u/Sad_Boat1868

We finally became parents in November but she came too early due to complications and passed away the next day.

I am still not 100% and with father’s day & his 40th birthday coming up I feel so lost and even more hopeless but he needs to be celebrated. However he always says I don’t know babe when i ask home what he wants.

Please I need ideas.

On November 9, between approximately 1:00 and 2:00 a.m., I arrived at Waterbury Hospital 22 weeks pregnant and in severe distress. I was experiencing intense pain and active contractions, and I knew something was wrong.

Every minute mattered. My body was responding in ways that were consistent with a medical emergency unfolding in real time, and I knew our baby was in danger.

What followed were hours of escalating pain, fear, and helplessness without the urgency I believe my condition required.

After being evaluated in the emergency department, I was admitted to the maternity ward, expecting immediate intervention for what appeared to be a high-risk obstetric emergency. Instead, I experienced delays, dismissal, and a lack of urgency as my condition worsened.

At various points, I was told we needed to wait for an ultrasound technician, and issues involving faulty equipment and monitoring contributed to critical time being lost before clearer action was taken. Instead their attention was quickly shifted toward other possible diagnoses, including appendicitis and an ovarian torsion, rather than urgently addressing my preterm labor happening in front of them.

However, one of the younger nurses recognized the severity of the situation as she observed contractions occurring approximately every two minutes — an extremely dangerous pattern at 22 weeks pregnant, especially following a recent cerclage procedure — and she escalated her concern her concerns but they were not acted on instead dismissed.

That moment may have been the point where everything could have changed. Instead, more time was lost.

Now we are left carrying more questions we cannot ignore: whether I was fully believed or taken seriously. I continue to wonder whether bias played any role in how my symptoms were perceived — whether my age, background, education, or even my last name influenced their response towards me. I may never know, but I will never stop asking myself that question.

Some have suggested the medical team may have been operating with incomplete information or “working blindly.” Even if that were true, uncertainty in an obstetric emergency is not a reason for delay or dismissal instead it is a reason for immediate escalation, urgent coordination, and aggressive efforts to obtain the patient’s medical records.

To this day, I do not know whether my OB-GYN was contacted or whether my medical records were requested or even reviewed before critical decisions were made.
What I do know is this: my pain worsened as I became more terrified, and it became increasingly clear that the seriousness of my condition was not being met with the urgency it required.

Everything changed when the first-shift charge nurse recognized the severity of the situation and acted quickly to initiate transfer. I will never forget that moment. I am also deeply grateful to the physician at Saint Francis Hospital who fought for me and gave our daughter a chance.

But by then, it was already too late.

During the transfer to Saint Francis Hospital, my water broke and I delivered our daughter there. Despite the extraordinary efforts of their medical team, she passed away the following day.

That same night, my spouse nearly lost both his wife and his daughter. He came dangerously close to becoming a widower while watching our baby fight for her life.

There are no words for this loss. No words for leaving a hospital without our baby.

No words for the questions that remain, or for the way time or questions that replay itself endlessly, asking whether earlier recognition, faster escalation, or immediate intervention could have changed everything.

But those questions will not be ignored.

Additionally, as we remain deeply grateful to the staff members who showed compassion — especially the first-shift charge nurse who acted when urgency was finally recognized and the younger 3rd shift nurse who supported me through the night, and the team at Saint Francis Hospital who did everything possible for myself and our daughter.

However, our gratitude does not replace the lack of care and urgency our situation required but this experience raises even more serious concerns about delayed recognition, faulty equipment, failed escalation, and whether appropriate emergency obstetric protocols were followed during a rapidly unfolding crisis happening in realtime.

We are requesting accountability.

Our daughter mattered. Our lives mattered. And what happened to us should never happen again.