10/06/2025
On September 11th we welcomed Elodie May into the world. Everything during pregnancy was normal and A ok up until 38 weeks when she turned frank breech. Was able to turn her back doing cartwheels and handstands in a swimming pool and everything was ok at the next ultrasound.
She was born 8lbs 13oz after a traumatic delivery (we kept losing her heart rate and my blood pressure kept going everywhere) and came very close to needing a c section.
Everything was going well up til her 24hr care check when they noticed her numbers not matching up on one of the tests. She was taken to the nursery to check those numbers again on a better machine. Turns out the original machine was right and she needed to be admitted to the nicu. That night she had her first Echocardiogram and it was determined her PDA had not closed. We waited the weekend to see if it would resolve and have a repeat echo done on Monday. Monday came and the repeat echo showed everything trending in the right direction so we waited 48 hours and repeated the echo again but there was no change to the echo. In between the echo on Monday and the one on Wednesday her numbers were matching and within normal limits over 95% of the time. We were given the option to be discharged home as long as we could make it to cardiologist for another echo and ekg on Friday. All her doctors felt comfortable with this given her numbers looking well and knowing i knew how to monitor her breathing etc. so we took our baby home.
Weve been going back and forth weekly for repeat echocardiograms between home and children’s hospital. (40 miles round trip each time) so far shes had 5 echocardiograms and 2 ekgs and is scheduled to have another tomorrow (October 7th).
It’s likely she will end up having a procedure to close her PDA next week. Although each time we go in i am prepared for us to be admitted. She’s also been diagnosed with pulmonaryhypertension.
As you can imagine, I’ve had to max out my CCs and only have 0.93 in my bank account due to unexpected expenses I could not foresee.
Im exclusively pumping for her and she has not had formula since her first night in the nicu while i was waiting for more of my milk to come in.
I had a hospital grade pump break on me and had to get a new one that has been working wonders thankfully.
Anything donated (even $1) helps and even if you can only share ! Thank you so much!
Hi everyone, I never imagined I’d be in this position, b… Monica Dollard needs your support for Support for Family & new Baby: Medical & Monthly Bills
