I knew this day was coming

Today was THE day.

I got the hospital records today.

I was looking forward to this, but still I was quite nervous to know what they said, too. Our family doctor requested the records for me a few weeks ago and today I picked them up.  She took a few minutes to read over some parts with me.

According to the records our baby (Ella) may have been as old as 30 weeks. . . .wow. . . that was really hard to hear. I'm not sure how that would be possible based on her size, but I suppose if she wasn't growing that could explain why she was so small.  She probably wasn't any younger than 26 weeks.

It was strangely comforting to read the records.  I mentioned in a previous post that even though I held Ella for what I thought was a long time, I wish I had held her so.much.longer.  I was grateful that someone from the hospital took the time to examine her.  I don't know how long an exam like that takes, but it meant a lot to me that someone spent that time with her.  We requested that they not do an autopsy, we felt like her little body had been through enough already.  So they did a Gross Examination - which means they recorded everything they could tell about her just by looking at her, no cutting.

I learned that:
* the two placentas were fused together
* the cords were inserted in different positions, one in the center and one (Ella's) more on the side, I think.
* she had no birth defects
* there were no knots in the either cord
* she was a little swollen and red
* she had all her fingers and toes ( I did hold her long enough to know that myself, I was just glad someone else had documented that)
* she was 15 oz.
* she was 12 and 3/4"
* her skin was very, very delicate, wrinkled

There are more things I learned. I wrote them out but deleted them. Ultimately I felt they were too personal to share.

It's funny, but it made me feel better to know that she had no birth defects, and had all her fingers and toes.

Also, I know that what I saw, and what the pictures show isn't who she really is.

When I close my eyes and imagine what she looks like, I see a happy little girl about three or four years old with curly blonde hair, fair skin, blue eyes, and a big smile on face with a handful of freckles sprinkled across her nose. She's spinning around in a little dress and it's like my brain is using that camera setting that makes all the edges blurry. . .  do you know what  I'm talking about?  That is how I picture her in my head; little, happy and beautiful.