My Baby Ollie Was Stillborn at 22 Weeks . . . When Abortion is Still Legal, by Britni Sauls

I’m sharing our story in memory of our precious son Ollie, born sleeping on October 31st at 22 weeks gestation.  My Facebook post about the value of his life went viral, and I’m hoping that by sharing his story further, he will continue to save lives.  First I’ll share the original Facebook post that went viral, which I shared to Facebook 6 days after delivering him, and then I’ll add more of our story, explaining our journey:

This post is probably going to start issues and make people mad but I could honestly care less.

This time last week I was laying in a hospital bed being asked questions no parent should ever have to answer.
“Do you want to see your baby when he is born?” Uhm? What in the hell kind of question is that.. the fact this question even has to be asked is sad…
“What funeral home do you want to use?”
“Do you want an autopsy completed?”
“Do you want to bathe your baby, or do you want the nurses to?”

Those are just a few of the many many questions I was asked.  A week ago tomorrow I held my baby Ollie who was delivered at 22 weeks.  He was perfect in every way.  Ten little fingers, and ten little toes, beautiful little ears, and his little button nose.  He had every single feature a baby should have.  He even had finger and toe nails.

I am ANGRY, but not at God because I trust in His plan.  I am ANGRY at every single person who shouts about the rights of this group or that group but is silent about the rights of these precious little lives who are killed every single day because someone chose to be irresponsible.  I am ANGRY that so many women think this is totally okay.  These babies need someone to be their voice and while I’ve always been silent about abortion until now, I will no longer do so.

Do you know that in my research on babies at 22 weeks, I found a dozen babies born at 21 weeks who were incubated and actually survived and are doing well today.  At 22 weeks there were even more.

One of the very first thoughts after my baby was born was how could anyone ever think to abort a baby at his gestation?  It’s sad that is even a thought in today’s world.

Did you know there’s an abortion clinic being opened in central Georgia?  The first one to open in this area — it’s in Macon on Walnut Street.  Do you know this clinic will allow abortions up until 24 weeks?  How the hell is this even allowed?  And what kind of woman (I would like to use a different term) would even do such a thing?  People do realize how babies are conceived, right?  Keep your legs closed if you don’t want a baby.  It’s completely preventable.

My baby kicked and responded to everything we said to him.  His daddy would talk to my belly every single morning and every single night and he would kick in response.  He responded to water hot or cold, shower, bath, or pool — he hated it!  He would move as far as he could up my belly to get out of it.  He didn’t like me sleeping on certain sides and he would let me know.

Just because they aren’t born yet, doesn’t mean they can’t feel anything.  I’m almost certain his last violent crazy kicks was him trying to free himself from an umbilical cord that had become wrapped three times around his little neck.  My baby would still be here if it wasn’t for a freak umbilical cord accident.

I will no longer be silent on abortion.  So while you’re going back and forth arguing on all these other groups, maybe, just maybe, you should think about the innocent babies who didn’t ask to be conceived and then murdered by their irresponsible mothers.

Now I’m off to drop my middle child off (who may I add is still gripping her baby brother’s blanket and took it to school this morning), then mail my baby’s ashes to Artful Ashes so that we have our baby with us ALWAYS, drop his blanket off to be framed and pick up things from the funeral home — not to mention my first post-delivery doctors appointment.  You know, the one most people take their newborn to.

I never expected my post to spread as much as it has, with nearly 35,000 shares to date.  It was really just an angry rant to get off my chest, because I constantly see my friends arguing about different groups on Facebook.  However, I know of three abortions that were stopped because of my post.  Here’s one message which I shared on Facebook — Ollie’s story reached New York and saved a baby!  Way to go baby boy!  Here’s what she wrote:

Hi Britni, I just wanted to say thank you for your very raw and emotional post that is going viral.  I live in New York and a friend shared it.  I have had one abortion never realizing the wrong I was committing.  I had always been told they feel nothing.  I had another one scheduled for today and canceled it.  Birth control fails for me so abortion I thought is my only way out.  Thank you to you and to Ollie.  I will now keep my baby and love on him or her when he or she is safely delivered.

So here’s the story of our journey. . . .

I had thought I was done having children, and I underwent a tubal ligation to “permanently” make sure of that.  But then I met my husband Zach, and we knew that somehow, we’d find a way to have a child together.  We got married in June, and were so blessed to find Dr. Montieth in Raleigh, North Carolina.  Because of him and his high success rate in tubal ligation reversal, we were able to conceive our sweet baby Ollie.  We will forever be thankful for his practice.  For anyone who regrets having their tubes tied, go check him out!  He is by far the best.

On August 15th, we were happy to announce with a fun family photo on Facebook:  “Life just got a little more chaotic.”

Ollie was due in March, and everything was going great.  We were stockpiling diapers, we went to the ultrasound where we were told everything looks great and that the baby is perfectly healthy.  We had a fun “Badges or Bows” gender reveal party where we announced that he’s a boy.  He was a miracle and we were so excited.

I know so many who shared my viral post were wondering what happened, so here it goes.

Ollie had been totally fine.  In fact, I had just had our big ultrasound days before because it had been rescheduled due to the hurricane.  Everyone close to us knows, Ollie was a very, very active baby.  He woke me up in the middle of the night every night since I was 13 weeks.  Many of those nights he didn’t even allow me to sleep.  He hated the water– bathtub, shower, pool — it didn’t matter.  He would move as far as he could up in my stomach where I thought he was in my lungs as it was hard to breathe.

On Saturday, October 27th, around 3 a.m., I remember waking up to him kicking like crazy.  I thought he wasn’t a fan of the side I was laying on.  Obviously now I’m wondering if he was trying to get free.  But anyways, I got up, went to the bathroom and went back to sleep.  We were busy all day Saturday, but when I lay down, I realized I hadn’t felt him.  I started to worry a bit, but thought maybe I just hadn’t since we were so busy and active all day.  Then came Sunday afternoon.  Still nothing . . . .  I took a bath thinking he was going to pull his shenanigans and try to suffocate me again. Nothing.  By then, I was feeling the mother instincts kick in — something wasn’t right.  But I tried not to let Zach know I was worried.

I called the doctor’s office and was told it was normal, that the baby was probably moved in a different position facing in and I just couldn’t feel his kicks. I still had my mommy instincts that this wasn’t right, but felt somewhat better.

Monday morning — still nothing, even after a shower.  I went to school, drank a Coke, and still nothing.  I immediately called the doctors office and the nurse told me the same thing — that it’s normal to not feel them for days at a time, and that he’s probably just at a weird angle.   I asked them to check for a heartbeat, but again, I was told it was normal.  I should have probably demanded to speak to my doctor who actually listens to me, but I didn’t, and am now thankful I didn’t. (I’ll explain soon.)

By this time, Zach — who had known he wasn’t moving, wasn’t feeling comfortable with the whole situation and also wanted me to check it out.

I messaged my mom and told her what was going on and that I had a bad feeling about it, but still tried to be positive, just to keep her from worrying too.  She told me if it made me feel better to make an appointment with the 4-D place in Macon and she’d pay for it.  (We all know how expensive they are.)  So I called and got a 5:45 appointment.

I asked my friend Amanda to meet me in Macon and explained what was happening.  I am so thankful she went even knowing the reasoning behind it.

My mother-in-law wanted me to come by her work and let her check his heartbeat, but since I already “knew” from my mommy instincts, I didn’t go.  I didn’t want her to be the one to realize he was gone.

We got there at 5:45.  (We didn’t tell the lady my fear, but just pretended it was to see baby Ollie in 3D/4D.  She put the thing on my belly and up popped him.  I immediately knew he was gone, but looked at Amanda and said “look, he is in a different position.”  (He had pretty much nestled right up against me).  The lady tried to jiggle him a little bit . . . nothing. She turned the color monitor on his belly (which picks up fetal heart tones.)  Nothing.  She asked when the last time I felt movement was and I told her.  I told her I already knew he was gone, and she confirmed it.  She then asked if I wanted her to be the one to call the doctor’s office and I asked her to do so since the nurse didn’t listen to me.  She spent some time out of the room calling, all the while I’m calling to let Zach know.

The sweet lady (I wish I caught her name) came back in and told me the office would be calling me shortly and asked if I wanted her to try to get some more photos of my sweet baby.  I asked her to please do so — this is why I’m now thankful I just didn’t go in to my doctor to check his heartbeat.  It allowed us last photos of our sweet baby boy.  She wouldn’t even let me pay for the ultrasound.

The office called while she was still getting photos and told me to go to the hospital or I could wait till the morning and come in and they’d set up a time for me to go.  I’m not even sure why this nurse even thought I’d wait til the next day.

Amanda decided to drive me to the hospital and Zach would meet me there with Ollie’s God-momma Jennifer.  His mom went to keep the kids at home.  My parents were packing to make the drive from Florida.

On the way to the hospital, I began to let my dad and brother in Texas, as well as my siblings in Florida know what was happening.

I also texted my doctor’s wife.  They are close to us.  She was very comforting and told me to make sure I get photos.  Thank goodness she told me, because I never would have thought to contact Kari — a big thank you to Kari for being able to take photos in such a sad time.

Once we arrived at the hospital we checked in, and they did another ultrasound to confirm what we already knew.  Around 9 p.m. Monday, Dr. Wright came in and told us I was too far along for a D&C (which I definitely wouldn’t have done anyway,) and that she wanted to induce labor instead of doing another C-section on me.  I was hooked up and the labor process began.

We had some of our close friends who are pretty much our family with us that night and throughout Tuesday.  We had many people come by and see us and I’m super thankful for it.  It kept our minds busy and really did help us.  We didn’t ask them to come.  They just came because they knew we needed them.

The nurses asked me many hard questions, like did I have a funeral home, did we want to see him when he’s born, did we want an autopsy and so many more.  Although they kept coming back into the room and at the time, I wished they’d just ask them all at once, I knew the reason was probably not to overwhelm me.  Every nurse we had was amazing.  They lifted the two-person in the room rule and brought more chairs for our visitors and an extra spot so both our moms could stay with us Tuesday night.

The two girls were brought to us on Tuesday after school so that we could tell them what was happening.  We chose not to tell Carson until after we were released.  The girls took it pretty rough, as expected.

After almost 33 hours of labor, James Oliver Sauls “Ollie” came into the world at 5:52 a.m. on Halloween.  He weighed 14.8 ounces and was 10.5 in. . . .  And to think, the first thing he saw when his little eyes opened was the face of Jesus.

His umbilical cord was wrapped tightly three times around his neck.  I am thankful we had this answer and were able to avoid having an autopsy done.

He was absolutely perfect — his little button nose, his sweet sweet face with all the features. (He clearly had more hair than his father.)  He came out criss-cross applesauce.  He was a teacher’s kid — what can I say?!  He had 10 perfect fingers and 10 perfect toes, nails and all.  The hospital told us to take our time with him and to spend as many hours as we wanted to.  We were able to love on him and bathe him.  We even took a nap with both me and him laying on his daddy.  Thank you to my mother-in-law for capturing those moments in photos .

Bella Baby also came in and took photos.  The company also wouldn’t charge us for them — simple gestures, yet they meant so much.

I told my Facebook friends that if you are tired of hearing our story, you may just want to hide me from your timeline or delete me because you’ll hear it throughout November and I’m sure for a lifetime.

Since delivering Ollie, I’ve been trying to focus on what I’m thankful for.