Today is my oldest son Christians 22nd birthday. Sadly because of poor choices he made in his life, he is not able to be home to celebrate with us, but here is a collection of photos (not in chronological order) and the story of how rocky his start was. He is actually LUCKY to be alive. Things went OK during my pregnancy with him. I was a bit skinny and the doctor decided I wasnt big enough to deliver him yet on his projected due date (which was Christmas Eve.) So fast forward to mid-January. My dad had my brother at his house for a few days and when he brought him back he teased that I was going to have my baby on my birthday at that rate. I told him I dont want to have a baby on my birthday, so I think Ill have him tomorrow. Little did I know I would keep my word on this one. I came into the house to sit down and watch my soap operas (I used to watch One Life To Live and All My Children) when my water broke right after I ate. So I went to the hospital and for the next 20 hours or so I slept through it pretty much. I do remember watching a couple things on TV in my room: one of them was The Dick Van Dyke Show episode about all the walnuts, and the other was the movie Young Guns 2. I had not chosen a name for him yet and in fact thought I was going to have a girl, so had the name Krystle Carlene picked out. So Steve (Chriss dad) decided that he liked the character Christian Slater was playing and thought that the name Christian would be a good name. His mother had wanted me to name him Samuel for a boy and I just was not keen on the name to be honest. Chris finally decided to come at 10:15 am on Friday, January 15, 1993. Things seemed to go smoothly until about the last few moments. Dr. Mease said that the cord was tightly around Chriss neck. So he cut the cord before he was fully out. Chris was also covered in his own feces, a substance referred to as merconium. He showed no signs of distress on the fetal monitors, but he was in obvious distress. His Apgar scores were very low. He would not start breathing on his own and the nurse did CPR on him for at least ten minutes before he finally took a breath enough to satisfy her. She also rubbed his back so hard she put a big abrasion on his back. They bathed him and weighed him and I was shocked to find out he was 9 pounds and 4 10th ounces. He seemed to stabilize and I noticed he had started jerking and acting funny. I told the nurse and she kept attributing it to first time mom jitters especially after what happened but she assured me he was fine. My mom also said something was wrong. It took the nurse to actually witness him having a grand mal seizure only on one side of his body that she realized I was telling her this baby was having seizures. They kept him in the nursery after that because they wanted to monitor him but I was allowed to enter the nursery to feed him. He had another seizure and crashed. I was so freaked out that the nurse quickly escorted me back to my room and gave me a shot of valium to calm me down. At this point they started him on antibiotics, saying he was likely just having a febrile seizure as a result of being born septic. My doctor went out of town and left him and I in the care of a couple other doctors. I never really saw the same one twice. A couple of them could not agree whether or not to release him home or to send him to the Eastern Oklahoma Perinatal Center (EOPC) at St. Francis in Tulsa. They did some CT scans on him and decided that he had something not right in his brain so they decided then to send him to the EOPC after debating back and forth. I attended the First Christian Church at the time so the pastor there made sure I had a way to get to Tulsa by having an elderly couple pick me up at the hospital to take me there because my mom did not know how to drive in Tulsa and I think that her car had some issues anyway with the transmission always going out so she didnt want to risk it. They were initially going ot fly him by Life Flight but because it had started sleeting they decided to ground transport him instead. (This was two days later, my 21st birthday too by the way.) So not long after the ambulance got there and started to transport him, I had already headed toward Tulsa with this elderly couple from church and my mom told me that as they were getting ready to load him, Chris had a heart attack and died right there. The ambulance decided to call it when he suddenly took a breath and they decided to roll with him. My mom said she never wanted to her the words the EMTs said we just lost him. So they ALMOST gave up on him. Just as the car I was riding in got outside of Claremore, the EOPC ambulance passed us and I could see them doing CPR on him in the back. It was quite a surreal experience to watch them working on a baby that you knew was yours. Once we got to the hospital they told me he died a total of five times...once before he left Grove General, three times en route and once after they got him to the EOPC. They stabilized his seizures with phenobarbitol. As I was scrubbing and getting into a gown to be taken to him, I could hear him crying over all the other babies in there so he sounded fine to me at that point. He had a couple more seizures while at the EOPC but they never could get a definitive cause after going through his soft spot and getting a biopsy of his brain tissue. He had a heart murmur that he still has to this day and the only ill effects from it are that he could never play soccer like he wanted, and he has to be on antibiotics before and during any surgeries. He spent the first two weeks of his life in the EOPC. He had a shunt for medicines in the top of his head the whole time and I remember Id unhook him and take him to the feeding room and sit there and rock him for hours, crying and praying. But he was mildly brain damaged and developmentally delayed. He was later diagnosed with Conduct Disorder. Raising this boy was no cake walk. He could not stay out of trouble at school but I loved him anyway. He may not realize this but I truly do love him. I just wish things had turned out differently for him. Wherever he is tonight he should know I do hope he has a great birthday today and that hes always in my prayers. I have hopes that someday hell straighten up and not only live up to his name but become an upstanding young man that hes capable of being if hed only apply himself. Yes hed have to work harder than most people at it but I think he can do it if only he tries. Happy birthday Chris. I love you.
Posted on: Thu, 15 Jan 2015 07:13:00 +0000
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