“Our Little Miracle Baby”
The Pass family and their little miracle, Anthony; Gainesville, FL

We are not the typical couple when it comes to IVF. We experienced success our first try! Now it definitely was not an easy road for us or our baby, but we are grateful that we did it! We had tried different measures to become pregnant for five years. We were getting frustrated and going broke, but our endocrinologist sounded so convincing when he suggested we try IVF. We also had high hopes of uncovering some information as to why we hadn’t gotten pregnant so we saved our money for another year and then began our IVF journey.

The cycle started off really simple considering I only had to take birth control pills. Little did we know what was ahead of us. Next, we had to learn about all of these complicated injectable medications with names that I couldn’t even pronounce. I was terrified of the shots. We started with one shot an evening, and then it became two and finally three. Things were going fine, aside from my emotional break downs from the anticipation I felt the whole time. I began to worry about the success of the cycle constantly. At this point, my hormones were completely out of wack and I was driving myself and my husband crazy. This roller coaster ride we were on was so intense. I couldn’t wait for it to be over. Finally, it was time for the retrieval and transfer. Things went great, but now we had to wait two more weeks to find out. The wait was unbearable, but we made it and found that we were finally pregnant!! We couldn’t believe it! Suddenly we thought all of our worries were over. Once again we didn’t know what was ahead of us.

Things started out fine. The pregnancy progressed as normal. However, at week eight I started experiencing a lot of bleeding. The doctors weren’t worried at first, but when it didn’t stop they sent me to a specialist. At week 16 we learned that I had a rare condition called Vasa Previa. Vasa Previa happens in 1 in 3000 pregnancies: It is a condition where the main blood vessel that supplies blood to the baby was lying across my cervix. If the blood vessel should rupture the baby would lose all of it blood supply and die within minutes. I was devastated! How could this be happening? At this point, I began to rely on prayer and I decided I would happily follow all advice from my doctor with no complaint.

Three days after retuning to work I had a major bleeding episode. I was terrified that I was losing my baby. I had an anxiety attack because I thought for sure that the vessel had ruptured and I lost my baby. My doctor asked me to lie flat that evening so the bleeding would stop. All evening I worried whether my baby was still alive. The next morning my doctor found the heart beat with an ultrasound and assured us that our baby was still alive. He also put me on permanent bed rest. Of course I didn’t argue. I didn’t care if he told me that I would have to stand on my head for the remainder of the pregnancy.

At week 31, I was admitted to the hospital for the remainder of my pregnancy so I could be in close proximity to the OR. I was admitted on New Years Day on the same day that my husband was leaving for the biggest football game of his career as an Athletic Trainer. My husband works for the National Champion Florida Gators and while he was in Arizona preparing the team for their biggest win his wife was stuck in a hospital trying to keep their baby alive. Of course this game was a great distraction for my long stay in the hospital and considering I was staying at the University of Florida’s hospital I was in good company with many fellow Gator fans. The night of the game was one I will never forget. My IVF nurse came to enjoy the experience with me, as she felt sorry for me that I was stuck in Gainesville. She and I and my mother-n-law and the Labor and Delivery staff cheered on our team as they took on Ohio State. Each time we scored the staff would play our fight song on the intercom. This hardly sounds like acceptable behavior, but in a football obsessed southern town it is only natural. After the game my cell phone rang. It was my husband. I cried because I could hear how excited he was. I was so proud of him. He tried waving to me through the cameras hoping I would see him amongst the crown on television. I wanted so badly to be there to congratulate him.

Of course this was the biggest stress of both of our lives, but after vie months of bed rest, 40 days in the hospital, and 1 National title for the Gators, we finally had our baby! It was a boy! Anthony Nicholas Jr. was born premature at 35 weeks weighing 5 pounds 13 ounces and 18 inches long. Due to his prematurity his lungs were underdeveloped so he had to spend his first 10 days in NICU. This was another bump in the road for us, but we just knew that our miracle baby had to be okay after all he been through to get here.

Now our miracle baby AJ is a thriving five month old. This journey has taught us so much about the value of life. There isn’t a day that goes by that we do not cherish our little boy. We feel so lucky that we live during the time of IVF treatments. We know that we would not have had our miracle without the intervention of doctors and medicine. We will be forever indebted to the medical world