PagesThe Hospital: Trying to save our babies, moment by moment --via Caring Bridge

Tuesday, January 17, 2017

My daughter would be two today.

Today is the second anniversary of birth and death for S.  We have a lot of stress related to housing and a lot of joy related C.  Between the three of us we have been sick for over a month and we didn't plan anything notable this year.  For some reason I thought that would be okay but now I'm not so sure.  I'm up while C. is sleeping, in the dark quiet house .

I keep remembering the day or so leading up to this moment.  We knew that she would be born, it was no longer avoidable and the strategy shifted from saving her to having her without contractions to try to save G. I am brought back to the  antepartum room we had been staying in with the plant and lamp from home, the wall hanging covering the religious iconography, the quilt from my friend, the diffused light, trying to make ourselves presentable before rounds after sleepless nights.  We had gone over the plan in detail with Pat the 24 hour dr. who was on duty, everything from how we would start the mag and what it would feel like, to the light that would be wheeled in, to how to breakdown the bed but still that ultrasound that showed S. had slipped past my cervix was devastating and in some way still felt unexpected.  The prep ended up being mostly unnecessary, our MFM attended the delivery along with Pat and we moved to the labor and delivery side.  The mag blurred my vision so much that it was a struggle to see our sweet girl for her short life, I wasn't prepared for that.

How is it that I will never hold her? Never see her grow? Never hear her voice? The bottomlessness of this never is always just beyond my comprehension. My love for her is never enough to save her.