Faces of Loss, Faces of Hope

Cara

Mom to Kensley Angel

Born Sleeping May 28th, 2010 at 20 weeks

Fort Worth, Texas

My husband and I found out we were expecting on January 24, 2010.  Scheduled our first doctor appointment for February 5, 2010 where we found out I was six weeks along with an expected due date of October 6, 2010.  We were very excited as our oldest was 5 and ready for him to have a sibling.  I was very sick this pregnancy, and completely drained of any energy I had early on.  I started leaning towards a girl because I had all the "textbook" signs of a girl.  In mid April, we went in for our routine 16 week checkup and opted to do the QUAD screen.  It all started going down hill from here. 

My results came back high risk for down syndrome (1:207) and open neural tube defect (1:297), and referred to a high risk doctor.  Although I couldn't help but panic when I received these results, there was still a very low probability that our baby had either one.  We had our appointment with the specialist and level II sonogram scheduled for the first week in May.  We were so excited to get to see our baby again, and hopefully find out what we were having.  The level II sonogram showed a very healthy baby girl!!  The doctor did not see any other markers for down syndrome and ruled out any possible open neural tube defect...what a relief!  However, she did notice the baby was measuring 10 days smaller than normal for her gestational period of 18 weeks.  My doctor did not seem concerned about it yet, and just said we would monitor the baby and hold off on changing the due date.  When I got home later that day, I really started to become concerned.  I was exact with all my dates as far as my last menstrual period and when I took my home pregnancy so there was no way we could push out my due date.  I had come to the realization that she was indeed measuring smaller.  I had comfort in knowing that my regular 20 week anatomy scan ultrasound was coming up in two weeks and hopefully she would grow some more.  Heading into my 19th week, I started noticing I hadn't felt her move in a couple days.  I still wasn't feeling her move consistently yet (just the flutters and butterfly's) so I wasn't too alarmed.  I decided to get out my doppler to check her heartbeat and then everything would be fine... or so I thought.  I couldn't find it right away, or ever again for that matter.  As I headed into my 20 week appointment I was still hoping for the best, but had this feeling that something was not right.  Then on May 24, 2010 as I lay on the table, I hear the doctor utter the most painful-earth stopped moving-dagger in my heart words I have ever heard,  "There is no heartbeat."

I was in labor for a total of 32 hours and on May 28, 2010 Kensley Angel was born sleeping at 20 weeks.  Our son was a big part of the whole process, and we let him pick her middle name, Angel.  It was so perfect and fitting, and I don't regret my decision to let him be apart of the whole process.  It has been 5 months since her passing, and thankfully it does get easier with each passing day.  There is not a day does by that I don't think of her ofter, and miss her dearly everyday.