Announcing Our Pregnancy - and that our girl wouldn’t be coming home.
October 10, 2021
15 weeks ago when the results of a genetic test came back “normal” and we learned that Leila would be getting a baby sister and new best friend for life, we had all sorts of excitement, expectations and plans for the next few weeks. Things like painting and setting up a new nursery, washing Leila’s old clothes, planning a maternity leave, talking about names, and wondering who our baby girl would be.
15 weeks later our “reality” looks much different. Following an “irregular” 22 week ultrasound… a few nightmare weeks of panic and countless hours of tests and meetings with the doctors at the Utah Fetal Center at Primary Children’s, we find ourselves in a much scarier place. I wake up every morning wondering if today is the day I will no longer feel her inside of me. If she makes it to delivery, we dream of a scenario where we get just few moments of hearing and feeling her heart beat in this world before she gets her wings. We wonder how in the world we will explain to Leila that baby sister won’t be coming home with us after all, and the loves and cuddles and hugs we promised won’t happen. And we wonder how life will be okay after it all.
This week we learned that our baby girl, who we expected to join us in January, will likely not survive until birth, and if she does will likely not have much time on this earth. We have been told she has an extremely rare genetic condition (documented in less than 150 people in the world ever) that has resulted in brain irregularities, a heart defect, and more- doctors believe that because of this condition, should she go full term will be less than 2lbs at birth.
We share this to update our friends and family of this hard time in our lives. It is no longer possible to hide my growing belly, and conversations of excitement for our new baby girl either turn into sadness if we share our news or difficult pain for us as we hide behind false hopes of much different reality. As we go into the next two weeks on the soccer fields and being around our friends in the soccer community, the anxiety and anticipation of these conversations has me utilizing the power of social media to share our news to avoid the awkwardness and sadness of these repeated encounters and conversations.
We like to share our highs and special moments on here, but today we share this horrible news and hope that you will please keep our family in your thoughts and prayers for our new found strength as we continue on this difficult journey and take each day as it comes realizing that no matter what happens we won’t be bringing our baby girl home.
Please hug your little ones for us. We appreciate all your love and support.
-Jen, Matt, Leila
