baby. I’d been through this ritual before: packing a hospital bag for me and my expected baby felt familiar. I’d always taken great care with this process and decided it would be no different for this baby. He or she was just as special and deserved the same care as my other children. And whether I liked it or not, I was about to be put into labour. I needed these items.
I was desperate to find a toy for the baby, a little talisman I could keep to remind me of him or her. Nothing seemed right: I couldn’t find anything delicate or special enough. I searched and searched, and just before giving up, I found the sweetest little honey-coloured bear. When we got home, I rang the genetics counsellor at the Women’s and Children’s Hospital. I needed to know the gender of my baby before delivery and knew it would have been recorded from the amniocentesis. I think I would have been devastated regardless of the answer, as we were equally excited about having another boy or another girl. A sister for Bonnie would have been lovely – and what a combo two boys and two girls would be! A baby boy would have been equally wonderful: Ted was desperate for another brother, Bonnie was quite a tomboy, and we were already quite a boy-oriented household.
When I learned it was a boy, my heart broke just that little bit more. I don’t know why exactly. I think in my mind, a boy was a mini version of Josh, and that was the one thing (biologically) we had not experienced together. In my gut, I had felt like I was having a boy from very early on in the pregnancy. The thought that I had known this by instinct made me feel genuinely connected to this child. I’d had also felt that something was not quite right from the start – and it turned out I was correct on both fronts. Maternal instinct is a truly strong force, and should never be ignored or dismissed.
I went through the older boys’ baby things: the special pieces I’d put aside as keepsakes. I knew none of the clothes would fit, so I picked out three of my favourite baby blankets. My absolute favourite was a wrap with navy blue stars, which both boys were wrapped in after they were delivered. I have near-identical pictures of the boys wrapped in blue stars in hospital, and wanted the same for my third son. I also wanted to name our little boy before he was delivered. I was scared that if we left it until after he was born, we would waste the short, precious time we’d have with him in hospital trying to decide on a name. (We didn’t have a good track record in this department: it took three days to name Bonnie, who was very nearly a Daisy). It was at this point that I realised Josh and I were approaching the situation very differently.
He had been shocked to learn that the baby would be delivered by induced labour. He had assumed that the baby would be delivered in ‘a procedure’, done under general anesthetic or by caesarean. He had no idea we would be given the opportunity to hold and cuddle our baby: a notion which repulsed and horrified him. I felt the exact opposite. I wanted to hold our baby, love him, have pictures taken and treat him just like my other children. I had carried him within me and it felt unnatural to do anything other than nurture him after he was born.
I brought up names and the only thing Josh wanted was for the baby’s initials to match his late father’s initials: M.J.B. Josh was happy to call him M.J., but for me that seemed like a shortcut, like we weren’t bothering to give him a proper name, as he wasn’t going to come home with us. Instead, I said I’d find a name to fit with the initials. I love to talk things over and over, but Josh doesn’t. I texted him a list of suggested names (some which weren’t M’s or J’s, but names I hoped he might go with anyway). He replied with the only two M/J names on the list: Marcus and Jack. These names didn’t mean anything to me, but I was determined to go in with a basic list to work with. I swapped the Jack for Joshua, as that is Josh’s full name, and stuck with Marcus.
I didn’t want to name our little boy something I would frequently hear in playgrounds or at school. The thought of hearing his name called out seemed too cruel. I have a cousin named Mark so was unsure of Marcus, I wanted a name that was unique but also very ‘us’. Naming a baby who is not going to live is not easy. I would happily have named him any of the names we’d started talking about together before we knew we’d lose him, but none of them were M names and given it was Josh’s only request, I wanted to fulfil it.
Chapter 7 Saying hello and goodbye in the same moment
What do you do the night before you go to hospital to deliver a stillborn baby? There is no guide for it, and apart from continuing to breathe in and out, I can offer few meaningful suggestions. Beaches, a movie I had watched a thousand times as a child in the eighties, was on TV. It’s not something I would watch now, nor something Josh would ever think of sitting through, but we put it on. I cried the whole way through. I swallowed a sleeping tablet, sent a prayer of hope to the sleep gods, and I’m pretty sure I cried in my sleep all night. The next morning, the thought of picking up my hospital bag, getting into the car and walking into that hospital seemed impossible. Josh, Bonnie and I drove there together. The plan was for Josh to drop Bonnie to my parents once I was settled, then come back.
Hopping in the car, popping the seatbelt around my bump for the very last time, I was overwhelmed with sadness. As Josh turned on the ignition, the Pharrell Williams song ‘Happy’ came on. Oh, the irony! I started laughing out loud. The past few weeks had robbed me of my sense of humour, and certainly my happiness, but I caught a glimpse of both. I think of Miles whenever I hear that song now. Perhaps it was his little way of telling us that one day we would be happy again, and giving us his permission to be so.
Walking into the hospital with a two-year-old was a great distraction and made what seemed so unnatural feel a tiny bit normal. We were taken to our room at the end of the labour and delivery ward, ‘away’ from the noise of crying newborns, and introduced to the midwife who would be looking after us. She turned out to be a friend of a friend, which could have been bad or good. She carefully mentioned the connection – a friend of mine from the mother’s group I was in with Alfie nine years ago – and I instantly felt comfortable with her. She was in the middle of a difficult divorce, something I could relate to, we bonded over that. As sad and horrible as what lay ahead was, I felt I was in good hands. She treated me with absolute kindness and compassion, which helped to minimise the trauma ahead.
I had given birth three times before (two inductions and one spontaneous labour) and each time, the epidurals had worked in different ways. In my first labour, I had refused one until late and ended up so dosed up, I didn’t feel a thing at the end. For the inductions, the epidural was suggested from the get-go as induced labour can be far more intense and come on fast and strong. In both of these deliveries, the epidural had worked for the first stage of labour, but by the time I felt like I really needed it, I had run out of time for a top-up. For this labour, patient-led analgesia was the only option I had. It is pain relief dispensed via a drip, re-loaded by pressing a button at five-minute intervals. I didn’t have the energy to question why, and just accepted that this would be all I was getting.
Josh came back from dropping Bonnie to my parents as restless as ever. Knowing how hard he finds hospitals, I suggested he go and have lunch somewhere. I had just had my first round of tablets, so knew nothing was going to happen in a hurry. After the second dosage of tablets, my labour progressed very quickly. I wanted to stop time. I didn’t want to deliver this baby. That would mean it was over, that he really had died, and there was no way of reversing or changing his fate. It was as intense and as painful as all of my other deliveries. I had naively thought that because I was delivering a pre-term baby, it would somehow be physically easier. By some small mercy, it was faster, but in no way did that dampen the pain.
The thing that still haunts me is the silence of the delivery room. No excitement, no reward after a painful labour, no first cry. The first of many lost firsts. No first tooth, first step, first word. Our baby’s life began and ended the second he was born. During the final excruciating stage of labour, pushing went against every instinct. The contractions felt like my body was failing me. The experience was truly traumatic. I don’t think I will ever get over or come to terms with it.
The midwife gently wrapped up our little boy and handed him to me. He was beautiful: tiny and perfectly formed. He looked so much like my other newborns, just smaller, darker, and still. The first thing I said to Josh was, “He looks just like you.” Later, Josh told me that this broke his heart. To watch the son he hadn’t wanted