I'm going to be Pegit's father! This realization slowly crept from the subconscious to the conscious. It happened somewhere in mid-October 2007, in the 25th week of pregnancy, when during a check-up with the gynecologist, my wife's blood pressure was measured. As a result, the doctor ordered her immediate hospitalization at Sheba Hospital in the maternity ward - a high-risk pregnancy, "high risk" in the words of those involved in the profession, since all the signs pointed to preeclampsia, the severity of which was becoming increasingly severe.

We are going to be parents to a premature baby, apparently quite tiny, what on earth am I supposed to do with this information!? After all, I have no idea what a premature baby is (except for the basic information that it is a baby born before her due date) and how am I going to deal with such a case!?.

Definition of perm – from Wikipedia
A premature baby is a baby born before the 37th week of pregnancy. Normal birth usually occurs at the 40th week of pregnancy.
Because birth occurs prematurely, and before the baby's body systems, especially the immune system, are completely developed, the premature baby is more susceptible to diseases and health risks, for example: cerebral palsy, respiratory problems, digestive problems, mental retardation, vision problems (such as retinopathy of prematurity) and hearing problems, as well as jaundice and various infections.
Although several factors are known to lead to preterm birth (see below), the causes of almost half of preterm births are unknown. In certain circumstances, doctors recommend performing an induced abortion because premature birth is dangerous for both mother and baby, and there is a concern that the baby will not survive.
Today, due to great progress in understanding the problems of prematurity and technological development, there are fewer risks to the life of the premature baby. The percentage of stillborn babies has decreased significantly, but the percentage of premature babies is only increasing and usually the child's future development is compromised.
In Israel, about ten percent of all births are premature – 15,000 premature babies out of 150,000 births per year, on average.
So, understanding the preeclampsia situation that was getting worse with each passing day and delving into the book "Premature Babies - The Complete Guide" by Ruhama Zalushinsky (which definitely became an important part of the process we went through and I highly recommend it), we set a goal for ourselves - to prolong the pregnancy until at least the 28th week, which later turned out to be a critical week for the chances of survival of a premature baby fighting for her life.

The days pass slowly, and I say thank you for every day we gain, but our little fetus is not gaining weight in the weight assessments that are performed from time to time, and a new concept enters our lives: and not just any, but extreme. This means – a fetus is significantly smaller than the size it should be at a certain week of pregnancy.

As is customary at High Risk, my wife takes a preliminary tour of the maternity ward and returns with some difficult impressions. In general, we feel that there is more hidden than visible when it comes to the period we are approaching.
I try to focus on the present and think less about the future, but I can't escape those thoughts about why this is happening to us, in the middle of our first pregnancy, with all the excitement involved.

Time continues to crawl, day after day, we "managed" to reach the beginning of the 28th week of pregnancy, the goal was achieved, my wife pulled and pulled with enormous force and with great suffering until the moment when the preeclampsia became so severe that it threatened the lives of my wife and the fetus.

On the morning of November 7, 2007, my wife was rushed for an emergency cesarean section. The moment of truth arrived. Little Ofri emerged into the world earlier than expected, at the beginning of the 28th week of pregnancy, almost three months before the estimated date of birth, a tiny premature baby weighing 670 grams.
In those moments, we didn't really know it yet, we were about to embark on a crazy roller coaster – the journey to survival had begun, from now on the neonatal intensive care unit was going to be our second home for a very long time.

That's it for now, and in the next column – the beginning of the program "Survival – The End of Tel Hashomer."

Goodbye, Gilad.