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S02.E06: Mother


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I saw it as Lena had preeclampsia and they needed to deliver the baby, to save her life.  It's a real situation that people go through everyday.  Bravo to the writers and cast for tackling this issue in an amazing way. 

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This was a hard episode for me (which is why I'm posting now that I'm watching it on Netflix). I lost a baby at 22 weeks gestation due to severe pre-eclampsia and HELLP syndrome. The primary difference was that I was already in crisis before I ended up in the ER and my perinatologist told me after the fact (when I was asking him if there was any chance that I could have held on another week or two) that the hospital was prepared to get a court order if I had tried to refuse delivery because I was so medically fragile.

A year later I testified before a committee to keep the "life of the mother" excemption in abortion laws-because legally, that's what delivery in the 2nd trimester is. Most people don't believe it happens anymore. Until it does.

I am crying in watching this episode, because it's so real (except that Lena looks FAR better than a woman with severe PE would-at that stage, the kidneys shut down, and you retain tons of fluid. I gained over 100 lbs in 2 days and looked like the stay-puff marshmallow man). And I am so, so happy that a TV show handled this so well. Down to the planting a tree, because often there is no funeral and the world expects you to go on like nothing has changed and there was no loss. I hope they address Lena's emotional response (grief, yes, but also usually major guilt-and there are often physical aftereffects as well which contribute) in future episodes.

Bravo, and thank you.

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Man, and I thought last week's episode was fantastic... this was even better!

 

- Sad that Lena lost the baby, though it was expected. (I did wonder, for a moment, if they'd go the special needs preemie route.) I thought it was a little weird how quickly this happened, though. Even that line about it happening "overnight" wasn't enough. I loved Lena's conversation with her mom, so glad that she vocalized what I think has been on her mind for ages. The little girl with the unicorn named Frankie was far too much but whatever, I was ugly crying !

That actually was quite realistic. PE really does come on that quickly, with little warning. I went from a "perfect" pregnancy at 20 weeks to feeling kind of strange on Christmas Day, less than 2 weeks later, to being admitted to the hospital on the 27th after it suddenly got much, much worse (like unable to walk or see bad) to induction beginning he next morning, and a C-section after 72 hours of induced labor had failed (and after they'd been able to get my platelet count high enough to make a C-section possible). It really was that quick, like something out of a soap opera.
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