Kansas City family in need of help after mom dies days after giving birth

KANSAS CITY, Mo. -- Welcoming a new baby into the world brings excitement, joy, and love, but also there’s worry, with hope everything goes as planned.

Tera Cowan never made it home with the baby she gave birth to earlier this month at a Kansas City-area hospital.

Her family needs financial help right now.

“I am so angry. I do. I feel like this was preventable,” Jennifer Morgan, Tera’s sister-in-law shared.

“After 15-16 years of trying for number two. They (the Cowans) got pregnant again," she continued.

Tera Cowan only had nine days with her newborn baby, Emersyn.

“They have a 16-year-old, well she will be 16 on Wednesday and then, Emersyn, the new one,” Morgan added.

“Emersyn was born on Wednesday the 4th; she came out of the O.R. She had a planned C-section. She came back to the room and once we go to her, she had been in the room half the day and was sick. Couldn’t keep anything down, including water, nothing. Her heart rate kept jumping up and down. They couldn’t keep it regulated," Morgan said.

Tera went in for a scheduled C-section, less than three weeks ago.

“Yes, she was the geriatric pregnancy, but her geriatric OB had no problems, other than her blood sugar. They monitored that. They monitored the baby’s. The baby’s was great coming out,” Morgan added. “Emersyn’s just been a gem.”

Her family knew something wasn’t quite right in a matter of days.

“She continued to be sick,” Morgan said. “I didn’t know if this was the drugs she was on to help her with pain, from the C-section. I didn’t know if this was the anesthesia. I didn’t know those things. That angers me because I didn’t know to push for more information for them to do something more than what they were doing.”

Jennifer Morgan has known Tera for nearly 20 years.

“It’s hard to understand when your Lord takes someone so precious from you.”

“It’s hard and explaining that to the older sister (Tera’s first born), who is going to have a hard time understanding. It’s going to be a long road. She doesn’t understand why her mom is gone," Morgan said.

Morgan believes Tera’s death could have been prevented.

“After eight days, they finally went in for exploratory surgery, and they found the nick in her colon, and it was too late. Eight or nine days from sepsis. Sepsis had already set in. Her body was too far to fight that,” Morgan said. “They pull blood once or twice a day while you are in the hospital. Who was looking at that?”

“Yes, I feel like after day two of being sick. Finding gas bubbles on her stomach or wherever they were finding things. They found enough information to think ‘we need to go in and make sure’. Sepsis was already setting in. Infection doesn’t just bloom in one night. It was already well set by that time. Two-three days max. They should have been able to find that,” Morgan said was her personal opinion.

Now, Tera’s husband is left to be the sole provider of newborn Emersyn and their oldest, a teenager with special needs.

Morgan says the family lives modestly. The family is equipped with diapers and formula, currently. Right now, financial help is what they need the most.

“My 16-year-old niece will definitely carry that (friendly personality) on and my hope for Emersyn will just be that she could do the same. Follow in her footsteps. Be that joy… have that laugh. That laugh is what we all miss. Emersyn’s already got the cutest cheeks. So, we are halfway there," Morgan said.

Tera’s service was this past Saturday.

“To say that it was hard, puts it very mildly.”

If you’d like to help the family with medical bills and expenses, you can do so here.

“Tera was a beautiful soul and a great friend to many, always greeting everyone with a smile, a kind word, or a hug. Her friends and family are completely devastated at this untimely loss,” the GoFundMe reads. “We have established this GoFundMe account to assist this humble family with the medical expenses, memorial services, and to help Justin through the unthinkable task of raising his daughters without their mother. Thank you in advance for your prayers and generosity.”