2009 Local Premmie Hero Awards

The past 8 weeks have been very busy for not only myself but a small group of talented parents of premature babies who have given up their time and worked non stop towards these awards. We threw around idea’s and decided to create Australia’s first Local Premmie Hero Awards in January 2009 as you can read about below..

L’il Aussie Prems is proud to sponsor Australia’s first award to recognise and celebrate the dedication of individual volunteers within the local premature baby community. LAP is seeking nominations from around Australia of “local premmie heroes” – the ordinary yet extraordinary people who give up their time to support the families of premature babies both during their hospital stay and afterwards, doing everything from sewing tiny clothing for very low birth weight babies to setting up local playgroups for prematurely born children to organising fundraising for research into the causes of premature birth.

As a community of parents, we understand the premmie journey and how hard the road can be. We want to recognise and pay tribute to those people who go out of their way to make things easier for other families travelling that road.

Nominations of local premmie heroes can be made via the L’il Aussie Prems website at www.lilaussieprems.com.au/hero. Nominees do not need to have any premature children of their own.

Nominations open Friday 20th February 2009 and close on Thursday 30th April 2009. Details of the winners will be announced in May 2009

The Joys of Having a Comfort Blankie

This morning while Brendan was watching tv I took the opportunity to grab his comfort blankie of the floor in the kitchen and threw it in the bathroom, to be washed after the load thats in now.

It smells, it smells REALLY bad. It’s also filthy, it has chalk and all sorts on it from being dragged everywhere.

Once Brendan had finished watching tv he went into the kitchen and then everywhere looking for his blankie… he was getting so upset so I had to give it back.

Hoping to still get it washed though…..

Latest Premmie Baby Competition

The Bub Born Early website is giving away a copy of their latest creation, The BubBE book to one lucky family. The BubBE Book was created by Natasha Bowden to be a guiding hand along the Neonatal Intensive Care Unit (NICU) journey. It is essentially a baby book for the premature child and their parents, in which all of the unique experiences that come with being born, or having a child, prematurely can be recorded.

To enter this fantastic competition visit the Bub Born Early website, answer the following question and email your answer via their contact us page.

Question: What hospital was the authors premature baby born in?

The competiton closes on Wednesday 17th December 2008.

Premmie Baby Birth Announcements *NEW*

Premmie Birth Announcements are now available online to all families of premature babies throughout Australia. We welcome all parents, grandparents, friends and relatives to submit the birth of their babies who either just entered into this world or were born some time ago, there is no time limit. L’il Aussie Prems realises how special all premmie baby’s are and encourage you to announce the birth of your little miracle.

To enter your little premmies birth announcement please visit our Premmie Birth Announcementspage. You may also view our Premmie Birth Announcements List.

Congratulations and we look forward to sharing your premmie babies birth with you.

Pregnancy after Premmie Baby

Just a bit of background info for everyone. My first bub, Brendan was born in Feb 2007 at 30 weeks, due to PPROM at 28 weeks. In Nov 2007 I suffered a miscarriage at 17+1 weeks.

In September 2008 we stared trying for our second child. I got my BFP on the 12/11/2008, 3 months after we started trying. I’m so happy and relieved. I haven’t had much m/s only a few very mild feelings. Mostly I am tired. Today I am 7+1 weeks pregnant. There is no word that can accurately describe how I am feeling about the possibility of another prem, scared doesn’t even come close. I had my first Dr’s appointment on Wed 26/11/08, referral has been done and sent to KEMH. My first u/s will be done at 12 weeks. I cannot wait to see my little bubble.

Things I’d like to do different this time:

• Make sure I am always feeling reassured
• Trust my instinct and follow what my head/heart is telling me
• Be more informed about what tests they are doing, what they are for ect, I will NOT be a pin cushion
• Relax and take things easy
• Ask for help when I need it
• Make it to at least 36 weeks
• Hold my baby immediately after birth
• Take my baby home with me!!

Until next update, take care

Premmie Mums - Amazing Help!

Since starting L’il Aussie Prems in March 2007 the site has grown more than i could have ever imagined. I created the premmie forum hoping that the site could offer some premmie baby parents hope and courage whilst going through life of having a premature baby but it has turned into more. With over 660 members registered on the forum and growing everyday the forum has become a community for families who have faced the battle of having a premature baby or a baby who spent time in SCN.

With the premmie forum growing and thriving over time i have had many ideas, most have been implemented on the website. The site covers so many things from premmie birth stories to premmie galleries, premmie forum, premmie birth announcements, premmie buddies, premmie of the month, monthly newsletters, directory, premmie baby tickers and more so the site needs updating quite a lot due to so many stories, photos and submissions emailed in everyday. I can spend up to 4hrs a day updating and adding new information/images/stories onto the website but thankfully i don’t need to everyday.

With the workload that the website brings i needed help with not just updating the website but also with help finding information for the next premmie newsletter, contacting a forum member and asking them to be premmie of the month and arranging details and photos with them, running premmie buddies each month, moderating the forum, administrating the forum (with me), organising and running premmie kris kringle and much much more. After a year and a half of doing all of these things on my own i realised that i really couldn’t do it all, i wasn’t superwoman (although i wish i was). With having just recently giving birth to my son i have 2 more helpers on hand helping with the running of the website and it could not have come at a better time.

The women who organise, update, arrange and implement things on the site are all so AMAZING. There are around 11 mums who give up their time to help. I cannot thank them enough for their amazing help, efforts & generosity in helping the site being kept up to date and the premmie forum being “watched/moderated” because without you it would be a struggle everyday.

Premmie Parent - Pregnant Again “Pregnancy Is Over”!

Well we finally had our little boy! I made it to 36+6 weeks. It was an amazing achievement considering i thought so many times that i was going to have another premature baby. What an experience it was this time around, just everything about the pregnancy even though i was considered high risk.

I faced the fears that premmie baby parents think about after having a premature baby who wish to have another baby. The fear of “we will have another premature baby”, “will i have the same complications that i did the first time around”, “what are the chances” and the unknown of what the outcome will be.

Throughout my pregnancy as the weeks went by i kept wondering when things were going to take a wrong turn. After i reached 32 weeks i felt very relaxed and knew that “if” anything happened now the outcome would be so different to our first son who’s premature birth was at 27 weeks.

Towards the end of my pregnancy things started to change. My blood pressure started to rise and i was put onto tablets to help control the sudden rise. The rise wasn’t too serious as my results were 145/90 but the doctor felt that it was best to control it now. Apparently it is very common late in pregnancy to have a rise in blood pressure so it wasn’t anything i was stressed about.

For a month prior to our son being born it was believed that i had suspected PPROM (preterm premature rupture of membranes) only it was a hind leak so i wasn’t gushing water, i just felt damp everyday. When the blood results came back after my 34 week appointment it showed that my white cell count keep rising so i was put onto antibiodics to be safe.

Due to my white cell count rising it was decided that i was to be induced and our son was to be born at 36 weeks. I had fetal monitoring a few times a week and my doctor booked me in to be induced on Monday 27th October 2008. This time we were more prepared and my mother came from Sydney to be there for our sons arrival and my husband was in the room when he was born. Sadly he missed the birth of our first son due to him arriving so early. I have heard many stories of premmie fathers missing the birth of their children due to it all happening so quickly.

I have written a birth story about our sons arrival and will add it to the blog.

I am so glad that the journey is over as there were many times of “what if” & “when” will it happen but we made it so much further than our first experience and we are so ever grateful for the doctors & midwives that looked after my pregnancy so carefully at Monash Medical Centre.

Our sons name is Tristan and here he is:

Reading to your baby

Premature Birth/Babies Forum

Our premmie forum has become one of Australia’s busiest support communities for premature babies families & friends. Our forum has a member base of over 630 members from Australia and beyond so you can be sure to find other premmie parents in your state or even parents who had their premmie babies at the same hospital as you.

Our forum offers families support, understanding, parenting advice, hope, friendship and networking. Our members have many “meet ups” with other parents in the same state and some parents have even started their own premmie morning teas due to the lack of support in their area.

There are many areas on the forum where you can write about your premature babies and their journey. We have parents with premmie babies in NICU, SCN, high risk pregnancies, babies who have just gone home to premmie babies who are toddlers and in school so you can be assured that there are parents who understand your situation.

We have a specific area on the forum where you can write about your premature babies journey whilst going through NICU/SCN, you can have your very own parent diary, write about your babies milestone achievements or delays, post photos of your gorgeous children, ask questions or talk about your premmie baby in our specific gestation areas. There are specific areas when you can chat to parents who have had a premature baby between 23 - 26 weeks, 27 - 30 weeks, 31 - 34 weeks, 35 weeks +.

We look forward to seeing you on the premmie forum and becoming apart of our free fantastic premmie parent community.

www.lilaussieprems.com.au/premforum

Premmie Parent ~ Pregnant Again cont…

Well here i am at 32 weeks pregnant! I cannot believe that i am still pregnant after having such an early premature birth with Ronan.

A lot of things have been happening including still going to my high risk clinic appointments at Monash every 2 weeks and we actually found out the reason WHY Ronan came early after a few blood tests and an AMAZING doctor who is looking after me. She is just the BEST and i couldn’t have asked for such a more gentle person to look after me throughout this pregnancy. I am very blessed that she figured out what happened within 2 weeks and no one else even tried after 2.5 years!

The best way to describe the reason for Ronan’s premature birth was that my placenta was not working properly. My blood results that were taken recently indicate that i have a “spelling mistake” in my chromosones. Basically my placenta will absorb nutrients ie: folic acid etc.. but it does not know how to distribute the nutients, so my placenta pealed away which lead to “placental abruption” due to the lack of nutrients. With the placenta pealing away this triggered on the heavy bleeding and the sponateous labour. Apparently this condition/”spelling mistake” is something that is passed on from my parents. Unless tests were done we wouldn’t know which parent it was but due to my mother & sister not having any complications with premature babies/premature birth of their own it would be interesting to find out if it was from my dad.

I had a scan last week to check that bubs was growing correctly and apparently everything is going great. He was head down, there was plenty of fluid, the cervix was closed and bubs weighed approx 1.8kgs or 1800 grams so he was growing very good. Apparently around the 31 week mark most babies weigh approx 1500 grams so he is a chubby bubby! My doctor said that he would be around 7 - 8lbs when born. What a huge difference between that number and 2.8lbs when my little premmie was born. Gosh i hope i don’t have any problems delivering naturally due to having a BIGGER baby.

Here i am at 32 weeks gestation and still going strong. I am feeling really good this pregnancy, no swelling, no backaches, no complications. It does actually feel very strange to know that i have a “normal” pregnancy! This is not something that i thought would happen and everyday i keep waking up thinking “ok when will our little boy come, is it today”. Because i am anticipating another premature baby i am sure we will have a very healthy newborn which will be totally surreal but very exciting.

I hope that my little updates give those parents of premature babies a little hope that having another baby after having a premmie can actually go to plan. It all depends on your situation of course but if you do plan on having another baby be sure to book yourself into the “high risk clinic” at your nearest hospital so you are closely monitored. For the health of you and your baby and also for peace of mind they really do watch you and monitor everything along the way.

Here is a picture of my belly at 31 weeks!

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