The hardest day of my life.....

On October 27, 2012 at about 10:30pm, 6 week old Aurora Skye Hunter-Phillipson met Jesus. We are so sad to not have her here with us on earth anymore, but she is now healed and wrapped in the loving arms of Jesus. Beware, some tissues may be needed when reading this post.

About mid week she started taking a turn for the worse. They had to up her meds, the ventilator and then by Friday they had her sedated like I spoke of in that post. They couldn’t really figure out why or what was causing her oxygen and heart beat to go up and down. They had maxed out the oscillator and her oxygen levels were still really low. They said it would soon be time to make a decision. The actual decision was more as to when Coral was ready to remove the tubes.

I got the call from Ethan about 8:30pm Saturday night that the tubes would be coming out that night sometime. I headed right down there to be with them. When I got there Coral was sitting on the couch they had brought in the room holding Skye. She had been put on a different ventilator and a bunch of the stuff in her arms that had been placed there in the last couple of days, like some IVs I think had been removed. She was dressed and had a little pink bow in her hair.

We sat there crying together and just watching beautiful Aurora Skye for about an hour and a half. One of the docs came in to give his sincere condolences. He explained that researching the CDH disorder is his specialty, so he wanted Coral to know that he (and the other doc that had been closely working with them) were deeply saddened by this. He also wanted her to know that if she so chose, she can allow them to do an autopsy to hopefully learn something about what was going on in her little body and thus possibly help babies in the future with CDH. Ethan and Coral had already discussed this and have chosen to do so.

So, at about 10:30pm Coral said that she was ready and so they got the nurse that would turn off/unhook the ventilator. It was the simplest of tasks, yet so big. They then could take out the tube in her mouth and get the tape off her face and we could see her without any of that for the first time. What a beautiful girl! Coral then got to snuggle with her in lots of different positions. She was such a natural snuggling her baby on her chest.

About 20 minutes later the nurse came back in and listened for a heart beat. She didn’t hear one, so she got the doc to make sure, and then it was official.

It was now about 11pm and I went out in the waiting room to give her some alone time for a bit. I came back after 20-30 minutes and sat with them again for a little bit.

Coral was then ready to go, so she wrapped her up in the knitted blanket and laid her back on the table, and we said goodbye. The nurses assured her that they would take good care of her. Then was the long, quiet, tear filled walk through the hallways out to the car. I know this was only possible because God’s hand was on Coral the whole time; she was so strong.

I was also so impressed with one of her main nurses, Rhama. She was on the day shift, which works 7am-7pm, but was still there when I got there at about 9pm, and stayed until about 11:30pm because of them, so heart warming!

Bill was able to spend a few hours with them Sunday afternoon. I took them to the train station Monday evening. The boys met us there so we got to hang out with them for about an hour before the train came. It was sad all over again to let them go. We will miss having them around!  We all didn't think it would end so soon or so abruptly.  Coral said on Tuesday that it was weird being back home.  I hope and pray that they both will be able to grieve as necessary and get help in the process if they so choose.