Harriet, 35 weeks

Miracle mum Jenna shares Harriet's story:

At 15 weeks, I walked into my first antennal appointment, oblivious to what was ahead of us, the midwife went through all of my paperwork and then casually lifted her head and mentioned “did you know you have antibodies” I laughed it off and said that doesn’t seem right and I wanted to get retested, she agreed and we proceeded.
Two weeks later I was checking in again and this time the OB saw me, then I realised something wasn’t right. She sat me down and began explaining what was going on, all I recalled was “dangerous” “death” “Rhesus factors” I walked out crying and called my mother in law who is a manager at the same hospital, she noted everything down and said she’ll find out more for us. Each time I googled I would cry.
That night she called and said to us it was extremely dangerous and rare the antibodies I had weren’t as common as anti D, there is no injection.
After my 3rd follow up with an OB at Campbelltown, I was sent to the MFM clinic at Liverpool to meet with a Professor who would be looking after me.
By the time i was 20 weeks I was having blood tests done every second week to watch for rising titres (early indicators) and every other week having an ultrasound to monitor the babies progression and to watch for anaemia. Both of these started to slowly rise, by 28 weeks I had gone from fortnightly ultrasounds to every second day, monitoring my daughter’s blood flow within her brain.
At this point in time, my doctor began preparing me for “the worst” I was luck enough to have been given my own midwife who was with me the whole time, and my care had been moved from Campbelltown hospital to Liverpool. During one of my visits the professor I was under the care of organised a meet and greet with a neonatologist, we talked about what care would look like and what would happen when baby does arrive.

Every second day I walked into the ultrasound prepared, ready for “it’s go time”.
At 34+6 days it happened, by this time I was able to read the scans, know what numbers were good and which weren’t, I remember looking at my professor and asking “it’s time isn’t it?”, he went and got his assistant to double-check, and then he triple-checked. Finally, he looked at me and said yes.

I remember being excited, not because I was going to meet my child, but this anxiety was going to stop.

I went and got the steroids, and had my consultation with the anaesthesiologist and signed the final paper work. The next day I came in again and had my final dose and one last ultrasound.

That Friday she arrived safely into the world, I remember watching her get lifted up then quickly transferred to the crib, then whisked away.

NICU was a blur for me, I remember watching her get blood tests, sleeping under triple lights to help with her jaundice, getting told she was on a CPAP machine and having and IVIG.