On the 2nd February, Charlie had had a rough night and kept waking himself up by hitting himself in his face with the drip cast on his arm. It was hard to see and he was getting very annoyed with it. I asked the nurse when the drip cast could come off and was told he had another dose due in a few hours so he would have to keep it on for a bit longer. The poor little guy was soo tired and we were just hoping he would sleep. He would even fight off his feeds and made the tube feed take ages. We ended up having to ask the nurses for a medication that would make he sleep. I can not remember what it was called but it did help him get to sleep which was a relief to us as he really needed it.
On this day we had been told we had to move from a isolation room to a shared room so we had packed our room up and were ready to go to the other room. The nurse pushed the cot that had all Charlie's clothes and nappies and various other baby items that we were taking the chance to use. We pushed Charlie in his cot to the other room as he was fast asleep, during the move he had a seissure and we thought he might have been fighitng the medication but it was a huge seissure. He also started to go blue so we started to push faster to the room and told the nurse. She attached him to the sat monitors and we realised they were lower than they should have been. He should have been at 100% he was at about 60% we was very worrying. At this stage the nurse turned his oxygen up and nothing changed until suddenly his heartrate starting to drop it was dropping a number at a time like a countdown. Just by looking at nurse we could tell the end was near, she then said I'm really sorry guys but I think it might be time.
We had mentioned to the doctors that we didn't want Charlie to be kept alive on a machine as we didn't think it was fair. So she started bagging him which was very frightening to see, I was crying just watching my little man's body being bagged and seeing the oxygen going in and not changing his sats. After the nurse had been doing it for 5 minutes and it still hadn't done anything to fix the sats we decided to stop. We just held him in our arms and got the nurse to ring our familys to come up and say goodbye. It was so hard just holding him and seeing him look blue but due to the meds we previously gave him he was peacefully sleeping which was a relief in a way as he wasn't suffering.
Josh held him and I just hugged Josh which was like a massive group hug with our little family. We kept saying 'We love you Charlie" and crying just in absolute shock that here was our baby. Who was only born 10 weeks before and here we were holding him in our arms watching him die. Every so often the nurse would listen to his heart and tell us how fast his heart was beating. It is amazing just how long the heartbeats for as it felt like we held him for hours just being told he is still here but it's slowing down still. Then the time came where the nurse listened for the last time and said 'It's stopped guys, I'll get the doctor". That was soo hard just knowing it was official, my baby was gone just a body who had lived but now was dead. Even now I write this in tears just remembering this day, only a few months ago.
We had my parents and Josh's parents around us while this was happening everyone was in tears and total shock. My sister was on her way over and arrived not long after his heart had stopped. Which was so hard as she walked on us passing him around the family who all took turns having a cuddle and saying good-bye. We just admirred our beautiful boy, who was so loved and had been through so much. We took off all the cord that were on him like the oxygen probes that were up his nose and the sats probe so that he looked like a normal baby. For us it was the first time in a while that we had seen his face without his oxygen probes and he was just so beautiful and so at peace.
We stayed for many hours just spending time with our family and little man talking about our memories and how he had held on for so long. He had survived so much, even though we knew he wouldn't live very long and it was still so hard. Nothing can ever prepare you for the death of your baby no matter how much warning you get as you never want to have to say goodbye. I still remember how cold his body got after his heart stopped beating and how blue he was. He even started to get a blood nose which was so hard to see. I miss him so much and just remembering that the last time I held him he was life-less is so hard. I miss him so much and can't believe it has been a few months since this all happened and we said good-bye. I still cry everytime I think of this day as it was the hardest day of my life and I hope nobody else ever has to go through a moment of seeing their baby take this last breath and die. To those of you who have also had to go through losing their baby, I send you massive cyber hugs and hope that our angel babies are above watching over us being our guardian angels. Giving us the strength to still live even though a part of us died when our babies did. Thank-you if you have read this, I am still wiping the tears that dripped down my face as I wrote this blog entry about my hardest day.
Much love,
Charlie's mummy xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
