I LOVE ROOSO MUCH
Kangaroo cuddles from mum help Mirren home after birth at 25 weeks
BABY Mirren Cook was born smaller than her dad’s hand and weighing less than half a bag of sugar.
But after being given a 10 per cent chance of survival, she has made it home thanks to special “kangaroo” cuddles from her mum.
Mirren had to be delivered by caesarean at 25 weeks after mother Katie, 28, developed pre-eclampsia.
For the first 10 days, Katie and husband Kevin, 30, weren’t even allowed to pick Mirren up as she lay in intensive care.
But as the baby grew stronger, Katie was encouraged to hold her every day using skin to skin contact known as kangaroo care. It increases the bond between mum and child and helps regulate babies’ heartbeats.
Last week, after 16 weeks in hospital, Mirren was able to go with her parents to their home in Dunfermline.
Katie, an early years officer, said: “It was such an overwhelming feeling getting to hold her for the first time. In a sense it felt like she wasn’t mine until that day.
“It was an automatic bond and my motherly instinct kicked in. The kangaroo cuddles really made a difference, because the skin to skin touch is crucial for bonding and developing, Mirren loved it.
“I feel it was comforting for her to feel snuggled and smell us. It also helps bring on milk for expressing as obviously I couldn’t have Mirren latch on so had to express milk into bottles.
“The more kangaroo care we had the better it got.”
Katie’s pregnancy had gone smoothly until she woke up at 25 weeks and realised she couldn’t feel her baby moving. Recognising symptoms that her sister had experienced with pre-eclampsia, Katie went to hospital. Doctors found high levels of protein in her urine and diagnosed the potentially deadly condition that causes blood pressure to rise and can lead to seizures. Doctors told the couple they had acted just in time and that in another 48 hours Mirren would not have made it. They were transferred to the Royal Infirmary of Edinburgh and Mirren was born on May 10, weighing 467 grams. Katie said: “If we had waited any longer, Mirren wouldn’t have made the next 24 hours and myself the next 48.
“We ended up having to have the caesarean section because of my pre-eclampsia diagnosis. It was slowly killing us both but luckily we both survived.”
Kevin added: “We went to get a check-up because Katie felt that something was wrong.
“I wasn’t allowed in the whole time, I waited in the car park for five hours when I got a call from Katie saying I should go home.
“I was home for 10 minutes and got another call telling me to come back because Katie was scheduled to have an emergency caesarean section at 3pm the next day.” He added: “The next day she was born and she was just tiny, my hand was bigger than her and her skin was very transparent.”
Over the next four months, Mirren had to have five blood transfusions.
Katie said: “It was a rollercoaster – in 12 hours she went from having a 10 per cent chance of survival to a 70 per cent chance, she just kept fighting.
“She has been through more at hospital than most will go through in a lifetime.
“The first 10 weeks were very difficult, I didn’t take it in at the time, but I remember that I couldn’t hold Mirren for the first 10 days.
“Now we’re just so grateful that she’s home and we can start our life as a family. It almost feels like she has just been born. When we got the call to pick her up, that’s when it sunk in that we were now parents to a healthy baby girl.”
Katie and Kevin are telling their story to help future mums recognise signs of pre-eclampsia and share how important it is to get a check-up if they arise.
Katie said: “I’m so grateful that we went and got checked, it really did save us.
“We’re incredibly grateful to the NHS, and all of the doctors and nurses that helped us and made it possible to bring Mirren home.
“Now she weighs 7lb, is getting stronger by the day and we’re all just taking it a day at a time.”