‘We held them until we couldn’t hold them anymore.’
Derrick Scott and Kelsey Gwyn Neff were told to prepare for the possibility their twin boys would not survive the pregnancy, but Kelsey had decided they were fighters.
It seemed such a short time ago that everyone – family and friends – had joked about them having twins. Even her husband’s 4-year-old daughter, Ronni, had been telling them Kelsey was going to have two babies – and it was before the doctors knew it.
“She kept telling us it was two from the beginning and we told her no,” Kelsey said.
By the week of Christmas, the doctor confirmed it would be two babies for the Paradis couple and her first pregnancy.
“Me and my husband were excited, wondering how we were going to handle this,” Kelsey said. “Then, everything just kind of slowly fell into place. We got a great deal on cribs, then we bought the strollers and then we were waiting on the gender for everything else.
“It was such a turnaround in our world and we just made it work. But then it just kind of felt like second nature.”
At 13 weeks, the ultrasounds showed the twins growing and at first look they appeared to be girls. An hour later, however, the doctor called to say the blood work confirmed they were boys.
They named them Dawson Joseph and Tyler Jacob.
“But the bad news started at 14 to 15 weeks,” Kelsey said. “That’s when we got told the fluids were dropping and, at 18 weeks, we were pretty much told to start preparing and it would be a miracle if they made it. They were starting to see the kidneys and bladders were not developing.
“Even though we were told to get prepared, I would go home crying, upset every week, and thought, ‘They’re fighters. They’ve made it this far.’”
By 22 weeks, the diagnosis worsened for the babies.Last Thursday (April 12), the hardest news came when they were told the children no longer had a heart beat. She had a cesarean section that night. Accompanied by her husband, Kelsey held their babies and they spent time together.
On Friday, a private graveside service will be held for the twins at Holy Rosary Cemetery in Hahnville.
“We held them until we couldn’t hold them anymore and they took them,” she said. “It felt like the worst pain in the world. I still don’t think it’s real. It doesn’t really feel like it happened or that it’s over.”
Be the first to comment