Meet Duke and Ford

• Baby Saves

• 09.12.24

“I’m a board member for Count the Kicks and I’m here to tell you my personal story about needing to use the Count the Kicks app myself. 

I was 26 weeks pregnant with my boys, Duke and Ford, and around 26 weeks and two days, I had just started using the app. I was considered high-risk after our daughter was stillborn in 2021. Because I was high-risk, and pregnant with twins, I started to use the app at 26 weeks. Though I was only a few days into tracking my movements, I had already felt my boys and was pretty familiar with their pattern even before that. But at 26 weeks, I started to record it. 

Then just a few days later, unfortunately, I noticed that twin A’s pattern of movement changed. I actually noticed he had stopped moving completely. At this time my husband and I were on vacation in Florida, and I didn’t feel baby A’s movement. Typically if I wasn’t feeling him, I could always move to the side that he was on and he would get moving almost immediately. He hated it when I rolled onto the side that he was on. 

After about 30 to 45 minutes of lying on the side that he was on and not feeling a single movement, we decided to rush into the hospital in Florida. We were out of state, and once we made it to the hospital there they hooked me up and they monitored us. They monitored us for about three or four hours. Everything seemed to sound OK and look OK. As for twin A’s movements, he kind of started kicking again, so they released us. They said everything looked good. They ran no cervical exams, no additional exams, just monitored us for a few hours, and then sent us on our way. 

A couple of days later, my husband and I had flown from Florida to Nashville for one of my good friend’s weddings. This would have been about 48 hours after our first hospital visit in Florida after not feeling twin A’s movement the way we normally had, and it happened again. 

I woke up, and he was normally very, very active in the morning. But suddenly I wasn’t feeling him – he was barely active at all. Then I noticed some other changes as well. I noticed a change in my cervical mucus, and then later in the day I would start feeling what felt like minor period cramps, but I hadn’t had those at all in my pregnancy. 

My husband and I again rushed into the hospital and after being set up, of course, monitoring the babies’ vitals and then doing a few cervical exams, we knew that something wasn’t right. I stayed in the hospital for 48 hours and we learned that I had an infection that had unfortunately spread to twin A and was in his bloodstream. That had kicked off preterm labor. That labor was what was occurring 48 hours prior, even back in Florida when we went in, but we just didn’t know it at the time. 

We were in this hospital in Nashville, they ran the cervical exams, and we knew that our boys were coming. We knew that our twin A had an infection, and that there was nothing we could do to prevent it. 

Our boys came at 27 weeks and spent 3 and a half months in the NICU. They are healthy, happy and doing amazing today. But had we not gone back in, had we just listened to that first doctor and nurse’s opinion back in Florida, I am certain that we wouldn’t have our son here today. Potentially both of our boys, because he had that infection and it was adamant that he had to come out and get the right care in order for him to be happy and healthy today.

I cannot stress to you enough how important it was to pay attention and count my baby’s movements. Again, we say 26 weeks if you’re high-risk, and 28 weeks if you’re not. But for me I could feel and establish their pattern even a little bit before that. 

It is so, so important to pay attention. Mamas, you know your babies. You know them, and if there’s any sort of inkling that something’s off, you need to go in. It’s OK for you to ask for additional help. Of course, I was monitored that first time. But ask for a cervical exam. Advocate for yourself is what I want to say. You know best. You know your baby best.” -Emma Kelly, Duke and Ford’s mom