The Lightsey's: Reagan's Story Part 2

Read Part One if you missed it to catch up!

So the Ultra sound was around 6:30am. They wheeled me into the delivery room about 6:45. It was packed!! There were 2 doctors, 3 residents, the anesthesiologist, a NICU doctor and about 5 nurses. Reagan had her own team of people there to work on her as soon as they pulled her out. Before going in we were warned that she would not cry and that we would not be able to hold her. We were under the impression she would immediately be taken away from us and rushed to the NICU for the doctors and nurses to check her out. We prayed daily for her lungs and their development, but we knew she was going to be tiny, therefore most likely needing a ventilator and breathing machine.

The c-section felt crazy, but I was so worried about Reagan I wasn't even concentrating on it. TC likes to tell the story of the anesthesiologist pulling him up by his collar and making him watch Reagan being pulled out. (He is not one to look at things like that). He got queasy and had to sit back down!

As they pulled out Reagan I remember asking if she was OK? I vaguely remembering people talking and then hearing the tiniest little cry ever!! She was CRYING!! I can remember TC and I looking at one another completely in shock. She was doing so well they wrapped her in blankets and handed her to TC. He was getting to hold her and he brought her over to me. I remember looking up at him and seeing him crying. She was so tiny in his arms I could barely see her in the blankets and he was a nervous wreck holding her.

He didn't get to hold her long before they took her down the hall to the NICU, but it was something neither one of us ever expected. She weighed approximately 1lb 13ounces.

I was wheeled into recovery and TC walked with Reagan as far as he could. He was eventually allowed back into the NICU to see Reagan again.

I can remember asking over and over if she was ok? If she was alive? Was she breathing? Everyone kept reassuring me she was fine, but I didn't believe any of them. After about 5 hours from my c-section I got out of the bed and got into a wheelchair. I made TC roll me down there to see her for myself.

When he wheeled me thru the doors, the nurses did a double take. They could not believe I was up and moving, but I was determined to see her. In the back of my mind I needed to see she was alive and well.

The first time I saw her tiny little body I remember just crying. I remember thinking Oh God please save her, let her be a fighter. Please let her live. I repeated Lord please let her live over and over and over. I would sit for hours in the NICU watching her tiny lungs go up and down.