nothing to worry about.”
“Is it because your baby is sick and it’s going to die?”
“No darling, the baby is fine.”
Ted is very perceptive and obviously quite the eavesdropper, but this still floored me. He had clearly sensed that something was amiss and picked up a few little soundbites along the way. Ted was obsessed with this baby and had been asking so many questions about it. If this baby didn’t make it, his little heart would be broken too.
I love Christmas and adore cooking Christmas lunch and making a big day of it. But my heart wasn’t in it, for obvious reasons. If I could have skipped it altogether, I happily would have. Luckily, Josh’s entire family was on Kangaroo Island, off the coast of South Australia. We were doing a very small lunch at my parents’ house, with just my older brother and his partner, over from Melbourne. I’d messaged my brother the day before, to organise a swim and a catch-up, so he could see the kids. I had an echocardiogram at the Women’s at 4pm on Christmas Eve, to investigate an additional issue picked up in the baby’s heart during Thursday’s scan, so Josh brought the kids to see my brother. I told my brother in my message that things were not going well with the baby, and the only way I’d make it through Christmas Day was to not talk about the baby at all.
I wonder now how I will feel towards Christmas in the future. It was such a pivotal day for us, the year Miles was born. I had gone to such extreme lengths to hide my distress from the boys, until they went to their dad’s on Christmas Day. I’d taken them to a movie the week before, sobbing through the whole thing in the dark, only just pulling myself together before we walked out of the cinema together, into the sunshine. I avoided school holiday hotspots, as I was terrified of bumping into people. I always feel obliged to tell people exactly what is going on, so I didn’t want to risk seeing people and having to explain why I was so down, especially in front of the kids. But once we got through the Christmas Day – the last thing we were expected to show up for – Josh and I were free to hide away and no longer had to keep up our brave faces.
A few very close friends knew what we were facing. The lovely ones who took the boys for the day when we had our first appointment with MFM were an incredible support. My best friend was over from London, and I felt I could tell her the full extent of the situation. And of course, there was Anna, the friend who had lost her own baby ten years ago. Our next MFM appointment was on 27 December. Although I knew the outcome was unlikely to change with this final scan, I was wishing upon every star in the sky that it would. The amniocentesis results that came back on Christmas Eve had cleared us of all syndromes, infections, etc. The only possible explanations remaining for our baby’s condition were NAIT (neonatal alloimmune thrombocytopenia) or a one-in-a-million brain hemorrhage.
Like many do when faced with this kind of tragedy, I began to bargain with the universe. I’m not religious, but I kept hoping that by some miracle, some twist of fate, our baby would be fine. I refused to believe this could even be happening. The why us? question played on repeat. What had we possibly done to deserve this? The answer was simple: nothing.
It wasn’t fair. Even though you hear of people losing babies, you always think it won’t happen to you. The odds will be in your favour, not against it. I wondered if I’d been ‘chosen’ because I am strong and as much as I didn’t want to have to survive this trauma, I knew I would somehow cope if the worst happened. I suppose the other way of looking at it is, why not us? As much as we would all like to think we can pass through life without tragedy or pain, it is unlikely that we will. Many people are lucky not to experience earth-shattering grief until later in life. For Josh and me, it seemed very likely we would face it relatively young.
Someone said to me, “At least you have three beautiful children.” I remember thinking, yes, I am so, so lucky, but I certainly didn’t need this utter devastation to make me realise that, or appreciate my living children. I always have and always will. Having to share the custody of the boys and going through a high-risk pregnancy with Bonnie had already reinforced this. Like all parents, I found my children exhausting and exasperating at times, but I was also so grateful to be their mum. I was worried that if the baby didn’t make it, the grief would crush me so much I wouldn’t be able to parent my living children. I was also worried I’d feel so guilty that they lived but their little sibling didn’t and wouldn’t know how to make sense of the injustice of it. My mind was in overdrive, with so many conflicting emotions vying for attention. But once we had got through Christmas and waved off the boys, our baby and his or her future dominated my every thought, without interruption or distraction.
Chapter 6 Preparing for the worst imaginable thing
The final appointment brought no joy. The swelling of the brain was still extreme, the blood clot had not moved and there was absolutely no change in our baby’s situation. Doctors are not allowed to tell you what to do, but in the kindest, simplest way, we were told there was absolutely no hope for our child. There were three doctors in the room with us reviewing the final scan, which in itself spoke volumes in a busy public hospital unit. The two female specialists who took me in for the final scan were so beautifully empathetic that I could not stop crying as they analysed the baby’s brain and discussed the outcome. It was clear to us from everything said that there had been no change and was no likelihood of one occurring.
From this point forward, everything was a hellish blur. Paperwork was signed, bookings were made. I had to sign a piece of paper that would result in the loss of this precious baby. I suppose the best thing I can liken it to is a parent having to switch off their child’s life-support machine. A task you never, ever imagine you will have to do; a task so dreadful and confronting that it beggars belief. In our case, I was the life-support machine and there was no tangible switch. In its place, there was a pill to swallow that would cause my placenta to stop working and induce labour. I still don’t know how I physically swallowed that pill. I didn’t want to barely scratches the surface of the torment within me. All I wanted was this beautiful baby, who I already loved so dearly, to stay with us.
In order to cope, I tried to rationalise it. I was so emotionally invested in my imagined future as a mother of four that I kept thinking it was all just a horrible nightmare. Josh was far more pragmatic. He knew we had no option, but as he admitted, it’s much easier to take a practical approach if you’re not the one who can still feel the baby kicking and moving inside you. I couldn’t comprehend how the baby could be so safe inside me, yet have no chance of surviving once born. The stark contrast between what I could feel physically and what I was trying to wrap my brain around emotionally was sending me mad. I was also exhausted. I hadn’t been sleeping and the emotional toll of the last few weeks had caught up with me.
Now that the final ‘decision’ (this will always be said in quotation marks, as to me this step was not a real choice or decision) had been made, I wanted to get the next stage over with. I was traumatised by the sight and feel of my pregnant belly. I toyed with the idea of asking a close friend to take some photos for me, but in the end, I didn’t. I felt too self-conscious. Now I wish I had, but not going ahead with that influenced many other decisions in the coming days. I didn’t want any more regrets. I was acutely aware of how limited our time would be with our baby and didn’t want to miss another opportunity to create memories, especially due to decisions made because of my own awkwardness. I didn’t want this to happen, I didn’t ask for it, and couldn’t control it or stop it. The only thing I could control was how I chose to handle it.
The day after the final MFM appointment was Josh’s birthday, 28 December. We had stumbled through a month usually overflowing with celebrations and happiness, navigating my birthday, Christmas, and now had Josh’s birthday, with New Year’s Eve still ahead. These dates were meaningless to us this year. I did wonder how December would ever be a happy month for us again, as it had always been. How could we ever be happy during the month in which our baby died? But I am now confident that we will come to see it as a month to celebrate and remember Miles in. It feels nice that he’s a December baby, like Josh and me.
We decided to go out for sushi (something I’d fastidiously avoided for the previous six months) and I needed to collect some things for the labour ward. It was incomprehensibly