So what actually happened?

Today marks one month of the twins celebrating their heavenly birthday. It has been a whirlwind of a month.  Between planning the memorial, Halloween festivities for Trey, family being in town, getting ready to put our house on the market, etc it has been crazy.  The support we have received has been overwhelming.  We’ve had many visitors bringing meals and thoughtful gifts.  Some have heard our story but there are many who have not.  For those who have not, I wanted you to be able to hear it too.  I know there are many questions to be answered- Lord knows I have a lot of my own.  So I will share what answers I have, knowing full well that some will never be answered this side of heaven.  So here goes:

Sunday, October 18^th, I woke up feeling horrible.  I had terrible cramps- not the coming and going cramps of contractions but constant abdominal pain.  Walking, sitting, laying down- all was difficult.  But I still wanted to go to church. I felt horrible but church was almost a break for me because I knew Trey would be well taken care of.  So to church we went.  I couldn’t even stand during worship.  I worshipped from my seat, singing “It is well with my soul.”

The service was on “why do bad things happen to good people?”  The culmination of the message was a video about my friend Kim who lost her husband 5 months ago from a tragic hiking accident.  Interwoven into her story was how she had mentored a student in the middle school ministry who then drifted from the Lord in high school.  This little girl ended up going to the memorial for Kim’s husband and heard all about how if just one person was drawn to the Lord through Woody and Kim’s story, it was worth it.  As the service progressed, she felt God whisper to her “you’re the one”.  She has since returned to church and her faith.  It was such a powerful story and reinforced my feelings that my babies are created to glorify God, no matter what.  If they are to go home early, they will still glorify the Lord in death.  That has to be my focus.  They are a part of my story, His story, and I want to tell my story to anyone who will listen. 

When I got home from church, my abdominal pain was awful.  I tried to lay down when Trey napped but there was no rest to be had.  I had also developed chills.  I was concerned I might have the flu.  I covered up with blankets and drank a lot of hot tea.  I also called mom and tearfully asked her to come.  This was a big decision because I knew that she has limited time because she is still working.  It was understood that if she came now, she wouldn’t have another availability to come until the twins came in February.  It was worth it. I felt so horrible I had gotten to the point where I just needed my mom.    Denny was more than willing to set up a flight for her for the following evening. 

By about 10pm I was absolutely miserable.  I took my temp and indeed had a fever of 100.2.  It was the cramps that were my main concern, however, so I ended up calling my dr.  I explained the situation and she advised me to come in to the hospital, just to be safe.  Since I thought I might have the flu, I didn’t want my best friend Corrie to come over to watch trey.  We decided that Denny would stay home with Trey (he was already asleep) and I would go to the hospital.  So I packed up for the hospital and called mom and dad on the way.  I also called Corrie to give her a heads up in case Denny needed to come. 

I felt an odd sense of peace.  I reminded myself of my mindset of glorifying the Lord through the lives of our children.  I reminded myself of the words that were spoken over Lucas and Lorelei (“your twins will be arrows in the quiver of the Lord.  They will be sure, accurate, and direct for whatever purposes the Lord appoints to them.”).  I thought about a friend from childhood who lost her twin girls at 24 weeks. The grace and strength she displayed at that tragic time was inspiring.  I thought of another friend from my MOPS group who lost two babies, one at 22 weeks and one at 34 weeks.  She has turned her story into a glorious testimony to young moms of how to keep going and honor God despite the difficulties.  Their testimonies marked me.  If the worst happens, I want to be someone’s Charise or Shannon.  I want to be the earthly inspiration that gives them strength, knowing of course that all strength comes from the Lord. 

I got checked in to the hospital.  The Dr wasn’t optimistic.  She was concerned about the pain and the fever.  She explained that I was basically showing signs of infection, specifically Chorioamnionitis.    This particular infection could be caused by one of the amniotic sacs rupturing.  If that were the case, the infection is very dangerous for me.  It could lead to massive blood loss, hysterectomy or death.  If I had the infection, there was nothing we could do.  Any medication they gave me would kill the babies.  The babies had already been infected just being in my womb so the only option for them was delivery.  Once they were delivered, they are too small at 20 weeks to be viable.  They would not survive.  Medically speaking, the Drs would focus on me and not my babies.  As I understood their position, I am a mom first and foremost.  My priority goes to my kids.  I have always said if it comes to a choice between me and my kids, my kids win.  But any way we look at this, if I have an infection there is no way the kids could survive, inside or outside.  The only choice we had in the matter was when the kids would come out.  I was dead set on not inducing.  I did not want to make the choice to end my babies’ lives.  So that is where my prayers began on a whole new level.  I had accepted whatever outcome but please Lord, do not make me choose myself over my kids.  Let them come naturally. 

They proceeded to examine me.  The ultrasound came first.  It was not good.  It showed that Lucas’ amniotic sac had ruptured.  There was barely any membrane around him, at least not enough to measure.  The theory was then posed that he had in fact ruptured back on Thursday but it was such a slow leak that it was not measurable on tests.  It was still not certain whether I had the infection.  We had to take a “wait and see” approach to that.  If we had more signs of the infection we would know where to go from there.  So our job at that point was watch and see and manage my pain as best we could (cramps were still constant at this point). 

Next step was devastatingly hard.  I had to call Denny and tell him he had to come to the hospital.  Tearfully I dialed.  Denny knew right away that he needed to come based on my tears.  My plan was for him to just get here and then I would ask for the Dr to explain everything to him.  Next I had to call Corrie (since I knew I at least didn’t have the flu).  She got even less information, poor thing.  All I could do was cry and squeak out “get to Trey”.  She said “I’m on my way”.  That was the end of our conversation.  You have to love friends like that. You say “go” and they “go”, no hesitation.   

Denny raced to the hospital.  I’ll never forget him coming into the room, falling down on his knees on the side of my hospital bed and weeping.  I did my best to explain what was happening as I called the nurse to get the dr.  The Dr came and explained everything to Denny.  In his shock, he got quite angry.  His concern was that there were red flags that had to have been missed.  I had signs of infection for weeks and every time I told the OB they said that what I was describing was within normal limits of a twin pregnancy.  The Dr assured us that if I had picked up an infection way back then, there was still nothing we could have done.  Basically, infection equals death of babies, period.   Denny simply was not satisfied with that answer, as no one should be.  He texted a friend who is a nurse and has had a super premie baby (that survived) and asked for advice.  Her first response was to get me to another hospital.  However, I was already checked in and there was no moving me in the state that I was in.  She then sent Denny multiple names of Drs and their contact information.  He immediately emailed one of them.  A few hours later, this dr whom we had never seen basically held a consultation over email.  That is unheard of. She explained, in detail what was going on.  She told him of the exact same outcomes that our doctors had shared.  This is huge for us because we had received the peace that comes from knowing that even if we were taken to the best doctors in Atlanta, we would still be facing the same issues.

My fever continued to progress, as well as some other symptoms that clearly pointed to the infection we feared.  My full abdominal cramps soon turned to contractions that came and went.  The Dr said that the infection was causing my abdomen to contract.  At that point, I was praising God because labor was progressing naturally.  He had answered my prayer that we did not need to choose to induce.  I could not be more grateful for that.  We had such mixed emotions because the fact was, we were losing our babies.  There was no turning back.  There was nothing we could do, and nothing that could have been done to prevent this.  Denny and the Dr emailed throughout the day.  She was so helpful.  Once it was determined that I had the infection, he emailed her.  She quickly responded with the most kind and gentle advice.  She said that she knows that what has happened makes us feel very helpless, that there is nothing that we can do.  She proceeded to give us a list of things we CAN do, and should do for our healing purposes. She said that if we hadn’t named them yet, give them a name (we had chosen Lucas months ago and Lorelei years ago).  She said that when they are delivered, we need to hold them and hold them for as long as we want. 

Monday afternoon my fever spiked up to 102.  We decided to ask for meds to speed up the process.  When the dr came in to check me before she would give meds, she found that I was fully dilated and ready to push.  That was a shock.  With Trey, I felt ready.  I was the one that told them I was ready to push.  I didn’t feel physically ready this time, let alone emotionally.  Even though I had been waiting for hours for this moment, I still felt unprepared.  I was scared.  The Dr. warned us that with twins, sometimes “Baby A” (which, by the way, drove me crazy that they called Lucas Baby A even though we had told them his name.  I wish I would have been emotionally stable enough to ask them to use his name) is ready to come out but “Baby B” (Lorelei) is not.  Lorelei could take days to get ready.  With my infection we didn’t have days to wait.  There was also an added pressure that they didn’t want to use any instrumentation to help the process along because it could potentially add more germs to an already infected area.   The goal was to have the babies come out with the least amount of help possible to stay as sterile as possible. 

Ready or not, we had reached our moment.  The time for Lucas had arrived.  The dr prepped me and he was out with three pushes, unassisted, as we were praying.  This is where I need to pause and praise God for the nursing staff.  They were amazing this whole time.  They were kind and gentle.  They were sensitive to our situation, almost walking on eggshells, in a good way.  However, they did get to the point where they recognized that we are not normal mourners.  They would walk in and sometimes catch us laughing, crying or in prayer. They got to the point where they were comfortable coming in and greeting us with a smile, knowing we would welcome smiles and not be offended.  I like to think that our room wasn’t a heavy burden on them almost as if it was refreshing to see grief differently.  There was one particular nurse that was incredible.  She swooped in for the birth of my babies like an angel.  I like to refer to her as “the voice of my babies”.  Before Lucas was born she asked if I wanted him placed on me right away or if I wanted a moment.  Since I had no idea what was next with Lorelei I asked for a moment.  She agreed and as soon as he came out, she took him to the corner of the room to clean him up and then brought him to me.  She laid him on my chest and told us we could hold him.  We could hold his hands.  She told us he may twitch but he is ok, he is not in pain.  She gave us permission to love on him for as long as we wanted.  She assured us that they would not take him from us.  And then the voice of our babies was gone, like an angel wisps in and out of your life in an instant. 

The experience of meeting Lucas was difficult, to be honest.  It was a flood of emotions.  But it was also so peaceful.  It was quiet.  He looked at rest. His big eyes were closed, just resting.  His mouth was closed.  We marveled at how much his mouth looked like Trey’s.  He had his top lip tucked into his bottom lip.  We think he would have looked like Trey.  His hands were on his chest.  We watched the rhythm of his heart and saw his chest rise and fall.  We both got our chance to hold him and talk to him.  We told him it was ok to go see Jesus.  But our little Lucas was not ready.  He was a feisty little fighter.  Denny took him over to the window to see outside.  Seeing him holding Lucas at the window is a memory I will cherish forever.  I wanted pictures of the babies, knowing that I might need to refer to them when I was ready.  Denny took some pictures at my request but he wasn’t sure he wanted pictures.  Denny at the window with Lucas is one moment I wish I could have captured on film but I couldn’t get to my phone.  But it’s a memory I’m sure I will never forget. 

After Lucas was delivered, the Dr checked Lorelei’s position and discovered that my cervix had closed.  Lorelei was nowhere near ready.  We then had the next choice to make, wait to see what happens or take meds to speed up the process.  Again, due to the dangers of the infection, we decided to speed up the process.  They gave me medication and we just had to wait.  As we waited I felt the effects of my epidural wear off.  I was feeling contractions again.  But I knew that we were nearing the end and the faster I could get that needle out of me the better.  So I was weighing whether or not to ask for more meds.  I finally gave up and pushed the button for more meds.  But in Lorelei’s dramatic fashion, it was too late, I felt a PUNCH and my water broke. As painful as it was (I almost jumped out of the bed and Denny almost dropped Lucas), I was again praising Jesus that this had progressed naturally and did not need any extra help from the doctors.  So again, I was ready.  This time I was afraid the dr wouldn’t get there in time!  Lorelei was READY!  Lucas was as well.  He had held on for two hours.  We like to say that he was waiting for his sister to enter the world so they could fall into Jesus’ arms together.  There were a couple times when we thought Lucas had passed on quietly but he came right back.  He was determined to see his sister again. 

As Denny held onto Lucas, we began to prep for Lorelei. ***Special note: the voice of our babies suddenly whisked in for Lorelei’s birth and played the exact same role.  Her presence in the room was a great comfort.***   I have a brand new respect for women who choose natural childbirth without an epidural.  That was a whole new kind of pain and Lorelei was only about a foot long.  Both Lucas and Lorelei were born breached, Lucas feet first but Lorelei was born curled in a ball, back first.  I’m a quiet laborer but under the circumstances I confess that I shouted.  But as quickly as it began, it was over.  She was out, on my chest and she was beautiful.  She was a bit more developed than Lucas.  Her big eyes were closed like Lucas’.  She was longer than Lucas.  We marveled at her long fingers and fingernails.  She had my hands.  Unlike Lucas, her mouth was open.  It made me think of the origin of her name.  Her name comes from Greek mythology that tells of the Sirens that would lure sailors to them.  My prayer was that she would draw people to her because of her middle name, Joy.  That she would be a bubbly, joyful girl whose joy was infectious.  As some hear this prayer, it may make them sad.  But I don’t share this to be sad.  The truth is, her spirit lives on in me.  We share the same middle name.  Her spirit of joy will be carried on, I promise you that.

Lucas held on for a few minutes, just enough to see his sister. They were both placed on my chest so I could see them both together.  We continued to hold Lucas as we watched Lorelei.  She held on for a little over an hour and then went to join her brother with Jesus.  We continued to hold them for the rest of the evening. The Dr and nurses were amazed at how long the kids held on.  They would come in the room and ask to see the babies.  We were allowed the opportunity to be proud parents of our twins.  We got to show the Dr and nurses that our babies are special.  They are not just “baby A” and “baby B”.  They are Lucas and Lorelei.  They are strong, stubborn, peaceful and joyful.  They had a will to live, a will to press on.  We can live by their example.  In this grieving process, we choose to live like our babies.  We choose to be strong in the Lord, stubborn to hold on to what is important in life, find peace in our Heavenly daddy’s arms especially when peace has no logical place in our life, and to find joy in the presence of God that is all over this story.