Gastroschisis

My husband and I couldn’t be more thrilled to find out that we were having a baby. It was the most exciting time in our lives and to have our first born be a boy was even happier cause it’s exactally what we wanted.

I did everything a mother was supposed to do and then on the first visit that my husband couldn’t accompany me to an appointment I took along my mom.

Well we seen a different doctor than I normally did and he was great. He wanted to do a sonagram just to check how our boy was doing. Well he kept looking and not saying anything.

I was starting to get worried after 10 minutes of him looking in the same spot then he looked at me and said I believe there is something wrong.

Well he told us that he thought it was Gastroschisis but he wanted to send me to a specialist because we are from a small town and they don’t deal with that kind of stuff there.

The next week I went to a specialist who said they wanted to see me in their office in Albuquerque, NM next week.

Well my husband, my mom, and myself drove up to Albuquerque and the next day got horrible news. The doctor ran all kinds of tests, then she came in the room with me and my husband and said that it definitely was Gastroschisis and that we had a problem.

She looked at my husband and asked “Sir do you want your son?” My husband puzzled of course said “Yes, what do you mean?” She then told us that if they did not induce labor now he was going to die. My husband replied “Well yank his butt out then.” The doctor did an amnio to check the lungs of our son since I was only 32 weeks.

He was good to go and they began to induce me since they said natural labor is safer due to they don’t know exactally where the intestines are and they could cut them and hurt us both.

Our son was born July 26, 2000, he was 5lbs 3oz and 10in long. I got to hold him for a second on my stomach then they took him away. I tried to send my husband away with him but they wouldn’t allow it. It took several hours before we were allowed to see our child and I was so sad.

Finally the time came and we walked in to what we were not prepared for they didn’t give us all the details on how he would look. It took three surgeries before they finally closed him up and they had to put everything in different then normal that they had to remove his appendix also.

After 2 1/2 months I finally got to hold my child after they finally woke him and took him off the ventillator. There were so many close calls and the questions of you should start thinking about what is best for him and should you turn everything off. It was some of the most hardest descisions of our lives.

After 4 1/2 months our son finally got to come home. It was a back and fourth struggle to Albuquerque for the first year and a half. Many obstructions and kinks and just things not working right. After nine surgeries, several blood transfusions, and many hospitalizations, things finally started looking better.

Our son is now going on 8 years old and still has some problems with his stomach.  But all in all he is a pretty healthy kid and very happy. He loves to run and play football and do all the normal things any boy loves to do. I did have another child after him and was scared to death, but she was very healthy and didn’t have any issues with her stomach.

I only hope this story has helped someone and if you want to talk about it just let me know.

Hi, my name is Amber. I went through gastroschisis when I was a baby!

I am 14 now, and my life is wonderful!!!  I used to be made fun of when I went swimming, because of the scar on my stomach; I always wore one peices, but now all i wear is 2 peices. You get over it, and now I don’t care what people think about me ! My mom always told me that, “it doesn’t matter if people make fun of me, You’ll always have a story to tell !”

For all of the women having a baby with gastroschisis, and for all the kids that have had it, I am praying for you, and I know God will take care of you !!!

Love:  Amber

My name is Kylie and I’m eighteen years old. I thought you’d be interested in hearing my story so you can learn about possible long term issues with gastroschisis.

My parents married young and my mom had me when she was nineteen. Since I was born in 1989, most pregnancies didn’t have ultrasounds done unless they were high risk ones, so my mother didn’t have one through out the pregnancy.

I was born a month early and was a natural birth so when I was born and my stomach was open with my insides coming out, I was rushed immediately to a children’s hospital. My mom only go to see me for a few seconds and didn’t even get to hold me. I was flown to the hospital and immediately went into a small surgery to secure my vitals. The organs that protruded were wrapped in gauze on top of my stomach and I had a small surgery every day for almost a month. They shaved what little hair I had and fed me through tubes in my head and my leg. The doctors told my mom that my surgeries were so difficult that it was like putting toothpaste back into a tube. I’m lucky though because my doctor ended up successfully separating conjoined twins later on.

I finally got to go home when I was almost a month old. I was born very small but gained a few pounds in the hospital. They thought there might have been damage to one of my ovaries but they can’t be sure. If so, I’ll have a narrower chance of having children. My scar on my stomach is vertical and is now six to eight inches long so I technically am known as the girl with no bellybutton. I also have three to four inch scars on my right leg from where I was fed through tubes.

Ultimately, I’ve grown to be a very happy, healthy girl. I’m a freshman in college and I’m living my life each day at a time. However, for the past five or so years, my stomach scar has had pains and the doctors just believe I have built up scar tissue and it wouldn’t be good to have to operate in the exact same spot as before. But other than the scar tissue, there’s nothing really wrong with me other than typical issues teenagers have.

My parents call me their miracle baby and I thank God every day still that I’m alive. To all you parents who have recently found that their baby will have gastroschisis or to the parents who have babies recovering, I’m a success story you can smile upon. I hope your children will grow to be as normal and healthy as I have.

I am Tracey’s mom… I have been a quiet member here for a
while…. I wanted to let everyone know that what I thought was a
normal ultrasound and prenatal visit yesterday turned out to be Isabella’s birthday! Isabella Marie was delivered at 5:11 pm at 34 weeks gestation by emergency c - section. I forgot how long she is but she weighed in at 3 lbs 14 ozs. They did not like the amount of bowel dilation seen on the ultrasound so from the DR we went straight to the hospital.

Both baby and mom are currently doing wonderful. Baby is breathing on her own (no ventilator) and they have a silo on her and said that they will probably attempt closure over the weekend.

They also said that she has been pooping a whole lot and the dilation has gone down quite a bit… also the fluid coming from her stomach is light yellow and not green and that said that this was good too.. Not sure when I will have the time to get back here but wanted to stop by quickly to let everyone know…. Thanks so much for all the support of this forum….