Loss and Life

On Friday, September 29, 2006, I found out that I was pregnant for the third time. This was an unexpected blessing, for which we were both grateful and hopeful. The last time it hadn't worked out, and we wanted this baby so much. I had a hard time wrapping my brain around this pregnancy because, for so many weeks, I didn't feel pregnant. (Well, except for the three-day stretch when I wanted nothing but green beans.) Maybe it was a subconscious way of protecting my heart after losing the last baby so recently. Or maybe my girlfriends were right that I didn't feel sick because it was a boy. It didn't take me long to decide my girlfriends and Ava were right--it was a boy. And he was growing, as was my belly. I started feeling pregnant once that pregnant belly made its appearance.

On Wednesday, November 8th, my worst fears were confirmed. I was eleven and a half weeks pregnant, but our baby had no heartbeat. Development had ceased three weeks earlier. It was too early for gender, but I will always feel like this baby was a boy. The same thing happened last time too. But this time my husband was at my side and felt my despair as we listened to our options. After several agonizing days, I chose to let nature take its course.

At this time four nights ago, I was doing everything I could to distract myself from the pain of labor. (This was no "heavy period" like they said it would be...) They say you forget the pain after your child is born, and that is largely true. I gave birth to Ava naturally, so I felt every contraction. And even a week ago, I was still convinced that despite knowing intellectually what a physically painful experience it was, I would birth my next child naturally too. After a few hours of intense labor pains Wednesday night, I remembered fully the physical pain of childbirth, and I was baffled as to how I had endured that for almost eleven hours with Ava. (At one point while discussing this feat, I exclaimed to my husband, "I am a lunatic!") Until Wednesday night, thanks to the merciful phenomenon of childbirth amnesia, I had lived blissfully unaware that labor really was "that bad" and it will be "that bad" again. The memory of childbirth pain indeed subsides after you hear the first cry of your newborn child and they place her in your arms, where you see the fruit of your labor, and it's all made worth it. The pain pales in comparison to your immense joy.

The pain of childdeath is different. It doesn't go away. You remember the agony because there's no reward at the end. There's no little human whose breath you feel on your neck, whose fingers you wrap around your own, whose warm body you press against yourself as you settle into a cozy snuggle. The childbirth experience is quickly absorbed by the in-love experience that immediately follows. The childdeath experience is not. It is just pain followed by more pain.

Shortly after 1:00AM on Thursday, November 16, 2006, my third child came into the world, and I was privileged to see him. I knew it was very unlikely that I would ever know it when he left my body, but I held on to my hope and kept watching for him anyway. I knew I'd know my child when I saw him...if I saw him. Then sometime around 1:15, there he was, a surprise waiting for me to discover him staring back at me. I knew that was my baby. He was different than all the other matter I'd been seeing for hours upon hours. His eyes were so amazingly distinct in his tiny little face, and though I knew he wasn't really looking back at me, I felt like he was seeing me and feeling me loving him. There was my baby...my child. I calmly called out to my husband to come see our baby. We marveled together at his magnificence in much the same way parents of full-term newborns do. But he didn't do anything. He couldn't. He had no life left in his precious body. He barely got started. But he had the most wonderful eyes.

The moments and hours that followed are a frightening blur now. Due to an obvious complication, I started bleeding so fast that there was no more time to spend with my newest child, not even time to take his picture. I had to save my life for my one living child, who was just awakening with an untimely fever spike. She was all too aware that something serious was happening, and she wouldn't even hug me for fear that she would be saying goodbye forever, I think. I could sense her fear. And from that moment on, no matter how sad I was over the loss of my third child--our second fetal loss in four months' time--my mind was set on getting help before it was too late. I couldn't die. I wouldn't die. And I didn't. We got there in time. And I wouldn't have wanted to get there a minute later because I had used up every store of calmness and strength I could muster by the time we made it to the ER. Where those left off, prayers took over, and I came through just fine in the end, admitting, "I should have opted for the surgery...."

But if I had done that, I never would have experienced the blessing of being face to face with my tiny baby. And though I will never forget the pain of childdeath or stop wishing I had a picture of him while he looked so fresh and full of life, I will always cherish those sweet moments I had with him and count it among the most joyous experiences of my life, meeting that child of mine, seeing his eyes, getting the chance to say I will always love you and Goodbye to his face before I rushed away to live.