Today, Finn Ignatius Gensic turns a month old. I can’t
decide if the month flew by or if it crawled. I don’t know if I’m exhilarated
or completely drained. All I know is that it has been quite a month.
During the second week of May, I went to my 36 week prenatal
visit for this pregnancy that up to that point had been relatively uneventful.
The doctor mentioned that my fundal height was a little low, so he scheduled me
for a growth scan the following Monday, May 15.
During the ultrasound, I made small talk with the tech, but
I could tell that something wasn’t right. There was a tension on the tech’s
face that I couldn’t ignore. I was taken to a room for a private consultation
with the doctor. Private consultations are never something you hope for in a pregnancy.
He told me that the baby was 5 weeks behind in growth, and they didn’t know
why. At a follow-up scan the next day, the tech told me that she estimated the
baby was only 3 pounds. I was scheduled for an appointment with a high-risk
pregnancy doctor in Norman on the 17th.
However, on the evening of the 16th, I went in to
the labor and delivery unit here in Ardmore because I was spotting. I informed
the nurses that it was probably nothing, but I was a nervous wreck, and could
they please check me out. I expected to be home within the hour.
I was hooked up to the monitors that are standard during
labor and delivery. As I was lying there, I kept having Braxton Hicks
contractions, and after some of the contractions, Finn’s heart would
decelerate. Out of concern, they sent me for another ultrasound in the
emergency room. Through that midnight ultrasound, we were finally able to
determine that my placenta was giving out on Finn.
During the whole night, I was terrified. I could hear Finn’s
heart beat, and the decelerations were agony to listen to. By the next morning,
BJ and I with the guidance of a warm and reassuring nurse had decided that we
wanted a c-section, and we wanted it soon. When my doctor came in, he had
reached the same conclusion. He said that it would take him about an hour to
get his surgical “A-team” together. He wanted to have the best because of the
high-risk nature of this delivery, so we agreed to wait an hour. He then asked
BJ if he would like to go on the helicopter with Finn if he had to be flown
out. In that moment, I realized how much danger Finn was in.
An hour later, the nurse who had been with me all morning
put an arm around my shoulder and walked me to the OR. An incredibly kind
anesthesiologist explained to me the process of the epidural since I had never
had one, and then he did a wonderful job of prepping me. Soon after, our
pediatrician, my doctor, and BJ arrived for the operation.
As I laid on the operating table, I kept silently mouthing
three words to God: “David and Goliath.” I didn’t know how to pray eloquently
in that moment of incredible fear, but I knew that David was small like my
Finn, and I knew he had faced a seemingly insurmountable challenge with God’s
support. I figured that if I couldn’t come up with my own words on Finn’s
behalf, I would just pray that story for him.
Within minutes of the operation starting, the doctor pulled
Finn out, and it only took a few moments for him to belt out a loud, beautiful
scream. Our pediatrician gave him high Apgar scores, and said that the
helicopter would be able to return without Finn. He only weighed 3 lbs. and 10
oz., but he was in good shape.
The next eight days, Finn and I spent in the hospital here
in Ardmore. He couldn’t be discharged until he reached 4 pounds. It was a
difficult week for me. BJ couldn’t spend much time with us because he had
laryngitis that he didn’t want to expose Finn to. And I was devastated by the
idea that my body had failed Finn. He was so small, it was difficult to feel
anything but fear and bewilderment: how could this have happened to our baby?
On the day that Finn reached 4 pounds and we were going to
get discharged, a nurse came to get him for his assessment. Normally,
assessments took only about 10 minutes, but 45 minutes went by when our
pediatrician walked into the room. He said that Finn had looked dusky to the
nurse, so she had checked Finn’s oxygen and heart rate, and he was showing
signs of distress. They had no idea what was wrong with Finn, but our
pediatrician wanted to have him flown to Cook’s Children’s Hospital in Fort
Worth so that we could get answers fast.
I was so shocked at first, that I couldn’t cry. Numb, I
called BJ to tell him. He said that we had been feeling better that morning,
and he had been about to leave for the hospital so that he could hold Finn for
the first time. At this point, I was able to cry.
BJ arrived soon after I called, and we waited in the
hospital room for more information. We were unable to be with Finn while we
waited for the flight crew and while he was assessed. About 2 hours after we
initially learned everything, there was a knock on our door. It was the flight
crew with Finn in an enormous incubator on a stretcher. Finn had multiple tubes
already connected to him. I don’t know how to put into words what that moment
felt like without leaning on clichés. I’ll just say that my heart broke.
The flight crew gave me a “lovey”, a cloth toy to touch and
keep in my shirt so that it would smell like me and so that Finn would have it
in the hospital. They explained to us where we needed to go, and told us to
drive carefully because speeding wouldn’t help anyone. I was quietly weeping as
I stood next to Finn. Pushing the stretcher was a man with a mustache who
looked like my dad. As we said our goodbyes to Finn, the man whispered to me
repeatedly that Finn would be okay. I decided that since he looked so much like
my dad, I would try my hardest to believe him.
The next 12 days in the NICU were a steady stream of
terrifying test that our little Finn had to endure. Through it all, he ate and
put on weight like a champ. The NICU has a funny way of turning the most laid
back mothers and fathers into quintessential helicopter parents, and BJ and I
were certainly no exception. We hovered over Finn, and rarely put him down. In
the end, it was determined that the growth restriction he had suffered in my
womb had put more stress on his body that originally thought, and he just
needed more time to put on weight and stabilize.
Twenty days after his dramatic appearance, we were blessed
to bring our Finn home. The adrenaline from the experience has not entirely
subsided, but we are starting to feel more normal. Finn weighed 5 lbs. 14 oz.
at his check this week, so he is doing what he is supposed to be doing. One of
the most trying parts of the experience was being separated from Shepherd,
Lydia, and Violet, so their crazy chaos is a welcomed presence these days.
The emotions from the past month are still raw. I can’t
think about telling Finn goodbye before he was flown to Cooks without crying.
His lovey is in our room, and I feel mostly anxiety when I look at it because
of the associated memories. But I refuse to throw it away because I know that a
day will come when I will smile at those memories.
I have thought a lot this past month about what I will tell
Finn about his origin story. I prayed constantly throughout this pregnancy from
the moment I knew Finn existed for his health and safety. However, I don’t look
at what happened and think God answered “no” to those prayers. I don’t believe
God smited us with inter-uterine growth restriction (IUGR) to teach us some
lesson or test us in some way. I think the IUGR happened because crap happens
sometimes. That is just the way the world is.
What I see when I look at Finn’s story isn’t an unanswered
prayer. Rather, what I see is that when my son got dealt a lousy hand by life
circumstances, God played for Finn’s team. I see a thousand different ways God
protected and shaped Finn despite a sorry excuse for a placenta. Finn’s story
is a story of what God can do for the little guy even when the odds are stacked
against him. It is a David and Goliath story.
During our twenty days in the hospital and NICU, I often
felt like I couldn’t see God. It was as if I was cloaked in the darkest of
fogs, a fog built entirely of fear and pain. I told myself that he was present
in the nightmare I was going through because he had been present at so many
other times in my life, but I couldn’t feel him there. The final night we were
in the NICU, BJ and I ran to Target to get a few things we needed for Finn’s
expected discharge the next morning. On the way, Fort Worth was adorned by the
thickest and most brilliant rainbow I have ever witnessed. Perhaps this is
far-fetched, but indulge me for a moment. When I saw that rainbow, a symbol of
God’s relationship with humanity, I knew without a doubt that God had been with
us the whole time, even when I had felt completely isolated.
As the pictures below shows, Finn has come a long way in a
month. We could not be more proud of all he has already accomplished in his
little life, and I feel so deeply blessed to be his mom.
