Alyssa Candler Wood was born on Feb. 22nd 2008 weighing just 1 pound. She was born 18 weeks early, when I was only 22 weeks pregnant. We have no reason why she was born so early. I woke up early one morning scared and confused that my water had broke. When we arrived at the hospital we prayed that she could wait 2 more weeks to be born. At 24 weeks in pregnancy is when doctors consider a baby “viable”. Alyssa had her own plans and was born the next day. We were devastated, and so unprepared for having a premature baby, let alone having a baby who died in our arms. Our lives changed forever.
Chris and I decided we would try again and I got pregnant right away. Everything seemed perfect until my 27th week of pregnancy. We were so worried about having another premature baby that we never expected for this baby to have health issues. We were told that our son had heart defects, fluid on his brain, and scoliosis. That’s when we moved to Kansas City from Springfield to be near Children’s Mercy Hospital. Even though our sweet baby had problems, we were preparing to help him in everyway and were so sure that he would have surgery and come home with us.
David James Wood was born on Jan. 12th, 2009 weighing 9 pounds, 9 ounces even though he was a month early! He had a full head of black hair and looked just like his Mommy! Our hopes and dreams were so big and we weren’t giving up on him. Two days later we were told that there was almost no chance for David to survive. The bones in his chest had formed wrong, making his chest cavity too small for his lungs to be able to grow, and David would never be able to breathe on his own.
On Jan. 15th, 2009 our precious baby boy went to be with his big sister Alyssa. It was the most heart breaking experience of our lives. We were so unprepared for loosing another baby. No parent should have to bury a baby, and no 6 year old sister should have to kiss her baby brother good bye.
Now almost 4 months later I am reaching out to meet other mother's who have lost their babies. I am having a real hard time, people say with time it gets easier but I think for me right now it is the opposite. We recieved our genetic testing results back and they all look good.
Now the decision...do we try again? My husband wants to without a doubt. I leave my decision up to God.
Follow my personal blog at http://prayforbabydavid.blogspot.com
