Beau, 26 weeks

Miracle mum Ashlee shares Beau's story:

It all started at work.. Wednesday 2nd April. I started to get cramps. As it was my first pregnancy, I assumed this was “normal” I remember mentioning it to my colleagues at work, and they said the same thing this was “normal”. Finished out the day and mentioned it to my husband, Alex and he said to call the hospital and see what they said.
I was in the midwife program at Armadale gave them a ring, they asked a few questions and said to come in and baby could get checked over.

Got to the hospital they did an ultrasound and an internal check. All was fine and I wasn’t in “early labour” which was their words. Didn’t think much of it. They said take some Panadol go home rest and have the next day off work. Which I thought was a bit dramatic but anyway.

Got home and carried on with normal duties. Then, about 8 pm the “cramps” came back and as they were so frequent and this felt strange, I tracked it in my phone. I had 6 within an hour and a half. Alex called back the hospital they said take Panadol, put a heat pack on and get some rest and to come straight in if it doesn’t get better/ it gets worse.

This is what I did until I woke up at 1am with bad pain stood up and felt all the pressure down there. Felt like I needed to go to the toilet and “push” at this point I was screaming in agony. Alex called the hospital they said to come straight in.
I remember that 13 minute drive feeling like the longest ever. Alex dropped me at the door and went and parked the car.
A nurse from emergency grabbed a wheel chair for me and started to take me upstairs. I will never forget her words “how exciting how far along are you?”, and I watched her face drop as I said I was only 26 weeks. And I think at this point was when I realised this wasn’t right.

They took Alex and I through to the maternity ward and the test they had done 6 hours prior to check my cervix they could no longer do as it was too painful and I was already a few cm dilated.
They then started to give me all the medication to try and slow down labour. All while this was happening I was having what I now know as contractions. They explained they would give me magnesium and a steroid to help babies lungs and would give again in 24 hours the second dose. As a short time passed we were told I was getting a priority 1 ambulance to king Edward and Alex would have to drive and follow us there, and I would have a midwife in the ambulance with me.

They got us there surprisingly quick although the contractions were stronger in the ambulance and I asked for gas during this time to help through the pain.
Meanwhile Alex following behind called our families at 4am in the morning just letting them know I was in hospital but I was okay and would keep them updated.
Once we got to king Edward this is when it all happened very quick. Alex eventually found us and they took us straight through to the birthing room and we were told we were having the baby today. This was scary but the midwife and training midwife both kept us up to date with what was happening and when.

I requested an epidural at 6.30, they started giving this at 6.45, at this time my waters broke. The epidural was finished by 7, I then started pushing, 2 pushes later at 7.12am little baby Beau was out.
The midwife had prepared us that he wouldn’t be breathing and they would be working on him on the baby bed next to me. This is exactly what happened. They passed him over for a quick photo and then they were straight off to the NICU with Alex.
Beau was intubated and looked after by all the nurses and doctors to get him stable.

Then from there Alex came back up to me after a couple of hours, I was assisted to shower and then taken down to the Nicu to meet Beau properly.
This was a crazy experience, not being able to properly hold him or even touch him was heartbreaking. It took at least a week of visiting him every day to not cry every time I would see him.
Once I was back in my own room we contacted our families and gave them the scary call they were not expecting that baby boy had been born at 26 weeks and 1 day on his Aunty Brianne’s birthday.
Then the NICU journey for Beau started, On day 5 I was able to hold him for the first time and day 6 Alex was able to.
This was then the long road of getting Beau home.

During this time we met Megan, from Miracle Babies. She came over to Beau’s station to introduce herself. I remember crying and her comforting me, I felt embarrassed but soon realised this would have been very common for Megan to see this! She shared her story of her boys being prem so many years ago and how well they were doing now. Although felt like such a journey to get him home if gave us a bit of hope that all would be fine.
We then saw Megan on a couple more occasions at King Edward's, where she would come and chat with Alex and I and ask how Beau had progressed.

Then unfortunately things took a turn about a week before Beau turned 2 months old. He became unwell, and each day was getting worse, his breathing got a lot worse and then one Sunday arvo I was cuddling him and he stopped breathing. They had to resuscitate him and intubate him again.

From here we waited a couple of days for him to be stable and he was transferred via ambulance/ nets to PCH.

He was monitored very closely (1 nurse for Beau only) with a lot of specialist watching him and trying to understand what was wrong. It was after 24 hours they had found out Beau had caught a virus called CMV. This had made him very unwell and react the way he had. They started treating him for this and said the next 24-48 hours were critical as to how and if he would recover. We were put up in the NICU accommodation where we could be by his side 24/7 for the next week. Luckily after a few days the medicine started to work and you could see he was slowly improving. After this we spent a long 8 weeks total at PCH. During this stay we would run into Megan regularly in Beau’s room or in the parents room. We were able to catch up and chat about how Beau was going and what our next steps for him looked like.
It was always lovely seeing Megan as she’s such an easy friendly person to talk to! And she was so supportive with all that we were going through. She even mentioned another mum who had come across from King Eddies who was close by to Beau’s bed at the time. They ended up in the same nursery room as Beau and to this day I have kept in contact and stayed friends with the mum, Zoe.

Earlier on in our stay we got some packs from Miracle Babies, I remember at the time being given a lot of information and booklets. However looking back at them when we bought Beau home I was able to put these nappies/ beanies in Beau’s Nicu box to show how small he was and the size of these items he was wearing.

Eventually, after a long 117 days total we left the hospital and was able to bring our boy home.

Megan and I kept in contact via Facebook and reminded me that we could join the nurture group. I decided to attend the Warnbro group and felt welcomed right from the start! I remember meeting other mums with totally different stories for their babies/ kids. But it’s just such a welcoming environment. I’ve been lucky enough to meet a few mums with similar age babies to Beau, who we also keep in regular contact outside of nurture group!

If it wasn’t for Megan / NurtureGroup I do feel the hospital time would have felt a bit more isolating. As well as having other parents to connect with outside of hospital life has been a blessing!

Now Beau is 11.5 months and we’re getting ready to celebrate his 1st birthday. From what was such a scary 4 months of Beau’s life it feels like a distant memory, and he’s kicking goals every day!