Brave Mom With Placenta Percreta Lays Down Her Life For Her Baby Girl
In March 2017, I became a member of a unique sisterhood. It’s not really a group you’d ever want to voluntarily join, but once a member the rewards can be great. Unfortunately so can the suffering. The sisterhood I joined was moms who fought Placenta Accreta during pregnancy. Accreta and it’s various levels (Increta and Percreta) is a beastly condition in which the placenta grows too deeply into the uterus, and at its most severe grows into surrounding organs and arteries. This causes hemorrhaging during pregnancy, but especially during delivery. The risk of a mother bleeding out during delivery is great; and thus, must be carefully planned out at hospitals with adequate technology and blood supply. Usually a mother delivers her baby and has a hysterectomy simultaneously, adding the loss of the ability to carry more children to an already daunting emotional and physical recovery. Due to the extreme nature of these pregnancies, there are several very close knit Facebook groups for survivors as well as moms who are currently pregnant facing an Accreta diagnosis.
My Facebook feed is filled daily with posts from the women in our Accreta sisterhood. We keep up with each other’s pregnancies, vocalize our frustrations with life after Accreta, and mostly just give each other hope as well travel through the various stages. I truly feel as though I personally know these women, though we’ve never met. Many of us with an Accreta diagnosis were told to terminate due to the potential for maternal death. I’ve had the opportunity to share my story (and many other pro-life sisters did the same) with women who were faced with being told to abort-just as I was- but after hearing so many of our stories of hope, they chose life.
Those moments are priceless, however, encouraging women to carry a pregnancy despite huge medical risks is not without its own emotional burden. When I tell these women to choose life, I know deep down in my heart that it could very well end in their own death. For many of us in our support system, carrying the child or aborting the child carry the same risks. These women are the brave foot soldiers in a battle for life. Two lives, their baby’s and their own.
Sadly, 1 in 14 moms with Placenta Accreta who carry their children to birth, never get to meet the life they made possible. This week in my Accreta Facebook group, we lost a sister soldier. She lost her battle with Percreta while delivering her precious baby girl. She left behind 3 daughters and a grieving husband. When I found out she passed, it was a little surreal.
I’d kept tabs on her pregnancy through her frequent posts, so I knew her diagnosis was the same as mine had been. She was in and out of the hospital due to bleeds and posted that they would be taking her daughter at 30 weeks + 3 days, She was so nervous that her baby would be too early. Even in face of her own possible death, her baby girl was her primary focus. She just wanted her daughter to be ok.
Last night members of our group asked for prayers because doctors were having trouble stopping the bleeding. By morning, we got bittersweet news that while her daughter survived, she did not. Her mother’s last act was her most courageous, she gave her life for the life of her child. It was like we lost a family member- and in a way- we did.
It’s emotionally very difficult for me to even write about this because her experience is mine, with a heartbreaking ending. It’s hard to understand why some of us make it and others don’t. Life can be messy, both in the womb and out. Just as Maribel poured our her own blood to give baby Maribel Elena Sanchez life, Jesus did the same for us on the cross to give us everlasting. Sweet Maribel will meet her precious daughter in Glory someday and Heaven will rejoice at the life lived out because, like Mary, Maribel said “Yes” to life. We were given this task of carrying children because we are brave and strong. We were made for such a time as this.
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Maribel with her other two daughters
The loss of a loved one is always difficult, especially around the holidays. To help with funeral expenses, you can donate to the Maribel Sanchez Memorial Fund in the GoFundMe link below
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Written by Amanda Solomon, Editor & Blogger @ Life Defenders
This article seems really exploitative. A woman died and that is tragic. But she didn't "give" her life.... it was taken from her by awful statistics and bad luck. She had hoped and wished to live, and feared death.
ReplyDeleteTurning her death into fuel for your agenda is not fair...
she's not even buried yet, and this article is extremely biased.
She knew the risk. She did give her life for her child. Life is never ours to take. We are not God. Abortion is murder and it is never right.
DeleteI'm in the same Accreta group as this woman was. And yes, in a way, she did give her life. When I went into the OR to delivery my child 10 weeks early, I knew that there was the possibility I may not wake up. I was scared but at peace with knowing my baby would be ok, and in that mk ment if I had to give my life for my baby to live. Then so be it. I was never told to or encouraged to abort. And had my accreta been diagnosed early on, I don't know what I would have done. But the fact of THIS matter with Maribel, is she did make that choice to continue with her pregnancy, and she DID give her life. Im pro-choice... why? Because if I'm not going to be supporting someone else's child; financially, emotionally, or phyisically... who am I to tell them what to Do? But I do believe abortion is not birth control. But you unknown poster above me... you are not without sin. .. And my baby needs formula and diapers.... do you need my address so you can support and contribute to a child whose face you'll probably never see? The judgement of people in the Church is EXACTLY why more people want NOTHING to do with the Church. Believing in God DOES NOT make you a good person, living your life as God would want and Jesus did, does. And from what i remember, Jesus didnt run around pointing his finger at people. He set an example for all to follow.
DeleteJesus also told us to turn away from our sin. And taking someone else's life is a sin. Just because each of us is guilty of sin doesn't mean we shouldn't point out sin when we see it or stand up for those who are being oppressed through abortion. For some reason people who support abortion seem to think that life without a lot of material possessions or living with the need for financial or medical assistance is a fate worse than death. Abortion takes innocent human lives created by God in His image and likeness. Why would anyone ever think that Jesus would be okay with the killing of the most innocent among us - people who have literally never committed a sin? Don't you think His heart breaks every time one of the little children He has created with a plan and a purpose, whom He has tucked safely inside her mother's womb, is violently killed through abortion? What will He say when face to face with abortionists: "Thank you for killing my creation"? What will He say when face to face with post-abortive women who are likely suffering from their pain and regret: "Thank you for choosing to end the life of the child I gave you"? or "I wish you had trusted me and my plans"? Maribel did for her preborn daughter what she would have done for either of her born children - she sacrificed for her. Love isn't feeling - it's action. And a person's age and location do not determine their worth.
DeleteI pray for these moms and their babies. I pray more will choose life for their babies. And I pray more will live to raise their babies.
ReplyDeleteThank you very much for sharing the difficult life story. I can't imagine the difficulties.
ReplyDeleteAnd I hope, that you know it isn't just 'platitudes' when I convey that one day you will be united with the mother of the child when you see Jesus Christ in the hereafter. God bless you.
This reminds me of Gianna Baretta Molla who did the same thing for her child in the 1960s.
Thank you, again.