We all have a story to tell.\u00a0 Our stories usually tell of our experiences.\u00a0 Some stories of experience help change the way we handle ourselves, or approach difficult situations in the future, and some stories of experience are happy and some are sad.\u00a0 Some stories of experience rock the core of our very being.\u00a0 The story that we are about to tell you has done all of that, and more.<\/p>\n

So, where do we begin?\u00a0 It was a normal pregnancy, through the very hot summer months of 1999.\u00a0 We knew that we were having a little girl in June, 1999.\u00a0 We were so happy.\u00a0 I never realized how much I wanted a daughter.\u00a0 I always said, just give me a healthy baby because at my age, I cannot push my luck.\u00a0 Dan, he was happy that we were having another child and that she was healthy.\u00a0 But, when I found out that I was having a little girl, I began to plan.\u00a0\u00a0 I thought about what she looked like, what kind of clothes I would have her in, what her bedroom would look like, and of course, was she going to have the same temperament as me!!!\u00a0 I figured her to be a little girl with a feisty temperament.\u00a0 She was constantly moving. In fact, I felt her moving at 11 weeks.\u00a0 She did not stop moving until that fateful day, when our lives turned upside, forever.<\/p>\n

I saw the doctor for my weekly routine visit on September 30, 1999.\u00a0 All was fine.\u00a0 I was 36.5 weeks pregnant but felt about 45 weeks pregnant.\u00a0 I wanted to deliver that day.\u00a0 We were all prepared at home.\u00a0 The house had been cleaned top to bottom.\u00a0 Olivia?s room was in order.\u00a0 Her clothes were washed and ironed and hanging in the closet.\u00a0 Dan and myself were ready.<\/p>\n

I woke up at 7:10 AM on Saturday, October 2, 1999.\u00a0 I did not feel her moving.\u00a0 I lay in bed for 5 minutes.\u00a0 Frankie woke up, and as Dan and I were waiting for his protests to get a little stronger, I told Dan, ?I don?t feel her moving.?\u00a0 I lay there a little while longer and still did not feel her move.\u00a0\u00a0 I had to get my haircut that day.\u00a0 So assuming Olivia was getting too big to move as freely, but still concerned, I got up and cleaned myself up.\u00a0 Throughout the next three hours, I concentrated on her movements.\u00a0 I did not feel them!!\u00a0 I went home after my haircut, choosing not to run errands.\u00a0 I ate a bowl of cereal with sugar on it, thinking that it would increase her movements.\u00a0 I lay down to count the kicks.\u00a0 After 15 minutes, I felt no movements, so I called the doctor.\u00a0 He asked me to come in to be checked.\u00a0 His demeanor was such that I thought perhaps I was over reacting but it was better to be safe than sorry.\u00a0 We had lunch and brought Frankie with us to the hospital.<\/p>\n

I walked in to the Labor and Delivery unit feeling stupid.\u00a0\u00a0 The nurses knew to expect me.\u00a0 One nurse placed me in a small room and promptly placed me on the external fetal monitor. \u00a0Quickly finding Olivia?s heartbeat, at 120 beats a minute, my immediate response was, ?okay, I can go home now.?\u00a0 The nurses? response was, ?not so fast.?\u00a0 Dr. Mallinger came in and reviewed the non-stress test monitor.\u00a0 He told me that her heart rate was non-reactive.\u00a0 I had no idea what that meant.\u00a0 All I knew is that she had a heartbeat.\u00a0 That is what mattered to me, but obviously not him.\u00a0 They explained that her heart rate was not fluctuating up and down as she moves.\u00a0 So, a sonogram was done.\u00a0 Sound waves were bounced through my belly, and Olivia did not move in response to the sound waves.\u00a0 I was still clueless, like nothing was wrong!!\u00a0 The plan from this point was to put me in a more comfortable bed and watch Olivia more closely.\u00a0 If she did not move in the next 20 minutes, I was to have a stress test with a Pitocin drip and possibly deliver her that day.\u00a0 I got up from the table and followed the nurse.\u00a0 While doing so, the external monitor slipped out of place.\u00a0 I got back in to bed, and the nurse placed the probe on my belly.\u00a0 At first at I thought that she could not find Olivia?s heart rate.\u00a0 I was getting ?pissy? because I thought that she did not know what she was doing.\u00a0 She called in another nurse who found a heart rate, at 80 beats a minute.\u00a0 At first they thought that it was mine.\u00a0 A sonographer brought in his sonogram machine and placed it on my abdomen.\u00a0 Olivia?s heart was only beating 80 beats a minute!!!!!\u00a0 All of a sudden, cords were ripped off of my belly; the bed cord was ripped out of the wall and down the hall I flew in the bed with nurses and doctors at my side.\u00a0 I always said if one more person was at my side, I would have been airborne.\u00a0 I went down the hall screaming out Dan?s name.\u00a0 He had left to call my parents to come down to the hospital.\u00a0 We needed them!!!\u00a0 Oh yes, Frankie was with us the whole time!!!<\/p>\n

It was at this point that I felt as though I was having an out of body experience.\u00a0 I was placed on the operating table where several people approached me.\u00a0 I heard, ?Susan, I am going to start an IV, Susan, I am going to put a catheter in your bladder, Susan, I am going to put a blood pressure cuff on this arm, Susan, I am going to put an oxygen mask on you.?\u00a0\u00a0 Then I felt a wet solution on my belly, and at the same time, I heard, ?Susan, you are going to feel a cold solution on your belly.?\u00a0 Through all of this, my obstetrician, Dr. Mallinger said, ?Susan, your baby needs to come out now.?\u00a0 They let Dan in because I kept screaming his name.\u00a0 When he did come in, I couldn?t talk.\u00a0 I just wanted to see him, to know that he was there, and all I managed to eek out, was ?call my parents.?\u00a0 I was scared to death.\u00a0 The last thing I remember was hearing the anesthetist, ?Susan, you are going to go to sleep now.\u00a0 Take a deep breath in.?\u00a0 As I lay on the table falling asleep, I kept saying over and over, ?GOD, please let me baby be okay, please let my baby be okay.?\u00a0 Olivia was born at 2:09 PM.<\/p>\n

I awoke two hours later to the sound of the neonatologist talking in my left ear and Dan on my right.\u00a0 I opened my eyes and immediately heard, ?it is not a good situation.?\u00a0 I heard the words, ?anemic,? ?very low blood pH,? ?we need to make a decision.?\u00a0 I immediately cried out.\u00a0 I wanted to see her.\u00a0 They wheeled me on the stretcher to the Intensive Care Nursery, where I saw Olivia for the very first time.\u00a0 There were monitors, lines and tubes everywhere.\u00a0 She was on a ventilator and a nurse was beside her pushing blood from a large syringe in to her umbilical IV line.\u00a0 Through all of this, I saw the most beautiful little baby girl I had ever seen.\u00a0 I saw her black, curly hair, her long delicate fingers and hands and long skinny feet.\u00a0 She had olive-colored skin and her eyes were slightly opened. I kept thinking, ?they have made a mistake, this is not my baby.\u00a0 My baby is okay.?\u00a0 The neonatologist explained in detail what happened, what her lab tests were like and what was the expected outcome.\u00a0 ?This is not a good situation,? she kept saying over and over.\u00a0 She was gently telling me that Olivia was not going to survive and that her medical condition was going to become worse.\u00a0 She then suggested that if we pull the tubes and the IVs, they would dress Olivia and bring her to us and then take pictures.\u00a0 We could hold her for as long as we wanted.\u00a0 Dan and I agreed to stop all heroic measures.\u00a0 But before we discontinued everything, I wanted her baptized.\u00a0 Olivia?s nurse knew that we were Catholic.\u00a0 She attempted to find a Catholic priest on call in the hospital or one that was available from the church across the street.\u00a0 No priest was available, and the hospital chaplain was one hour away.\u00a0 A respiratory therapist working in the ICN knew of a Catholic priest recovering from open-heart surgery in the hospital.\u00a0 He was medically stable and was getting ready to go home soon.\u00a0 The therapist went down to his room and brought him up.\u00a0 Olivia was baptized, and it was then that she was named Olivia Anne Bevevino, after her maternal great-grandmother.<\/p>\n

Olivia was dressed and brought to me.\u00a0 Ironically, I brought an outfit from home for her, just in case.\u00a0 They brought her to me wrapped in a quilt donated by the hospital staff. She was still alive when I first held her.\u00a0 She opened her eyes as I spoke to her, then she closed them.\u00a0 I gazed down at her beautiful face.\u00a0 She looked like Dan.\u00a0 I marveled at every feature. Held her little tiny hand, and admired perfectly formed nail beds.\u00a0 Her hands were so feminine!!\u00a0 She took a few breaths and then stopped.\u00a0 She quietly slipped away at 5:58 PM in my arms.<\/p>\n

The next two days were a blur.\u00a0 I kept thinking that this was a dream and I was going to wake up. I could not believe that it was happening.\u00a0 Did this really happen?\u00a0 There I sat in my hospital bed wondering what happened, why did it happen, and where do I go from here?\u00a0 Where is she?\u00a0 Is she really with GOD?\u00a0 Is she watching us?\u00a0 Can she come back to us one more time?\u00a0 Did she know that I loved her with all of my being?\u00a0\u00a0 What did I do to her?<\/p>\n

You see, when Olivia died, a part of us died with her.\u00a0 Here we are three years later, and two children more, and we still struggle with her death, our loss.\u00a0 The depth of the pain is unbelievable.\u00a0 We still cannot believe that it has happened to us.\u00a0 There are good days and there are bad days.\u00a0 What else in the future will hurt us this deeply?\u00a0 We miss her so much.\u00a0 We would do anything to hold her, and see that sweet little face again.\u00a0\u00a0 Life is so, so precious.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

We all have a story to tell.\u00a0 Our stories usually tell of our experiences.\u00a0 Some stories of experience help change the way we handle ourselves, or approach difficult situations in the future, and some stories of experience are happy and some are sad.\u00a0 Some stories of experience rock the core of our very being.\u00a0 The […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"rank_math_lock_modified_date":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1946","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/pdsaustralia.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1946","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/pdsaustralia.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/pdsaustralia.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/pdsaustralia.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/pdsaustralia.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1946"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/pdsaustralia.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1946\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/pdsaustralia.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1946"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/pdsaustralia.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1946"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/pdsaustralia.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1946"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}