This memorial website was created in the memory of our loved one, Louis Bolton who was born in United Kingdom on July 12, 2000 and passed away on July 14, 2000 . We will remember him forever.
On 12th July 2000, I was in a hospital bed, I'd been admitted at 3.20pm on the 11th. I'd been bleeding at work and waited for my check up with the doctor to tell him what had happened. He sent me straight to hospital to be checked over, said it was probably nothing to worry about. I drove myself there, following my midwife in her car. When I got there they admitted me and started the paperwork, I was still bleeding. They told me I was having contractions and dilating, so they put me on a drip to stop the contractions, and gave me steroids to help the baby's lungs. The contractions slowed and stopped in the evening, so they took the monitor off.
At 4am I started getting pains again, but every time I buzzed for help it took them so long to get to me that the pain had gone. I couldn't move around because I was attached to a drip and I wasn't even allowed to go to the loo. This went on all day, the pains getting worse and more often, but no-one seemed to believe me. Would it have made a difference if they had? At 6pm my sister visited and was shocked at the pain I was in, so she grabbed a doctor on the ward and demanded someone check me over. I laid there while she checked me and heard the words "your baby's feet are coming out".
They said a caesarean was probably safer for him so they rushed me to theatre. I remember the lights flashing above my head and me crying because I knew my baby had been given a 20% chance of survival. I'd wake up and not know if he was dead or alive. Louis was born at 6.57pm, weighed 1lb 12oz and breathed on his own for a while. When I came round the neonatologist was waiting to show me a photo of my beautiful little boy. He said he was doing well but was 'very poorly'. They used that phrase a lot.
I tried over the next few hours to go to the unit to meet my baby but every time I got up I was dizzy, so it was the early hours of the next morning before I saw him. They let me touch his tiny hand and his fingers gripped the end of mine. I can still feel that touch. That was the only time I touched his skin while he was alive, and I regret that so much, I'm so angry they didn't let me open the incubator.
They told me I couldn't take photos because he'd get cold. On the Friday they said I could bring in a camcorder, so I rang my sister to bring hers on the Saturday, but it was too late. So many friends and family visited in those two days, one friend came twice. I was so proud of my little boy, I knew he was ill but convinced he'd be ok, be christened in church, not in hospital, come home to his new bedroom and go to the school I'd been to.
On the Friday we had another load of visitors and in the afternoon I took my friend up to meet Louis and noticed his eyes were puffy. I'd seen him have a wee and the nurse said that was good, he was getting rid of fluid. When I questioned about his eyes, they said he was retaining fluid, which I knew was a bad sign, but still believed he'd be ok. At 7ish Tony's two sisters came to visit, they were so proud of their little nephew but while I was talking to them at his incubator the registrar appeared and muttered something about Louis being 'very poorly'. I asked if he was going to make it through the night, did I need to stay with him? He said he wasn't sure how long he'd survive, he was very vague and didn't give me the impression Louis was dying.
I went downstairs to talk to Tony and decide what we'd do, but they called the ward and told us to go back up, which they'd not done before, so I guessed it was bad. They took us into a side room to explain about the 'very poorly' situation. I asked the same questions I'd asked every other time they'd said it "is there anything you can do? Is he going to die?". They gave me the answers I didn't want to hear "no, there's nothing we can do, yes he's going to die".
They asked us to consider switching off his machines. I asked for them to give us 5 minutes to think about where we'd want to be with him, etc. A minute or two later a face appeared at the door saying we hadn't got 5 minutes, Louis was dying. By the time they'd taken us to the quiet room and taken Louis' tubes out, he had died. I held my baby and his life had finished without me, I wasn't there for him when he needed me the most.
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