to manage computer time very carefully in my lucid hours.

So. The infectious diseases team hold the strong opinion that I should be cut open and drained.

And the obstetrics team seem to think that cutting open a uterus that has been through what mine has been through is just asking for trouble. The obstetrics team also seems to understand that although I am not ready to make the decision about having more babies – I am also not ready to have that choice taken away from me.

So they have decided to change to a funky new antibiotic, increase the dose of another one, and just keep pumping me full of drugs until I start to feel better.

But I am expecting that won’t be any time soon. Today was a nasty shock. Again I went from perfectly fine, to very, very sick in about 30 minutes. Shaking and sweating and sobbing and hallucinating. After my fever had started to break, it was measured at 39.9. Finally, I think my doctor is realising that I am not getting better quickly. And no, I won’t be going home tomorrow.

So while I am loving the visitors (really really), not knowing when I am going to have one of these attacks is quite scary, and it’s not the sort of thing that is fun to watch, so I think it might be best to give me a call before you come.

As of right now, I am feeling fine – but for most of today I have been feeling extremely poorly. If I continue to feel as well as I do right now, party in my room tomorrow 😉

That despite my fever spiking again at 39.2 this afternoon, I am going to respond to the antibiotics, and will be able to go home on Saturday. I have been afebrile for most of the afternoon and evening, but woke up about an hour ago needing pain relief with another temp, 38.7 this time.

Not hopeful for Saturday yet.

Id once more like to mention how lucky I am to have such great friends. My room looks like a florists shop, and I barely have time to feel sorry for myself because of the constant influx of visitors. There may come a time when I will need some quiet, but for now, constant love and affection is keeping me breathing. I know what has happened to me is really, really shitty, but I still feel blessed to know all of you!

Oh, and we have met with the funeral directors – a lovely company that do at cost services for neonates (bless them!), and have set arrangements in place. We wont set a date though, until we are sure I am well enough to leave hospital, and stay out.

After my second round of 48hours of broad spectrum antibiotics, I am still febrile (temp over 37.5 – actually around 38.3 for the last 24 hours), so they have finally done an abdominal ultrasound, and found what looks like a pocket of ooze (that is a technical term), and also what looks like a significant abscess.

I haven’t spoken to Team Lara (Roshni, Rena and Armani, my gorgeous doctors), but I am assuming this means more surgery.

I told them I was sick!

Yesterday I woke up feeling crappy. Fevers, bad pain, shivers, cold. Spewy.

Turns out the infection hadnt cleared. I was told I would need another 48 hours of antibiotics before I could leave, now I am being told I need to be afebrile (no fever) for 24 hours before they let me go home.

Which I am kind of happy about, because I would hate to leave only to have to come back again.

So I am still felling physically terrible, which leads having the sads quite bad – so I am loving all the visitors. Thank you to all my lovely friends 🙂

I have a fever, chills, nausea and bad pain. Another 48 hrs of IV anti biotics at least.

Today we finally found out that our other baby was also a boy.

When my mum was two years old, her mum (my grandmother, Rita), gave birth to a baby boy with a hole in his heart. These days there is a relatively simple surgery to correct the problem, and babies born with this condition live perfectly normal lives. But back then, it was a death sentence, and Nanna wasnt even allowed to meet her baby boy. He lived for ten days.

Nanna called him Michael, and even though she went on to have two more children, she was never the same.

To honor Nanna, and the appalling way she was treated, our other baby will be called Aubrey Michael.

Ill probably be released from hospital tomorrow (assuming they are happy with the new pain meeds they are giving me), and we are meeting with the funeral directors on Wednesday to discuss arrangements, so it will probably be a few days before we have all the details ironed out.

Nannas experience of infant loss was awful, and I am motivated by her experience to make sure that our family has a much better experience. Weve got a grief counsellor lined up, weve got some materials to help Inigo through navigating the funeral and related dramas. And we have made a commitment that we will answer all of Inigos questions as directly and openly as we possibly can. And part of that is talking about these babies. We wont be pretending nothing happened, and we wont be pretending that everything is ok.

As our friends and family, you can help us by talking about the babies. Ask questions, say their names, keep them alive in our hearts. Its very hard to deal with such an impossible burden of grief and loss, and it can be very hard to know what is the right thing to say – so many people say nothing. Please dont worry about saying the wrong thing, the only wrong thing is to say nothing.

Archie and Aubrey will always be a part of our family, and I am amazed at how many lives they have touched already.

In time I will get around to posting more about their birth, and the medical details of what happened, and I will post funeral details as soon as they are finalised.

And once more I would like to thank everyone, friends, family, and even perfect strangers who have reached out to us in these past few days. I feel very loved at this bleak and desperate time.

Mark and Lara pleased to announce the birth of their second beautiful son, and deeply saddened to share the news of his death.

Archimedes Hare Nettle. Born 5/11/10 at 10:59pm, died 6/11/10 7am. We had eight hours of hope, and a very special morning saying goodbye. Inigo has met his little brother, and on hearing of his death said, we’ll have to get another baby. Ah, the simple innocence of youth.

Thank you for all of your warm messages of support for our little family, that seems even smaller today.

Thanks to Fi for taking the time to help us celebrate and commemorate our beautiful baby’s too short life.