When I got pregnant I was very scared, but happy. I had what we all thought was a normal pregnancy. When I was about 8 months pregnant, my doctor was doing a sonogram to determine the sex of the baby. It was a girl! I was so excited. But, then he said that I had a cyst on my ovary. He said he would make me an appointment with a specialist, but said not to worry about it. 4 days later, I went in to see the specialist.
I was laying down getting my sonogram, and it was taking a long time. After laying there for what seemed like hours, I asked if something was wrong. The doctor told me to sit up. She said they had a found some problems. She said your child does not have a face. I cannot see her eyes, she doesn’t have a nose. She has a mid facial cleft lip and palate. I cannot see any fingers, but she may have her hands in a fist. Her brain is severely damaged. She has an encephalacyl on the side of her head. She looks like she has clubfeet and I cannot be sure but it also looks like she has spina bifida. I was speechless. I couldn’t talk. I couldn’t move. I was in total shock. The doctor did an amniocenteses and then monitored me for contractions. I was in labor. They rushed to another hospital that could deal with Katelyn’s problems better. When I got there, the did an emergency c-section. If I got into hard labor, we would be risking the cyst to burst.
On June 23, 1999, I gave birth to an 8lb baby girl. The doctor told me he didn’t think that she would survive birth. But she did. The cyst on her head was 15oz. It was the same size of her head. When I first saw her, I thought she looked like a two-headed baby. I was so scared to look at her. But, the doctor said she probably would pass away soon. So , I held her as we got her baptized. 3 hours later, they said she was hungry and asked if they could put a tube down her throat to feed her. I said yes. She was very healthy. She did not have spina bifida or club foot. She did have hydrocephalus and part of her skull was missing. When she was 1 week old, they decided to remove the cyst from the side of her head and put a VP shunt in. The surgery went great. Then at 2 weeks old they put a tube in her belly to eat. Then at 3 weeks old she came home. She beat all the odds. The doctors didn’t know what to say. The next few months went by so fast. She was a wonderful baby. It was also hard knowing that one day, I would live life without her. She never had any more surgeries.
When she was 8 months old, she started having a hard time breathing. She couldn’t keep any food down. She wasn’t wetting her diapers. I took her the doctor and he put her on a constant feeding pump. I gave her her medicine that night and then went to bed. Her daddy left the house at 7:00 that morning and gave her a kiss bye. I fell back asleep. When I woke up at 10:00, I was wondering why she was still asleep. I got up, walked to the kitchen to get her medicine, walked in her room and looked into the crib, and she was dead. She quit breathing in her sleep. She was 9 months old. She has been gone now for almost 3 years. I miss her so much, but I am so glad God let her be in my life at all. It was such a privilege to care for one of God’s angels. And I thank Him everyday for her!
