Living in the Rainbow

The Saturday after the scan was tough.  The prospect of giving birth to Abigail loomed ahead of us.  The shock of her having died still rested on us.  We were in between the times.  The world had just fallen apart but we knew it was still about to disintegrate further too.

There were a few things we were not prepared for.  My wife could still feel Abigail moving inside her womb (not kicking but moving still) and shefound that very traumatic.  My wife’s parents came up to look after our son the next day when we went into hospital.  They said a few silly things like “it will be easier when you have another child” – that was silly then (we could have a 1000 kids and this wouldn’t be any easier) and it is even more silly now since we won’t have another child.  That said, I do appreciate that they had no idea what situation they were coming into and we were/are grateful for their support.

19 October 2008 (Abigail’s birthday)

I think my faith had disintegrated over these few days.  I had the sense that if it was going to survive at all, God would have to hold on to me, not the other way around.  As my wife and I walked out to the car there was a small sparrow on the roof.  I remember praying sarcastically “that is nice God – not a sparrow can fall without you noticing – well you are going to have to do better than that, a lot better!”

The hardest part for me was driving my wife to the hospital.  We went in for 9am.  I wanted nothing more than to drive in the opposite direction, get away to a beautiful part of the country and take my wife AWAY from this ordeal.  And yet here I was driving towards it.  That was the only part in the day that I was really active, that I decided what happened.  Once we were in the hospital the medics took over and we were on rails really.  We were active but not with any real options, we became passengers.  But here in the car I was the driver – this was my last chance to run away and I desperately wanted to.

In the hospital the staff were great.  Our consultant Paul had come in to kick things off.  He understood my wife’s concerns about the baby moving and arranged a final scan (even though he knew their was no point). It was strangely comforting to see Abigail’s body on the screen one more time.  Still no heartbeat (what did we expect?).  This was a Sunday and I remembered thinking about our church meeting, praying for us – it seemed a long way away but I could imagine their support.

All the midwives took time to say how sorry they were.  They latched on to our language and quickly started talking about Abigail.  Also, I had on the spur of the moment grabbed some pictures of our son and my wife kept looking at them and showing them to the midwives.  It gave us a way of remembering him through the day and dissipated some of the focus off Abigail.  This was a helpful survival tactic and I remembered thinking how impossible this would be if we had no children at all.  At one point in the late morning my mother-in-law was able to bring our son in and we played and chatted with him for a bit.  It was good for him to see Mummy was okay and it was good to break up our day as at this stage there was quite a bit of sitting around.

Once labour kicked in, it got going really quickly.  One of my prayers was that it wouldn’t take too long.  We had been told sometimes it could take days in induced stillbirths.  Once we got down to the labour ward the atmosphere changed  – we were a few rooms up from where our son had been born (one of the happiest days of our lives!).  Now it was all about Abigail (the saddest day of our lives).  The midwives asked how we had chosen Abigail’s name.  I explained about the infertility problems and how happy we were when we conceived.  How Abigail means Father’s Joy and that was our expectation when we chose the name – she would be my joy.  Now we believed Abigail was our heavenly Father’s joy.   The older midwife cried at this point.  She said later she would pray for us and I believe she definitely had faith.

My wife had enough pain relief as there were no real limits to the drugs they could give her (as no baby’s health to worry about).  But whilst with our son (she had had an epidural) with Abigail she could feel her body moving down.  We were both very emotional.  And there was nothing they could give us to dull the emotional pain.  I felt so much for what my wife was going through first and foremost but was also in turmoil myself.

At one point the midwives asked us if we wanted various mementos – photos, lock of hair, crib blanket etc – and we said yes we wanted everything.  They also asked if we wanted to see Abigail the moment she was born or later.  We said we wanted her to be taken away at birth and then bought back once we were ready and my wife had been cleaned up.  This took some of the pressure out of the later stages of labour.

I remember being really surprised when my wife went through the exact same stages of labour as she had with our son.  There was the very emotional tearful stage when she seemed to give up on it ever finishing.  I knew it would not be long at that point.

At 19.16 (Sunday 19 October 2008) Abigail was born.  She came quickly in the end.  As she was being born my wife screamed that she wanted to hold her straight away.  “Give Abigail to me” she said.  The midwife was aware that we were changing what we had said we wanted, but we didn’t care at that point.  Abigail was out now and that changed everything.  She asked “were we sure?  Did we want her to tell us what to expect first?”  Images of horror filled my mind…  I simply said “just give her to us now.”

And there she was.  My wife held our daughter.  I  held my wife.  After a bit of clearing up we were left alone.   We cried.  We examined and cuddled our daughter.  I took a few pictures (I still regret not taking more pictures such as a good picture of my wife holding Abigail).  There was at this point a feeling that the worst was behind us.  We could just relax now.

After all of the scans and grainy images here she was.  I am not sure how much to say here.  Some things are just for me and my wife I think…

On the one hand our daughter was beautiful.  I could see the family likenesses.  Her features were wonderful and intricate and yes she was a girl.  I felt emotions at that, my only daughter wouldn’t get to grow up, wear a princess outfit, have a boyfriend, have her own babies.  So yes she was beautiful.

But death’s mark was on her too.  Her body quickly darkened and cooled.  My parental instinct says she was perfect but my mind knew she was not.  She had died for a reason.  A couple of her fingers and toes were fused together and that made me think the cause must be genetic (not nutritional which was the other scenario we had lived with).  We would await the post mortem results to see if this was the case.

Then came my time for a cuddle.  We later found our she only weighed 625 grams (our son had been 10lb 10oz!  Quite a difference) but she was still bigger and heavier than I expected.  She fitted easily in my arms.  Even as I write these words and remember holding the weight of her… tears are so near.  I cried then.  Throughout the day I had planned this moment.  I knew what I had to say to dedicate my daughter (Father’s Joy) to our Heavenly Father.  (Every night when I put my son to bed after stories and prayers I say what he calls the special words – I said them for Abigail too).

The Lord bless you and keep you, Abigail

The Lord make his face shine upon you and be gracious to you my Daughter

God lift up the light of his countenance upon you and give you his peace, his eternal peace.

I Love you

And I put Abigail back in her crib.  I had done for my daughter in death what I did for my son every single day in life.  I committed her to God, blessed her, loved her and put her to rest.  At that moment I felt secure in my place as her father.

Then I invited the staff back in to take her away.

Seeing Abigail was desperately hard but not as bad as I had thought it might have been.  This was my first personal encounter with death and I think the main feeling to be honest was peace.  It wasn’t horrible or ugly, it was just sad but also peaceful.  I felt God in the room.

With Abigail out of the room we took some time to make some phone calls.  I remember telling our minister with a wierd conviction that even if before conception I had known this was going to be the outcome, I would still have gone through it all.  To hold Abigail and know she had lived and now was in heaven was worth it.  I didn’t regret that despite the pain.  I also had the bizarre feeling that we had been perfect parents to Abigail.  I couldn’t say that for my son where we make mistakes on a regular basis.  But for Abigail we had done everything we could.  OK it wasn’t very much but throughout her short life and on this her birthday we had loved her, cared for her, protected her as best we could and that was all we could have done really.

At one point my wife felt very sick and stood up and suddenly there was blood everywhere.  The staff came back in and sorted us out.  I realised my wife was quite woozy and wobbly still.

Throughout the day we had had two midwives.  One was very experienced, the other very young and inexperienced.  When we had first met the inexperienced one she had been very chirpy and happy and nervous.  She hadn’t recalibrated her expectations to what was happening this day and was acting like it was a normal happy birth.  The experienced midwife took her outside and she came back totally different – very sober.  I wondered what had been said but I can guess.  At the end of the day they were out with Abigail, weighing her, taking photos for us and things like that.  They bought Abigail back in – I think they thought we had not had enough time with her.  I felt a bit undone by this at the time but looking back we should have had a lot longer with her that we did – I wish I could go back now and have another few hours, few days (lifetime !) with her.  So I am glad for that extra time.

At one point I asked the inexperienced midwife if this was the first “sad one” she had done.  She said yes and burst into tears and left us.  I bet she remembers us and Abigail for the rest of her career.  I was grateful someone else felt emotion for our daughter – it was another person who would keep her memory alive.  At another point the senior midwife asked if there was anything she could get us.  My wife, asked though tears if she could get her another heart as this one was broken.  The midwife responded instantly and very warmly by saying that from what she could see there was nothing wrong with the heart she had.

Our Doctor Paul came to see us at one point with Abigail.  He said she was beautiful.  I really thought highly of him that day coming in at the start and the end of the day and just sitting with us for no reason other than to show compassion with us.  All the staff were absolutely wonderful.

Earlier in the day I had picked up a booklet from the hospital chapel.  When we were on our own again, I got it out and read a few pages with my wife.  My heart skipped when I opened the page that quoted Luke 12 v 6-7

Are not five sparrows sold for two pennies? Yet not one of them is forgotten by God. Indeed, the very hairs of your head are all numbered. Don’t be afraid; you are worth more than many sparrows.

That verse had top-and-tailed, totally-encompassed the day.  I had said God would have to hold me, my strength was gone.  And he had.

We went back upstairs to the ward.  We spent some time talking through the post mortem authorisation.  We felt it important to know what had caused Abigail to grow slowly and to die.  Would it happen again?  That said, I didn’t feel old enough to be making decisions about whether they could take small samples of organ matter and things like that.  I just got through it by telling myself that this was not our daughter now, she was somewhere else, this was what had been left behind.

My wife and I talked late.  She slept – she was exhausted.  I was mostly awake.

At about 4am I got up for a walk.  My restless wander.  I went to all the places that had dominated so much of our lives those past few months.  The car park we had parked in so many times, the hospital entrance we had walked through for each appointment, the yellow lines that our son had played on during the 20-week scan when everything started to unravel, the room where we had all the scans, the room where we had sat after Abigail died, the drink’s machine which had served me the odd drink.

The hardest place I visited was the entrance to the neo-natal intensive care unit.  I could see tiny babies.  Babies I had felt so sorry for a few days earlier.  But these were breathing babies.  Ours was on a mortuary slab somewhere now.  I saw worrying parents and I didn’t pity them – I envied them.  I had been terrified by this option a few days before but now I would have happily given my right arm to have Abigail in there with all those machines and tubes.  Was that selfish – she was in a better place.  I was sad for me not her.

As I toured the hospital landmarks I was consumed with grief.  All these placed had only a few days earlier represented different possible outcomes.  Some were hoped for, others feared.  Now I said goodbye to each of these scenarios.  I was left with just one scenario, a funeral to plan.  There was nothing to hope for now, only our grief to endure and to survive.  I felt cheated.

I went back to bed.  Hopefully this was rock bottom, hopefully it would all be easier from here.