At my 30 week checkup, I was put on hospital bedrest after noticing spikes with my blood pressure. This led to a diagnosis of pre-eclampsia with severe features. After a 5 day stay at my local hospital, I was then transferred by ambulance to a bigger hospital (3 hours away from my home town) — that specialized in high risk pregnancy. 6 hours after arrival, after a nightly battle of severely high blood pressures and severe chest pains, my placenta had burst. I had an emergency c-section at 8:40am. And at 8:44am, our son, was born at a whopping 3 pounds and 8 ounces — 31 weeks gestation.

After my c-section, I was in extensive recovery. The next 12 hours I didn’t wake up. At exactly 8:44pm, I woke up (eyes still shut) telling nurses I needed to pee — little did I know, I had a catheter in. Several nurses began to rush in the room and it became a fight for my life as I had hemorrhaged. Safe to say it was a very long night. 2.2L of blood loss and 3 blood transfusions later, I finally could open my eyes 24 hours later.

I finally got to hold my son 28 hours post delivery. But with 48 hours on magnesium — I hardly knew what had happened, yet I was determined to hold my baby. I was given the diagnosis of HELLP syndrome. I spent the next week in extensive care. Our son spent 35 days in the NICU. My husband and I never left his side.

We both have since made a full recovery and credit the good Lord above for watching over us. Things could have been very different for either of us and we are just so thankful we both made it through. No doubt it gave us a glimpse of just how precious life truly is.