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Miracle Baby

I remember the day just like it was yesterday. It was a nice spring day; I was working at Credit Union as teller just barely 20 years old. I wasn’t feeling well so my friend convinced me to take a pregnancy test on my lunch hour; to my surprise it came back positive! I went back to work in disbelief, I’ve had friends get pregnant young before but didn’t think it would happen to me especially since I was on birth control (yes you can get pregnant even on birth control).

My mind was in a daze and we were getting ready to close up for the day when a gentleman approached the teller line with a gun to a pregnant woman sitting beside me, we were getting robbed. As if the day hadn’t been emotional enough this was just icing on the cake. I got home late that evening, I told my boyfriend about all the events in my day.  After getting over the shock he gave me a hug and said things will all work out; he was right or so I thought!
 
I remember the excitement from his for their first grandchild and my parents being extremely angry and my father not talking to me for two and a half months. It was my 21st birthday (a day I had been looking forward too) while I was eating lunch with my sister in law and my boyfriend my father decided to show up 3 sheets to the wind (if you catch my drift) he pulled my boyfriend outside of the restaurant to have a “talk”. Thirty minutes later they came back smiling putting my mind at ease.
    
Two weeks later I went in for my blood screening (a standard procedure for pregnant women). Being so young I didn’t think anything of it. I came home from work a week later to a voice message from the doctor’s office telling me they need me to come in immediately the next morning as something was wrong with my test results and they would like to take pictures of the baby. The waterworks immediately started and there was nobody at the office for me to call to get additional details. Following doctors orders I went in the next morning. With no explanation; I was giving a sonogram so they could see the baby, the nurse took so many pictures that they were starting to wrap up on the ground. Within 20 minutes I had 3 doctors in my room still providing no explanation as to what was going on. In all the excitement of seeing the baby I got lost as to what was really going on. After about 45 minutes they asked walk to the doctor’s personal office. It was the longest darkest hallway I had ever been down. I kept asking the nurse questions only for her today the doctor will go over everything in minute. 
    
We finally get seated!  Without answering any of my questions the doctor proceeds in asking a series of his own questions. He goes through both of our family history of any known diseases, deaths, illnesses or genetic deformities. I don’t know a lot of my family’s history as I had never met anyone other than my parents and brothers. It was after 15th question that I started to realize this wasn’t standard procedure, and I was right!
   
The doctor explained that my Alpha-Fetoprotein (AFP) in was extremely high and he was trying to determine if there was a history of genetic problems in either one of our families.  He went on to explain that Alpha-Fetoprotein is a substance made in liver of a fetus and when the (AFP) is high it means one of two things. Either you’re having more than one baby (scary for a 21 year old) or your baby is at risk for certain birth defects such as spina bifida or cleft lip, or chromosomal problems like Down syndrome or Edward syndrome. The pictures from the sonogram showed no sign of physical deformities, which didn’t mean much since I was only about 17 weeks along.  He went on to offer me a medical abortion since he was certain this baby would have birth defects. I was appalled! How could this stranger offer me such a thing, or was I being selfish in wanting to keep this baby regardless of it’s possible medical problems? That night we went home and talked about our options. We decided to take a chance in keeping the baby since neither of us had any family history of anything abnormal except triplet that ran in his family and which the doctor had already ruled out.
    
The next morning I called with our decision to continue on with the pregnancy. Judging by the doctor’s tone I could tell he was not thrilled. He recommended an Amniocentesis. A procedure generally done between 15 and 18 weeks where the doctor takes a small amount of amniotic fluid from the sac surrounding the fetus and conducts further testing for birth defects giving an accuracy rate of 99.4%. Another week passes as I wait for results, the phone finally rings; it’s my doctor. I could hear a sense of relief in his voice when he gave me the news. The test results came back negative meaning the baby should be fine.

Having this sense of relief I was able to kick back and enjoy the rest of my pregnancy until birthing day came. The doctor now informed me that they wanted to induce me so they could plan accordingly to have the appropriate staff on hand to deal with any genetic defects.  Once again I started to panic; I opted to take the epidural an anesthesia for pain and mind relief. After 12 ½ hours of labor, it was time for delivery. My son was born! He was 5 pounds 10 ounces, happy healthy and screaming his little heart out.  To this day the doctors never figured out what caused the increase in Alpha-Fetoprotein, and I’m happy to say that my son will be turning 10 this year and couldn’t be healthier.  Had I listened to the doctors, this little miracle wouldn’t be in my life today. 
     
My advice is to do your own research, get a second opinion and follow your heart!