A young Dublin woman has opened up on her journey of dealing with the loss of her baby boy.
Lauren Cooper, from Tallaght, became pregnant when she was 14 years old.
Her baby was diagnosed with a condition called anencephaly which made him "incompatible with life".
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She was told her son would more than likely be stillborn before the third trimester but he and Lauren made it to 33 weeks of pregnancy together.
Her son Kaiden lived for two and a half hours after being born.
Lauren is now 18 and studying midwifery in UCD and has written two books about her and her child's journey.
She opened up to Dublin Live about her pregnancy and her son Kaiden.
"My mam was the one who actually told me I was pregnant because our cycles would usually be the same and I didn't even realise mine wasn't coming," Lauren said.
"My mam was texting me while I was in school and she picked me up on my lunch break and handed me a pharmacy bag with a pregnancy test in it.
"I went upstairs and did it and it said I was pregnant.
"I went back to school after and I remember just sitting there just being in complete shock. I didn't believe it at all."
Lauren said the initial shock wore off and she became really excited for her first hospital appointment.
She said: "I remember how excited I was that morning. When my mam woke me I hopped up out of the bed and we went in to the Coombe Hospital.
"We went in for my scan and they said everything was perfect, his anatomy was perfect, it was just that he was measuring a week behind the date."
Lauren returned to the hospital two weeks later for a re-dating scan and that was the day they realised Kaiden wasn't developing normally.
"I got on the bed and the excitement was still there, even greater excitement to go in and see my baby again," she said.
"I remember my mam started crying. I didn't know what was wrong because I heard my baby's heartbeat just a minute before so I knew he wasn't gone.
"My mind was just blank. I didn't even look at anybody, I was just sitting there looking at the frozen screen that had the picture of my baby.
"His Silhouette looked perfect. Nothing looked wrong to me."
The midwife told Lauren that it looked like her baby's bowel and liver were growing outside of his stomach and his head was too small for his body size and gestation.
Lauren was told that her baby had anencephaly and he was "incompatible with life" and "he'd be more than likely stillborn before the third trimester".
She said: "The doctor explained to me that it was a fatal foetal abnormality so my baby was incompatible with life and he wasn't going to survive."
Abortion was illegal in Ireland at the time but Lauren chose not to travel to England to terminate the pregnancy as she "wanted to carry her baby to term."
"I had hope and whatever that hope was meant to be. "
Lauren defied the odds and carried her baby to the third trimester, going into labour on October 31, 2018 at 33 weeks.
"I remember the midwife coming in and I asked her would she examine me again and she examined me said 'oh you're 6 and a half centimetres!'.
Lauren was put in a wheelchair and rushed down to the delivery ward. By the time she got to the ward, she was 10 centimetres dilated.
"I remember screaming for the epidural but I couldn't get it because it was too late so I was trying to be brave," she said.
"Three pushes later and he was out."
Kaiden was born at 2:59pm on Halloween and lived for 2 and a half hours.
Lauren said: "I remember sitting in the room and I was surrounded by doctors and midwives and my bereavement councillor on my right hand side and my mam on my left, getting me through it.
"So when he was born he got cleaned up a little bit and then put straight onto my chest. I could feel his little heartbeat and I knew that he was still there.
"We made it to the third trimester, we made it to 33 weeks so that was a big goal in itself that we accomplished together.
"I didn't know if he was going to be born alive or stillborn because the pathway of getting from the womb, down the birth canal and out to the world, it would have been very stressful on him."
Lauren said she is "so thankful" for the time she got with Kaiden.
"I remember just feeling full of love and this is the moment I've been waiting for. This is the moment that got me through all the hard times, knowing that I was going to have my baby in my arms one day.
"I'm so thankful that I got those two and a half hours with him.
"I remember taking loads of photos because I knew that was all I was going to have left of him.
Lauren said her mam Emer, dad Paul and whole family are her "biggest supporters and have made her the person she is today".
Since Kaiden's passing, the 18-year-old has written two books about the pregnancy and the aftermath.
Lauren said: "It's important that I put it into a book because even if it was my own experience, because nobody's experience is the same with child loss, but I thought that if it could even help one family then I've done the right thing.
"So I wrote the first book and self published with Kindle and Amazon
"My first book, 'I Will Carry You' is about my pregnancy story, finding out I was pregnant and him dying and that experience for me, Kaiden and my whole family.
"My second book, 'After I Carried You' is about all of my grief, how I coped with things and everything that happened after my baby died."
Lauren, now a student midwife at UCD, said she is "doing well" now and "just wants to make her little boy proud".
"Everything I've done was for him and me. I'll never forget him.
"Everybody talks about him everyday.
"We all go up to the grave and spend a bit of time there and I look through the blankets and photos and everything so that's what keeps me going."
You can find Lauren's books on Amazon here.
If you have been affected by this story you can contact Feileacain for support.
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