My name is Jennie. I'm a wife and a mother. I have been married to the man of my dreams, Trever, for 9 wonderful years. We have 5 beautiful daughters who fill our lives with joy and excitement. We just had our 6th child. Our son Caleb.

I was diagnosed with a rare condition called Placenta Accreta along with Placenta Previa. Accreta is a condition where the placenta attaches to the scar tissue in the uterus. It will often continue to grow to deeper tissue (increta) and even through the uterus attaching to other organs(percreta). I ended up having an 11 hour surgery, including a hystorectomy, and bladder repair. I received 7 units of blood and blood parts. (This is a lot of blood loss for my surgeons, but minimal blood loss to those who are not as experienced in these deliveries. I spent 36 hours in the ICU after surgery. I have also had many other complications afterwards including another minor surgery 2 weeks later. These complications are somewhat normal for the type of surgery I had.

I had a team of specialists doing my surgery. Obgyns, Gyno-oncologists, trauma surgeons, urologists and anesthesiologists. This team has specialized in techniques helping with minimal blood loss. Those with accreta , loose large amounts of blood because the placenta cannot detach naturally at delivery.

My goal is to help save women's lives by giving this terrible condition a voice. So many are ignorant to its fatal attack. Doctors and women alike, need to be educated about Accreta. Many have never even heard of it. The numbers are on the rise because of so many women choosing to have c-sections when it isn't necessary. Not all women can avoid it, but many can. Please help me give Accreta a voice, by sharing the information in this blog. (There are numerous posts with information on Accreta as well as the Accreta team who took such great care of me.)

Thursday, February 21, 2013

30 weeks and 1 day


The rest of the story...
- somewhere between 13-15 weeks, I had been having quite a few contractions. I assumed it was Braxton hicks but seemed weird to have so many. Since I wasn't bleeding, the nurse said it was probably Braxton hicks and to call if anything changed. 

 -about 17-18 weeks... Trever had gone to the urgent care and then the hospital for some esophagus issues. In the middle of the night I started bleeding. Too out of it to think straight, I assumed it was either random pregnancy discharge or something to do with the UTI (urinary tract infection) that I was dealing with, I went back to sleep. Early that morning, to my horror, it was blood. I knew my dad would be awake so I called him for help. No car, no husband to watch the kids. He rushed over and I was able to get into the my regular OB (Dr Tutt) first thing. There it was concluded that I had partial placenta previa and needed to be on pelvic bed rest. He said I needed to take things very easy and stay down (I had a huge boutique that I was putting on in a few days). I got permission to go, but had to stay seated as much as possible. Yeah, I didn't do so good, but I did better than I would have.

 -23 weeks... Still partial previa. The doctor told me about this condition called placenta accreta. It happens to those with previous c-sections who have previa or low laying anterior placentas. I was both. He wanted to have a perinatal dr, check into it better. 

 -Jan 22 almost 25 weeks... I went down to PPA ( Phoenix perinatal associates) and got a thorough ultra sound. A great b-day present for Trever, to see our healthy and strong baby boy. The bad news is that I now had full previa and confirmed accreta.  After telling him of my spotting at least 1-2 times a week, he put me on full bed rest, only to use the bathroom. Though I could sit for a little while. I was so thankful that I had been listening to my body like Dr Tutt told me to. I had realized weeks before that very little activity would lead to spotting and contractions. Something just never felt right about only pelvic rest. So I listened to my gut feeling and stayed down as much as I could, saving my energy points for some get out of the house time for a little while.

 -Jan 24th... I received a call from 2 of the PPA doctors. One was Dr. Wolfson telling me that they met as a team and were very concerned about my frequent spotting. He said Dr. Clewell would call me and talk to me about heading to the hospital for the rest of the pregnancy, so that if I had a heavy bleed, I was right there. That night was a particularly tough one for Trever and I. Wondering if we would ever be together in that house again. We were both very aware that my condition could turn really bad at any moment, but that I needed to go to the hospital so I could be well taken care of. 

 -Jan 25th... I waited for a few hours to get into a room. Woops, the doctor and PPA office forgot to get me taken care of with Banner Good Samaritan before hand. We got all settled in. Then it was time to say goodbye. Sad day!! I knew I was where I was supposed to be, but so sad to say goodbye!
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