A woman in the UK has given birth to a healthy baby boy after being urged to obtain an abortion amid bleak prognosis that left him with only a ten percent chance of survival.
Rachel Collins, 30, says that she was told by her doctor that she had oligohydramnios, meaning that there was too little amniotic fluid surrounding her son. If the baby did survive birth, he said, the child would not have any kidneys nor lung function.
“The doctor didn’t mince his words,” she told The Daily Mail. “He said, ‘This baby will die. the best thing you can do is terminate it.'”
But Collins refused to end her son’s life.
“There was no way I was terminating my baby,” she said. “I thought, if he’s not meant to be, I will miscarry. But I knew I had to try.”
As Collins was already keeping a diary about her pregnancy, she decided to continue to journal about her journey and the thoughts and emotions that accompanied it. She titled her journal Alfie: Born to Fight, Ready for Battle—Our Miracle Baby Boy.
“[The doctor] said, ‘Your baby has a ten percent chance of survival. You should expect a miscarriage. The baby will survive the next two weeks at best; you should have a termination,'” she wrote in her August 6, 2013 journal entry. “I wanted a second opinion. Something in my heart was telling me we could do this. I wasn’t going to give up hope—a 10% chance was not zero.”
“Our new consultant is amazing, and every fine detail of you is checked down to the fine vessels in your brain,” Collins wrote days later. “She never mentioned termination and supported our choice to fight for you.”
Two months later, she began fighting with her fears and wondered whether she might miscarry her son.
“The doctors have been called. We are still bleeding, but your heartbeat is stable and steady,” Collins journaled on October 20, 2013. “In the back of my mind, I can hear [the doctor’s] voice. What if he is right and you are going to die? I will lose the most precious boy in the world.”
But the following day, at 30 weeks gestation, Collins gave birth to her newborn son Alfie via C-section—and he was perfectly normal.
“He came out screaming. He defied them all,” she said. “He is a little miracle. It was a nightmare pregnancy, but every day he was hanging on was a blessing. He is now 6lb 14oz and has no health problems.”
Collins states that she plans on giving her journal to Alfie when he is older to show him how loved he was and how much she fought for his life.