Jenefer’s Story

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“On Mother’s Day my oldest daughter was going to be baptized by her Daddy. It was the most amazing thing to be 20 weeks pregnant sitting next to my little 8 year old, and watching my husband help our oldest profess her faith in our Savior publicly.

The following day we went in to find out the sex of our third child (the first biological for my husband.) Sitting in the waiting room, he had no idea how this all worked. So I was excited even as a veteran. The sonogram started and I waited as they measured all the organs and did the medical part. My best friend was blowing up my phone by text demanding to be the first to know. My husband just kept saying “Well, what do you see?”

They moved us to another room, my mother and I look at each other, and I whispered, “There’s something wrong.”  My husband, with the Bible in his hand, asked, “What?” 

“There’s something wrong, honey.  They don’t usually usher you out of the room that fast.”  My mom and I started counting shapes, fingers and toes. “I didn’t see two feet” and “did it look like Down syndrome?” were discussed. Then the doctor came in and very clearly said “I’m so very sorry, your baby is not going to live.”

YOUR BABY IS NOT GOING TO LIVE.

Did she just say that? At that moment my phone went off, and I typed, MY BABY IS GOING TO DIE. No one should ever read that by text. I can’t apologize enough to my best friend, but she wouldn’t ask me to. The doctor immediately called a specialist at my husband’s request, but we had to wait until the next morning to see her. This was not even close to being a bad night, but I didn’t know that yet. The next morning off we went.  After a lengthy sonogram on a big screen, counting every little centimeter, it was time for her professional opinion.

This lady can do open heart surgery on a fetus inside the womb so this is going to be good right? NO. She went from least to greatest. “The hole in the heart, I can fix that. I only see one kidney, that’s not a problem yet.” There were several more sentences I think I blocked out and then… “there is no skull, I cannot fix that. Anencephaly.”

I urge you not to Google that. My brother thought he could handle it, and that was a long crying phone call later. There was just no possible way for her to live outside my womb.  My husband was told almost twenty years ago that he could not have kids. A miscarriage two years earlier had give us great hope.  But now, halfway through a miracle pregnancy, he would still not get his biological baby.

As desperate as I possibly could I asked the specialist, “Can you please tell me the sex of our baby?” From the best she could tell (as a fifty-fifty guess) it was a girl.

“Would you prefer to terminate the pregnancy since it is not viable?”

“I’m sorry, maybe you missed the part where this is my Pastor husbands, miracle baby,” I responded.

Two more times we would be asked that question and assured it was okay because of the diagnosis. Two more times we needed people to understand how big our God is. Every day she moved — and by moved I mean it felt like she was riding a bucking bronco inside me. You could feel her and see her.  She only stopped when she heard her daddy’s voice as if she had been caught acting wild.

I worked at the office for several more weeks until at a routine visit to the specialist my fluid measured too much and bed rest was needed. I was again assured that it was perfectly okay to peacefully end all of this so my health was not jeopardized.

We already had Brooklynn and Madalynn, and now Gracelynn was on the way. Times like these are when you find out who your friends are and what people are made of.

I made a list for my friend Staci of things that I could not bear to do: visit funeral homes, pick out an outfit, and the list went on.  At this point, I still did not have one single picture of my daughter even though sonogram after sonogram had been performed. Staci called and told me that we were going to a place called Storkvision, in Grapevine, They would give us the best pictures they could get.

Everything was effortless once I walked in.  I only had to sign my name and lay down. Staci had already given instructions.  And in the room with ten people (including parents and my other daughters) we saw her face. Upon walking out with everything they could possibly provide, including a recording of her heartbeat in a stuffed animal, I was now at ease. I had pictures of my daughter.  I’d seen her face and could always listen to her heartbeat.

Every week we were warned that this could end at any time. But every week her heartbeat was stronger and stronger even with a hole in her heart.  As we were quickly approaching 36 weeks we now had decisions to make. Mainly, we had to pick the day our daughter’s heart would stop. The best chance of getting her out alive so that I could meet her was to schedule my very first C-Section.

We had to look at the calendar, knowing that the umbilical cord is what kept her alive as my body did all the work, and pick a day to cut it. Would she be alive when she was born? I would meet my daughter and say goodbye all in the same day. At this point it didn’t register that she was going to die. I just wanted her out alive. I wanted to see her face.

September 18, 2014 is when we chose to meet her.

As we drove to the hospital I was a ball of nerves.   The photographer messaged me that she was almost there. In the room with thirty people, our Pastor led us in prayer with strength, hope and love. In the operating room we put on our favorite worship station and after the incision I heard the doctor say, “Oh my, she is beautiful!”

Gracelynn Rhea Hatch entered this world silently, but alive and completely formed for her condition. She was wrapped up and handed to her father.  It was his first time to hold a newborn.  They unstrapped one of my arms so that I could hold her on the operating table. 

For twenty eight glorious minutes we loved this sweet baby while the doctors closed my incision. She grabbed my finger, and as her hand eased up my husband and I looked at each other and knew she was gone. “This is Amazing Grace” by Phil Wickham was playing on the radio.  The NICU team confirmed she had passed. While I don’t have any living biological children with my husband, on September 18, 2014 God gave us Grace.”

-Jenefer H
Hope Mom to Gracelynn Rhea