V
A band of agony wrapped around my bump, catapulting me from sleep with a cry of fear.
Instantly, X was awake beside me, sitting up. “Vee, what’s wrong? What’s happening.”
I couldn’t even speak, just sat there with my eyes squeezed shut against the pain, breath held, my arms wrapped around my belly. The grip the pain had on me finally started to loosen its hold, and I snatched in a breath and gasped, “The baby. Something’s wrong.”
He jumped from the bed. “What do I do?”
“Hospital. We need to go to the hospital.”
“Nicole!” X yelled.
My sister came running, her eyes wide. She took in the sight of my pain-stricken face. I could feel all the blood had run from it. I must have been white as snow.
“Oh, God, Vee. It’s too early.”
“I know,” I cried.
“You have a bag packed, right?”
“No, I don’t have anything. I’m not ready. The baby’s not ready.”
Terror clutched at me. This couldn’t be happening.
X helped me up off the bed. Another contraction caught me and I doubled over again, clutching his arm and biting my pain between my teeth. I was unable to even move until it released its grasp on me. A thousand panicked thoughts flitted through my head—could they stop the labor, did babies survive if they were born at this date? But one voice shouted the loudest—was I going to lose our child?
Between X and Nicole, they managed to get me to the car. X drove at a breakneck speed, but I barely registered what was happening around me. I’d completely internalized, focusing on what was going on in my body. I put my hand against my stomach, praying I could feel the baby move beneath, just as I had a thousand times before, but my bump was rock hard and I couldn’t feel anything. What had I done wrong? Was it the walk through the forest? Had I lifted something I shouldn’t have? Had having sex with X the previous night caused the early labor? I would never forgive myself if something terrible happened and the baby didn’t make it.
We reached the hospital, and X grabbed a wheelchair from the entrance hall. Both he and Nicole shouted for someone to come and help, but another contraction took hold of me and I was barely aware of the nurses who hurried forward to help. I was rushed up to the maternity unit, and helped onto a bed.
I saw my own fears reflected in X’s eyes as he held my hand and watched me in pain.
The doctor arrived. “How close are the contractions?” he asked.
“I don’t know,” said Nicole. “We forgot to time them.”
“Every few minutes,” I managed to say between gasps as another one hit. “They’re coming faster now.”
“Okay, I’m going to need to do an internal check. It’s going to be a little uncomfortable. I’ll try to wait until you’re between a contraction, okay?”
I gritted my teeth while he did what he had to.
“I’m afraid you’re already several centimeters dilated.”
“What does that mean?” asked X.
“That the labor is progressing. We’re going to get you hooked up to some monitors so we can keep an eye on the baby’s heartrate, and give you a couple of injections to see if we can slow things down, okay? When you’re this early, even keeping baby inside for a few more days can make all the difference.”
All the difference. He meant the difference between life and death.
I was given injections, one of steroids to help mature the baby’s lungs, and another to try to stop the contractions. The medical team told me to try to relax, but it was easier said than done. X and Nicole flitted around me, unsure of what to do or how to help.
The nurse came back to check on me. “How are you feeling?”
“The contractions don’t seem so bad,” I told her.
“That’s good. Maybe we’ll be able to keep baby inside for a little longer, then. We’ve had women come in here with premature labor and they’ve ended up going home and carrying to full term. I know it’s scary, but you’re in the best place.”
She had reassured me. “Thank you.”
I pushed myself higher on the bed, trying to get into a more comfortable position. A sudden rush of hot fluid spilled between my thighs. Panic and fear filled me and I pulled back the sheet to show the bed beneath me soaking wet. “What’s happening?”
The nurse bit her lip. “Your water just broke. I’ll be back in a couple of minutes.”
I sat, numb, and terrified, with X holding my hand, until the nurse returned with the doctor.
“I’m sorry,” he said, “but it’s unlikely we’re going to be able to stop the labor now. Your baby will be at risk of infection if we do.”
“But it’s too soon. The baby isn’t ready.”
“Babies born at this many weeks preterm have a high survival rate. I’m not going to say it will be an easy road, and you will feel like you’re on a rollercoaster, but this doesn’t mean the worst, okay? I need you to try to think positive.”
I barely heard what he was saying. A buzzing had filled my ears, and I felt distant and surreal. How was this happening?
“Did I do something to cause this?” I exchanged a worried glanced with X. He squeezed my hand. I knew he was thinking exactly the same as I was—that us having sex the previous night had caused the preterm labor.
“It’s nothing you’ve done,” the doctor reassured me. “These things just happen. They can be a hormone imbalance, or the placenta stops working, but at least forty percent of the time, we have no idea why it happens.”
I nodded, trying to convince myself that what he said was true.
The injection they’d given me had slowed down the contractions. When they did come, they weren’t as strong, and no longer stole my breath.
“Verity,” the doctor said, “normally, we’d try to keep the baby inside you for as long as possible. At this many weeks pregnant, every extra day can help, but because your water has broken, it means your baby is no longer protected from infections from the outside world. So now we’re doing a balancing act of trying to keep the baby inside you for long enough for the steroids to start working, while not leaving it so long that the baby contracts an infection. Does that make sense?”
I nodded. “You’re saying that you want the baby to stay inside me, but he or she has to be born soon, regardless.”
He gave a sympathetic smile. “Yes, that’s exactly right. We’re going to start you on a course of IV antibiotics as well, which will help reduce any chance of infection.”
“Okay.”
What more could I say? I couldn’t argue this, or fight it. It was going to happen, no matter what I did. For once in my life, I simply had to go along with things. I had no choice.
The next few hours passed in a blur. Both X and Nicole stayed with me, trying to get me to eat and drink to keep up my strength. I had no appetite, but I wasn’t thinking about myself anymore. I had to do what was right for the little life inside of me, who was about to have the biggest fight anyone could ever dream of, and he or she hadn’t even been born yet. It was the least I could do to force down some toast and sweet tea. Guilt and disbelief filled me, and I tried not to pay attention to the other mothers brought in to give birth naturally and take home their full-term, healthy babies. Just seeing them made me blind with bitterness and jealousy. This wasn’t how this was supposed to go. I’d had plans, and none of them had included wondering if my baby was developed enough to be able to breathe after they were born.
“It’s going to be all right,” X kept telling me, holding my hand or stroking my hair. I wanted to take comfort from his words, but I couldn’t. He knew even less than I did. He was in no authority to tell me how this was going to work out.
At least he was here, though. The idea of going through this without him would have destroyed me.
The injection they’d given me to slow the labor began to wear off, and gradually the contractions returned. I was strapped up to more monitors, a large band around my belly which read both the contractions and the baby’s heartbeat. All around me, everything beeped, wires everywhere.
I was checked internally again. “Your baby’s head is already through the cervix,” the midwife told me. “We’re going to be having a baby soon.”
I thought I’d look forward to this moment, the first time of seeing our child, but instead I was terrified. Would he or she even look like a normal baby? I had no idea what to expect. I’d never been so scared in my life, and I’d been through some terrifying experiences. I looked to X who was standing beside me, holding my hand. He squeezed my fingers in reassurance, but he looked as worried as I felt. We were used to taking life, not bringing life into the world, especially not one as precarious as this.
Was this our punishment for everything we’d done?
“I’m here for you, Vee,” he said, his blue eyes intense. “I’m here for both of you.”
I didn’t have time to answer as another contraction took over and I bit down, squeezing his hand hard and trying not to scream. The pain faded, leaving me sweaty and panting. Wrung out.
“Heartrate has dropped,” said the midwife.
We exchanged another worried glance, and Nicole was ushered from the room with promises that she’d be kept updated.
“I love you, Vee,” she called to me, and I saw the tears streaming down her face. Tears I hadn’t spilled myself for many years.
I was checked internally again.
The midwife looked up at me. “Verity, I need you to push really hard now, even if you’re not feeling a contraction. You’ve had a cord prolapsed which means your baby won’t be getting any oxygen. This baby needs to be born right now. Understand?”
I didn’t, not really, but suddenly the room filled with what felt like a hundred panicked people. They wheeled in trolleys and more equipment, shouting instructions to one another.
“Oh, God.”
“Push, Verity. Push, as hard as you can.”
“I can’t!”
“Yes, you can. You have to.”
I gritted my teeth and bore down, breath held, pushing with everything I had. I felt so useless, knowing this baby would be tiny compared to the full-term babies other women were giving birth to.
The pain was excruciating. There hadn’t been time for an epidural, and even if there had been, I would have refused it. I wouldn’t have done anything that would have risked this baby’s life any further.
I pushed and strained and clutched X’s hand so tightly I thought his fingers might break. Nickie waited in the hallway outside, no doubt worrying herself to death.
It felt like it had been too long, but finally the baby slid out from between my legs in a gush of hot fluid. Immediately, everyone sprang into action. I only caught a glimpse of terrifyingly blue skin, before the cord was cut. Then my baby was whisked away and placed on an open warming bed to assess and work on him or her. There were no cries of a newborn filling the air. No one congratulating us, or telling us what sex the baby was. It was all frantic movement around the tiny body of my child, wires and machines, and oxygen given.
Blood continued to flow from between my thighs, hot and sticky. The room spun around me, nausea sweeping over, and my vision began to tunnel.
“X,” I managed to say, reaching for him, though I was no longer aware of what direction he was in. “Help—”
I was barely aware of one of the doctors shouting, “She’s hemorrhaging!”
And then I was gone.