The day before Christmas eve, we went in for our 18 week scan - it was our third scan of the pregnancy and we were excited to be seeing our much longed for baby again. But five minutes into the scan it became obvious that something was wrong. There was our baby, wriggling and kicking away like a champion as usual, but something didn't look right. We were told that day that our baby had encephaly. It's brain had developed partially outside of it's skull. A form of spina bifida, they said. Had you been taking folate, they said? Of course I had. Very rare then, apparently. We were told the long and short of it was that we would lose our baby. Encephaly is always fatal. We had a decision to make - go full term and hope for a few precious minutes, or be induced. It was recommended we be induced as our baby's heart rate had dropped to 90 beats per minute.
On the Friday after christmas, we arrived at the hospital. They administered the first dose of drugs for inducement at 5pm. Throughout Friday, Saturday and Sunday, I felt no movement. On Sunday, the 29th of December, at 4.15 pm, Brann Phoenix McGrath was born. The name Brann is gaelic for "spirit of eternal youth". He was handed straight to his mum, and he was beautiful, perfect and very still. 10 seconds later, despite a fatal illness, despite having been through two days of contractions and drugs, despite having a low heartbeat, and despite having been born at 19 weeks, and definitely against all odds, he reached up a tiny little hand, and kicked out his feet. For a precious 15 minutes, his mum and dad got to hold him and watched while he amazed them and the nurses with his sheer strength and determination until he just seemed to get tired and stop.
He had his daddys huge hands and feet, and his daddys length - he was going to be very tall! And he had his mummy's long fingers and toes. He was, and is, loved out of this world.
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