On Sept 9, at 11:52 pm my water broke while I was in my bed. I knew I better get to the hospital. They admitted me and began a pitocin drip to induce my labor since I was not have any contractions and was only dilated 2 cm. After 12 hours of labor, I realized I still was not feeling any kind of pain, I thought this was because this was my third child and my body has been through labor before. My doctor came in to check on me and asked how my pain level was and I told her I was not feeling very much pain so she checked me and I was dilated to 5 cm. She then advised that they were going to increase the amount of pitocin they where giving me and suggested the epidural because she stated I would feel a lot of pain. Within 15 minutes of receiving the epidural, I could not feel my legs. I was paying extra attention to my baby’s monitor and suddenly I noticed my daughters heart rate kept spiking. I called the nurse to check me. She came in and stated that my daughter kept moving so she would have to monitor the baby from the inside using a spiral or scalp electrode. The nurse called in another nurse from assistance and began the procedure to monitor the baby from the inside. Within seconds of that procedure I began to cough and tried to catch my breath. I could not breathe, so I began to panic. All of a sudden I heard “code red” and they said my baby’s heart rate was really low and they needed to get her out to save her. Still not able to breathe, they moved me from the delivery room to the O.R and performed an emergency C-section.
I blacked out. My husband later told me that after they got my daughter out I began to hemorrhage from all of my orifices and went into cardiac arrest. They had to resuscitate me twice. My lungs had filled with fluid and my other organs started to fail. My husband did not know what was going on, he said there were several doctors working on my daughter and he thought that I has already died. After working on me for 3 hours, a social worker advised my family members that I had a 30 percent chance of survival.
I was placed in a medically induced coma to protect myself against injury to my failing organs. Finally after 4 long days, my family got the news they were waiting for, I was on the road to recovery. When I finally woke from my coma, I had no memory of what happened and all I wanted to do was see my baby. In my mind I though they were going to tell me she didn’t make it, but to my surprise I was told she was fine and in the NICU. I really did not know the severity of what we had experienced until my doctor and husband told me. When I finally got to meet my daughter, Maleeya Misty Velencia, I was overjoyed and thankful.