I’m sitting in my hospital bed in complete bliss as my new baby sleeps soundly next to me and my husband’s snores fill the room. Our birth story was not at all what’d we had planned, and I feel so very lucky that everything turned out so well.

On Friday 4/19, I was already 4 days overdue and patiently waiting for my little guy to decide it was time. At my appointment that morning, my cervix was still closed and I had plenty of fluid. The NST results were perfect. I was having infrequent contractions and baby was responding well. We set an induction date for the following Thursday, and I went home to try all the natural methods of getting things moving along.

When I got home, pieces of my plug started coming out. Then that night, around 12:30 am, I got up to pee. When I got back in bed, I felt a gush of fluid but ignored it. A moment later, I felt another so I got up and went to the toilet. Suddenly blood and fluid was flowing out of me like a river. I’d been told most women don’t have their water break before they get to the hospital, and for those that do it’s just a small leak usually. Yeah, mine was like something out of a horror movie.

I was freaked out by how much blood and liquid in general there was, so I yelled at my husband to get up and get me a towel so we could go to the hospital. We were out the door and into the hospital within 10 minutes, and still liquid is flowing out of my like Niagara falls 😂

They check me and I’m still closed, but I’m admitted anyway since my water broke. They give me a pill to help ripen my cervix, and wait 4 hours to see what happens. I end up dilated 1 cm and having regular contractions that are 10 minutes apart.

That’s where everything changes. They notice the baby’s heart rate is decelerating with contractions. After some moving around of monitors, they can’t find a heartbeat at all and go into full on emergency mode. People rush into the room. They give me a shot to slow things down and give him a chance to recover (which also makes me shake like a leaf), and put an oxygen mask on my face. That’s when they call my OB. He comes in and tells me I need a C-section right away.

I hate needles, but here comes the epidural.

I’m terrified of surgery, but here they are counting knives to cut me open.

In reality, none of it was that bad. It was even almost easy, if I hadn’t been scared to death.

Turns out, there was a major complication with my pregnancy that none of us had known about. Velamentous Cord Insertion, an extremely rare condition affecting only 1% of non-multiples pregnancies, means the umbilical cord was not attached correctly to the placenta. The arteries and whatnot that give the placenta its nutrients were on the side, not in the center, meaning they weren’t as effective as needed. 50% of cases like this end up in stillbirth. Preterm birth and other complications are almost a guarantee. I’d had a totally standard, low risk pregnancy that could have so easily ended up devastating instead.

Rowan Ramsey was born in the most dramatic way I could have imagined, but he’s here and he is so perfect. 😍🥰❤️