How my tiny 1lb 3oz was saved... by a £1
Mother tells how a clever idea gave her tiny daughter the chance to begin a long f ight for life
EMILY Cressey should not even be born yet. Her tiny, birdlike body should still be safely encased in her mother’s womb, 35 weeks into the gestation process, 18 inches long and gaining the weight she needs to thrive when she is born on June 16. Instead, she is officially three months old, weighs just 4lb 8oz and is only alive today thanks to a plastic sandwich bag that replicated the warmth and safety of her mother’s body.
Weighing little more than half a bag of sugar and born 16 weeks before her due date, Emily is one of Britain’s youngest surviving premature babies. Pictured last week clinging to her mother’s finger, Emily struck a deeply emotional chord with anyone who witnessed her battle for life.
Now for the first time The Mail on Sunday can reveal the incredible technique that doctors used to save the baby’s fragile life – and her mother’s own devastating account of watching her daughter try to survive.
The instant Emily was delivered, doctors delicately placed her inside the resealable plastic bag, identical to those sold in supermarkets the world over, which they desperately hoped would act like an insulation jacket for her fragile frame by recreating the cosy and moist conditions within her mother’s amniotic sac.
It was an ingenious measure to keep the little girl alive. ‘The bag acts as a little micro-environment,’ explains Dr Andrew Gallagher, a consultant paediatrician. ‘At this age they are too tiny for an incubator, which is designed for full-term babies.’
This week her exhausted but exhilarated parents, Claire Cressey and Alan Coultas, 47, will celebrate Emily reaching three months. Her fight for life has astounded medics at Edinburgh Royal Infirmary who delivered her.
On June 16, the day she was due to be born, little Emily will finally be allowed home. Cradling her daughter, whose feeding tubes have now been removed, allowing her to be bottle fed by her mother, Ms Cressey said yesterday: ‘It’s been an emotional journey. Our world has been turned upside down and what should have been every new parents’ happiest moment became our worst nightmare, delivering our beautiful daughter at 24 weeks.
‘I thought she would never live to see this day and leaving hospital with her for the first time is a moment I can’t wait for – it’s the moment I will finally feel like her mother at last.’
Latest UK statistics show that babies born at 24 weeks have a survival rate of between 42 and 46 per cent. They are highly susceptible to losing body heat, so increasingly hospitals are popping them into sandwich bags – some from the UK’s biggest supermarket names – to stave off death from hypothermia.
Ms Cressey, a former care assistant who is originally from Morecambe, Lancashire, but now lives in Coldstream, Berwickshire, added: ‘Emily’s finally out of the woods and I’m told there’s no reason why she shouldn’t continue to flourish. It’s such a relief to get to this point after everything we’ve been through. My little lady is on a roll now and there’s no stopping her.’
Today, in her own words, Ms Cressey, who has three older daughters, Caitlin, eight, Millie, four, and Brooke, 17 months, describes the traumatic moments leading up to Emily’s birth on February 27 and the desperate battle to save her life.
THE BEGINNING OF OUR NIGHTMARE
TO this day, I will never know why I went into labour early, throwing us into a nightmare of uncertainty and fear. Our much-wanted fourth child was supposed to arrive on June 16 but, instead, she had other plans. My waters broke without warning on Sunday, February 23, sending me into a state of panic.
I was aware babies born before 24 weeks, still within the legal abortion stage, are labelled on the ‘edge of life’, as their lungs and other vital organs are not developed enough. So not all hospitals are keen to intervene, and let them die a dignified death.
I remember counting in fear, wondering what would happen if the baby was born that day. I now understand the despair some parents must go through when their baby is born at 23 weeks or earlier and is allowed
‘A day earlier, it might have been different’
to die. I will feel forever fortunate. It was with relief I counted she was exactly 24 weeks that day and at least my baby would be given a fighting chance, whatever happened. A day earlier, and it might have been different – a terrifying thought.’
THE FRANTIC DASH TO HOSPITAL
IN the end, it would be another four days before Emily arrived on Thursday, February 27 – the day before my 34th birthday. I’d been given a series of steroid injections in hospital on the day my waters broke, in an attempt to help accelerate the baby’s lung development. But with no sign of contractions starting, I was allowed to return home to rest.
It was a horrible waiting game. I’ve had three healthy girls and only the youngest came a month early. But that was nothing like the fear involved in this scenario.
When my contractions finally came, it all happened terrifyingly quickly. I was in floods of tears. I thought we would lose the baby. I couldn’t believe she was coming so early. The journey from Coldstream to Edinburgh Royal Infirmary seemed to take an age but none of us could foresee the speed of the labour.
We’d known from scans that Emily was in the breech position and, by the time we reached the hospital, one of her feet was already sticking out.
THE DRAMA OF THE DELIVERY
INCREDIBLY, they delivered Emily one-and-a-half minutes after we arrived in the labour suite. To all intents and purposes, it was a ‘normal’ birth, except my baby was coming far too early. I delivered naturally – it was too late for a Caesarean. Her position in my womb – breech and back-to-back – meant she was pretty badly bruised when she came out.
But there she was, my little Emily Grace, weighing just 1lb 3oz – and our lives would never be the same again.
To my surprise, she was put into a sandwich bag straightaway. It was just like any one you would get in a supermarket but it apparently simulates the protective environment they’ve just come out of and keeps them warm and moist as if they are still in the amniotic sac.
It is rather like a little insulation jacket that helps them to maintain body temperature because they lack the necessary body fat to stay warm.
I didn’t have time to see her or touch her before she was taken away to the neonatal intensive care unit. I was sick with worry, not knowing if she would live or die.
SHOCK ON FIRST SIGHT
I HAD bonded with my other babies instantly but it would be an hour before I saw my daughter for the
‘I felt panic and horror that she was so small’
first time – and instead of that feeling of instant, overwhelming love, I felt panic and horror that she was so small.
I felt guilty that she should still be protected inside me but now here she was fighting for her life. Surrounded by tubes and on a ventilator, I prayed she would be okay. But it was impossible for anyone to know what would happen next.
The medical staff didn’t give us a prognosis and we didn’t dare ask the question: ‘How long will she live?’ We didn’t want the answer anyway – we were convinced it was only a matter of time before she died.
I saw her for 20 minutes before I was taken back to the maternity ward and put into a side room. I could hear the happy sounds of other mums with their babies all around me. It was horrendous.
THE FIGHT BEGINS
THE next day was my birthday and I managed to see Emily around lunchtime. Seeing her lying there was every mother’s worst nightmare come true.
Her skin was transparent, her eyes were still fused shut and her little hands and feet were still webbed. We weren’t allowed to touch her and we
spent hours sitting by her incubator, willing her to fight. As she made it through the first 24 hours, then the first week, we began to allow ourselves to think she might pull through. But the more we started to bond with her, the scarier it became that we would lose her after all.
By two weeks old, Emily had already needed two blood transfusions. Her heartbeat was erratic and her oxygen levels fluctuated. Still nervous, we decided to have her baptised in case the worst happened.
It was a beautiful service, carried out at the side of her incubator, and gave us some relief. And still Emily fought on. As the days passed, everyone kept saying to us: ‘That’s her through the danger point.’
But that’s not always the case with premature babies. It’s not unusual for their little bodies to become tired at three weeks and they die. I was allowed home but, for the first few weeks, I slept beside the phone with my clothes on, in case the call came to say she had died or was deteriorating. It was also surreal watching my little girl grown and develop outside of me – in an incubator.
THE FIRST CUDDLE
EMILY would be one month old before I could finally hold her – a moment which coincided with Mothering Sunday and proved the perfect present. She’d finally opened her eyes and I was getting to hold her for the first time. But I was also terrified I would break her or drop her.
After being persuaded by the nurses that I couldn’t hurt her, I enjoyed the wonderful moment I never thought I would see. It was an absolutely amazing feeling.
Looking at her, I was glad she hadn’t decided to come any earlier and that we appeared to be winning the battle. But it also made me dwell on the fact that some terminations legally occur at the age that Emily was when she chose to arrive. I personally don’t
‘She’d opened her eyes
and I could hold her’
have a strong opinion on termination, every woman is different. But you only have to look at how developed Emily was at birth to think it needs looking at and the gestation limit should perhaps be lowered, even though terminations that late would happen only for medical reasons. Women who are pregnant know long before 24 weeks if there is a life-threatening condition to themselves or their baby. Why they wait to deal with it in the 24th week is something I don’t understand.
THE ROCKY ROAD TO RECOVERY
BY six weeks old, Emily still remained in an incubator but her weight was up to 2lb 5oz and she could be dressed for the first time. I could see small but significant changes as her tiny hands and feet developed properly.
Her condition continued to improve so much that by the age of nine weeks, at the beginning of this month, Emily was finally transferred to Borders General Hospital, just half an hour from our home.
But we were brought down to earth with a bump again soon afterwards and reminded how long the road ahead of us is when Emily’s consultant told us she has a heart murmur that will require surgery at some point in the future. There are so many scans and tests to come, not to mention the long-term follow-up appointments and care plan.
The reality of being born at 24 weeks is starting to kick in. The worry of long-term effects and wondering what the future holds for Emily is frightening.
But, ten days ago, in another first, I was able to bottle feed Emily and, last weekend, give her a bath. Those were beautiful moments most mothers take for granted but after fighting for so long to keep her alive, it was a very precious time for me.
Slowly, the equipment has disappeared from my daughter’s room. It’s very scary seeing it go and it will take a bit of getting used to. It goes without saying how proud and in love with her we are. She has fought amazingly hard to stay with us.