We are walking this year's 5K in memory of our firstborn daughter, Catherine Grace Yancey.
Catherine Grace is our firstborn daughter that was conceived through IVF after years of infertility. For the first half of her pregnancy, it was pretty uneventful. However, at her 20 week ultrasound, we realized that she had issues with her kidneys and her urinary system. For the next 12 weeks, we visited doctors and came up with discussions about her care moving forward. However, she was delivered via emergency c-section at 32 weeks due to severe preeclampsia on October 1, 2022.
After her birth, she was diagnosed with VACTERL association, a set of random birth defects and was brought to the NICU where the medical staff tried everything they could to help her kidney issues because those were the most important. She went through two surgeries to bring the ureters to the skin to help her urinate. However, her kidneys were worse off than any of us anticipated. Since she was also growth restricted with her highest weight being 3 lbs, she was not a candidate for dialysis and we had to make the difficult choice to place her on palliative care.
We placed her on palliative care on October 12 and she left us peacefully on October 20, 2022. We made memories with her such as taking her outside, giving her a bath, watching movies with her, and reading to her. She loved being swaddled and cuddled. She was also dressed up as a mermaid and kitty cat for Halloween with costumes lovingly made by the NICU staff. She would stare at you with her sweet, tired eyes when you talked to her and refused naps in those last days unless we left her room to grab a snack. The NICU loved her so much and lots of tears were shed between us parents and the staff. She will always be our “little mermaid.”
