Natasha Sherwin, 27, entered into a waking nightmare after her water broke in the middle of the night when she was 16 weeks pregnant.
She and her husband Sam, 26, at first thought she had embarrassingly and hilariously ‘wet herself’ in her sleep but all such thoughts were dispelled when she went to the toilet and saw blood.
At the hospital, doctors said to prepare for labor but she didn’t deliver even after waiting for 48 hours. She was told to abort her pregnancy because chances of survival were only two percent.
Watch to find out more of their story below.
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But Natasha wanted to give her little girl a chance at life and was later proven right. The baby survived with small amounts of fluid to protect her until she was delivered at 30 weeks.
Natasha from Elgin, Scotland, says: “I was shocked to hear my waters were broke, I thought perhaps I had an accident until I started bleeding.
“Every time I moved into the hospital, water would trickle down my leg and doctors thought I was going to give birth.
“I was praying for the best but expecting the worst, two days later, I was asked if I would like to terminate but my answer was always no.
“I decided I would let mother nature take its course – I wasn’t going to kill my baby.”
Natasha suffered what is called preterm premature rupture of the membranes (PPROM) and this carried a high risk of infection for both mother and baby. After her water broke, she remained in the hospital for two more weeks in case the fluid levels increased.
She says: “I was warned my baby probably won’t survive and asked if I would like to terminate weekly until I was 22 weeks pregnant.
“I just couldn’t do that to my baby – I could feel her moving inside me and I just knew I had to let her fight.
“The fluid would build back up but disappear again – the highest it ever got was 3cm and for 90 percent of my pregnancy there was none their protecting Faith.”
Because her pregnancy was a high-risk one, doctors kept her in the hospital starting at 23 weeks for close supervision. Finally, on January 12, 2018, at 30 weeks they welcomed baby Faith into the world. She weighed in at 2 lb. 13 oz. and immediately transferred to the NICU.
However, Natasha had contracted E. coli and just a day after giving birth had sepsis.
She adds: “I was on death’s door; I was struggling to catch my breath and unable to speak.
“I couldn’t even see Faith as I was getting sicker and sicker.
“Sam was told to prepare for the worst as a CT scan discovered my right lung was full of fluid and the left was also filling up and I had pneumonia.
“I had my first cuddle with Faith after a week, I felt horrendous and still unable to move but I needed to see my baby.”
Natasha had to spend the next two weeks fighting for her life. Luckily, she had a blood transfusion, without which she ‘wouldn’t be here to see her children grow up.’
Even over a year after it happened, Natasha still can’t believe that she had lived through ‘something you would see on TV.’
She adds: “Once I got better and was told about the severity of my little girls’ condition, I was in shock and couldn’t believe this was happening to my family.
“The first six weeks of Faith’s life were spent in hospital and after five weeks at home, she was emergency flown down to Edinburgh because she stopped breathing and they had to put her on the life support machine.
“She was fighting for her life due to catching bronchitis and having chronic lung disease her body couldn’t fight it off without her having a machine to breathe for her.
“She developed a blood clot in her leg and stomach that caused her leg to go grey and her toes were black.”
The newborn’s parents were confronted with the ‘hardest decision of their lifetime’ with doctors saying they could amputate Faith’s leg or give her medication that could reduce the clots but carried with it a high risk of bleeding on the brain.
She continues: “Thank god the medication worked but her health continued to decline as her left lung collapsed due to a build-up of mucus.
“It was horrible to see our tiny daughter on three different machines.”
But Natasha has never been happier as baby Faith is now thriving at 22 months.
Natasha adds: “An abortion was never an option for me and I am so glad I took the risk as she has changed our lives for the better.
“She has completed our family and my son Tyler, 3, is the best big brother.”
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