Hey there! I am back today with Ruby’s birth

So it’s no secret that I am a “Rainbows and Unicorns” type of girl. I do my best to see the Unicorn Horn on everything I look at, and if I can’t, I will dang sure make one out of a toilet paper roll and duct tape it to it. So when the doctor tells me “Well, you are NOT having this baby at the birthing center, go home and pack your bags they are waiting for you at the hospital and you are having this baby tonight” well…I was a little in shock. “Something is wrong with your umbilical cord” he says…”she isn’t getting enough nutrients to grow, only to survive” he says. “We need to take her out of your belly immediately” he says. Honestly, I felt like I was in the twilight zone, with no sparkly Unicorn Horn to guide me out. How in tarnation was this happening?

At this point there was still no mention of “Down syndrome” or any other chromosomal difference, and I was just in survival mode. I had only known a natural birth with Ella Mae, and was terrified of any other way. I get to the hospital and her heart rate was dipping so they ended up doing an emergency C-section to get her out. Scared out of my mind? Heck yeah. Ready to meet my daughter? Oh, so ready. 20 minutes later out comes this 3 pound 12 oz, perfect lil’ lady. I remember them letting me kiss her, and for one second I got to breath her in and see her sweet face…and then off her and the hubby went. I laid there for what seemed like an eternity as they were putting me back together and literally wanting to shout over the curtain, “Hey! Just stuff it all back in there and zip me up so I can get to my baby!!”

FINALLY…they wheeled me into recovery and in comes Ruby’s doctor, whom I have not met yet. My hubby had come in several times to update me, “she grabbed my finger!” he would say. “Her eyes are open!” But we had not had a doctor come and tell us the full scoop, and of course this very anxious, scared, hopeful and proud mama was dying to hear how she was doing. “She’s breathing on her own, but we have her on oxygen, she overall is doing well…BUT… she is showing several soft signs of Down syndrome.” I could barely hear him because my teeth were chattering so bad from coming out of whatever they gave me for my surgery, so I literally had to hold my jaw closed to listen. He goes over them all and says he is “pretty sure, but sending for results” and we will know in about a week. He was all about the facts, which worked for us at the time. My main concerns were “is she going to live?” I felt like we could literally deal with anything else.

After over an hour of being away from my new daughter, they finally wheeled me down to meet her. I am lucky in the fact that my hubby and I are one in the same, for the most part, when it comes to dealing with life situations. To us, there is one way to go…forward. All I could think about was holding my sweet baby girl and kissing those tiny, perfect little cheeks again. On my way there I was so nervous and could not shake this fear…am I going to be able to give her everything she needs to grow and be all she can be? Can I rise to the challenge of loving her in the way she deserves? I had been around only a few children with disabilities before, so was unsure of the road ahead and what it meant to have a child with special needs. But when I got to the NICU and saw my new baby girl, she had an oxygen mask on, tubes everywhere, so it was quite the ordeal to get her in my arms…but the second I held her I knew. She would teach me and show me the way.

Come back tomorrow to hear just how our lil’ lady inspired this entire organization