Cassy & Brandon with gastroschisis baby

Hi my name is Cassy Atencio. For starters, if you know me I’m not one to reach out for any sort of help and I’m usually very private with anything ongoing in my life. A lot of people in my family or even relatively close to me don’t even know that my little family and I are even going through these difficulties..

I am starting a GoFundMe due to some emergency medical issues with my pregnancy. I am currently 30 weeks and 2 days pregnant with a gastroschisis baby, measuring 2 weeks behind her gestational age. My fiancé and I found out at 21 weeks that our baby girl has this medical condition that has no genetic cause, that this condition just surprisingly happens in random pregnancies. Gastroschisis is where the baby intestines grow outside of the stomach and at times even other organs can be included. As of right now, we know it’s the intestines itself but can have a different outcome at birth. As of last Friday, 2/3/2023, our baby girl gave us the biggest scare possible. I could not feel any fetal movement from her at all and it was very unusual to go as long as I did without movement from her. We were advised to head to L&D for monitoring and while we were there an ultrasound was performed to try and get baby to move. Unfortunately, baby hadn’t moved for us and her biophysical profile wasn’t looking good failing fetal movement, breathing and tone and even the conversation of an emergency c-section was discussed. I was taken to EIRMC that evening to prepare for the scariest possibility. Over the course of the weekend, I was monitored vigorously and on bed rest and miraculously baby’s condition improved to where there weren’t any significant concerns other than the opposite she was now borderline low on amniotic fluid. I got released from the hospital Monday evening in hopes baby would stay the course of doing decent. Fast forward today Thursday, 2/9/2023, I went in for my normal non stress test and ultrasound with a follow up from my doc. Baby did decent on her NST but still did not pass her ultrasound BPP, now she’s had even more of a decrease in her amniotic fluid and my placenta isn’t doing it adequate job to keep it at a consistent level on top of no fetal breathing. With how concerning things keep getting and although baby does good for a certain amount of time doc said it was more beneficial to air flight baby and I to the U of U for better observation and better level of care. As of right now, I am currently on bed rest at the U and waiting to hear what will be our next possible step.

With things happening so sudden, not sticking the course of our birth plan and baby coming even more prematurely which is going to leave me out of work much longer than expected and baby in the NICU at the University of Utah it has left me having to leave work before I could I figure anything else out financially. My work also doesn’t do any sort of disability to help bring in any income nor do they do paid maternity leave which is causing more stress on my fiancé and I.

All donations will be going towards monthly bills, travel expenses, childcare for our other daughter and any medical expenses that may not be covered. We are so very appreciative for anything we do receive and couldn’t be more grateful for the support we receive.