A January baby. What I'd always dreamt of having. A little Capricorn like myself. I would know exactly how that baby was feeling and thinking and I'd be there for that baby like no one was ever able to be there for me.
The struggle to time it would be tough, but I was going to make it happen. I prepared myself after 3 years of trying to conceive naturally or through IUI due to my husbands infertility issues and made an appointment for IVF + ICSI once again. When I arrived, I found that the process had changed and they no longer performed fresh transfers at the clinic and I'd have to first freeze my embryos and wait an addition couple of months before hopefully becoming pregnant. My careful date planning had failed me and the additional cost of freezing embryos was an even bigger blow after already planning to spend more than we had in our savings. I went home and decided that I'd return to the doctor and beg him to do a fresh 5 day transfer. My begging and fact that my body is perfect for baring children made him agree and I was set to begin a set of painful vaginal prodding and daily injections given by myself.
After several weeks of shots, I had grown a ton of follicles! I felt like super woman! I had done it again! I actually grew so many that I had hyperstimulated and had a bad case of OHSS, which made me gain 10 pounds within a matter of days after my egg retrieval surgery. It was okay though because I had made 21 awesome eggs. 21 chances for perfect babies.
However, once it came time to add my husbands portion to the equation through ICSI, things began to go terribly wrong. Only 10 eggs were able to be fertilized. Within 2 days, we were down to only 6 eggs that were viable. By the 4th day before surgery, we were down to 2 eggs for a transfer and 1 egg that probably wouldn't make it, but they promised me they'd give it an extra 6th day to have some movement before discarding it.
The embryos were implanted and I soon had the best Mother's Day I could ever possibly ask for. Two babies growing inside of me and a set of twins giving me love on the outside. My cup runneth over.
Morning sickness set in and my arthritis symptoms were lessening (an awesome perk of being pregnant with RA). I knew both embryos had taken. History was repeating itself and I was having the same type of pregnancy that I had with the twins.
Several weeks went by as we waited our time to finally go and see the babies for the first time and hear the heartbeats, but in that time my pregnancy symptoms went away completely. In fact, I had no nausea at all and my arthritis was back so bad that I could barely walk and had been using crutches. My husband went away for a business trip in Europe and I was experiencing the panic of losing symptoms and frustration of not being able to rest my foot, but I somehow made it. When our visit to the doctor rolled around I knew it would not be as magical as I had hoped and indeed, when they checked inside of me, only one baby remained with a slow baby boy's heart rate. My little fighter.
Sad at the loss of the idea of having twins again, I quickly moved past and couldn't wait to get to the point where I could share it with the kids and others close to me. Our son Desmond being the thinker he is, managed to put the pieces together and without us knowing, went to school and proclaimed to everyone that his mommy had a baby in her belly with sheer excitement. At 11 weeks, the cat was out of the bag for me at their school. People began approaching me and congratulating me. It felt wrong and I didn't want to feel excitement so dangerously early, I had suppressed it all this time for the fear something wasn't quite right and tried not to let happen, but I started to feel excited inside anyhow.
After 10 weeks we found out the sex of the baby and confirmed that our little fighter was a boy. However, we found out around 12 weeks that the blood tests on the genetic screening they had me do was also abnormal.
I received this news while sitting at my desk at work one morning. As the doctor called and explained it was Trisomy 13, I was unsure of what that meant, but I knew it was bad. My hand holding the phone was numb and I could feel my heart beating through my chest. Frightened I asked him what this meant and he responded that we had some decisions to make. He explained further that if my baby made it full term, that I would only be able to hold him for a matter of hours or days. They hospital would keep him there with me and give him comfort care and as soon as he passed, we'd have to bury him.
I couldn't speak. The silence seemed like forever. The doctor called out my name and I answered that I was still there. I explained that I had a feeling something was wrong and this confirmed it. He said he could tell I did the last time we saw each other and he said typically mothers always know ahead of time in his experience.
He insisted that I go to the specialist right away for an amniocentesis. I left work without telling my boss. I walked to the car, sobbed for several minutes and called my husband. He left work also and we met at home soon after. I shared with my husband then that we were having a baby boy- a surprise that I had wanted to keep and excite he and the kids with in a special way for 3 years since I obviously would never be able to surprise them with an "I'm pregnant" announcement. We laid on the bed as I cried and he read about Trisomy 13 and convinced himself that nothing was wrong with our baby and all the tests were wrong.
At the specialist's office, we found it full of pregnant women, all there for happy sonograms. They had brought family, children, and friends along with them and there I sat. No family or children, just me, my husband and my sick baby. I sobbed as I waited. People looked at me awkwardly. The longer we waited, the more pregnant moms pushing strollers of very young babies came in for sonograms. They must have gotten pregnant again immediately after having their first. Some people get all the blessings.
Finally they removed me from the waiting room due to my loud sobbing and brought me through a back door to sit in a private office. Eventually a genetics specialist came in to explain Trisomy 13 further to us. My husband argued with her endlessly saying she was wrong. At the end of all the talk, I was moved into a sonogram room to check where our baby boy was laying so they knew were to stick the needle for the amniocentesis. After taking several measurements and oohing and aaahing over our beautiful boy, it was time to hear that magical heartbeat. But it never came. The tech said, "okay guys, I'm not seeing a heartbeat any longer. I'm going to get the doctor." My husband wailed out "No" and began sobbing extremely loud. I froze. This wasn't happening. The doctor rushed into the room and pushed around on my belly for a good while with the sonogram machine and then confirmed that our baby boy had passed.
Just like that. It was over.
He explained that my body didn't even know it was miscarrying. Things should be collapsing down there and I should have had more progress at this point. "In two or three months it should pass" he told me if I wanted to do it naturally. Still frozen, I asked him what I was so do with my baby when he came out. Where do I put him? How will I know? I had so many questions and the only answer I can remember him saying was that I could put him in a jar and bring him for a further autopsy. Bottle up my perfect baby boy in a jar in a few months after carrying his lifeless body in my womb and drop him off at a doctors office? How could I? Who could do that?!
I opted for the D&C and they rushed it in for the very next morning.
I arrived at the hospital, already sobbing, with my sister helping me along the way. My husband was home with the kids taking them to a dentist and doctor visit. They put me in a room and nurse after nurse came in to get the entire rundown of my miscarriage again and again- all while saying "everything happens for a reason." I hate that phase now. What is the reason other than God hates me? No one ever has a reason. Not even the nurses that said they had experienced miscarriages themselves figured out the reason. Things don't happen for a reason, God hates your or he doesn't. God hates me. How could he create a life inside of me that would die? How could he hear my pleas for a bigger family for years and do this to me?
The doctor arrived for the surgery, held my hands and said to me, "Tiffany, it's truly better this way." And although I trust him, I still feel upset that I didn't get to hold my baby for at least a few seconds- no matter how deformed he may have come out looking. Why couldn't God have at least given me a few seconds? Why couldn't he have let it be perfect from the start?
I awoke from surgery hours later and quickly rose up from my bed in recovery. I was drugged heavily, but it wasn't helping. I was wailing that I wanted my baby back. I hadn't clear vision due to the drugs, but a woman was hugging me from the side of my bed, rocking me and telling me I'd be okay and I kept arguing with her that I'd never be the same. They gave me morphine every 5 minutes and I wouldn't pass out. They removed all other patients from the recovery room because I was so loud. Eventually they gave up on making me sleep and took me back to my room to cry. After about 8 hours, I was getting dressed again and going home- without my baby boy. I was empty.
Entering my second trimester, I had felt secure in my pregnancy and ordered the cutest "Big Brother" and "Big Sister" shirts for pregnancy announcement photos. I had even ordered our baby boy a few things too. I spent weeks picking the items out and waiting the chance to order them and I had finally gotten to place the order. As I sat at home grieving on my bedroom floor alone for days after the surgery, the mail would arrive each day. Each delivery brining more and more items for my baby boy. It was salt to my wound. I'd quickly wrap up the items for shipping and return them while sobbing in the post office. I had to get them away. They were pointless now.
A matter of days before, I was daydreaming of what color hair my baby boy would have and now there were no signs anywhere- even on my body- that he had even existed. All I had were some sonogram pictures, my weekly bump progression photos and a picture of he and the other embryo that we lost. That was it. How would he be remembered? No one even knew he existed. I couldn't keep my sweet boy a secret from the world. I needed him to live on. I panicked. I gathered my few remnants of my baby boy and ran to Target to get frames. I had to frame him and make him visible to the twins. We had to use his name. We had to talk about him. Sadly Target did not have a single picture frame that fit a sonogram photo. I sat on the bottom shelf in the home accent section and again sobbed uncontrollably. Not one tender mercy, God? You can't even let there be a frame left in the store to hold my dead baby's photo?
I went home and poured out my soul to God. I yelled at Him. I cried to Him. But I never felt His presence. I read my patriarchal blessing and looked for help. I found nothing. I had done everything I was blessed to do. Where are my rewards? I'm not asking for much- just a bigger family to love. Why doesn't he care?
My husband and I discussed my panic of him being forgotten and he agreed we should start using his name. I had picked out twin boy names when I had my embryos implanted and we decided this one should be Jude. Kingston Jude. My husband took me to Tiffany's to have him added to my necklace that has the twin's initials on them. When I arrived with Amélie in tow, the sales associate could tell I wasn't well. As I explained what I was there for, Amélie interrupted several times to ask when she was going to get to hold Jude. The situation wasn't setting in for the twins. The sales associate took me to the back, sat me down to rest, took my necklace, cleaned it and put it together for me and brought it back to me. Finally, someone who didn't tell me "everything happens for a reason" and just helped me on my way. I felt better to have a memento of him around my neck, but my sadness remained.
The day I arrived from the hospital, I found I had lost my appetite. After a few days, I realized I hadn't eaten since the morning I received the call from the doctor.
It has been over a week since I lost my baby boy and I still haven't eaten (just water), yet I'm fully functioning and able to feel every ounce emotional pain this loss has dealt me.
The physical recovery from my D&C lasted a day, but the pain of this miscarriage will not go away for a very long time.
I'm still struggling to figure out why this happened and what I did wrong to deserve such a horrible experience. I read and read stories and scriptures to find insight, but I'm still left confused. Why Jude? Why me? Haven't I been given enough trials? Why do babies come so easily for bad parents and irresponsible teenagers and not for someone who wants to raise their children with love, comfort, and give them everything they can? I'll never understand this.
No comments:
Post a Comment