Baby William James Martin (LIAM)

I've always wanted to be a mother, so when I was young and had to go to the hospital for immense pains and they told me I would most likely never conceive and if I did would never make it full term, it was like a knife in my heart. I had multiple exploratory surgeries where they found I have an uniconuate uterus (half) only one fallopian tube, and endometriosis. Not a very good prognosis. I was put on the depo shot to hopefully stop the progression of the endometriosis after having my uterus scraped. Fast forward to meeting my husband and getting married we decided it was time to give it a try. I got off the birth control and we tried naturally for 2 years with no luck. Month after month of waiting and praying with each month being a bigger disappointment. "Once you stop trying it will happen" was what everyone kept saying to us. But it never did. Finally we got to go back to the doctor to make the next step. The doctor told me I wasn't ovulating, and we set up an appointment with the fertility Dr. The next step was to have a tubal flush, this is where they go inside with a metal clamp to grab your cervix and flush iodine through your tubes to see if the are blocked. Mine were but the flushing ended up going through. It was extremely painful, having now been through labor I'd say it was worse than contraction pains. They sent us home to keep trying until our appointment with the specialist in 4 months, even though we "weren't ovulating". I prepared myself for more dissapointments. We decided to just go with the flow and try to enjoy ourselves. We went to North Carolina to see Kevin's mom. When we came home, I had another period. (Or so I thought) Devastated that the procedure didnt work I stopped paying attention to everything completely. The next month I didnt pay attention to when my period should have started. I went into work on a Monday and my coworker told me she had started her period 4 days prior, my heart screamed. Her and I had been on the same cycle schedual for months. At lunch I all but came out of my shoes going to the store to buy a pregnancy test. Trying so hard not to get my hopes up I told myself my body was probably just stressed and I was not going to be pregnant. The test was positive!!! Back to the store, 4 more tests! All positive! I came out the the bathroom screaming, I could not believe it!! Still trying not to get to excited, they said it would probably end in miscarriage, but my heart was soaring. Call the doctor and they made an appointment for a week later. I took a test every morning that week. Finally the day came to go to the doctors. There it was confirmed, I was pregant! Within 6 days of finding out I had the worst morning sickness I could have ever imagined. 10 lbs down in one week with no sign of letting up. I couldn't go to work. Had to call in everyday. After my next appointment it was decided I should quit. Which I did, and Kevin became our sole provider, going to work everyday to support his now growing family. At every appointment they told me he was doing well and to try to stay optimistic, but that I was still high risk so I had to go in every 2 weeks to make sure things were fine. My stress levels were through the roof and I was still sick constantly. At 4 months along the Dr rold me that things looked so well we could switch to once every 3 weeks and then gradually to every month. Back and forth between Portland and home, Portland and home. The financial burden became greater and greater, and still my husband just kept trudging along working to keep us fed and a roof over our heads. After a while the sickness changed to only in the morning and sometimes after eating, but still I wasnt allowed to do much because of my uterus and the fear of losing our baby. When we found out he was a boy our joy doubled even more, but again we ended up having to be more careful and seen even more because of cramped space. "You both need to prepare yourselves for a possible late term miscarriage after 20 weeks" the Dr told us. Again my stress skyrocketed. Each appointment went well with him having enough fluids and my uterus growing well. The doctor told us to expect about 32 weeks and to be happy with that. At our 31st week appointment they had some concerns and switched us to being seen every week in portland. We got through 1 more weekly appointment making us 32 weeks! We were doing great but they still want to see us every week. 33 weeks, again my mom and I made the trip to portland while Daddy worked. That day I felt funny. Couldn't keep any food down whatsoever but the Dr said they thought I had a bug. I knew better. That afternoon I got home and decided to try a popsicle. It had been over 24 hours since I had kept food down. Within 5 minutes I threw that up to. I called the office and they decided I had better go in and get checked. I was in fact in labor, and 2 centimeters dialated. They started me on a magnesium drip to hopfully stop the contractions, and gave me my first of two steroid shots incase he came to help his lungs. After that they waited 2 hours to see if it had worked. The contractions didnt stop and I dialated another centimeter, so they called an ambulance and shipped me off to Portland at 12:30 am Saturday. When I got there they gave me more magnesium and another steroid shot. That stopped my contractions and they decided to keep me for monitoring until Monday. All of this unplanned for with Kevin having to miss work so I wouldn't be alone. Sunday night at 10:30 they stopped my magnesium drip and monitored me for more contractions. At 12:30 Monday they sent me home on strict bedrest instructions, but Liam had other plans. Once we got home I went and sat in my recliner, about 20 minutes later I felt a small rush of fluid, then more and more. I yelled for Kevin, and called the hospital. My water had broken. They told me I needed to head right back to Portland. We got there and I was having contractions and dilating again. They sent me to my room where they told me that if I wasnt making progress by 12am Tuesday they would induce me to help things speed along. Which is what happened. At 9:40 am Tuesday morning I was fully dialated and Liam was right there ready to come! Push push push, I pushed until 10:02 when our little boy made his debut into this world. At 34 weeks. He'll have to be in the NICU they told me and we would see how he was doing. Now we are faced with the choice, does Kevin go back to work, or be with his wife and new born premie boy in the hospital. Already behind we used his 1 week off before liam was born while I was in the hospital in preterm so there would be no money coming in for who knows how long. As of right now Kevin will be having to go back to work during the week. Leaving us here, and coming to stay in the Ronald McDonald house with us during the weekends. We have no idea how long we will be here, " until his due date" they keep telling us. Which is January 28th. That's over a month with us here alone while he has to also be home alone to work. Our 4 dogs have all been split up between family members to take care of them while we are gone, it's been a strain on everyone, with no clear end. Family has been driving us back and forth all over the place because our car is broken down. And our wonderful cat stepped on our heater with no one there forcing us to buy a whole tank of propane we were not expecting. We are trying our hardest to stay positive and so happy our baby is doing good, but with Monday coming and the thought of being separated approaching it's so hard. Especially at Christmas time. Katrina- As much as we would love to do this all on our own, anyone who knows us knows we are a pretty independent couple, we need some help, some prayers, and some good luck. We are only asking what we are already behind on and appreciate every penny. Merry Christmas!