A dream of you

I just took medicine to make a dream of you. I chose to do it. The same medicine people use to abort babies they don't want. Except you are wanted-so desperately. I feel like a traitor to us both, to choose to force you away from me, even though you are already gone...

We saw you then at 7 weeks, waving, smiling, a happy heart dancing in your chest. And my dream was cemented. A third child we could love-that would bring light and joy to our lives. You measured a little small, but the doctor there said it could be error...they saw a small sub-chorionic bleed, a "dime a dozen" they said. Nothing to worry about if the bleeding wasn't making it to the outside. And it wasn't. She said things looked good, and your heart looked healthy and strong and that there was a less than 3% chance that we would lose you. The thing is, I never play the odds, because I have bad luck.



So, the weeks passed and we dreamed of you-would you look more like Gillian or Addie? Would you be a little brother or sister? We loved the timing-we could announce your coming on Christmas day-at 12 weeks on the dot. You were due on Addie's birthday. I would have the months of July and August to spend nesting with my girls-who wouldn't have to go to camp now that I would be on leave-and my sweet new baby. I would be able to help the girls transition to their new school by walking them there every morning and picking them up-no aftercare-and we could walk with our old friends/new neighbors who are having a new baby at the end of March, those friends who have two girls the same age as our girls..who are dear friends of us and our girls. It was perfect. It couldn't be more perfect.

I planned how I would tell my colleagues and shared the news with a few close friends. We had a wonderful idea of how to tell the girls on Christmas Eve-we are reading "Unwrapping the Greatest Gift" for advent. We were going to make crowns and talk about the three kings who brought gifts to the newborn baby in Bethlehem, and Sean and I would give them a gift-the gift of you-that night.

Two days ago, I went for my monthly prenatal, and Dr. couldn't find your heart beating. That same little heart that was so cheerfully greeting me before. I felt a lot of fear. That nagging feeling that something wasn't quite right that I had had since the first ultrasound-when you were too small-returned. We heard Gillian and Addie's heart on the fetal monitor at 10 weeks or just before, and you were then 10 weeks and 4 days..Dr. joked that maybe he'd lost his touch. I told him that wasn't possible. He said for peace of mind he would send me for an ultrasound the next day.

I read all the blogs and saw all the posts of all the women who said they didn't hear a heartbeat but saw a healthy little heart beating when they went for the followup ultrasound. I was heartened by that, and chose to assume you were in there, hiding away, you tiny lentil heart beating somewhere safe and warm. I stifled my unease as I went to Gillian's class and did the scheduled craft with the children...life moving right along. The next morning dawned, and we did the normal routine and dropped the kids off at school. We went to the hospital for the ultrasound. It took 40 minutes to be called back for our exam.

The tech was nice, I told her we were there for peace of mind. Sean sat next to me, and the tech pulled you up on the screen. There you were, but you weren't. You floated lifelessly in your tiny love space. No movement- no primal nerve twitches, no blood flow. The cardiac tones were gone. The happy little heart was still. You never grew past 8 weeks...you had grown 1 week and 2 days over a month's time, but it was hard to say when you had passed since it seemed you had been growing too slow. And right at that moment, my heart broke, and all those dreams of you felt suspended, like you were on the screen, lifeless and dull and broken. She said she was concerned but that the doctor would interpret what anyone would have seen there. You had passed. Gone away. You had left me, the child we so wanted. The child that would have been our light and joy. It was surreal, what followed. The tech stepped out and I dissolved in Sean's arms after a trip to the bathroom, where I washed my hands with the soap they had in the NICU when Gillian was born. How many prayers had I said with that scent on my hands already? There was no praying now. The doctor came in the interpret what we already knew and was matter of fact. She tried to hide the fact that she was desensitized to the grief of mothers after so many visits like ours. She talked, but I was dead inside. I didn't hear her. I just knew a kind NP came in afterwards and led me to the private exit for mothers of dead babies so no one had to see the crippling grief--the grief etched in every tear that poured out of my heart.

We went home then. To our home that is happy and safe and warm. We went home to drop me off. To wait for Dr. to call and tell me what was next. While I waited Sean made some calls. To work, to family, to music teachers...And I looked for an angel grave marker, already planning the most beautiful place to lay you down. There will be flowers  at the place we will set aside to visit you. And a sleeping infant angel to guard you, like you are guarding us now. I found a small cherry ring box for your tiny casket and a website to help me find you in the mess of what will come today and tomorrow. I realized that I need to know if you are a daughter or son. I need to know why you died, if DNA tests can tell me. Dr. called and gave me the three options- 1) D&C (essentially an abortion where the suck the tissue out and scrape your uterus clean-which results in a chopped up mess of tissue) 2) natural miscarriage, which can take up to 6 weeks (the idea of carrying you lifelessly around that long was too devastating to consider) or 3) taking prostaglandins to induce labor. I chose the third option. Maybe birthing you would be cathartic. Heart shattering and bloody, but in the privacy and comfort of my own space. I told the doctor that your body belongs here with us, intact. They can have the rest for their tests, but I need to hold you, just this once, and bury you close to me.

The girls came home after a music show for Addie (the ONLY performance or reading or event I have ever missed of either of theirs-I just couldn't do this in public), and music lessons, and swim class. They came home, innocent, and sweet. They were concerned because they story had been that I was very sick..sick with grief, perhaps. The came and nestled into bed because I told them there was something Papa and I needed to talk to them about. So, I told them that there was a baby in my tummy, and they said they noticed it getting fatter, and I told them Papa and I found out our baby had died that morning. Addie felt my grief momentarily and then went in to comedian mode trying to undo what I had just said. Gillian fell apart, asking over and over again if I would be ok, she begged me not to cry, which made me cry harder. She weakly offered that we could have another baby one day, like getting to this point-11 weeks of fear and worry, and paranoia-was on par with going to the store and buying a new baby. We cried and cried, Gillian and I--my empathic angel girl. The one Sean had said, sitting in the ultrasound room, that we had used our grace card to save, our Get out of Grief Free card those 8 years ago when we nearly lost her when she was born too soon...11 weeks too soon, and a week of blood transfusions and blood infections, and all the praying and lack of sleep. We used up our Miracle then. There wasn't any left for this baby.

This morning I got up after terrible sleep. I saw that my hospital bracelet, the one Gillian had asked why I didn't take off the night before, was still there. I answered her with, "it reminds me that this isn't just a terrible dream." So this morning, I humorlessly noticed, it was still there-this was not a terrible dream. It is horribly real. I woodenly did what I had to do. I drove them to school, I picked up the tissue containers from the doctor that were filled with formalin to preserve it after waiting entirely too long in the waiting room for something that was supposed to be waiting for me...my eyes were red rimmed and shiny and ravaged. I saw people shifting uncomfortably when they encountered my grief stricken eyes. I was like a wall of sadness, I reckon. Of heartbrokenness. People know that when they see it, it's instinctive. After that, I went to the pharmacy, and got the medicine that will make you leave the comfort of my body, where you belong, and out into the little wooden box that will be buried in the frozen ground. I inserted that medication as they told me, and I am waiting for my labor to begin-to end our bodies entertwining.

We will never teach you to walk or hear you laugh or hear you speak; I will never feel your sweet milk-breath on by cheek, or feel your slight little body sleeping over my heart. But I will feel you all around us, another one of my many angels. Somewhere, I have made my mother a heaven grandmother, and I know she will love you and love you and love you until I can hold you, mother you at long last, in the light of ever after.

The birds they sang
at the break of day
Start again
I heard them say
Don't dwell on what
has passed away
or what is yet to be.

Ring the bells that still can ring
Forget your perfect offering
There is a crack in everything
That's how the light gets in.
                                  -Leonard Cohen

Goodnight, Sweet Babe.
Love, Mama