In remembrance...

I’ll never forget the way he looked at me when I told him. Tears, streaming down his face as he tried to catch his breath. It was the most beautiful display of despair and love that I have ever seen.

It was the kind of news no one wants to tell the person they care for the most in the world, but it was our reality and even though he was not here, I knew he had to know.

There was no heartbeat.

The tiny, beautiful creature that we had already come to love was perishing and there was nothing anyone could do but wait.

The thoughts flooded my mind. The new chair we had purchased for the room that we would be lovingly transforming in preparation, the empty baby book with pages yet to be filled with the beautiful details of the beginning of life, the 8 week sonogram pictures of the most beautiful little glow worm I had ever seen. All these things would be representative of the future, the future that now existed only in the past.

As I waited, I stared at a most beloved photo of my sweet baby girl. She was sleeping peacefully in the room next to me, completely unknowing of any of the details that had been and the ones to come. As I looked in to her deep, beautiful eyes, I was ever so thankful for her life, her simply being. I gazed for a long time, minutes that passed felt like an eternity and mere moments at the same time.

My body began to break and what I experienced was unlike anything I have ever felt in my life. In an instant the baby was gone. The flush of my body would continue but I knew there were no longer two lives being sustained by my body. I felt helpless, failing. I was so heartbroken and felt my body had failed this baby.

The next morning when I woke up, I was forced to face the realization that the morning before I had been pregnant and that morning I was not. It was an empty feeling, one that no one else could feel for me. I realized I was part of a unique group of women who have been faced with this reality and for a moment I could feel the weight of so many women who have gone before me. The friends I had known, the babies lost, the heartache, it all seemed to be in this emotional box from which the lid had exploded.

As I waited, two days felt like an eternity and then finally, it was Tuesday. I would see my sweet husband that evening and finally get to hold him and have him hold me. I knew it would be the first real cry I would have since being in the ER, since hearing those 4 fateful words.

Even still, as I write this, it seems like a bad dream.

I sat in my car, plucking up the courage to walk in, to face the fact that I would have to solidify it even further and this time it would be in person with him. My heart raced as I anticipated seeing his face for the first time. As I navigated the parking lot and airport entrance, I emotionally navigated the juxtaposition of both joy and sorrow. I was thrilled to see him and have him with me but so devastated that he was home for this, these circumstances.

As I waited, I paced, pretended to look at the art hanging in the airport gallery and finally settled myself into a chair. Try as hard as I might, I could not make myself still. It was much like every other time I had picked him up if it weren’t for the sadness lurking around in my mind. My leg, crossed over the other, wavered almost uncontrollably and each time my mind passed to what our conversation would be, my eyes welled up with tears.

Finally, I saw him. Immediately, I moved my body to approach him. His embrace was the perfect fit, exactly what I needed. I felt myself completely safe in his arms and presence. I breathed a sigh of relief, yet I knew we would not get to share any of our needed words. He had not known the full details of the past 72 hours, but the airport baggage claim would not be the proper place to unload the precious details I held so closely.

The drive home dragged on as if we would not reach the comfort and safety of our home. I searched all the corners of my mind, trying to find something, anything else we could talk about. But one subject sat so heavily, that the few words we shared were very superficial, just begging to fill the silence even the tiniest bit. After what felt like an eternity, we pulled into our driveway. Even after we had brought his bags in the house, caught our breath and taken off the remnants of the day, we still did not speak. It was as if we didn’t speak the words, then maybe, just maybe it wouldn’t be true.

As we climbed in to the safety and warmth of our bed, I asked if he wanted to talk and if so, what he wanted to know. We laid there and I spread out the blanket of details that had covered my last 3 days. I cried, really for the first time since those 4 words had been uttered to me; it was the first real, cathartic cry since I had shared those same words with my husband. After we labored over the emotions and heartache, we slept.

I awoke the next morning, knowing he would be gone. It was to be expected after getting back from a work trip. I laid in my bed, gradually waking up to my new reality. This morning it felt different. I wasn’t waking up alone even though my bed had only me in it. I knew I had him to hold. I got up and right as I was about to get our sweet baby girl out of bed, he came home. He wanted to get her and I knew it would be special.

He went in her room. She reached for me but then went to him. They snuggled. And then snuggled some more. It was the sweetest moment and I was so thankful to get to take it in. I was grateful for her. For him. For her to have him. And for me to have them both.

The morning went on as it always did. After breakfast they went to get groceries. I stayed home.

I began to busy myself with some household chores. I straightened up a little and decided which things needed to be put away. As I put a few baby things away, small reminders of what had been, what would be, I felt a sense of renewal and I knew the healing had begun.