As I'm sure you have heard, there was a shooting at an elementary school in Connecticut today. Since it just happened a few hours ago, I don't have a lot of the details. Even if I did, I certainly wouldn't want to rehash them here. The truth of the matter is, I want nothing more than to stick my fingers in my ears and repeat "LA-LA-LA-LA I CAN'T HEAR YOU!" any time someone at work (or on my Facebook feed) brings it up.
I'm not trying to minimize the tragedy. I'm not saying I don't care. It's just that this is the sort of thing I can't even being to think about without completely breaking down. My stomach ties itself in knots just reading the headlines for these kinds of stories, let alone the gory details.
The thing is, I lost a child. Obviously I did not lose a Kindergartener who had been the biggest part of my life for years. My loss was much earlier than that, so I won't claim to know how the parents of those children must feel. The thought of their babies, terrified and crying for them in a place they are supposed to be safe... it makes me shake in horror. It makes me want to puke. I can't even imagine how it must make their parents feel, knowing their children lost their lives in such a gruesome, violent manner.
My point is just that things like this hit me differently than they do a lot of other mothers, I think. My Facebook feed is filled with friends, family, and aquaintances talking about how they can't wait to get home and hug their kids. How terrifying it is to think that, even in elementary school, you can't ever be sure that they are safe. The difference for me is that is how I feel all the time.
I feel like it would be absolutely disrespectful to compare my stillborn baby to the children who were tragically gunned down this morning, so I want to be careful to say that I'm really not trying to do that. My point is more the reaction from other parents.
When I lost Nicholas, every drop of "that could never happen to me" left my body. I don't ever doubt how quickly and unexpectedly a tragedy could cross my path. Or Caitlyn's. For the most part, absent of a current, relatable tragedy such as the one that happened today, I think most people fall on the other side of the fence. Most people want to believe statistics. They want to believe that if there is a 98% chance something will never happen, that of course they wouldn't be part of the 2% with the terrible luck.
During my pregnancy with Caitlyn, I had an overlap with both of my sister's pregnancies as well. April was near the end of her pregnancy when I got pregnant, and Samantha had just found out she was a few weeks before I did. My loss was certainly on everyone's mind, because it was just 6 months prior. In fact, April was already a few months pregnant when I lost Nicholas. They never talked to me about their fears for their own children, but my mom told me not too long ago that they were both terrified. "That will never happen to me" just hit a little too close to home.
I wonder though, if now, years after the fact, they still have the same fears I do. I mean, every parent worries for the safety of their child, but i think I do to an excessive degree. I never feel 100% sure that I'll see Caitlyn again. Every time I strap her into her carseat, I kiss her goodbye. Just in case we are in a terrible car accident and she doesn't make it, I want her to know she is loved. Even when she is being difficult and crying and fighting me while I try to strap her in, I give her a kiss and tell her I love her. About half the time in the mornings, I wake up and think to myself "she's sleeping too soundly. Did she suffocate in her sleep?". On the rare occasions when I make plans without her, I always find myself fearing that something will happen to her before I return, and I'll have squandered my last precious hours that could have been spent with her doing selfish, unimportant shit.
Sometimes I have to tell myself that I'm being obsessive, or that she will almost definitely be fine. I have to remind myself that my sanity and my ability to be a good mother to her depends on occasionally giving myself a break. But I never, ever tell myself that something could never happen. Unfortunately, the older she gets, the more there are outside influences in play. I'm surprisingly not a crazy overprotective mom, but I mostly attribute that to the fact that my own mom never stopped me from doing things I wanted to do and always trusted and encouraged me. I know when it comes to decision-making, she will be trusted and trustworthy. It's all the stuff outside of both of our control that utterly terrifies me.
Ironically, Caitlyn had her first taste of preschool today. Our babysitter's son celebrated his 4th birthday today and his preschool allowed Caitlyn to stick around and join in the festivities. It was very nice of them, and I got a bunch of very cute, very big girl schmoozing with the other big kids pictures sent to my phone. It made me a little excited to see her so very ready for the next step that will eventually come, but also a little sad to see her embracing such a big step without me. And then all hell broke loose and I had to breathe and type and try not to cry at my computer.
Showing posts with label stillborn. Show all posts
Showing posts with label stillborn. Show all posts
Friday, December 14, 2012
Monday, March 19, 2012
The Worst Day of My Life
Exactly 3 years ago today, I had the very worst day of my entire life. Tomorrow it will be 3 years since we said goodbye to Nicholas.
You would think tomorrow would have been the worst day, but it wasn't. 3 years ago tomorrow, I woke up in far too much pain from being in labor all night to really think about what was happening. And yes, having my son fall out of my body onto the floor was undoubtedly the worst moment of my life. But as much as it hurt, as hard as it was to say goodbye to him, I can't say it was the worst day. Because I got to hold him and kiss him and say goodbye. I got to see his face for the one and only time. And I'll never get the chance to do any of those things again.
So tomorrow will suck. It will be sad and quiet and I won't quite know what to do to feel like I've acknowledged it in the right way. But I'll remember his face too, and that makes it a little bit easier. Tomorrow is a mix of emotions. I never know what to call it. His birthday? That seems to imply cake and balloons and presents. Anniversary isn't right either. It still has a connotation of celebration to it, and that is not what I plan to do. I do not celebrate that day. And then there is the way I've seen a lot of people refer to it- angelversary. God, I fucking hate that so much too. So I don't know. I don't know what to call it or how to deal with it. I just know it makes me sad.
Today though. Three years ago today, I had an early appointment for my 24 week check-up. Rodolfo had worked late the night before and wasn't even going to come with me, but right at the last minute he threw on some clothes and decided to join me. I can't even imagine how I would have survived that appointment if he had just stayed home.
I remember being annoyed about my 20 week ultrasound. The tech was kind of a bitch and just as she started my much-anticipated ultrasound, she told me to be quiet and not ask any questions because she was very busy performing the detailed exam. She printed me some great pictures, but I never got to see the screen. I never got to see my little boy squirming around. So when I walked into my appointment that day 3 years ago, I remember hoping that Nicholas would be in an awkward position where they wouldn't be able to find his heartbeat with the doppler, so I could get another ultrasound. When his heartbeat wasn't found right away, I smiled a little to myself. Listening to his mother already.
My OB assured me that this wasn't anything to worry about. "I think I picked it up for a second, but let's do an ultrasound just to be sure everything is okay". She sent me back to the bitchy ultrasound tech and I waited in the room with the butterflies on the ceiling to see my baby boy again. I expected to immediately recognize the sound of my son's heartbeat, but it wasn't there. I held it together for a few minutes while the tech silently checked without so much as a word to us about what was happening. Finally, I asked what was going on. She said she needed to get the doctor.
This is when I started to panic. I started to cry and asked Rodolfo if he heard the implication in her tone. "Why didn't she say he was okay? I have to go get the doctor? She might as well have said "your baby is dead"." Rodolfo assured me that everything would be fine, but the tears would not stop rolling down my face. I had to be overreacting. It was something else, something they missed at my 20 week ultrasound. Maybe he had a birth defect. That would suck, but we would figure it out. We would love him no matter what. Then the doctor stepped in and the life I knew, the life I anticipated, the life I carried inside of me, it was all gone in a moment.
After giving us 10 or so minutes of privacy to sob and hyperventilate and call our families, my doctor came back in and told me I needed to calm down so she could explain what came next. Calm down? Really? My baby was dead. How the fuck was I supposed to calm down? Somehow, I managed to stifle my sobs for the next few minutes.
My first option was to have labor induced. No. That was my immediate reaction. I couldn't bear it. I was already terrified of labor, and without the prize at the end of it, I just didn't think I was strong enough to do it.
Option number two was a D&E. What the fuck a D&E even was, I had no idea. I just knew I would go to sleep and have surgery and no longer be pregnant when I woke up. It was not explained to me until after we had made that choice, after I was given medication to dilate my cervix, that a D&E meant I would never see my son. In fact, I don't know that it would have even come up at all, if it weren't for the fact that I was asking why this happened. "Well", my doctor explained "We can run some tests, but with the D&E there is only tissue to test, so we may not get a clear answer". Oh. So she was going to rip my baby out of me in pieces. Thanks for the heads-up, cunt.
Oh, and did I mention she called me fat during all of this? Yes, when I told her that I could not bear to labor with my stillborn son, she told me it might be my only option. She told me that because of my weight, there might not be enough... room?... in my cervix to do a D&E. Then she actually bothered to look at my cervix and remarked "oh, well that's not bad". Again, thanks, cunt.
At that point, layers of my cervix were stripped and medicated sponges were placed next to it. Then I left. I left the doctor's office and went home and sat on my couch and stared into space for several hours. I didn't cry. My mom showed up, visibly upset, offering hugs and comforting words but I barely registered them. I was numb. I was in denial. I was a few steps away from being catatonic.
Soon it was time to go to the hospital for pre-admission testing. This is when all the horror of the day shook loose again. I remember sobbing in the waiting room and while they drew my blood. I was suffocated by the realization that my baby was gone. Devastated.
I went back home and started to freak out. I had made the wrong choice. I realized it then. It pisses me off, looking back, to know how little information I was given. Because I spent hours researching cribs and swings and strollers, but did not give a moment's thought to what I wanted to do if my baby didn't make it. And I don't think anyone does.
Why didn't anyone give me more than just the most basic medical information? If I'd have known what a D&E actually was, I never would have chosen to have one. If I'd heard of Now I Lay Me Down to Sleep, I would have asked them to come take pictures of my son. If I'd have known that you can find funeral homes that will do cremations for free, maybe I wouldn't have spent months after Nicholas' death imagining his remains ending up in a dumpster full of medical waste. I can't tell you how many nights I was kept up by that thought. And you know what else? Maybe have a fucking pamphlet for a grief counselor or something on hand.
Anyway. So I was freaking out. I had realized I didn't want a D&E but for some reason I didn't think I was allowed to change my mind. So I decided that I would need to put myself into labor and maybe I'd have Nicholas before the next day. So Rodolfo and I walked a mile away to an ice cream store near our house, had an ice cream cone and walked home. We were 3/4 of the way back when the contractions started to become really obvious.
I spent the rest of the night in pain. When I finally tried to go to bed I was woken up every 3 minutes or so with another contraction. All I wanted was to be unconscious, to avoid the mental and physical pain, but I was not that lucky, because the worst day of your life takes forever to end. It gives you no break. And you replay it over and over again every year for the rest of your life.
You would think tomorrow would have been the worst day, but it wasn't. 3 years ago tomorrow, I woke up in far too much pain from being in labor all night to really think about what was happening. And yes, having my son fall out of my body onto the floor was undoubtedly the worst moment of my life. But as much as it hurt, as hard as it was to say goodbye to him, I can't say it was the worst day. Because I got to hold him and kiss him and say goodbye. I got to see his face for the one and only time. And I'll never get the chance to do any of those things again.
So tomorrow will suck. It will be sad and quiet and I won't quite know what to do to feel like I've acknowledged it in the right way. But I'll remember his face too, and that makes it a little bit easier. Tomorrow is a mix of emotions. I never know what to call it. His birthday? That seems to imply cake and balloons and presents. Anniversary isn't right either. It still has a connotation of celebration to it, and that is not what I plan to do. I do not celebrate that day. And then there is the way I've seen a lot of people refer to it- angelversary. God, I fucking hate that so much too. So I don't know. I don't know what to call it or how to deal with it. I just know it makes me sad.
Today though. Three years ago today, I had an early appointment for my 24 week check-up. Rodolfo had worked late the night before and wasn't even going to come with me, but right at the last minute he threw on some clothes and decided to join me. I can't even imagine how I would have survived that appointment if he had just stayed home.
I remember being annoyed about my 20 week ultrasound. The tech was kind of a bitch and just as she started my much-anticipated ultrasound, she told me to be quiet and not ask any questions because she was very busy performing the detailed exam. She printed me some great pictures, but I never got to see the screen. I never got to see my little boy squirming around. So when I walked into my appointment that day 3 years ago, I remember hoping that Nicholas would be in an awkward position where they wouldn't be able to find his heartbeat with the doppler, so I could get another ultrasound. When his heartbeat wasn't found right away, I smiled a little to myself. Listening to his mother already.
My OB assured me that this wasn't anything to worry about. "I think I picked it up for a second, but let's do an ultrasound just to be sure everything is okay". She sent me back to the bitchy ultrasound tech and I waited in the room with the butterflies on the ceiling to see my baby boy again. I expected to immediately recognize the sound of my son's heartbeat, but it wasn't there. I held it together for a few minutes while the tech silently checked without so much as a word to us about what was happening. Finally, I asked what was going on. She said she needed to get the doctor.
This is when I started to panic. I started to cry and asked Rodolfo if he heard the implication in her tone. "Why didn't she say he was okay? I have to go get the doctor? She might as well have said "your baby is dead"." Rodolfo assured me that everything would be fine, but the tears would not stop rolling down my face. I had to be overreacting. It was something else, something they missed at my 20 week ultrasound. Maybe he had a birth defect. That would suck, but we would figure it out. We would love him no matter what. Then the doctor stepped in and the life I knew, the life I anticipated, the life I carried inside of me, it was all gone in a moment.
After giving us 10 or so minutes of privacy to sob and hyperventilate and call our families, my doctor came back in and told me I needed to calm down so she could explain what came next. Calm down? Really? My baby was dead. How the fuck was I supposed to calm down? Somehow, I managed to stifle my sobs for the next few minutes.
My first option was to have labor induced. No. That was my immediate reaction. I couldn't bear it. I was already terrified of labor, and without the prize at the end of it, I just didn't think I was strong enough to do it.
Option number two was a D&E. What the fuck a D&E even was, I had no idea. I just knew I would go to sleep and have surgery and no longer be pregnant when I woke up. It was not explained to me until after we had made that choice, after I was given medication to dilate my cervix, that a D&E meant I would never see my son. In fact, I don't know that it would have even come up at all, if it weren't for the fact that I was asking why this happened. "Well", my doctor explained "We can run some tests, but with the D&E there is only tissue to test, so we may not get a clear answer". Oh. So she was going to rip my baby out of me in pieces. Thanks for the heads-up, cunt.
Oh, and did I mention she called me fat during all of this? Yes, when I told her that I could not bear to labor with my stillborn son, she told me it might be my only option. She told me that because of my weight, there might not be enough... room?... in my cervix to do a D&E. Then she actually bothered to look at my cervix and remarked "oh, well that's not bad". Again, thanks, cunt.
At that point, layers of my cervix were stripped and medicated sponges were placed next to it. Then I left. I left the doctor's office and went home and sat on my couch and stared into space for several hours. I didn't cry. My mom showed up, visibly upset, offering hugs and comforting words but I barely registered them. I was numb. I was in denial. I was a few steps away from being catatonic.
Soon it was time to go to the hospital for pre-admission testing. This is when all the horror of the day shook loose again. I remember sobbing in the waiting room and while they drew my blood. I was suffocated by the realization that my baby was gone. Devastated.
I went back home and started to freak out. I had made the wrong choice. I realized it then. It pisses me off, looking back, to know how little information I was given. Because I spent hours researching cribs and swings and strollers, but did not give a moment's thought to what I wanted to do if my baby didn't make it. And I don't think anyone does.
Why didn't anyone give me more than just the most basic medical information? If I'd have known what a D&E actually was, I never would have chosen to have one. If I'd heard of Now I Lay Me Down to Sleep, I would have asked them to come take pictures of my son. If I'd have known that you can find funeral homes that will do cremations for free, maybe I wouldn't have spent months after Nicholas' death imagining his remains ending up in a dumpster full of medical waste. I can't tell you how many nights I was kept up by that thought. And you know what else? Maybe have a fucking pamphlet for a grief counselor or something on hand.
Anyway. So I was freaking out. I had realized I didn't want a D&E but for some reason I didn't think I was allowed to change my mind. So I decided that I would need to put myself into labor and maybe I'd have Nicholas before the next day. So Rodolfo and I walked a mile away to an ice cream store near our house, had an ice cream cone and walked home. We were 3/4 of the way back when the contractions started to become really obvious.
I spent the rest of the night in pain. When I finally tried to go to bed I was woken up every 3 minutes or so with another contraction. All I wanted was to be unconscious, to avoid the mental and physical pain, but I was not that lucky, because the worst day of your life takes forever to end. It gives you no break. And you replay it over and over again every year for the rest of your life.
Friday, October 15, 2010
Pregnancy and Infant Loss Awareness Day
**As a disclaimer, I will say that there are pictures of my stillborn son at the end of this post. It may be uncomfortable for some to see. **
Today is October 15th. For those who don't know, it is Pregnancy and Infant Loss Awareness Day. This blog is fairly new, and I've talked mostly about my daughter and parenting, but what I haven't addressed are the struggles I faced on my road to becoming a mother. I won't go into detail (at least not today) about the actual fertility issues. I will simply say that getting pregnant was not easy for us. There were major issues and we were told IVF was our only option. We were excited, overwhelmed and cautious when we got pregnant through a frozen embryo transfer (FET) the cycle following our fresh cycle IVF.
When you need IVF to get pregnant, there is a certain level of anticipation that something might go wrong. The process itself is stressful enough, but what I'm talking about is after it's over and you have had success and you are pregnant. I did a ton of research before my IVF. I knew that I was forcing my body to do something that wasn't coming naturally. I knew that it could mean the pregnancy wouldn't stick.
I'm not a person who keeps things to myself. Even though I feared that I could lose the baby, I told my friends and family right away. Even my coworkers knew fairly early on- mostly because I couldn't stop puking.
You always hear about the first trimester being the time you should worry. I remember being 12 weeks pregnant and thinking "am I safe now that I hit 12 weeks, or do I have to wait till I'm officially PAST 12 weeks before I can stop worrying about a miscarriage?". I made it past 12 weeks and I felt a little relieved. My morning sickness was still pretty intense... I remember practically eating the entire contents of Nadine's pantry while baking Christmas cookies because I would puke if I didn't have a constant stream of food in my mouth. But I told myself it was all ok. I would throw up and think "this means my baby is growing". And he was.
I had my monthly doctor's appointments and everything was going well. I still had morning sickness pretty bad, even into my 5th month, and I was absolutely exhausted all the time. But, hey, that's pregnancy for you. I was so eager for my 20 week ultrasound. I was convinced from day 1 that I was having a baby girl and I managed to convince everyone else of the same. My mom came to our appointment that day and we all reacted with a bit of shock when the ultrasound tech showed us a picture and said "there's the penis!"... apparently "it's a boy" wasn't explicit enough for her. I had never pictured myself with a boy, but I quickly adjusted my view. We made our way to Babies R Us right from the doctor's office and bought my sweet boy, Nicholas, his very first outfit.
It's pretty ironic that this visit was the turning point for me as far as fearing that I wouldn't take a baby home. I finally felt confident that everything was going to be fine. I could see my life with my son clearly and it was wonderful. I never imagined that he would never wear that first outfit, or any of the others I bought for him from that day till the day of my 24 week check-up, a month later. I could never imagine that as I shopped for baby clothes and started a registry, my tiny, perfect son was dying inside of me.
It was March 19, 2009. I was in a good mood, because my morning sickness was FINALLY subsiding. I stepped on the scale at the doctor's office and was surprised to see I had lost 2lbs. "It's that fat baby boy eating all my food", I thought. As we waited for the doctor, I remember hoping my son had turned into an odd position...somewhere the doppler couldn't pick up his heartbeat so I could get an ultrasound again. Ultrasounds were always the most fun. When the doctor came in and actually couldn't find his heartbeat, I smiled a little to myself... he was listening to his Mommy already! It never occurred to me that he didn't have a heartbeat anymore. Not even for a second. I was just anxious to get my ultrasound and see my boy again.
I expected immediate recognition of the sound of Nicky's heartbeat. I expected "there it is!" from the ultrasound tech. What I got was silence. Several uncomfortable minutes of silence. Is everything ok?. Had they missed something? I just had an ultrasound last month! I feared that they found some sort of birth defect that they missed last time. The only thing she said to me was "I need to get the doctor" and she walked out of the room.
That's when I started to cry. Rodolfo told me not to worry, that everything would be fine. It wasn't. My doctor came in, briefly looked at the ultrasound and said to me "I'm sorry, Jaclyn, he just stopped growing". It took me a second to realize that she didn't just mean that he was too small. He had stopped growing because he died. I fucking lost it. I sobbed hysterically for the next 20 minutes or so. The doctor left the room to give me and my husband a few minutes alone. I called my mom and blubbered into the phone "HE DIED MOM, HE DIED". I was so hysterical that I had to say it half a dozen times before she could understand me.
At that point I was told I needed to make a decision about how I wanted to proceed. I could have labor induced. No, definitely not. I wasn't ready, I was terrified. I couldn't spend the next day in the maternity ward, laboring with my dead child. I couldn't. My only other option was a D&E. I said yes without really knowing what it was. I was then given medicine to dilate my cervix and told to be at the hospital the next morning for my surgery. My doctor offered her condolences. I asked if she had an idea as to why this happened. She said she could run some tests but that with a D&E there is only "tissue" and it can be hard to know for sure. That's when I realized that what they meant was that they would rip my baby apart and pull him out of me in pieces. It was absolutely horrific to think about.
I went home and was in shock for the rest of the day. I sat on my couch and didn't even cry. I just stared into space and didn't know what to do. It occurred to me that maybe I made the wrong choice, but for some reason I didn't feel like I could change it now. I thought maybe I could bring on labor and my son would be born before the D&E. So I walked. I took my dog and my husband and walked to the ice cream shop a mile from my house. As it turned out, that did put me into labor.
I was given painkillers and took some as my labor got progressively harder to handle. By midnight I was waking up every 5 minutes or so with contractions. By 2am I didn't know how much more I could take. I called my doctor and she told me I only had a few more hours till I had to be at the hospital and asked if I thought I could make it. So I stayed home till 6am, then made my way over. By that point I was having contractions every 2 minutes or so. I remember waiting in the lobby of the hospital for my husband to park the car and thinking that I didn't yet look pregnant enough for anyone to realize I was in labor. People probably just thought I was whiny and fat. By the time we made it up to the surgery floor, I was begging for painkillers and told them I needed a wheelchair because I simply couldn't walk anymore.
The operating rooms were running behind and my contractions came fast and hard. I begged for meds that never came. My nurse was warm and comforting and promised that she would get me something as soon as she spoke to my doctor. When they were finally ready to bring me in for my surgery, it was after 9 am. They told me to use the bathroom before they got started and I did. I was actually wheeled into the bathroom on a gurney because I was unable to walk and having nearly constant contractions.
After that they had me get into a wheelchair and told me they were bringing me to the operating room. As I stood up I could feel the sensation that something was coming out of me. The medication I was given to dilate my cervix was in the form of medicated sponges, so I assumed that was what I felt. Nonetheless I was concerned and started shouting "something is coming out!". My nurse rushed me to the operating room, where I stood to get onto the operating table, begging them to knock me out immediately. But then I saw the sponges on the floor. I turned to look at them and my water broke. It was brown. Meconium. Fetal distress. It made me wonder if he suffered at all. It made me so sad.
A moment later, I was looking at my son. He had fallen out of me and onto the operating room floor. The nurses and my doctor all yelled at me that I shouldn't look, but I wanted to see him. I told them to please bring me my child. I saw him for a moment. He had my husband's lips but he looked like me in every other way. Then my doctor told me they would still be doing a D&C, because it was very common for the placenta to stay attached at such an early stage of pregnancy. As they brought the gas mask to my face, I just remember saying "I want my husband to see him". She told me she would try...that wasn't good enough. I looked at the nurse right in front of me and told her firmly "I want my husband to see him". She said ok and then I was out.
I don't remember the surgery at all. I didn't even have the recognition of time passing. I woke up in another room with no idea how I got there. I woke up in a clean, dry gown (as I went under, I was wet with amniotic fluid and shivering cold) with no idea who saw me naked. It was a very strange sensation. Rodolfo was there waiting for me to wake up. A few minutes later, they brought us our son.
He was on a fluffy white surface- maybe a blanket, I'm not really sure. I remember how tiny he was- only 9 ounces I would later find out. He looked like a doll. He was mostly wrapped up, so I spent a few minutes looking at his perfect face, then I took his hand and compared it to mine. His entire hand was the size of the tip of my thumb. I was vaguely aware of someone taking a picture in the background. I held him for a few minutes, then kissed him goodbye 3 times on his forehead. That was the last time I ever saw my son.
When I look at his picture now, as I sometimes do, I'm shocked at how he looked... he was purple and covered in blood. That's not how I remember him at all. He was angelic, perfect. It was unfathomable to me at the time that he wasn't just sleeping or something. He looked exactly like I pictured he would. My nose and cheeks, my husband's lips. I always pictured him with hair, but he was too young to have any yet, so that's all I can say I was surprised by, that he was bald. I wish I had taken more time to look over his whole body... to see his tiny legs and feet and butt. To take more detailed pictures of him. The ones I have are blurry and at an odd angle. I wish I would have given him a bath and maybe put a little hat on him so I could have something concrete to hold onto and say "this belonged to my son". All I have now are 2 blurry pictures and the few outfits that were the first I chose for him. And pictures of the things I registered for that I imagined he would love and use for his entire babyhood. I have so little... I have to truly cherish those few reminders.
I've felt like a mother ever since that day, March 20, 2009. It's odd because outsiders don't see you that way. If my child had lived even one day outside of my body, if he had grabbed my finger or smiled at me even once.. if I had one picture of him when he was alive, it would be so different in the eyes of everyone else.
I guess I can say that, up to that day, I had been lucky in not ever losing someone who was very close to me. So I can't really compare the loss of my son to anything else, but I can say that with the overwhelming grief came a crushing sense of guilt and responsibility. I tried to remind myself that I wasn't to blame, and now I can see it with a little more perspective. But the truth is that it's hard to see it any other way. I was the one and only person charged with caring for him and ensuring he was safe. I was the one who noticed he was moving less and didn't want to seem like one of those paranoid pregnant ladies so I never called my doctor. I was the one who left him on the floor of the operating room instead of picking him up like I wish I would have. There are just so many regrets, so much lost.
Today I have Caitlyn and she is amazing. The fear that something will happen to her never leaves me, and was especially terrifying during my pregnancy. But at least now I can look at her and know she's ok. I think of Nicholas every day. Each night I ask him to watch over his baby sister. I don't feel overwhelmingly sad every day anymore, but it's the little things that hurt the most. As I watch Caitlyn grow, I'll sometimes picture a boy version of her and know that I'm missing my Nicky. I think of how she won't ever know her big brother. As Halloween approaches, I imagine them in coordinating costumes. The reality is that if Nicholas had been born when he was supposed to, I wouldn't have ever been pregnant with Caitlyn. But I can't think of it like that. When I imagine how our life would be different if our son had lived, I don't imagine a boy instead of a girl. I imagine them both, very close in age as would have been the case if I had gotten pregnant again right away, growing up together.
So on this day, I wanted to talk about the child I lost. The child who has just as big a piece of my heart as Caitlyn does. The child I only ever got to kiss goodbye. He's mine and I'm his. And I miss him every day. I wanted to recognize that lost piece of my life. As with any mother, I think he was perfect and beautiful and special. He liked Skittles and sleeping late. He was here, if only for a moment and I want people to know him.
Below I'm going to include his photo. I don't have any pictures of him alive, unfortunately, so please be prepared for what you will see if you choose to look at these pictures. I don't think it's weird but it may make some people uncomfortable to look at them.
Today is October 15th. For those who don't know, it is Pregnancy and Infant Loss Awareness Day. This blog is fairly new, and I've talked mostly about my daughter and parenting, but what I haven't addressed are the struggles I faced on my road to becoming a mother. I won't go into detail (at least not today) about the actual fertility issues. I will simply say that getting pregnant was not easy for us. There were major issues and we were told IVF was our only option. We were excited, overwhelmed and cautious when we got pregnant through a frozen embryo transfer (FET) the cycle following our fresh cycle IVF.
When you need IVF to get pregnant, there is a certain level of anticipation that something might go wrong. The process itself is stressful enough, but what I'm talking about is after it's over and you have had success and you are pregnant. I did a ton of research before my IVF. I knew that I was forcing my body to do something that wasn't coming naturally. I knew that it could mean the pregnancy wouldn't stick.
I'm not a person who keeps things to myself. Even though I feared that I could lose the baby, I told my friends and family right away. Even my coworkers knew fairly early on- mostly because I couldn't stop puking.
You always hear about the first trimester being the time you should worry. I remember being 12 weeks pregnant and thinking "am I safe now that I hit 12 weeks, or do I have to wait till I'm officially PAST 12 weeks before I can stop worrying about a miscarriage?". I made it past 12 weeks and I felt a little relieved. My morning sickness was still pretty intense... I remember practically eating the entire contents of Nadine's pantry while baking Christmas cookies because I would puke if I didn't have a constant stream of food in my mouth. But I told myself it was all ok. I would throw up and think "this means my baby is growing". And he was.
I had my monthly doctor's appointments and everything was going well. I still had morning sickness pretty bad, even into my 5th month, and I was absolutely exhausted all the time. But, hey, that's pregnancy for you. I was so eager for my 20 week ultrasound. I was convinced from day 1 that I was having a baby girl and I managed to convince everyone else of the same. My mom came to our appointment that day and we all reacted with a bit of shock when the ultrasound tech showed us a picture and said "there's the penis!"... apparently "it's a boy" wasn't explicit enough for her. I had never pictured myself with a boy, but I quickly adjusted my view. We made our way to Babies R Us right from the doctor's office and bought my sweet boy, Nicholas, his very first outfit.
It's pretty ironic that this visit was the turning point for me as far as fearing that I wouldn't take a baby home. I finally felt confident that everything was going to be fine. I could see my life with my son clearly and it was wonderful. I never imagined that he would never wear that first outfit, or any of the others I bought for him from that day till the day of my 24 week check-up, a month later. I could never imagine that as I shopped for baby clothes and started a registry, my tiny, perfect son was dying inside of me.
It was March 19, 2009. I was in a good mood, because my morning sickness was FINALLY subsiding. I stepped on the scale at the doctor's office and was surprised to see I had lost 2lbs. "It's that fat baby boy eating all my food", I thought. As we waited for the doctor, I remember hoping my son had turned into an odd position...somewhere the doppler couldn't pick up his heartbeat so I could get an ultrasound again. Ultrasounds were always the most fun. When the doctor came in and actually couldn't find his heartbeat, I smiled a little to myself... he was listening to his Mommy already! It never occurred to me that he didn't have a heartbeat anymore. Not even for a second. I was just anxious to get my ultrasound and see my boy again.
I expected immediate recognition of the sound of Nicky's heartbeat. I expected "there it is!" from the ultrasound tech. What I got was silence. Several uncomfortable minutes of silence. Is everything ok?. Had they missed something? I just had an ultrasound last month! I feared that they found some sort of birth defect that they missed last time. The only thing she said to me was "I need to get the doctor" and she walked out of the room.
That's when I started to cry. Rodolfo told me not to worry, that everything would be fine. It wasn't. My doctor came in, briefly looked at the ultrasound and said to me "I'm sorry, Jaclyn, he just stopped growing". It took me a second to realize that she didn't just mean that he was too small. He had stopped growing because he died. I fucking lost it. I sobbed hysterically for the next 20 minutes or so. The doctor left the room to give me and my husband a few minutes alone. I called my mom and blubbered into the phone "HE DIED MOM, HE DIED". I was so hysterical that I had to say it half a dozen times before she could understand me.
At that point I was told I needed to make a decision about how I wanted to proceed. I could have labor induced. No, definitely not. I wasn't ready, I was terrified. I couldn't spend the next day in the maternity ward, laboring with my dead child. I couldn't. My only other option was a D&E. I said yes without really knowing what it was. I was then given medicine to dilate my cervix and told to be at the hospital the next morning for my surgery. My doctor offered her condolences. I asked if she had an idea as to why this happened. She said she could run some tests but that with a D&E there is only "tissue" and it can be hard to know for sure. That's when I realized that what they meant was that they would rip my baby apart and pull him out of me in pieces. It was absolutely horrific to think about.
I went home and was in shock for the rest of the day. I sat on my couch and didn't even cry. I just stared into space and didn't know what to do. It occurred to me that maybe I made the wrong choice, but for some reason I didn't feel like I could change it now. I thought maybe I could bring on labor and my son would be born before the D&E. So I walked. I took my dog and my husband and walked to the ice cream shop a mile from my house. As it turned out, that did put me into labor.
I was given painkillers and took some as my labor got progressively harder to handle. By midnight I was waking up every 5 minutes or so with contractions. By 2am I didn't know how much more I could take. I called my doctor and she told me I only had a few more hours till I had to be at the hospital and asked if I thought I could make it. So I stayed home till 6am, then made my way over. By that point I was having contractions every 2 minutes or so. I remember waiting in the lobby of the hospital for my husband to park the car and thinking that I didn't yet look pregnant enough for anyone to realize I was in labor. People probably just thought I was whiny and fat. By the time we made it up to the surgery floor, I was begging for painkillers and told them I needed a wheelchair because I simply couldn't walk anymore.
The operating rooms were running behind and my contractions came fast and hard. I begged for meds that never came. My nurse was warm and comforting and promised that she would get me something as soon as she spoke to my doctor. When they were finally ready to bring me in for my surgery, it was after 9 am. They told me to use the bathroom before they got started and I did. I was actually wheeled into the bathroom on a gurney because I was unable to walk and having nearly constant contractions.
After that they had me get into a wheelchair and told me they were bringing me to the operating room. As I stood up I could feel the sensation that something was coming out of me. The medication I was given to dilate my cervix was in the form of medicated sponges, so I assumed that was what I felt. Nonetheless I was concerned and started shouting "something is coming out!". My nurse rushed me to the operating room, where I stood to get onto the operating table, begging them to knock me out immediately. But then I saw the sponges on the floor. I turned to look at them and my water broke. It was brown. Meconium. Fetal distress. It made me wonder if he suffered at all. It made me so sad.
A moment later, I was looking at my son. He had fallen out of me and onto the operating room floor. The nurses and my doctor all yelled at me that I shouldn't look, but I wanted to see him. I told them to please bring me my child. I saw him for a moment. He had my husband's lips but he looked like me in every other way. Then my doctor told me they would still be doing a D&C, because it was very common for the placenta to stay attached at such an early stage of pregnancy. As they brought the gas mask to my face, I just remember saying "I want my husband to see him". She told me she would try...that wasn't good enough. I looked at the nurse right in front of me and told her firmly "I want my husband to see him". She said ok and then I was out.
I don't remember the surgery at all. I didn't even have the recognition of time passing. I woke up in another room with no idea how I got there. I woke up in a clean, dry gown (as I went under, I was wet with amniotic fluid and shivering cold) with no idea who saw me naked. It was a very strange sensation. Rodolfo was there waiting for me to wake up. A few minutes later, they brought us our son.
He was on a fluffy white surface- maybe a blanket, I'm not really sure. I remember how tiny he was- only 9 ounces I would later find out. He looked like a doll. He was mostly wrapped up, so I spent a few minutes looking at his perfect face, then I took his hand and compared it to mine. His entire hand was the size of the tip of my thumb. I was vaguely aware of someone taking a picture in the background. I held him for a few minutes, then kissed him goodbye 3 times on his forehead. That was the last time I ever saw my son.
When I look at his picture now, as I sometimes do, I'm shocked at how he looked... he was purple and covered in blood. That's not how I remember him at all. He was angelic, perfect. It was unfathomable to me at the time that he wasn't just sleeping or something. He looked exactly like I pictured he would. My nose and cheeks, my husband's lips. I always pictured him with hair, but he was too young to have any yet, so that's all I can say I was surprised by, that he was bald. I wish I had taken more time to look over his whole body... to see his tiny legs and feet and butt. To take more detailed pictures of him. The ones I have are blurry and at an odd angle. I wish I would have given him a bath and maybe put a little hat on him so I could have something concrete to hold onto and say "this belonged to my son". All I have now are 2 blurry pictures and the few outfits that were the first I chose for him. And pictures of the things I registered for that I imagined he would love and use for his entire babyhood. I have so little... I have to truly cherish those few reminders.
I've felt like a mother ever since that day, March 20, 2009. It's odd because outsiders don't see you that way. If my child had lived even one day outside of my body, if he had grabbed my finger or smiled at me even once.. if I had one picture of him when he was alive, it would be so different in the eyes of everyone else.
I guess I can say that, up to that day, I had been lucky in not ever losing someone who was very close to me. So I can't really compare the loss of my son to anything else, but I can say that with the overwhelming grief came a crushing sense of guilt and responsibility. I tried to remind myself that I wasn't to blame, and now I can see it with a little more perspective. But the truth is that it's hard to see it any other way. I was the one and only person charged with caring for him and ensuring he was safe. I was the one who noticed he was moving less and didn't want to seem like one of those paranoid pregnant ladies so I never called my doctor. I was the one who left him on the floor of the operating room instead of picking him up like I wish I would have. There are just so many regrets, so much lost.
Today I have Caitlyn and she is amazing. The fear that something will happen to her never leaves me, and was especially terrifying during my pregnancy. But at least now I can look at her and know she's ok. I think of Nicholas every day. Each night I ask him to watch over his baby sister. I don't feel overwhelmingly sad every day anymore, but it's the little things that hurt the most. As I watch Caitlyn grow, I'll sometimes picture a boy version of her and know that I'm missing my Nicky. I think of how she won't ever know her big brother. As Halloween approaches, I imagine them in coordinating costumes. The reality is that if Nicholas had been born when he was supposed to, I wouldn't have ever been pregnant with Caitlyn. But I can't think of it like that. When I imagine how our life would be different if our son had lived, I don't imagine a boy instead of a girl. I imagine them both, very close in age as would have been the case if I had gotten pregnant again right away, growing up together.
So on this day, I wanted to talk about the child I lost. The child who has just as big a piece of my heart as Caitlyn does. The child I only ever got to kiss goodbye. He's mine and I'm his. And I miss him every day. I wanted to recognize that lost piece of my life. As with any mother, I think he was perfect and beautiful and special. He liked Skittles and sleeping late. He was here, if only for a moment and I want people to know him.
Below I'm going to include his photo. I don't have any pictures of him alive, unfortunately, so please be prepared for what you will see if you choose to look at these pictures. I don't think it's weird but it may make some people uncomfortable to look at them.
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