Secret Affairs

Always remember us this way

May 2009

You look at me and, babe, I wanna catch on fire
It's buried in my soul like California gold
You found the light in me that I couldn't find
So when I'm all choked up
But I can't find the words
Every time we say goodbye

"There's something wrong," Ellen said, she was extremely pale as she stood at the door of the bathroom.

"Oh god," he saw blood dripping from her as she stood at the door, a terrified look across her entire face made him jump to his feet.

"I'm calling an ambulance," he said to her trying to find his phone.

"We can drive, just hurry," she grabbed a change of underwear from her drawer and put a large pad on her underwear as he tried to grab everything.

"I'm taking these to the car then coming to get you," he said breathlessly as he hurried to the car. He was in a panic, not sure what was going on. He quickly returned to her crouched over the bathroom counter, tears streaming down her face. She looked absolutely terrified.

"El, let's go," he said as he grabbed her hand.

"I'm only 34 weeks, she's not big enough," Ellen cried into his arms.

"She will be ok but we have to go now Ellen," he said as he lifted her up, her body becoming weak from the blood loss. He hurried to the car, helping her in the best he could. He drove as fast as he could, he kept looking over at her as she was crying. His heart broke looking at her clinching her stomach as the pain got worse and worse.

He got to the hospital, parking as close as he could and helped her up, blood dripping from her as she waddled her way to the doors.

"Can I help you?" The nurse asked from the desk.

"She's pregnant and bleeding really bad," he said panicking.

"How far along is she and what is her name?" The nurse quickly jumped into action, grabbing the wheelchair by the door and helping her sit down. She looked worried, seeing the droplet of blood all down the floor where she was walking.

"Ellen Pompeo, she is 34 weeks," he replied, walking as fast as he could to keep up with her as they went to labor and delivery. They were met with the doctor as they got there.

"Hi Ms Pompeo, can you tell me what's going on?" The doctor asked as she followed them to a room.

"I don't know, I've been having pain all day and I called my doctor, she said just monitor the pain and rest. If it gets too bad to come here and then I felt this awful pain and I went to the bathroom and blood just started dripping," she said between sobs. The doctor started hooking her up to monitors and putting an oxygen mask over her.

"Baby's heartbeat is low, and by the looks of it you seem to be having what we call a placental abruption. We are going to have to do an emergency caesarean," she said as she was accessing her.

"What? She's too little, I can't," Ellen said panicking as her breathing got rapid.

"We don't have an option. I will go get the OR prepared. We are going to have to put you under. We don't have much time to save your baby," she replied before she left the room.

"It's going to be ok Ellen," he said, trying to stay strong for her though he was just as terrified.

"Please, just stay with her. Whatever you do, do not leave her side. And if something happens, save her," Ellen said under the oxygen mask.

"Ellen," he said, he was in such a shock by everything. He struggled getting the gown on the nurse gave him.

"Patrick, she is going to be so small and I can't be with her. And I just-" she could hardly breath. He tried to be as strong as he could, he was absolutely terrified of what was going to happen to her.

"Please," she begged.

"Ok," he just agreed, the doctors rushed in, they didn't say much of anything as they started rushing her to the OR. It was a blink of the eye and the doctors rushing everything, they started to put her under. Patrick stayed there, holding her hand tightly as he let tears fall from his eyes.

"She's here," the doctor said, holding up the tiniest baby in his hands. She looked so tiny in the doctors hands as she immediately placed her into a blanket and to an incubator.

"She's so tiny," he said with a smile over at Ellen. He didn't know if she could hear him but he wanted to.

"We are taking baby to the NICU," the pediatric doctor said and they started moving her out the door. He immediately leaned down, kissing Ellen's head and started off after her. Just before he left, he heard the monitors.

"She's loosing too much blood doctor," the nurse said as she was replacing the bag of blood.

"I'm trying to control this bleeding," she replied.

"Is she going to be ok?" Patrick said, stopping at the door.

"We are trying our best. Get him out," the doctor said as one of the nurses came over to him.

"Go be with your new baby Mr. Pompeo, we got it from her," the nurse encouraged as she put her hand on his back and guided him out of the room and to the NICU.

"How is she?" He asked as he walked in and immediately went to his baby girl.

"She's a fighter, a whole 4 pounds," the doctor replied with a smile.

"Is she going to live?" He said with tears, he couldn't lose them both.

"She doesn't seem to have any health issues, her lungs are a little under developed so we are going to keep her on oxygen. Would you like to hold her?" The doctor asked. Patrick nodded with a smile as he went to sit in the chair next to her bed. The doctor carefully picked up her tiny body and place her into his arms.

"Hi baby girl, we haven't picked your name out yet. We couldn't decide until we saw you, your mama is very strong and she will be here soon to hold you," he said in a whisper, tears rolling down his cheek as he looked at her. She looked like a spitting imagine of Ellen right down to her little button nose. He had never felt so vulnerable in his life, he had to be strong to make it through for them.