Ryanne's story

Hello. My name is Ryanne, I am 16 years old, about 7 days ago (march 14, 2002) was the worst day of my life. It was the day I would deliver my baby boy.

I had not known that I was pregnant, I know its hard to believe but I still got my period once in a while, I was always irregular so it didn't concern me. I am also a very small person (90 lbs, 5 ft tall) so I didn't gain very much weight at all maybe 5 lbs, and when I did I thought it was from being lazy. I had no other symptoms of being pregnant, and I never thought anything of the sometimes not getting what I thought was my period, because I had always been on and off like that.

Well now on with my story, Thursday I stayed home from school because I had a severe headache, and fever. I had, had a headache for the past two days and I just thought it was a head cold. I had just got my license the day before and my mom works nights so she was home, she went to the insurance company to pick up my license plates. When she got home she said to me, to come down stairs to see my first license plates. I got up went down stairs and sat at the kitchen table looked at my license plates and then from there on it went black.

My mom had started talking to me and I could see her but I couldn't hear her, I guess from what she told me she came over to me because my head started shaking, I had started my first of 4 seizures. My mom laid me down on the floor and called the ambulance, when the ambulance finally arrived they had thought I had overdosed on drugs, they asked me (I don't remember) if I had taken any drugs and I said "I think" not helping the situation, but I was so out of it I don't even remember this. They had searched my room not finding anything.

They brought me to the closest hospital, when they took my blood they found out I had been pregnant and my blood was toxic, and my blood pressure was almost 200!. Since they did not care for premature babies, I had to be sent to a hospital that did because if I did not have a "sea section" immediately I would have died, I was brought in helicopter to the nearest hospital that handled premature babies.

I was unconscience for about a day and woke up Friday at about 5 pm, with a tube down my throat, when they finally pulled the tube out and my mom told me what happened....at first to tell you I did not believe them, I thought it was a big dream, me? pregnant? how is it possible I still got my period? all these unanswered questions. The doctors had said that they think I was almost full term, about 8 months, around there. I had given birth to a 8 month old baby boy that was 2 lbs4.8 oz Very small for his age.

Then to make all my nightmare worst my babies brain was not fully developed and we had to make the choice to keep him on life support or pull the plug. Now even knowing that he would be a "vegetable" his whole life which even on life support they did not think would be very long, it was the most hard decision me and my boyfriend had ever had to make. Seeing my baby boy, having to name him knowing he wasn't going to live to even be called by it was the most difficult thing that we had to accept.

After hearing all of this news first I had, had a nurse call my boyfriend, which was thankfully the father, we had been going out for about a year and a half. When he had got to the hospital he ad no idea of anything, and I was so drugged up I just blurted out that I had his baby and it was a boy. ect.ect. He was so excited, I mean we are young 16 and 17 but after you have a baby, its the most amazing experience, especially because he wanted a boy and that's what he got. But then I told him that he wasn't doing good and we had to make the choice to take him off life support etc. etc. I had never seen him cry before until then.

His mom was so upset because when she came to the hospital to se him and hold him she saw her son. He looked exactly how the father did. I did not want to hold him, I couldn't do it, just seeing him made me so upset, we had him baptized.

So that's my amazing story. Zachary Ryan weighed 2lbs 4.8 oz and lived for four days. He will live with me always and I will never forget. Until Thursday march 14 I had never wanted children, but after having a baby and seeing him it changed my whole opinion on that. Thank you for reading my story.

Ryanne