Rather aptly (seeing as it is their 2 month birthday but it should only be their 1st), today is also World Prematurity Day. Today is a day for raising awareness of premature birth and promoting research and treatment especially in the developing world.
Now as a mother to 4 premature babies this is really important to me. Oliver and Matthew were born at 24 weeks and 3 days gestation, right at the limits of viability. 4 days earlier they could have been legally aborted and 4 days earlier the doctors wouldn't have had to intervene when they were born. However, Oliver and Matthew did have a chance of survival. They were lucky enough to be born in a hospital in the developed world and taken straight to a state of the art neonatal unit where everyone did their best to save them. There are many parts of the world where they simply wouldn't have been given the chance.
Emily and Sophie are at the other end of the spectrum for premature babies. Prematurity is defined as birth before 37 weeks gestation and they were born at 36 weeks and 2 days. They didn't need SCBU but they did need a helping hand to start feeding and to keep warm. They also had the benefit of antenatal cortesoids to help their lungs develop before they were even born. Again, if we lived elsewhere, whilst I'm sure they would have been OK, they may well not be the healthy little girls they are now.
Also, there are so many things that could have happened with the girls. At 23 weeks, when I had my stitch put in, I was told that if I didn't have the procedure, we had a 50 percent chance of them arriving before 25 weeks. There is no doubt in my mind that Emily and Sophie have had the start in life that they have due to fabulous medical care and scientific research, something that not all babies have the benefits of.
Through both my pregnancies I have met many other mums of premmies with babies who were born at anything from 25 weeks to 35 weeks gestation. Most of them have their babies home with them, but I'm pretty sure that every single one of them would tell you that their journey hasn't been easy and many of their children will have health issues related to their prematurity for years to come.
So today let us spare a second to think of all the little ones who are born too soon. Both those who sadly don't make it and the little fighters who do!
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