Every year, more than one in 10 babies born around the world are born prematurely. That is 15 million babies - one million of those babies die due to complications from prematurity.
Often health professionals are unable to say why women have had a premature birth. Parents of premature babies sometimes face difficult and emotional months ahead as they closely monitor the health of their newborn.
One new dad has shared his thoughts and feelings about the birth of his premature baby. As reported by LancsLive, Jake Oates, engagement producer at Reach reflects on World Prematurity Day and how the birth of his son has made his family stronger.
Excitement and fear. These are both things that I would imagine all parents-to-be feel prior to their child being born.
But knowing that your son is coming almost two months early brought those feelings about, much more suddenly than I was ever expecting. I was excited at the thought of finally getting to meet my son after months of watching him flicker around on a black and white screen during a scan, and months of hearing from my wife about how much he’s kicking and moving around in her belly.
But, sitting in the delivery suite on the evening of April 16, 2022, with the consultant telling us about all of the worst-case scenarios that could happen with a premature baby, I’ve never known fear like it. They ran us through the increased risks of medical complications.
We’re talking cerebral palsy, hearing, speech and vision impairments and developmental delays. I was trying to make sense of it in my head, as medical professionals spoke to my wife and I about what could happen to our son.
I will never truly be able to imagine what my wife was going through in those moments, sat on a bed waiting to be taken up to theatre. My son, Finley, was due on June 5 this year.
Two months and a day before his due date, we went to hospital as my wife had reduced movements. I remember the call from her saying not to worry, most things she’d read online about this were that the nurses would put her on the monitor and we’d be sent on our way within an hour or so.
Prior to this, it had been a relatively stress-free pregnancy. But that day in hospital and not coming home after an hour or so, like we had both hoped, was the start of an unbelievable few weeks.
We stayed in the hospital together that night and the next day, with Finley not meeting the criteria needed to be sent home. Theatre was then very quickly on the cards for an emergency C-section.
We were told it would be the next step if Finley was not where he needed to be by the next morning. Finley fought back and got to where he needed to be, for us be sent home.
But it was the start of daily visits to the hospital and while we were with the best people, in the best place we could be, it didn’t do anything to stop the dread building in us both. It is almost impossible to explain to loved ones how we felt in these weeks.
Trying to explain what it is like being in hospital all day every day, for two weeks straight, with my wife wired up to monitors and my unborn son frequently not meeting criteria to satisfy the doctors. It was mentally and physically draining.
Making the journey, wandering around the corridors of Royal Preston Hospital to pass time between monitoring sessions, not knowing if our son was okay, if he was going to be born okay, and ultimately, if he was going to born alive. It took my wife Naomi and I to some tough places.
We were living separately at the time as our house was a building site and while work was due to be finished before the baby was supposed to arrive, it certainly made things tougher. I remember one night we were texting each other saying that part of us wished something would happen so that it would bring an end to the daily hospital visits, the daily unknown, the fear of Naomi going on the monitor and there being no heartbeat.
Another meeting with medical professionals at Royal Preston found that Finley’s placenta was not working as it should. The questions then came from us to whoever was there to listen - Was he going to be ok?
Did this mean he had to come out straight away? Was my wife going to be ok?
We were straight up to the maternity ward and on the monitor again but this time felt different. There was a sense of urgency, he did have to come out, sooner rather than later.
An emergency C-section was booked in, with his heart rate dropping dramatically. We were warned about things that could happen and before we both knew it, my son, Finley, was born seven weeks prematurely.
I would bet most dads feel this way at some point in time, but I’ve never felt more useless in my life than I did at that moment. Finley was placed on a table in the theatre, wrapped up in towels with a knitted hat covering his thick head of hair and I just froze.
The surgeon even asked me if I was going to go up and see him, to get pictures and videos for Naomi to see him while she was on the operating table. He was in the room with us for about 15 minutes in total.
Naomi had a brief opportunity to hold him before he was whisked away up to the neonatal intensive care unit (NICU) where he would stay for the next three weeks. And so began the daily hospital trips again.
Except this time, we knew we had a tiny human being that we could go and visit. I was the first one to go and visit him alone in the NICU.
After no sleep for the best part of 20 hours at that point, I was struggling. The nurse in the intensive care room, where Finley was in his incubator, was telling me loads of probably important things.
As much as I wanted to listen and take in what she was saying, trying to keep my eyes open for long enough to look at the precious little boy in front of me, was enough of a challenge. Especially with all sorts of thoughts flying around my head.
Strangely, being the one to go back to my wife and relay that information, I felt like a failure for the first time as a parent. I couldn’t even pass on the information I had been told because I was too tired to concentrate on more than my son.
It was tough going to see him on a daily basis. You never knew what you were going to see until you got to the hospital.
On your way there, you’re wondering to yourself if you’ll even be able to see your baby’s face that day or if they will be covered up by a breathing machine, the feeding tube down his throat and the little tiny felt goggles and hat that were protecting his eyes. The one thing that hit both of us quite hard was knowing we went into the hospital and there were three of us.
Leaving the hospital days later without our baby was so incredibly tough. Nothing prepares you for life with a premature baby.
Simple things that many might not pay much mind to, like learning how to change a nappy side on, with your hands in an incubator through two small doors, learning how to use an ng (nasogastric) tube to feed your baby and having to ask permission to hold your child. All firsts that no parent ever expects to have to deal with.
When we were ready for discharge from the NICU, he had to pass his car seat test. Finley turned blue after a few seconds in the one we had for him and it was a total shock to our system.
It was a frank reminder that even though we were going home, we were by no means out of the woods yet. We were sent back to hospital in an ambulance by an NICU outreach nurse who visited us because Finley couldn’t keep his oxygen saturations up where they needed to be.
For a baby as early as Finley, this needed to be 98 - 100 and he could barely keep them above 90. He had bronchiolitis.
Since then, we’ve had three more hospital trips because of bronchiolitis and him struggling with his breathing but he’s doing okay and mum is doing an amazing job. I’m immensely proud of her and the things she does for our son.
I’m also incredibly grateful for the staff on the NICU at Royal Preston Hospital. They’re a credit to themselves and all the people who work there to ensure babies and families are being looked after during their time on NICU.
Being a NICU parent is a club that I don’t think anyone would choose to be part of. But we are a part of it now and it’s one that my wife and I both embrace.
All children are different but NICU babies have already had to overcome so many things just to make it home. It took Finn 13 weeks to reach the average newborn size of 7lbs 7oz, his organs were still growing, he had to learn how to digest milk, to breathe, suck, swallow and then to do all three at the same time and he couldn’t even maintain his temperature when he came home.
A prem baby isn’t just ‘small’ and even if they’re born a ‘good weight’, it doesn’t mean that they’re developed. To some people, the things we do for Finn, the way we parent, might not make sense.
It might not seem ‘normal’ but we’ve a full support team of professionals and family around us and we’re all doing our best for our tiny human. I’ll finish with something my wife said: 'Prematurity doesn’t stop at term'.
I wanted to share my experience of having a son born prematurely and the amazing work of the staff at Royal Preston Hospital, specifically on the NICU.
