* celebrate the lives of healthy babies, including our own Jenna Bean
* provide hope for each baby that must spend their earliest days in the NICU
* honor the lives of each NICU baby who has beaten the odds
* remember all angel babies who could not stay
We raise money to support the March of Dimes with the hope that continued financial support will enable the March of Dimes to continue funding research, supporting NICU programs and help mothers everywhere give their babies healthier starts by carrying them as close to 40 weeks as possible.
Not familiar with Gracie's story? Keep reading here...
Pregnancy with Gracie was pretty easy and relatively uneventful until 6-8 weeks from her estimated due date. At 32 weeks Gracie was estimated, via ultrasound, to be in the 30th percentile for growth. At that time, Susan began twice weekly non-stress tests and weekly to biweekly ultrasounds due to her pre-existing diagnosis of hypertension. Most of the time, Gracie did not cooperate during the NST, and most of them were considered to be non-reactive. Due to the fact that everything else was looking good (belly measurements, kick counts and baby movement, etc), the non-reactive NST were not overly concerning. During the 35 week ultrasound, Gracie was estimated to be in the 19th percentile for growth. Because the estimate measurement had not gone below the 10th percentile, there was no immediate concern about Intrauterine Growth Restriction (IUGR).
On the morning that the 36 week NST, ultrasound and prenatal check were scheduled, Susan woke with the immediate realization that Gracie had not woken her during the night, which was unusual. Over the next 3 hours, Susan noted no movement from Gracie and was also unable to find Gracie’s heartbeat with a stethoscope. The search for her heartbeat continued for another 30 minutes, but as each minute passed, the fear of every expectant parent started to become our reality. Less than two hours later, ultrasound confirmed that Gracie's heart was no longer beating. Labor was induced around 3:00 that afternoon and Gracie was born at 2:29 on the morning of August 1, 2009. She weighed 4 lb, 3 oz and was 17” long.
In the months following Gracie's death, we learned that Susan's placenta was about half the size it should have been, and there was also a higher than normal amount of infarct in the placental tissue. The result of the small and ineffective placenta was Intrauterine Growth Restriction (IUGR), which was virtually undetected (and undetectable using the most common indicators) until the backslide in her growth was noted at 35 weeks. Her death came at 36 weeks, 1 day…at which point she was in the 7th percentile for overall growth…well below the 19th percentile that had been estimated one week earlier.
On September 15th, 2010, after months of close monitoring by our OB provider and a perinatology group, we welcomed our second daughter to the world. She growing so quickly, and is everything that we have been waiting for, but will never take the place of what we are missing. It is our hope that further research and developments in technology will be able to more precisely detect problems like those we unknowingly experienced with Gracie…before it is too late.
Grace Isabelle from Every Life Has A Story on Vimeo.
