Conjoined Twins- Juniper Monroe & Joplin Meadow

**UPDATE**

Our gorgeous girls were born Monday, October 18th at 8:31am. They lived to be 45 minutes old and we have cherished every second with them. Thank you all so much for your kindness and donations! We are blown away at the support you all have shown.

Hello, everyone.

Jake and I have decided to start this go fund me so that he can hopefully take time from work after the twins are here. This will make it possible for us to grieve and heal together as a family. Most of you know our story. For those that don’t, I will write it out below.

On June 2, I was in my 15th week of our fourth pregnancy. We decided to have an elective ultrasound done at a nearby boutique so that our other kiddos could finally meet Juniper. We got into a room, got settled, and the ultrasound was started. Right away we could see two whole babies. TWO BABIES. I started crying uncontrollably, Jake looked like a kid on Christmas morning and the kids got to find out they were having TWO sisters all in real time! It was magic. We started calling family right away. Everyone was so excited!

The next day we decided on the names for our baby twins. Juniper Monroe and Joplin Meadow. How stunning and perfect. Everything felt that way. For exactly one week.

A few days later our doctor got us in at the hospital for a confirmation ultrasound. They didn’t say much to me and I was just happy to see my girls again. The next morning I had a notification from my online chart. My ultrasound results were in. The first line I read stated “conjoined twins with single fetal heart tones established“. I was so confused. I call Jake and let him know. And then I called my doctor and waited for a callback. She finally called me and explained everything. At this point I was in tears. I thought maybe it was a mistake. She let me know that they would be transferring my care to Children’s Hospital. Before we hung up she told me she wanted to prepare me. She said they will offer termination. I couldn’t even breathe at that point and called Jake back to tell him this devastating news. We decided not to tell anyone until we had it confirmed at the specialists office. Again, a week later it was confirmed. During our ultrasound they showed us everything. They had two perfect little heads, four perfect little arms, four perfect little legs and two perfect little abdomens- connected- right down the middle. It look like they were holding each other. Just giving each other a big bear hug. It made sense why I couldn’t see it on the first two ultrasounds. They clearly only had one heart and we learned they also shared a liver. They told us our baby girls were going to die. They said I would not make it to the third trimester. Or if I did, the babies would not survive birth. We were given options and left alone to talk. We knew we would not terminate. We would continue this pregnancy and we would meet our girls.

We’ve had A LOT of doctors appointments since then. During one, we learned they both have cleft lips. During another we had an echocardiogram with a cardiologist. We had hopes that the heart would be in good enough condition to give to one baby. During the echo we learned that the heart was indeed a four chambered heart. This was good news. Then, we learned that the heart was missing major arteries to each set of lungs, there was blue and red blood pumping into the heart and one of the chambers had thickened muscle. Eventually, we were told it would be impossible to operate.

So, here we are.

We’ve met with infant comfort care twice. We’ve created a plan for our babies once they’re born. We have the option to give them oxygen, feeding tube‘s and pain medication to keep them comfortable while they are with us. We have decided on what is important to us as far as memory making. This is a huge reason why I decided to create this. We were told we would have a C-section at 36 weeks but because of health problems for me, they’ve decided to move it up to 34 weeks. I am 33 weeks now. We are scheduled for surgery on October 18th, 2021. We thought we would have more time to get all of the girls things that we wanted to get for them. We are in the last week countdown so I’m hoping with your help we can get everything ordered/purchased and to the hospital by csection day.

Luckily, we found a local funeral home who has offered to preform the cremation for free. We will have to purchase the urn. The rest of the funds will make it possible to heal at home, together, for as long as we can.

Thank you so much for taking the time to read our story. Prayers and healing intentions are greatly welcome.