The Birth

I wanted to take some time to tell about how the twins came to be born at 25.5 weeks because it is an amazing example to me of God's perfect timing. It all started Monday, Dec 12 at 4:30 am. I was laying in bed when I felt something that wasn't quite right. I got up to see what was going on and after taking about 3 steps, I froze and yelled at Rob to get up. I told him either my water broke or I was bleeding. Well, my water did not break. I went back to bed and things seemed to improve but we decided I would call the doctor as soon as they got into the office and Rob would come home after running the bus route, in case the doctor wanted to see me. At 8:00, things got worse again and I began having contractions as well. I called the doctor but had to leave a message. Rob got home at 8:30 and I called the doctor again. They told me to come in. Then, almost immediately, I got a call from them telling me to go to the hospital. As soon as I got there, Dr Doughtie told me he was sending me to Baylor and by 10:00 I was in an ambulance on my way. Not a trip I hope to repeat ever again in my life! I was having contractions all the way to Dallas. Rob went home to gather up some things and then came to the hospital. They had given me the medicine to stop the contractions, which makes you feel like you are on fire. The first doctor came in and did a sonogram and said the babies looked good. The second doctor came in (an at-risk neonatologist) and did another sonogram to determine why I was in labor. He discovered that the babies were identical and had twin-to-twin transfusion. They did not share any body parts but were sharing blood vessels. All of Gideon's nutrition was going to Josiah. So Gideon was suffering from a lack of what he needed and Josiah was suffering from too much of what he needed. Josiah was in too much fluid and had too much fluid going to his heart so it was enlarged. Gideon was smaller and his placenta was shrink-wrapped around him with very little fluid in it. The fact that both babies had their bladders and they appeared to be functioning was a very good sign. A third doctor then came in (the cardiologist) to look at their hearts and rate them on how much damage they had. Gideon's heart was structurally good and beating correctly. Josiah's heart was not contracting, but rocking back and forth because of all the fluid it had. She rates their heart damage on a scale of 1-4, 4 being the worst and not expected to survive. The boys hearts were both rated as a 2 which is not bad considering we had just discovered this. The plan was to keep them in the womb as long as possible to help their lungs develop. At 7:30pm, the doctors had just about gotten the contractions stopped when I began throwing up and the bleeding started again. This is when the well-oiled machine of Baylor Hospital's labor and delivery team went to work. The doctor calmly told me they couldn't stop the bleeding and would have to do an emergency C-section. At 7:41 they wheeled me into the OR and at 7:49 the babies were born. We truly believe the babies would not have survived much longer in the womb. God has a plan and it was amazing to get to see the perfection of His timing within that 24 hour period.