Day 4: Dark + Light

Capture Your Grief Day 4: Dark + Light

There's the old adage, "when life hands you lemons, make lemonade," but when life punches you in the stomach and rips out your heart it's a little hard to find anything sweet and worth salvaging from it. Some might think that it's just the days following the death of our son that were the darkest, and while they might be right, they certainly weren't the only truly dark moments. There were the days which if we told anyone else other than our friends who also buried their babies about them, we most likely would be critically judged. The what ifs and why us persist long past the time most people think it probably should. The why them is the harder one to admit. Yes, I admit it. There were several times when we found out someone was having a baby that was less than suited to be a parent and it just made us want to scream! It seems like every cocaine addict on the planet can have a perfectly easy pregnancy with a healthy baby while parents that do everything right and want a baby so badly are stripped of it and told by doctors there is no reason they can find that it happened. Then there are the days that are just dark for no reason. They days you wake up crying and fight with your husband for absolutely no reason.

But the absolute darkest day for me I barely remember. It started at about 1am when I was told they could no longer find a heartbeat. My husband was 3 hours away for work and I was in the triage room by myself, waiting for my mom to arrive. I had drove straight there from work after not having felt the baby move for a few hours. My worst fears were coming true. I watched the ultrasound of my baby and the blank face on the doctor. He had to bring another doctor in to confirm. As if being told it the first time wasn't hard enough but I had to be told a second time. Then I was given the decision. Stay, be admitted and be induced to give birth to your dead baby or go home and wait it out; eventually my body would go into labor naturally to rid itself of the dead baby. Wow. What wonderful choices you give me. I just looked at my mom unable to even speak. She asked a few questions, I called my husband told him our son had died and heard him just bust out sobbing and screaming "No, why!" 

The rest of the morning hours became a blur. I was admitted and the induction process began. It hurt like a mother f-er. I mean seriously? My baby dies and now they torment me? I was beginning to think I made the wrong decision but then again, was there a better option? To make matters worse, I began to run a fever. By the time my next Doctor came on duty, my husband was there, my friends were there, my extended family was there and my fever had spiked to nearly 105. The new doctor immediately took me off the induction meds, assuming I was having a bad reaction to them. I was only dilated 2cm at the time. Less than 30 minutes later I was a 10, in excruciating pain, active labor and no epidural yet. The amazing nurse I had was running around like crazy trying to get me an epidural while I screamed in pain "why is this happening to me?!" I finally got the epi and the doctor asked me if I wanted to push. I snapped no and she left me alone. Remember there was no urgency. I wouldn't be birthing a living baby. Some time passed and I'm pretty sure I slept and then she came and asked me again if I wanted to push. I agreed, knowing I would have to eventually. See most women could have mustered through the pain knowing that the outcome would be their beautiful baby they would take home. For me, labor was the beginning of the end.

Fortunately, I didn't have to push long before Nolan was born. We were given the option of having a photographer come, which I said yes to. The nurse helped me bathe him, we had him baptized, then we had our only family photos done with him. Lastly, we were talked to about our plans for his remains. Never in a million years had I imagined I would be having to decide what funeral home, should we bury or cremate our baby boy. Then I was told there was a chance my milk would come in too. To help ward it off I was told to bind my chest for several days with ace bandages. Again, I was lucky at least that worked and I wasn't forced to deal with lactating breasts.

I stayed in the hospital for several days after but Nolan only stay for a few hours with me. When they wheeled him away for the last time, I immediately wished I had held him longer, spent more time with him. But the truth was, no matter how long they kept him with me I would have wished that. The day I left the hospital my husband and I drove to the funeral home to finish making our son's burial arrangements. Those days were the darkest of my life.

No light came until the day, nearly 1 year later when my healthy son Ronan was born. Some would think that the pregnancy would shed some light on our lives but instead it just was full of worry and biweekly doctor visits. I felt as though I was treading on eggshells the entire 9 months. Every day that Ronan has been on this earth with us has brought more and more light into our lives. He is the rainbow that colors our life. We were drowning in our sorrow and Ronan was the life boat that saved us.