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birth story

“I Had Just Heard His Heartbeat”: A Mother’s Story of Stillbirth and Strength

November 19, 2024 by Winter

Trigger Warning: This episode discusses infant loss, including miscarriage and stillbirth. Please listen with care.

Hours after hearing her son’s strong heartbeat at a final checkup, Veronika received the devastating news that her sweet Benjamin had passed away. Looking back on her challenging pregnancy, Veronika shares the heartbreak of losing Benjamin at 40 weeks from having only one umbilical artery, and the impact it has had on her life.

In this episode, Veronika opens up about her pregnancy, finding a new OB-GYN, and hearing Benjamin’s heartbeat only to be told he had passed.

Listen to the podcast here:

Highlights from our conversation with Veronika:

  • The emotional impact of the ultrasound and fears that something was wrong
  • The overwhelming emotions and confusion surrounding her experience
  • Receiving support from her church community
  • Challenges with funeral home arrangements
  • Allowing her other children to grieve and how they helped her through the loss

Veronika’s story is a reminder of the different ways each person grieves. Her story shines a light on the importance of self-compassion, community, and getting support from loved ones.

"She said, 'Mommy, I'm very sorry Benjamin didn't get to know you. You're a great mommy, and he didn't get to know how good you are.' And that was just the absolute sweetest thing." – Veronika

Quotes:

“She said, ‘Mommy, I’m very sorry Benjamin didn’t get to know you. You’re a great mommy, and he didn’t get to know how good you are.’ And that was just the absolute sweetest thing.” – Veronika (17:49)

“I didn’t scream or cry—I just shut down. I wanted to be left alone. I was really irritated by all the staff coming in, and, you know, you still had to deliver that baby, so you can’t just get up and go home. You still have to go through all of that.” – Veronika (40:55)

Other Episodes You Might Appreciate:

https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/since-my-baby-passed-powerful-life-lessons-from-a/id1473594556?i=1000671153704

Support the Show:

By donating $5 or $10, you’ll be supporting the ongoing production of these stories. We appreciate your help toward production and hosting costs. 

Donate here: https://ko-fi.com/stillapartofus

Thank you for your support! 

Subscribe:

YOUTUBE: 

Please subscribe to our YouTube channel for more birth stories from families who have experienced a stillbirth or infant loss. We’re grateful that you’re part of our community! https://www.youtube.com/stillapartofus

THE PODCAST:

Please subscribe to Still A Part of Us wherever you find podcasts.

https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/still-a-part-of-us-a-podcast-about/id1473594556

Links: 

Grief Support Groups: https://nationalshare.org/

Some of these links are affiliate links, which means we may get a small commission off your purchase, at no extra cost to you.

Filed Under: birth story, grief, infant death, podcast episode, stillbirth

She Had a Full Head of Dark Hair: A Mother’s Heartfelt Stillbirth Story

November 19, 2024 by Winter

Trigger Warning: This episode discusses infant loss, including miscarriage and stillbirth. Please listen with care.

Being a young mom of two is both beautiful and challenging. But when you become pregnant and experience constant morning sickness throughout the entire pregnancy––that adds another level of difficulty.

In this episode, our guest, Melissa, shares the moments leading up to the birth of her baby girl, Patricia, who was stillborn at 36 weeks due to a pinched cord. Even though this happened over 16 years ago, Melissa’s love for Patricia has only grown, just like any mother’s love for her child.

Listen to the podcast here:

Some highlights from our conversation with Meilssa include:

  • The challenges of morning sickness
  • Navigating pregnancy and early appointments
  • The third trimester and an unusual, concerning strong kick
  • Time spent with Patricia after her birth
  • The emotional impact of funeral arrangements

Melissa’s story is a powerful reminder of love, support, and the journey of healing and this conversation truly highlights the bond between a mother and her child and the resilience that comes in the face of unimaginable loss.

"They had to give me something to sleep because, you know, here are all the other babies, and I don’t have mine, and all I had was a stuffed animal.” – Melissa

Quotes:

“They left me in the labor and delivery room, so it was like I was able to hear the other babies. And then that is when I, once everyone left, is when I started crying. They had to give me something to sleep because, you know, here are all the other babies, and I don’t have mine, and all I had was a stuffed animal.” – Melissa (31:07)

“Even though I know it’s not my fault, you know, I would think, like, what did I do wrong?” – Melissa (31:35)

Other Episodes You Might Appreciate:

https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/16-years-of-remembrance-melissas-journey-with/id1473594556?i=1000672862574

Support the Show:

By donating $5 or $10, you’ll be supporting the ongoing production of these stories. We appreciate your help toward production and hosting costs. 

Donate here: https://ko-fi.com/stillapartofus

Thank you for your support! 

Subscribe:

YOUTUBE: 

Please subscribe to our YouTube channel for more birth stories from families who have experienced a stillbirth or infant loss. We’re grateful that you’re part of our community! https://www.youtube.com/stillapartofus

THE PODCAST:

Please subscribe to Still A Part of Us wherever you find podcasts.
https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/still-a-part-of-us-a-podcast-about/id1473594556

Links: 

Grief Support Groups: https://nationalshare.org/
Some of these links are affiliate links, which means we may get a small commission off your purchase, at no extra cost to you.

Filed Under: birth story, grief, infant death, podcast episode, stillbirth

Baby Hazel, Stillborn Due to a Tragic Handgun Accident: Mom Bailey’s Story

January 15, 2024 by Winter

Mom Bailey tells about how she was shot below the hip in a tragic handgun accident, being 37 weeks pregnant with her first child. Her daughter Hazel died en route to the hospital due to the injuries she sustained because of the gunshot wound. Because Bailey was in stable condition, but starting to labor and in a lot of pain, they performed a C-section. She didn’t get to meet Hazel when she was born because she was in and out of consciousness due to her pain from the wound.

Watch her story here on YouTube:

Listen to the podcast here:

Shownotes:

Pregnancy:

Bailey discovered she was pregnant, when on a whim she decided to take a pregnancy test after watching YouTube videos about different families who were getting pregnant. She and her boyfriend were both shocked.

Despite being pregnant during the COVID-19 pandemic and experiencing morning sickness and weight loss, the baby remained healthy and Bailey received a lot of support from her family. They learned they were having a girl at a gender reveal party. As the due date approached, Bailey and her boyfriend prepared Hazel’s nursery, receiving gifts from a virtual baby shower due to COVID restrictions. They eagerly awaited Hazel’s arrival.

Handgun accident:

Bailey recounts the events of Memorial weekend, where she had maternity photos taken at a lake, despite her initial reluctance to have the pictures taken. The next day, while spending time with her boyfriend and some of their other friends, her boyfriend mishandled a gun and accidentally shot Bailey who was sitting next to him in the bottom of her hip, nicking part of her uterus. Despite initial confusion and attempts to locate the exit wound, Bailey’s primary concern was the well-being of her unborn baby. The EMTs arrived, and her anxiety intensified until she heard that they were able to find Hazel’s heartbeat.

Bailey, at 37 weeks pregnant, was airlifted to a hospital after the accident. In the hospital, they did an ultrasound and discovered that Hazel had died during the transport due to the injuries she sustained from the gunshot wound. The medical team also got x-rays and CT scans to determine the location of the bullet and found that it was lodged in her other leg, the bullet narrowly missing a major artery. Because Bailey was stable, but had started laboring and in a great deal of pain, her study team decided on a C-section to deliver Hazel stillborn. Because she was in and out of consciousness during the C-section, she didn’t get to meet her daughter, but learned that the doctor had placed Hazel on her for skin-to-skin contact before being taken away.

The medical team waited a few days to operate on Bailey further to remove the bullet, which they did successfully. Bailey remained in the hospital for a few more days and had to do rehab in order to walk again.

Funeral:

Returning home was challenging, especially with Hazel’s nursery all set up and ready. Family and friends thought ahead and helped pack everything up before Bailey and her boyfriend arrived home. Bailey with the help of her family started to plan Hazel’s funeral, and Bailey expressed her desire to walk before the funeral. Meeting with the funeral home, they decided on cremation. After the autopsy and before Hazel was cremated, Bailey and her boyfriend were able to spend time with her. She brought meaningful items like her baby blanket and her boyfriend brought his military name tag. During the hour spent with Hazel, Bailey touched her, read to her, and took pictures of her hands, legs, and feet. However, she couldn’t bring herself to look at Hazel’s face, because she was unsure of how she would look from the gunshot wound.

The funeral service was emotional, attended by a supportive community, and Bailey chose to bravely walk down the aisle unaided as a tribute to Hazel.

Autopsy:

After the tragic incident involving the unintentional gun discharge, Bailey was grieving her daughter Hazel’s death and regretting she had not looked at her face when she could. Her sister encouraged her to reach out to the doctor who performed Hazel’s autopsy. When she called the office, Bailey asked if they had pictures she could see and told them her story. She went to the office and discovered that the staff had made a slideshow of pictures, some edited and some unedited, to show to her. Bailey also describes the significance of obtaining pictures from the autopsy, highlighting a special moment where she saw unedited images that provided a more complete and beautiful picture of Hazel, bringing her a sense of closure.

Healing:

Bailey shares the aftermath of the incident, detailing her emotional journey and the impact on her relationship with her then-boyfriend, who was involved in the gun discharge. She emphasizes the challenges in coping with grief, anger, and the strain on their relationship. Bailey discusses her decision not to press charges, the support she received from her family, and the eventual end of her relationship. Over time, therapy, particularly EMDR, played a crucial role in her healing process. Bailey expresses gratitude for the support of friends and family and the podcast that provided solace during her difficult moments.

Time Stamps:

  • 00:52 Introduction
  • 02:02 Bailey’s pregnancy
  • 18:36 Handgun accident
  • 25:37 Hospital and Hazel is stillborn
  • 42:17 Going home and planning the funeral
  • 51:07 Hazel’s funeral
  • 57:21 Hazel’s autopsy
  • 1:04:34 Healing after

    Full Transcription:

    Bailey 0:00
    Hazel Kay

    I always remember her long hair, it was an inch and a half long.

    Winter 0:13
    Welcome to still a part of us a place where moms and dads share the story of their child who was stillborn or who died in infancy. I’m winter. And I’m Lea, we

    Lee 0:21
    are grateful you joined us today. Please note that this is a story of loss and has triggers thanks to

    Winter 0:26
    our loss parents who are willing to be vulnerable and share their children with us. If

    Lee 0:30
    you’re listening to this podcast, just know that on our YouTube channel, there are pictures and videos that are related to the stories that are being shared.

    Winter 0:37
    Subscribe and share it with a friend that might need it and tell them to subscribe. Why? Because people need to know that even though our babies are no longer with us. They’re still a part of us.

    Welcome to Silla part of us. We are so grateful to have Bailey here with us today to talk about her sweet daughter, Hazel. I am really looking forward to this conversation. I’m a little nervous, to be honest, because of a part of her story that is, is a little tricky. So I’m so grateful for you, Bailey for coming on today. So welcome.

    Bailey 1:11
    Thank you. And thank you for having me. I’m happy to be here.

    Winter 1:14
    Yeah. Well tell us a little bit about yourself. Tell us where you’re at and what your family looks like the time that Hazel was born. I

    Bailey 1:23
    live in a small town in North Dakota. I was just with my boyfriend and I at the time we just got a house. We’re starting jobs were young, 21 years old. Okay.

    Winter 1:35
    What were you doing for a job? And kind of what maybe what were some of your hobbies?

    Bailey 1:40
    Um, I was working at a daycare. And it was during COVID. So there wasn’t much going on. Yeah. I love to be in with my family and my nieces and nephews. Yeah.

    Winter 1:53
    That’s great. And just a little bit of point of reference. How long ago was Hazel born?

    Bailey 1:58
    She was born three and a half years ago, three and a half

    Winter 2:02
    years ago. Okay. Yep. So right smack dab in the middle of COVID. You guys I like it’s it’s nuts, talking to people that have gone through the COVID experience and having been pregnant or given birth. So there’s like an extra dose of sympathy from him. Because I just feel like that is hard. It is hard. So. Okay, so you guys were you had purchased a house together? You guys were young living together? And were you planning on getting pregnant? Was that something that was in your? Oh, no. Not at all. Okay, so super surprising. Yes. Okay, so tell me how that went then. Like when you found out? Or? And then did you tell your ex about that?

    Bailey 2:46
    Um, yeah. So I, it’s kind of a funny story. But I was by myself at the house. And I was just watching some videos on like YouTube. And some, like families that I watch recently, or whatever, and they’re all getting pregnant or whatever. And I was like, oh, that’s like, I don’t know, I just had a random test in my closet. And I was just like, let’s just take it like no signs of pregnancy at all. None. And then get there was

    Winter 3:19
    no way. Yeah, it

    Bailey 3:22
    was very shocking. I had no signs of pregnancy. Didn’t even miss my period yet. Like it was. Very soon, obviously. Yeah, completely. Yeah. And then yeah, I called him right away. And it was a shock to us both. We didn’t know how to take it in. We didn’t know what to do. He was working out of town at the time. And I was like, well, there’s always those things of like, false positives. I was like, that could be a thing, right? It was late at night is like 9pm. And I was like, I’ll run to $1. General real quick, because we live in a small town and went to grab a couple more tests took them and sure enough, I was pregnant.

    Winter 4:05
    I just can’t believe that you just took a test on a whim. Like, you’re like, Man, that is so funny. But yeah, sometimes I guess you get it when you get a feeling you get a feeling about something. Yes.

    Bailey 4:15
    Oh, yeah. I was not expecting that at all. Yeah.

    Winter 4:19
    So did you end up telling anybody like

    Bailey 4:23
    my mom, okay, right away. So by myself, and I was told her I started bawling. And I was like, I don’t know what to do. I’m young. I don’t have like a secure job. I was like, I don’t know how I’m gonna afford this. It’s like a big step in the life. Yeah. And, yeah, it was. And then I called my dad. And I said the same thing to him. And he’s like, we got this. I’ll be there for you. I’ll help you out when you need. You guys will be the perfect parents.

    Winter 4:52
    Okay, so you got a lot of support. That’s good. Yes, very. Did your boyfriend at the time tell his His family or is he from the same town by the way? Or is

    Bailey 5:03
    the same town His family lives in town? My family lives like 3045 minutes away. Okay.

    Winter 5:09
    Okay.

    Bailey 5:10
    So did you tell them how old? I think one of his parents I want to say his dad. And it was kind of the same thing. Like there’s obviously there’s a lot of anger, like, what did we just do, but also excitement, but also wondering, how are we going to do this? And he has a very supportive family as well. So it’s nice to support our families. Yeah,

    Winter 5:35
    that’s great. I, it’s always a little tricky. Yeah. When, especially when it’s a surprise, and you’re like, Wait a second. This is not part of the plan right now. Yeah. Yeah. Okay. So you guys, you’re pregnant? And obviously, like you said, quite early for you not even to notice that. I mean, nothing, had your period hadn’t been skipped or anything. Did you end up like, setting up an appointment with an OBGYN? Did you have a regular OBGYN that you were gonna go see,

    Bailey 6:08
    actually, my cousin works at the OB GYN in the town. And she kind of knew who to put me with or who to try put me with. I called them and made an appointment. Yeah, I found out in early October. And think I didn’t my first appointment in November. Yeah, I was. I wanted I was by myself. Because my boyfriend at the time was in the National Guard. And he had to leave for some training. Okay. Yeah. The town or the state. And so I went to the appointment by myself. Was

    Winter 6:42
    that around? It was a kind of early, like, eight, nine weeks or so.

    Bailey 6:46
    Yeah. Yeah. And my sister came, met me there. And then they did the bedside ultrasound. And they’re like, just the heads up. Like sometimes we can’t always see the heart or hear the heart because it’s it’s so little. And then I remember like, hearing everything go away. And they’re like, Well, you gotta be good. And then, yeah, so that made it feel all real bad. A little bit of pictures there. So I got to send it to my boyfriend. And that was pretty special.

    Winter 7:23
    Yeah, it is really amazing. Seeing that little. It looks like a little bean with a heart. Yeah. Okay, and then, how are you feeling at the time? I mean, now that it was a little bit farther along, were you starting to feel some of that any morning sickness or any other pregnancy symptoms? Ah, yes,

    Bailey 7:42
    I got really sick. But, I mean, ever over the sickness, it was all okay. And all other problems going on? So that’s always a plus. Yeah, total. It’s really sick and tired, obviously. But, yeah. And working and doing COVID started. Yeah,

    Winter 8:05
    I know. I was like, so you because you got pregnant at the very beginning of COVID. Is that right? So early? 2020. I think the United States shutdown in May in March, I think. Yeah, essentially. So. So you guys went? So you’re, you’re going along, and then tell me about how some of these doctor’s appointments are going. Kind of early on?

    Bailey 8:28
    Um, they’re going really good. I just went in came out because like, the quickest appointments ever,

    Winter 8:35
    because it was it? Yeah. It’s like, oh, everything looks

    Bailey 8:39
    fine. Yeah, yeah. Yeah. And when we came around that 20 weeks, when we were finding out the gender, um, we didn’t want to know, but we wanted to have like a little surprise party. Okay. Yeah. So that was kind of a cool ultrasound getting to see her for the first time, like, up on the big screen, seeing her feet move and her toes and her hands and just her Wiggles. And I remember the doctor kept telling us to, like, look away, and then we can look and then he’s like, I just got to double check. Again, so then we’re like, oh, maybe it’s a boy then. We didn’t know for sure. Yeah,

    Winter 9:19
    yeah. Okay. That’s, I’ve always kind of wondered how that works. But like, oh, yeah, look away. Yeah, I’m checking things out. Yeah. That’s cool. Okay, so And was your boyfriend able to be there at that appointment? Yep.

    Bailey 9:36
    Yeah, that was his first appointment coming to and seeing her. Oh, good. Cool. Yeah. Yeah.

    Winter 9:41
    And how did she look at that time?

    Bailey 9:44
    Um, good. Any issues they

    Winter 9:47
    or was Everything looking good with your placenta, everything

    Bailey 9:52
    was on track. Okay. Awesome.

    Winter 9:56
    Okay, and then tell me how how things went along with your Your next appointments and anything that you guys did to kind of celebrate Oh yeah, maybe tell me a little bit about your the your gender reveal party. Yeah, it’s always kind of fun to hear this

    Bailey 10:10
    is kind of funny too. Um, so we went to my sister’s afterwards and I dropped off the little envelope. And I was just wanted to look at it. It’s got to be a surprise for everyone. So put it in their mailbox and we drove off out of town. And what we did was my sister boiled eggs and then color them pink and blue. And then there is obviously a one raw egg. That was pink or blue. And, and so we had a couple of our friends and family over at my sister’s and we had a crack an egg over our head. Our color was cracked. But it’s so fun. Yeah. And I was like, Oh no, like, you get your hair done. You get all prettied up or whatever. And I was like, the egg is gonna crack on me. I just know it. But my boyfriend took one. He took a pink one right away. And there it was. It cracked right away the first one very first one.

    Winter 11:19
    Yes, that’s perfect, then yeah, it was like, Oh my gosh. Were you guys expecting what? Well, obviously, he grabbed the pink one. So I’m was he expecting a girl? Or was that just

    Bailey 11:31
    he kind of said, like, I’ll start on this end. You start on this end, and then we’ll meet like in the middle, but I was like, okay, whatever.

    Winter 11:39
    So are you were you told me? Were you excited for girl? Boy, I

    Bailey 11:43
    was so excited for a girl. Yeah, but I knew my bank account was not going to be excited.

    Winter 11:47
    No, girls are expensive. Seriously.

    Bailey 11:51
    But no, I was excited. Growing up, I always thought it was gonna be a boy mom. So it’s kind of cool to change it around. And then I was like, Oh my gosh, I gotta learn how to do hair. I gotta learn how to do all these things. That so?

    Winter 12:07
    I know. There’s not

    Bailey 12:11
    a girly girl. So I was like, Oh my gosh, you’re gonna have to paint her room pink. It can’t be gray.

    Winter 12:16
    It’s gonna be tough. Yes.

    Bailey 12:18
    But no, it was so much fun. Oh, good. Yeah. Googled all the things afterwards buying all the things and

    Winter 12:25
    you just get so it’s so exciting. It’s It is

    Bailey 12:29
    so exciting. Yeah. And the first girl grandchild on my side,

    Winter 12:35
    on your side. And that’s so so exciting. Yes. Yeah. Grandparents gets so excited about that kind of thing. Because that they get they get to buy stuff, too. Yes, yeah. When you guys found out that you were having a girl, did you guys start thinking of names? Or did you really have a list kind of go in? Um, names? Yeah. So

    Bailey 12:55
    we got that. I always want to say it’s like a tinder app, but it’s for names. Like you pick and they pick and then if you guys come together on one, it shows up on your guys’s list or whatever. So we went through that. And I always liked Hazel. It was always a name that was probably on the top of my list or in my list. I use a nanny a little girl. And her name was Hazel. And I always loved it from that second on, I was like, I am going to have a girl name here. So one day,

    Winter 13:23
    this is sweet. Sweet name is so cute. Yes. And

    Bailey 13:27
    yeah, we came up with a couple names kept going back and forth. And we picked one I think we picked like a I think we said Delilah right away. And then I was just like, No, I’m just not feeling it. We gotta come up with different ones. And you just go back and forth for more pregnancy. But yeah, we had a couple that we liked. But we didn’t want to tell anybody the name.

    Winter 13:46
    Yes. Oh, that’s good. Okay. Yeah. Because people have opinions about names. Yes, yes. They’ll shoot you down. You’re like I used to know somebody in high school. They were a jerk. Right? Yeah. Yeah. Well, awesome. That I think that’s that’s a cute name. Okay, so then the pregnancy is going along at two you had the at 20 weeks you found out well, right. I guess it was about right around 20 weeks. Yeah, that you guys had that. Okay. And then how else how were you feeling the rest of your tell me about any other appointments after that? I

    Bailey 14:20
    was feeling really good. Until about I want to say like 3435 weeks I started getting really sick. Oh, and throughout my whole pregnancy I dropped 30 pounds. So I never gained I dropped. So how sick I was. I wasn’t able to eat kept going into the ER getting fluids. Oh, no. Yeah. And then I like broke out. And like cold sores all over my mouth one day and I just couldn’t eat or drink anything. So then I had to go in and get flu words and then they sent me up to a different town with a more high risk pregnancy doctor. Okay, and so I went in there and that’s actually where I got the last 3d photos of her. Oh, so they did that. And then I got to see this video of like her hair through the ultrasound you could like see it like standing up?

    Winter 15:23
    That is cutest. That is the cutest.

    Bailey 15:26
    Yeah. But then, after all the medications I kind of felt a lot better than I was feeling good again.

    Winter 15:33
    She it just was like a viral infection or something. Yeah. Oh, that’s no clear. But yeah, yeah, that’s i It’s so tricky. Especially like, you mentioned you were doing COVID and all sorts of other things were popping up to you know,

    Bailey 15:48
    I thought I had COVID. And then when I was first starting out, you’re like, oh, my gosh, you have COVID Like, it’s a big thing. Yeah.

    Winter 15:56
    But you didn’t have that it was something else. Yeah. Crazy. Okay. Was, but Hazel was doing okay. Even

    Bailey 16:07
    the whole time. It was nothing with her. So that’s all I was like, alright, I’ll go through it all. You’re gonna be alright.

    Winter 16:13
    Yeah. You’re being miserable. I know. Yeah, we do so much for kids, right?

    Bailey 16:18
    Yeah, for real. And I was pretty much by myself. My boyfriend at the time had an older town job. So he was gone during the week. And so, yeah, there’s a lot by myself, but yeah,

    Winter 16:29
    that is. Did you take anybody with you though, to some of those appointments like your sister, your mom?

    Bailey 16:34
    Yeah. My mom and my sister usually came with me. Oh, bigger ones. Yeah, small ones. I just went in by myself, but okay. And

    Winter 16:42
    okay, so then tell me so that’s around 34 weeks that you got quite sick. Was that like a week or so? Um, how long was that? Second?

    Bailey 16:52
    Yeah, that was actually probably a couple of weeks. Two weeks. Oh, you

    Winter 16:56
    were sick a long time? Oh, yeah.

    Bailey 16:58
    It was it was miserable.

    Winter 17:02
    No. And then yeah, just tell me as as you go on, tell me what happens.

    Bailey 17:07
    I went on. Obviously COVID was there. And so places were shut down. We didn’t really hang out with friends. Unless it was like a small gathering in the house or whatever. And then it came to be made. And things were going good. We got her nursery all set for nursery was ready. It was ready to go or babies were packed. Around the 37 weeks. You

    Winter 17:36
    guys had to you guys probably had a baby shower and everything. Before actually.

    Bailey 17:41
    I said yeah. My baby shower was going to take place in March. Like right won the pandemic hit so so yeah, I had to have everyone just mail me the gifts. Oh, really

    Winter 17:52
    had a baby shower. Yeah, darn it. Yeah.

    Bailey 17:54
    But I just remember like, gifts coming in. And it was like Christmas every day. You walk up to the door and there’s a bunch of packages. Like we’ll take it. Yep. And so I actually just kept all the packages until my like, Baby Shower day. Yeah. And then we opened it up on that day. Oh,

    Winter 18:13
    yeah. Okay, that’s, that’s, I guess a good enough way to have a baby shower during Yeah. Yeah.

    Bailey 18:21
    I don’t think we need anything else. Her room is tactful. Okay.

    Winter 18:25
    So you guys were well stocked, though. I mean, yes. We got a lot of love from family and friends. So that’s great. Yes, very supportive. Okay, so sorry to interrupt here. So everything was packed nursery was ready to go.

    Bailey 18:36
    Yep. Yep. And it was Memorial weekend. And it was that Saturday, the 23rd. My sister has been begging me to do maternity photos. And I’m not a photo girl. I don’t like being in photos. But she’s like, You need to remember this too. first pregnancy. I was like, Okay, fine. So I got ready, we got ready. And then we headed out to the lake that was only like 20 miles away. And my sisters, and she had this arm land in the back of her like place. And that’s where we just took our maternity photos. And they turned out wonderful. I’m very thankful I have them. And that was the 23rd. And then the next morning was the 24th, obviously, and woke up and I was gonna go out to the lake to see my family again, while my boyfriend at the time went out to a friend’s house out in the country. And so is separated in different ways. And I decided to hide my family and then they were packing up to leave. I was like, oh shoot, like, you’re leaving. So I got to figure out a different thing to do today. And so I said goodbye to them and then I went back to the house and I called up my boyfriend’s like, what do you guys do mean? And he’s like, Well, you can come out here if you want, there’s nothing really going on. I was like, Okay. And then I always remember like going in and out of the house, like, I would go to my car, then I’ll be like, Oh, I forgot my water bottle, like go back in the house, and I come back out. And I’m like, oh, I need to do this. So it’s like those little things that you always remember. Like, were they all signs? I don’t know. But it was just took the felt like forever to get out there. And so I went out there on the country, and a couple of my friends were there, which was nice. So those people to talk to while the boys hung out. And the boys are just talking less girls got bored. So we went driving. And then we came back. And some more people were coming over. And it was kind of a first time like hanging out with friends with the whole COVID going on. Yeah. And so we’re sitting down around the table. And I remember like the topic about guns kept coming up. And which is whatever. And I remember there was a certain thing that they were talking about. And it was like about the grips on a gun. Oh, the grips, do whatever, I’m a gun. And I remember there was a gun brought out it was on the table. And again, talking about the grips or whatever. And then the person next to me, grabbed the gun, looking at the grips, checking it out, or whatever. And like when I say next to me, like we were literally right next to each other. And that’s when all of a sudden I was in shock. And I was in did not know what happened. My ears were ringing. And I knew the gun went off. And I remember just like what is happening, and everyone’s just like, freaking out around the table. And I looked down and I was like, I just got shocked. Oh, and that was neat. So

    Winter 22:07
    the person that was right next to you had grabbed the gun was just kind of messing with it. Yeah. And it discharged.

    Bailey 22:16
    It discharged. Yeah.

    Winter 22:20
    And so where was the where you said it was on the table, but this person had it in their hand or, like, from

    Bailey 22:29
    the table. And I’m guessing it was on my lap. I think I was talking to somebody else on this side. And then the person next to me was on the other side. So we were talking and then all sudden, it went off. And then you’re just in so much shock right away. And I just remember everybody just freaking out. Oh, yeah. Yeah.

    Winter 22:52
    Where did you get shot? Um,

    Bailey 22:55
    it was right in my bottom of my hip.

    Winter 22:59
    So bottom of your hip area and did it go?

    Bailey 23:03
    It’s like, where are your hip and your leg needs?

    Winter 23:05
    Yes. Okay. So through there. Yeah. So did it go through? You did? Or was the I’m assuming the bullet was lodged somewhere? Yes.

    Bailey 23:16
    Well, actually, that’s the first thing that everybody did. They came over and tried to find the exit. Yes. And we couldn’t find it. Couldn’t find it anywhere. I wasn’t bleeding. I wasn’t nothing was happening. That they just couldn’t find it. I remember someone calling 911. Yeah, and were

    Winter 23:38
    you in pain? I mean, like, I know, you were in shock. Were you Did you feel any pain? I mean, cuz shock can help protect you. For sure. Yeah.

    Bailey 23:50
    No, not that. I remember. I I wasn’t in any pain until later on when I went into back labor. But no, I know. I they kept telling me I couldn’t move. I couldn’t do anything. Okay. I remember I was sweating. I started feeling lightheaded. I was starting to like be a thing do you feeling Yeah. And I just like kept telling them what I needed as I need an ice rake. I need this. While they’re still checking me out all over trying to find this exit one and nowhere to be found. And so, obviously, my first thought was my baby. Is my baby going to be okay? And if I go is my baby going to be okay. I did not know what was happening. I didn’t know if I was just gonna be alive for a little bit and then I go, I was like, I just need to know that my baby’s gonna be okay for me to be stronger. In this moment, I just wanted to close my eyes and like go, Yeah, but I kept closing my eyes and then forcing myself to stay awake because I didn’t want to pass out until the EMT came and It was a bunch of them. They came and they brought. I remember a stethoscope and listening to Hazel’s heartbeat. And I could just kept telling me like, I don’t want to know, I don’t want to know right now, if you can hear it or not. And then later I was like, I want to know, I need to know if you can hear it. Please let me know if you can’t. And he’s like, I can hear it. I think she’s still alive. Okay. Okay. Okay, we got this, then I was like, I’m going to be strong. We’re gonna do this.

    Winter 25:31
    And then, can you tell me again? What about week? Are you 3637 3737

    Bailey 25:37
    was just gonna go in for my next appointment that week. And I was actually going to be asked if I could be induced because my boyfriend at the time was leaving for 80. So they take like, two and a half, three weeks. Yeah. Long content. Yeah. Sounds like for him to be there with her for a little bit. But yeah, I was 37 weeks. And so I was like, well, that’s a good if she was have to be born right now. And if she’s alive, then there’s a possibility that she can make. Yep, she’s full term. And so yeah, I remember the EMTs coming up. Then it was up up on the stairs. So they had to put me on a stretcher, and then carry me down to lifeflight. I remember, like flight flying and meeting us in the driveway. And I kept asking if somebody could come with me. And they kept saying, No, I had to go alone. And then I remember if I need to go to my doctor that I’ve been seen, that is in a different town. But I had to go to the high risk hospital that had better people for please, actions. And so I remember going in there, or into lifelight, I kept asking someone to call my mom. And I just really wanted my mom to be with me. Yeah. And going into lifelight. And just talking to her asking her, like you feel like it’s gonna be forever to get there in the moment takes forever, but it’s just a quick trip. Like, I think it took seven minutes. And yeah, I remember flying and landing on the roof and going in through the door, and then all sudden, there’s a bunch of people, yes, and white, just all ready to go. I want to say there’s like 20 People just waiting for me. And they’ll push me in into this room. And I lay down and there’s a doctor there that was going to do an ultrasound and there’s a nurse by my head that’s just kept saying we’re gonna pray it before we find out and I pray that everything’s gonna be okay. Right that everything’s gonna be alright, and you’re gonna make it and I remember the doctor but the Jelani, but the ultrasound on? And she’s like, do you want to see the screen? Or do you not want to see the screen and I said, I want to see the screen. And so I remember her checking. And obviously it took a while. And then that’s when it hit me that I knew she didn’t make it. There’s no way. And then the doctor brought over another doctor and kept asking if they see anything. And then they push the screen away. And then that’s when it really hit that should not make it. And obviously I’m still in shock. At this point. No feelings are going through me. no emotions, no nothing. I was by myself. I didn’t know what to do. And then they turn the screen back over. And that’s when she said I’m sorry, really, your baby did not make it. And I was like, Okay, and what is the next step? Like I am by myself. This is gonna feel real at the moment. I feel like this is a dream. But I said, Am I going to die? Is there a chance that I’m going to die? And she’s like, we we do not know at this point. I said, she’s like you need to go and get a CAT scan because they said that if she was alive that they were just going to go straight into emergency C section. Yeah. But since she wasn’t they took the time to get the X rays to find more where the bullet was more aware what things were going on inside. And so I remember that I kept going in and out. At this point. There’s the stuff that like I can’t really remember but I remember going into the CAT scan And I kept telling them, they can’t lay on my back. There’s, there’s no way I can lay on my back because I was just in pain. They said it will only be a quick 10 minutes tops like, and I was like, okay, so they helped me out and put a pillow on my back. And then I went in, and they checked it all out. And that’s where kind of like my memory kind of stops. Yeah. Because then I went into emergency C section. I went out, obviously. So I remember a thing about it. And I remember waking up in the room. The doctor was there. And she’s kept repeating me like, What just happened? I lost my baby. And I was still by myself. And I was like, and I was my mom, here is my sister here. Is anybody here? And they said, Yeah, your mom’s here. She can come in. Said, Okay, so it was my mom, my sister, and my cousin that came in. And I didn’t know what they knew, and no idea. But I told them, I said, maybe that make it and I remember my mom saying I know. And that was kind of that was tough. Yeah. Tough knowing that. I don’t know, you get the nod. The blame comes for yourself. Like I was I there? What was I doing? You know,

    Winter 31:34
    after the CAT scan, they just took you or emergency C section right away. Right? And then did they? Did you get to see Hazel at all? Um,

    Bailey 31:45
    so right away? No. When the doctor was there that woke me up. Or when I woke up, she was there. She kind of told me that they placed Hazel on my chest and did that. A few minutes of skin to skin before they took her back. So I mean, that is really nice knowing but obviously it sucks not not being there in the moment and not remembering it or singing it or because

    Winter 32:15
    I mean, most emergency C sections. I mean, yeah, they kind of put you out sometimes and other times you’re I mean, yeah. But I was gonna say they were probably working on you as well. Right? They were sewing you up finding whatever needed. I mean, they need to find the bullet they needed to take care of you. What, what, what was all involved in that surgery to take care of you? Um,

    Bailey 32:38
    so basically, it was just a C section right now. They found where the bullet was a bullet was actually stuck on my other leg. Oh, well, I went through. I went through my uterus. And then but obviously very low. Yeah, yeah. And then was stuck between two bones on my left leg. Okay. Yeah. And the bullet was they told me it was point five millimeters away from a big artery. Holy cow. That I could have lost it. Yeah.

    Winter 33:15
    Holy cow. That was Yeah. I say lucky. But that is not. Right. Right word.

    Bailey 33:21
    I mean, obviously, the scenario I wish I would have went into would have been Yeah, no.

    Winter 33:26
    Okay, so they did the emergency C section. And, and then you came out again, and then were they going to prep do you prep you for what was gonna have to happen for the rest of the surgeries? And yeah,

    Bailey 33:39
    so they are? I think since I was doing all right, that they were okay with waiting a couple days before I did think it was two days waiting for my other surgery to get the bullet out. Okay. So we came back into the array was back in the room. And I remember, my boyfriend at the time went to go see a nurse to see if he could see Hazel, okay. And I’m pretty sure he got told No, not right now. And so he came back in. And that’s when the first time that we saw each other again. Then the doctor came in. And she’s like, do you want to see Hazel? Or, actually, I should maybe backtrack a little bit. So it was my boyfriend, my cousin, my mom and my sister. And they said, Do you have a name for her? And I was like, um, I don’t know. And then I looked at my boyfriend at the time and I said, he’s okay. And he said, Absolutely. And so that’s when we named her he’s okay.

    Winter 34:52
    That’s cool. And where did you get case? I should have asked Is that a family name or?

    Bailey 34:56
    Yeah, so my sister and my mom. See middle name. Okay, okay.

    Winter 35:00
    Yeah,

    Bailey 35:02
    that’s fun. Well, yeah, I named it after them. And then the nurse came in and asked if I wanted to see Hazel. And I said, or something along the line of my boyfriend saying, No, you didn’t want me to see her in the circumstance. And then then there’s

    Winter 35:23
    he said, No. Yeah, yeah, were you.

    Bailey 35:26
    And, um, and then I thought about as like, Well, maybe not. I don’t know what happened to her, you know, and has told me nobody has. Okay. Okay. I don’t know, if the bullet hit her. I didn’t know if I didn’t know. I didn’t know thing. Yeah. Um, so I was like, Yeah, I don’t want to see her. And it’s one of the biggest regrets in my life. But so we moved on. And she said, Well, I took some photos of her, just in case you didn’t want to see her. But I took these photos whenever you’re ready, if you want to see them. She just took them on her phone. It was something very special that she didn’t have to do. But she did. Yeah. And I said, Yes, I would like to see them. And so I think I backtracked a little bit.

    Winter 36:21
    Yeah, that’s Oh, no, that’s okay. No, it’s totally fine. I think that is we, I wanted, we should definitely spend some time on what you did with hazel, or what your decisions were with hazel? Because that’s like the Yeah, it’s important.

    Bailey 36:35
    Yeah. So obviously, we’re grieving together. And we had family come in throughout the night, it was a long night of just our immediate family come in right away. Yeah. And obviously, COVID going on, right away, I only could have one person, and then they bumped it to three people, and then all sudden, they’re like, whoever wants to come and see you can come in and see you. And I was very grateful for that. And yes, they gave me a big room. And I’d stay in that room until for a couple days until my next surgery. So family kept coming in friends kept coming in visiting us. And then a couple of days later, is when the doctor came in and told me that she took pictures on the phone. Oh, okay. And so this is when I already knew that Hazel was off to the autopsy place to get all her autopsy done. And then she was going to head to the funeral home.

    Winter 37:40
    So you guys did get an autopsy? I just I’m not familiar with because there was a gun in involved. The autopsy is an automatic. Is that correct?

    Bailey 37:52
    I think so. Yeah. Okay. Okay. Well, they had to do an autopsy. Okay,

    Winter 37:56
    gotcha. Okay, to make sure to kind of rule out whatever happened. And so yeah, okay. Yeah. Okay. And

    Bailey 38:03
    so the doctor showed us these pictures off of her phone. And obviously, we just bought looking at her how much actually at the time, we could not see her hair. Her hair was covered too is she had a little hat on, and then a blanket. And we couldn’t see anything else. I was just like, Oh, her face. And I mean, it was still very special. And we’re just, I’ll bet her nose was her chubby cheeks like it was actually like, I mean, we like, you know, you’re pregnant. You know, you’re gonna be a mom, but like seeing them in real life is a big. It’s a big difference. Yeah, that’s how I knew I was like, I That’s my daughter, my daughter right there. And I would say I just stay in a hospital for a couple of days. And before my surgery, and then I went back and got the bullet removed. And then I had to stay a couple more days. I think my total stay was a week long. The doctors brought in the mold of her feet, or hands. Oh, good. I have those which was really special. They took the stamps. And then they cut out cut off some hair. They did have a little envelope of her hair. Oh, good. Yeah. And that was pretty much our hospital stay away. People coming and going. We had funeral homes coming in. We had people to talk to for therapy, obviously it’s a big Oh, yeah. Big thing with making sure that we’re okay. And knowing the next steps. I mean, obviously you don’t plan for this in your life. Nobody plans this when they’re pregnant. And I never really thought I would be in charge of a funeral. Yeah. For my daughter.

    Winter 39:58
    So Bailey when you did finally show, talk to the doctor, and she showed you the pictures of Hazel, did you ask her any questions about maybe how she passed away? Obviously, you, you had a major trauma just that basically happened to you. So I’m curious if and it had gone through your uterus. So entered like, did it? Did it hit any bones or shatter any bones or anything like that? Okay, no, no,

    Bailey 40:29
    no, it just went straight through. Okay.

    Winter 40:32
    And then launched into your other leg into the bone itself. So, okay, but didn’t break that. Didn’t it just launch there? Okay. Yep.

    Bailey 40:41
    Yep. And, obviously, I, I was in a catheter for most of my stay. I wasn’t able to walk right away. I had therapy coming in, it was basically learning how to walk again. Yeah, no, I mean, how to get up. And I remember one of the days that they came in, they’re like, alright, we’re taking the catheter out. And I was like, no way. There’s no way I’m gonna be getting up and going to the bathroom. And so we pushed for it took a little steps day by day. Then I finally moved on to going up and down steps. And obviously, it was very slow, very hurtful. It was very painful. Yeah. They wanted me to be able to go upstairs, downstairs and be able to walk as our house had serious to get up to Yeah. Before going home. And finally got to the point where I was able to leave. We had a funeral in mind. But nobody was pushing things at the time, which was very nice. They said, let us take us at a at our own rent or at her own time. Yeah. And I remember packing up everything. And obviously, all the flowers, all the things that you get from everybody just very special. But also, it’s very hard to go walk down the halls afterwards without baby. Yeah. And I see other families being happy, which they should be, but it’s hard.

    Winter 42:13
    Yeah, you don’t have

    Bailey 42:17
    the drive home. Like I said, it was about 45 minutes from our house. So that drive home was really long. Really sad. And then getting home was probably another hard thing. Obviously, her nursery was set. We had everything ready, ready to go. We actually had family and friends come to the house while we were in the hospital. And they kind of helped us pick up everything. And we told them right away that we wanted the door shut to Hazel’s room. I mean, I had her bottles outed the clean mean stuff out. And so they kind of just packed it all up for now. Yeah. And so we didn’t have to walk in to everything baby girl for everything, baby. So we got home as long and then we’ve had to start doing the funeral process. And I always said that I wanted to walk before her funeral. That’s one of my goals. I want to walk without my walker. Yeah. So I don’t want to have her funeral until then. And we knew that she wanted or we wanted her to be cremated. Okay. So we met with the funeral home a couple of days later. And then they told us that she should be coming back from her autopsy. And then that will be a time where we can finally say our goodbyes before she goes and gets cremated. I remember waking up that day and feeling very sick. Like it was like the first time that I ever felt like a real elephant was sitting on my chest. I couldn’t breathe. I couldn’t. I didn’t know what to expect and didn’t know what to do. But I actually had my cousin who was a nurse was actually made a connection with their hospitals. I want to say aggrievement person who comes in and talk to them. Yeah. She gave me yeah, she gave me a phone call. And she kind of went through all the steps about how today’s gonna go. She’s like you can do anything you want. You can tell them anything you want. This is your child. If you want to write down a journal of what you want to say to his or you want to sing her lullaby if you want to bring anything to be cremated with like your baby blanket or a certain outfit, she’s like, you can do literally anything. She’s like, I want to give you some points. You take it and you can do whatever with them. That’s good. Yeah. And so I gathered Oh, my baby blanket. My boyfriend took his name tag from the military. And so we brought that in. And I wrote a little note that I still have what I wanted to say. And remember, our families came with us, our parents came with us to the funeral home, we kind of went over the steps of the funeral home what we wanted. And then it was finally time to go into the room and see her. And they kind of gave me some advice. So they said, We, I don’t know if it was that word for word, but it was something around like, not sure about holding her as she won’t feel like a baby. And I was just kind of crushed by that. I didn’t know how to take it, and didn’t know what that meant that No, like fluid or thing got to her. She was like, lopsided, like I still at this point, had no idea what truly happened to her. Okay. And and so we went in, they said that right away, she’s gonna be covered with two blankets. And then as you want, you can take off a blanket. And then you’ll see her arms. And then you can take off another blanket, and you’ll see her feet and her legs. And so obviously, you go in there and you see blankets covering your child is very hard to see. And so just took my time. And that was the first time I got to see her hands. And it was very special. She had really long fingers at the top. And then she had like, chunky from the knuckle down. Oh. That’s kind of like a memory we always have and what we kind of can laugh about is her. Only say her funny hands so long and skinny and chubby. It’s like her mom’s hands in the front. And then the bottom was her dad.

    Winter 47:05
    That’s funny is a hand. Yeah.

    Bailey 47:10
    Um, yeah. And then her legs and her feet. She had long legs. She was 20 inches long. And she weighed about five pounds in 10 ounces. Oh, yeah. And then we saw little hairs on her legs and our arms. And that’s kind of how I came out. I came out with a lot of hair came out a lot with a lot of hair on my body. My dad always made the joke that I was half monkey. Oh, yeah. But um, so it’s kind of special, like, seeing those resemblance of you on your child. And then I still didn’t see her face. It was covered. And it was something that I couldn’t do. And then obviously, the another regret that I wish I would have pushed for and pushed for my child and pushed for myself as being able to see her in person. Yeah. At the time, I was just listening to everybody else. And worried about everyone else’s feelings and not really on my own. And I knew that I I shut it on it. I should have looked at her. So I held her anything I wanted. Um, and then I think we spent about an hour in there. And then it was finally time to say our last goodbye. We gave her all the things covered are up on my blanket. And then we came back out. And there’s another tough day. Yeah, so my walker. I say it’s exhausting. You just don’t know how to cope with it. Yeah.

    Winter 49:04
    Right. In the funeral home is yeah, not. No, not great. It’s not

    Bailey 49:11
    at all I see this walk in and it’s just your motors. But

    Winter 49:18
    Bailey, can I ask you a quick question? What are some of the things that you guys did with her? For that hour that you spent?

    Bailey 49:27
    Um, obviously, I touched her the whole time. Yeah. I kind of got I read her what I wanted to say to her just apologizing for everything. And wishing things were different. Obviously, we had a couple chuckles about our fingers. So it was kind of nice when we’re just sobbing and crying. We had a couple laughs Yeah. But, and then I wanted to take some pictures pitches that I had. And so we took pictures of our hands and our legs and feet. And then we took them off holding them in our hands. So it’s kind of like us both. And then her feet were on. Those are pretty special pictures. Yeah. Basically what we did during the time, lots of crying lots of holding hands and just spending that time with her. Yeah, the first time really.

    Winter 50:24
    And and you did mention that you were worried about looking at her face. Up until that because it nobody still had told you what had happened or how she looked or anything like that. Is that right?

    Bailey 50:38
    No, no, nobody. I mean, I guess it’s not really a question I asked either, because I kind of just assumed, yeah, but I also did not know what, yeah, okay. Yeah. Obviously, I knew that that’s how she passed was from the bullet. But I didn’t know where it went in. Or if it went in or if it hit something. I had no idea at this

    Winter 51:01
    point. Yeah. You did have some other pictures from the doctor that showed her face and everything.

    Bailey 51:07
    Okay. Yep. Yep. So you hands more? Yeah, I had a picture of her face. And it was actually just a picture of her half face. There was a blanket covering the half of her face. So that’s kind of where I put into my mind that she that was where she got hit. Yeah. But again, I didn’t confirm it with anybody. It was just in the back of my mind. And so we planned the funeral that day. I think it was like a week or two later, I asked my sister, she would sing because she has the most beautiful voice. And she said, if you want me to I will. And so it’s a song I always remember. It’s jealous of my angels. And she’s saying that. And the other day of her funeral. We had an early morning. And I remember getting to the church. And all of a sudden this church was just packed. Sure. From top to bottom. We had a very supportive community. Yeah, I’m forever thankful for it. They were there for us. It was a packed church. And then the pastor told me, it’s pretty packed in there. I don’t know if you want to walk down the aisle or else you can come out from the side. Yeah, it won’t have to face anybody. And so we decided to come out from the side and go in the pew. And it was a beautiful service, a lot of cries. And then finally, I wanted to walk by myself down the aisle back. It’s just something that I wanted to do for her. I wanted to be brave, I wanted to be strong. And so we exited. We went down the aisle. And we had people come out. I was trying to get away and head to the house. But obviously when people come out, they want to see you they want to give you the hugs. And so I think I held almost everybody in there, which again is it’s grateful for

    Winter 53:09
    that support. Yeah, that’s awesome. That’s great. Yeah, yeah.

    Bailey 53:13
    But yeah, posters made or canvases. And I had her mold out. And then we got these like dog tags from the hospital too. So I had those out. And I have just like a little table of remembrance for her. Yeah. And so that was pretty special to have that.

    Winter 53:32
    That’s great. And then did you get the autopsy results after that? I know it takes a while to and autopsies to actually come back. Yeah,

    Bailey 53:45
    so yeah, we went through, obviously, you go through your own grieving process, your own therapy. And then one of the things I wanted to do was meet with a doctor. That was in my surgery, and I just wanted to go have an appointment with her. And I wanted to ask all the questions. Yes. I had a list of questions I wanted to know about her. And, and so it was a couple of weeks later that I went in, and I talked to her. And well, I also had to get my staples out, too. And so I got staples out on my stomach and staples out on my leg too. Yeah. And so

    Winter 54:22
    Oh, man, that’s like a lot of like, your surgeries, like your emergency C section and then plus your other surgeries like I Yeah, yeah, there’s a lot. That’s so much Bailey. Like, holy cow. This is crazy. Okay, so you went in and had those taken out? And then what did you ask her all of your questions?

    Bailey 54:41
    Yeah. So I asked her and I said, I want to know if the bullet hit her where it had her and where it came out or and I said, and then I asked, did she feel like a baby being held? And she said yes. And then that’s what I broke down, knowing that I made the wrong choice. And she told me that it did go through her head. And it came out to her head, went in her back behind her ear, and then came out on the bridge of her nose. Oh. So that kind of put into place by the picture that we had of her was covered. Yeah. We kind of talked about it, how she had tan skin. Her hair was crazy. It was super long, and did a little wave to it. And it was kind of I finally got that. I want to say I don’t like closure, a little bit of knowing what happened to her. Yeah. And, and so then, after that, I kind of just did a remembrance of her every month, we let go of balloons. And then obviously picking out her gravestone. We knew, obviously, she wasn’t gonna be buried there. But we want to do some Memorial bench for her or people to come and visit and just spend the time or. And so picking that out. It’s a lot. It’s crazy for parents just pick that up for a little baby. Yeah. And so we found the perfect one. And we got to make it personalized for her. And then I think I want to say it was about December, my sister and I were sitting at her house. And we’re just like talking talking about her. My sister was the most supportive person ever. It couldn’t have done it without her. And she’s like, did she go in for an autopsy? And I was like, Yeah. And she’s like, because I always told her he was one of my biggest regrets was not being able to see her. And she said, Oh, why don’t we reach out to the place that took it? And see, because obviously, they have to take pictures for them

    Winter 57:18
    for their reports and everything. Yeah.

    Bailey 57:21
    So she’s like, why don’t you reach out to them, and just see if they have any pictures. They’re like, we know what’s over that six month I was like, I don’t know if there’s a certain time limit that they keep everything or what they do with it. So I reached out to them. And the lady called me back a couple days later, and said, Yeah, we have pitchers. We have things if you want. And I said can I am I able to come and see them. I was like I told her kind of the story. I said, I didn’t, I wasn’t able to see her. I wasn’t able to do anything. I just want to see her I want to see it before her. And she said absolutely. So we arranged a time. And my sister came with me. And we came in and it was pretty special. Like they they could have just given me these pictures. And that’s it. But this girl went above and beyond. And I walked in and it was like a slideshow. Oh, Baby Hazel. Oh baby girl, Hazel. And I was like, This is awesome. So kind. Yeah. And so her and I talked about it. And she said the first picture is this. The second picture is this. And then the third is when you’ll see her like fully without edited without anything because she said that her and another person she worked with, they actually took the time to edit photos between the time that I called now. And so she told me she’s like, this is an edited one. And it was like her full face. Yeah. And it was just beautiful. I could see her for who she was. Yeah, the whole her. And that’s when I first time I saw her hair. And I looked at my sister and I was like, holy cow. She has a lot of hair. Yeah. And that was pretty special. I mean, it was dark. And that’s when she told me that her eyes were brown. Oh, okay. And I was like, oh, that’s something I just didn’t think of I didn’t think to ask I didn’t think of what the colors they would be you know. And so at the time, yeah, her eyes were brown. So that was pretty special. Because I got blue eyes. Yeah. But um, yeah. And so we went through those pictures. And then it was she’s like this next one is unedited. You’re gonna see it and I said it, okay. And she’s like, I’m just gonna give you a heads up, like where it is on her work, what you will see and everything. And then I look at it and my stomach just dropped. And I said this is this is her, and is actually pretty special to know. Like, you couldn’t really see anything at all. There was no, I mean, obviously there was damage, there’s blood there was a little bit but nothing that I was pictured in my head. Okay. You couldn’t fully see the exit hole you couldn’t really see much. And it was just the most beautiful picture. Oh, okay. Yeah,

    Winter 1:00:45
    that’s a nice thing right there. Holy cow. That is

    Bailey 1:00:48
    Yeah. And then. So that was a close up of her. And then the next one was her full body. And those are the two pictures that I have on my phone that I just I love them. Because I can see her full body. Like I can see your stomach. I can see her legs. I can see your neck. I can see your head like just everything. And it’s it’s just perfect. Perfect little baby. Yay.

    Winter 1:01:12
    Yeah, those little babies. Yeah. So they’re just, they’re perfect. Right? They

    Bailey 1:01:19
    are? Yes.

    Winter 1:01:21
    What a special. First of all, I’m going to say your sister is a godsend because like even just to put that in your head to just go try and see if you can get that file or or the picture. Absolutely. I think that was a big deal. And then the people there at the coroner’s office was they, they Yeah, they sound amazing. Like, it kind of people not

    Bailey 1:01:42
    expect anything like that. And they did. And they actually gave me a flash drive. I have these pitchers forever. Yeah.

    Winter 1:01:49
    That’s awesome. Yeah, that is wonderful. That’s wonderful. Did that feel like a bit of like you said before, it’s not necessary closure. But did you feel? Yeah,

    Bailey 1:02:01
    I did. I did feel I felt like my last step that I always wanted, was met. And I got to see her for who she was. And I got to see the full her without edited without covering. Yeah. And I know, everybody was just trying to protect me. And maybe it was, but it was, it was, it’s what I needed is to see the full thing who she was. Yeah. Yeah. And it was a picture that I hid for, honestly, two years. And then show anybody until this past year.

    Winter 1:02:39
    Really? Yeah. Sometimes those are sacred. Those are special and just you kind of hold them close to your heart. And that is that is wonderful. So because those are, yeah, there’s a few of them that I don’t share of my son yet, either. Not really, just my husband I’ve seen I’ve seen them. So I’m just so sorry. This is like I’m assuming your recovery for your your legs, muscles, all everything that was essentially damaged by the bullet was okay was progressing. Well, any permanent damage damage that you are aware of? Um,

    Bailey 1:03:19
    no, no, I, I recovered, and they said it that I was able to have more babies when I was ready. Okay. And so that was one of the most the biggest concern that I wanted if I was ever going to be a mom again. Yeah,

    Winter 1:03:35
    especially if it went through your I mean, yeah, it hidden obviously hit Hazel. So went through uterus and everything. Yeah. So. Okay, so they they do feel like it is a positive. You have a it looks positive for you. So yeah, yeah. Good. That’s great. Bailey, I think that there’s going to be a few people that want to know a little bit more about the whole the gun discharging so I’m wondering if you can go a little bit into that and what happened and like what happened afterwards? Because obviously, there was actually one right there’s one casualty and and your life you’re you have been hurt significantly. So can you tell us a little bit about how that was handled and and if you don’t want to get into certain things, you don’t have to mention that. I’ll try not to pry too much. But if you want to share then I’m sure others will be curious to know what happened and and if there was any resolution to that.

    Bailey 1:04:34
    Yeah. So the person next to me that was sitting next to me was actually my boyfriend at the time. Okay. And he was the one that the gun went off in his hands. And so that is why he couldn’t come with me right away. We didn’t know what was was gonna happen. But afterwards after we got home the sheriff came over. And I kind of had to say my statement. And it was an accident. And accidents do happen. And I press no charges. It just something that we have to learn from this day forward. Yeah.

    Winter 1:05:30
    Probably was quite heavy. And

    Bailey 1:05:34
    it was a hard, really hard recovery with going through grieving. Yeah, when we’re both on two different pages of the story. Yeah. And supporting one another, it was really hard.

    Winter 1:05:48
    Did you find that you’re getting getting some support from him? Or, I guess I can imagine there was a lot of obviously anger and, and guilt. And there’s, yeah. Yeah. Along with the grief and right, there’s like, there’s all of it. There’s like so many layers of it. So how, how was that?

    Bailey 1:06:14
    Um, yeah, it was hard. But obviously, we went through right away, we’re really together, we were supporting one another, really listening to one another. We kind of kept to ourselves for a while. And then as months go on, I think is when anger started to come out. And just things that it was kind of it was really hard, actually, because I wanted my house to be full of her. I wanted her to be everywhere in my house. And my boyfriend at the time can take it, you can take looking at her. And I think that was the one of the biggest things that hurt me the most. Is the baby that we made, baby that we created. Maybe that I carried for almost nine months. Yeah, that I just have to not have her in the house. But we came to terms and we had one little area of her. We still had a nursery up for a long time. Yeah. And but yeah, there was a lot of anger, a lot of anger. And, obviously, I think, a couple of years, or a year and a half after is when those are falling out. We couldn’t be together anymore with what happened. It was really hard to support one another and love one another. And to be on the same page again, it was something that we knew that we probably wouldn’t ever be on. So in that time, it was his house. And so I had to pack up everything. And that was the first time packing up Hazel stuff.

    Winter 1:08:12
    Oh, so Bailey, I know that we kind of went over a number of the details in your birth story. And not really talking that not really mentioning that it was your then boyfriend that had that had discharged the gun. So I suspect that there was a lot of I personally, if I if this happened to my sister, this I would have I would have been all up in his face, honestly. So I’m i How did your family take that information? And news and yeah, how did how did that work out?

    Bailey 1:08:52
    Obviously, the first thing was to make sure that I was okay. Yeah, everyone was there for me. But it was a long process. It was a long road of being able to face my parents and still being together. Obviously, there’s a lot of anger, a lot of anger with our family between our my mom and dad really and my sister. But they kind of kept quiet as they knew that I I was kind of basically I was protecting him. I didn’t let my feelings come out. I didn’t protect myself and my life. I was really worried about him in the ways that I probably shouldn’t have been. But you think of it when you’re young. You’re in love you think that that is your forever and it really wasn’t. And it was just, it was really long. It was yeah, it was long. It was a long couple of I think it was a year and a half afterwards. And

    Winter 1:10:02
    So were your parents. I know that you, you said that you kind of put hit him a little bit first and kind of put your feelings in the, in the background there. Did you? Or did your parents say anything to you or your sister say anything to you about it or question you about not pressing charges, that type of thing?

    Bailey 1:10:24
    Not really, I think everyone was still in shock right away. And I knew there was a lot of anger. But I remember my dad always saying if if you’re okay, and if this is how you want to live your life, then I have to keep my mouth shut, and I have to protect you. And he said, If you’re happy, then I will support you in any ways that I can.

    Winter 1:10:56
    Good, right.

    Bailey 1:10:57
    Yeah. I never thought about pressing charges. It was never really a thing that came to my mind. I knew it was an accident. And I knew that it wasn’t on purpose. Yeah, I’m in accidents do happen. And I don’t know, I don’t know how I would have been if it was a friend that did it. Or if it was somebody else that did it. Right. I mean, you think of it, then yeah, maybe I would have pressed charges. But knowing that it was a boyfriend at the time, and knowing that it was an accident that it wasn’t really something I thought of as we grieved of losing her together that I didn’t really want to do it by myself.

    Winter 1:11:39
    Yes, because it is hard. It’s a hard road anyway. So Bailey, thank you so much that I think that will help others feel like knowing that sometimes it’s a journey. And sometimes you learn a lot about yourself. And as you go through life and sounds like you’ve had in the three and a half years, you’ve really been able to like, heal and grow and learn some stuff has been important. Yeah,

    Bailey 1:12:10
    I think this last six months, has been the happiest that I’ve ever been since then. And I’m pretty proud of it. That’s

    Winter 1:12:18
    great. Because it does take work to to be in that place.

    Bailey 1:12:23
    Yeah,

    Winter 1:12:24
    that’s great that you have felt like peace and happiness for the last six months. I’m wondering, is there anything that has been helpful to you to in that healing in that? Yeah, the growth? Is there anything that’s been helpful for you?

    Bailey 1:12:38
    Yeah, I went to therapy right away. There’s a couple that I went in, I didn’t really like. And then I finally found a girl. And she did EMDR training, which is the eye movement, dissonance, annotation processor, diarization, yeah. Processing. And I did not have any idea what it was. And so we took it. So basically, that’s how I’m able to tell my story. It’s how I’m able to say it fully. And what we did is we broke up the trauma, and the accident by little pieces. And each session that we did, we focus on the one section, and it was about talking about it, and then thinking of like a different room, you’re in something that calms you. And think of different things when we were able to say it. And so I think that really helped me process the full traumatic event. And, and I’m able to say it to the state. And I think that is really amazing. I am thankful for the EMDR therapy that I did. And really just my friends, and my family just being there for me every year. celebrating her birthday is a big thing. We get together and we all release balloons. And I let the kids draw on these rocks that I bring out to her memorial bench. And I think the biggest thing is letting go of the relationship that I was in. I think that had to do a lot with the and truly happy now. Yeah, it’s a big weight that is off my shoulder that I didn’t think was ever there but it was but

    Winter 1:14:32
    it was. That’s, that’s great. I just, well a couple of things. EMDR has been it’s very has been a very helpful therapy for me honestly and I think Lee has also found it helpful when we have done that mode of therapy. So I think that’s awesome. If you don’t know much about it is it does help process trauma like and this is a big T trauma type of situation like there’s there’s a lot that you have dealt With and, and it’s great that you were able to find somebody, oh, that was going to be another thing I’m going to throw in there is that you got to shop around for a therapist until you find the right person. Because you really do, you’re not going to click with everybody. So that’s just another little tip. If you are going through this chopper route, it’s okay. If somebody doesn’t click with you. It’s not, it’s not the right might not be the right person. So yeah. And then I think that’s really cool that your family is so supportive of honoring Hazel remembering her, they seem to be very involved in and wanting to talk about her and wanting to do they

    Bailey 1:15:37
    are and I am very thankful that they’re actually see her as a grandchild and, and actually a person, not just an event that took place. And not just the trauma that took place. She was actually the baby, she was the person to she was there. And it’s somebody that I will never forget. And I do want to say thank you for providing this podcast, because during my time, I was searching on podcast, and I found you guys. And that’s what really helped me the first year was listening to other people’s stories, and connecting with them and just driving in my car crying alone with them. And that is another thing that helped me a lot. And I’m thankful for you guys.

    Winter 1:16:27
    I’m so glad that’s what we we we wanted to have a podcast to listen to, but there was nothing there. So we’re like, let’s just start it. We’ll just do it. Yeah. So I’m glad that that was a comfort to you. And thanks to all the parents that have shared other stories that were willing to be vulnerable just like you Bailey to tell your story. Bailey I thank you again for your time today. I want to just ask you one last thing that anything that you would like to share about Hazel briefly before we close today, what to remember about her and say to her,

    Bailey 1:17:03
    um, that I will always remember her a little cakes and our hiccups in my belly. And that she was forever my hero. She saved my life. If I would have been for her that I know that I wouldn’t have made it and that I always say that she is forever my five pound 10 ounce sweet baby girl who is my hero.

    Winter 1:17:30
    Thank you this beautiful thank you

    Filed Under: birth story, late term stillbirth, podcast episode, stillbirth Tagged With: c-section, stillbirth

    In Loving Memory of Baby Lydia Jaelle | A Dad’s 30-Week Stillbirth Story

    February 17, 2022 by Winter

    Dad Jonah recounts the events of his wife Danielle’s first pregnancy, and how he remembers Danielle asking the doctor about whether she should be monitoring the baby’s movements. Danielle noticed decreased fetal movements, and when they get to the hospital, they are unable to find Lydia’s heartbeat. Lydia Jaelle was stillborn at 30 weeks due to an umbilical cord accident.

    Watch here (YouTube):

    Listen here (podcast):

    Time Stamps:

    00:00 Lydia
    02:42 Pregnancy and finding out
    07:28 Going to the hospital
    10:52 Birth
    16:25 After birth
    19:46 Going home
    30:37 Funeral arrangements

    You might appreciate these other episodes:

    • Watch/listen to Jonah‘s advice episode of daughter Lydia: Click here
    • Watch/listen to Danielle‘s birth episode of daughter Lydia: Click here

    Wanna help?

    • DONATE! Consider giving a one-time or recurring donation to help with production and hosting costs: Go here for more information.
    • SUBSCRIBE! Head over here to subscribe to our YouTube channel and our podcasts.
    • SHARE! Spread the word to a loss mom or dad, or those who may be supporting a bereaved parent. Send them a link to this post. Pin one of our graphics on Pinterest.
    Lydia’s tiny hand

    Full Transcription:

    Jonah 0:00
    My daughter’s name is Lydia.

    Jonah 0:07
    When she was born, and we got to see her for the first time, I was at an absolute loss of words to describe how beautiful I thought that she was. I’ve never seen anything more beautiful in my entire life. It was– I’d never experienced anything like that before, where I just could not comprehend how beautiful that she was. So I remember she had curly hair, dark curly hair. Which was a bit of a surprise that she had dark curly hair. We always thought that she would have blonde hair. I think my wife was hoping that she would have blonde hair like her. Then blue green eyes like me, but we never got to see her eye color. She had big feet. Very similar. I think Danielle said that she thought that her feet reminded her of my feet. That was the thing that I just remembered the most about her. I just could not comprehend how beautiful she was. I mean you see babies and people talk about babies all the time. About how cute they are, and all that. I will be the first person to admit that when my son was born there was a period of time where I was like he’s a little bit scary looking. But once she was born, she was absolutely the most beautiful thing I’ve ever seen in my life.

    Winter 1:42
    Welcome to Still A Part of Us. A place where moms and dads share the story of their child who was stillborn or who died in infancy. I’m Winter.

    Lee 1:49
    And I’m Lee, we are grateful you joined us today. Please know that this is a story of loss and has triggers

    Winter 1:55
    Thanks to our loss parents who are willing to be vulnerable and share their children with us.

    Lee 1:59
    If you’re listening to this podcast, just know that on our YouTube channel, there are pictures and videos that are related to the stories that are being shared.

    Winter 2:06
    Subscribe and share it with a friend that might need it and tell them to subscribe. Why? Because people need to know that even though our babies are no longer with us. They’re Still A Part of Us.

    Lee 2:20
    Well, wonderful, thank you so much, Jonah.

    Jonah 2:22
    Yeah.

    Lee 2:23
    For this podcast tell us a little bit about the time period leading up to the pregnancy of you and your wife, Danielle? And then where were you guys at? What were you guys doing? Was this a planned pregnancy, or was it a nice surprise or?

    Jonah 2:42
    So we had just moved to South Carolina in 2013. It was actually in April when we found out I think it was April 15th. So tomorrow I believe would be the anniversary, I guess. If you want to call it that of when we found out that we were pregnant. We had been discussing definitely wanted to have children. At the time, I kind of wanted to wait a little bit longer. Just because I mean, we had only been married for maybe two years. So living together was all new and all that to me. You have a wife, and you’re still trying to figure out how to live with one person. Then not even 10 months later, you get another person come in here. It’s difficult to figure that all out.

    Jonah 3:42
    So we had been talking about getting pregnant. Then it turns out that we were. So at the time I was working at a hospital in cardiac rehabilitation. Then Danielle was working remotely. So she worked from home full time. She’d occasionally have to travel for various meetings and whatnot, or presentations. So back to Virginia or Maryland or various other places.

    Jonah 4:16
    So we were renting a home at the time. So it was in August of 2014 that we had purchased our first home together. It was just two months after that when we found out that Lydia was not going to make it and she was stillborn. So that was very difficult. Because only being in our home, two months in a brand new home and then having to go through that experience. That was like not starting off on the right foot or so to speak and whatnot. So we had some, I would say negative–

    Lee 5:04
    Probably negative feelings yeah.

    Jonah 5:07
    Yeah. But we figured that out. I remember details about the evening very clearly, so. I believe, so that time, obviously this was well before COVID, and all that craziness. I went to pretty much all of the doctor’s appointments.

    Jonah 5:29
    I remember very clearly, my wife asking the doctor, if she should be counting kicks. Monitoring movement, maybe, the baby’s movement patterns and whatnot. He hesitated for a second, and then said, No. There’s no need for you to do that. I can remember it very clearly like it happened yesterday. That was seven plus years ago.

    Jonah 5:59
    So one night, we were watching TV, and it was actually we’re watching The Walking Dead, it was on a Sunday night. So it was kind of later; it was after nine, around 10 o’clock or something like that. And Danielle noticed that Lydia wasn’t moving much. And I could see that she was getting pretty frustrated or pretty concerned, we were at 30 weeks at the time. So I think she had called into the doctor’s office and the doctor’s office suggested that we go to the emergency department. So we went upstairs to get ready.

    Jonah 6:37
    I remember praying about the situation and never having considered for a second that we would find out that our daughter was gone. It was quite the opposite. I remember when I was closing the door to go out of the garage to get in the car. I was thinking to myself, I was like, I looked and looked into our home. And I was like, when we come back from the hospital, we’re going to be bringing a baby back home with us. And that was absolutely not the case. So we jumped in the car about what to–

    Lee 7:16
    About time was this? You were watching The Walking Dead?

    Jonah 7:23
    Yeah.

    Lee 7:23
    You called, got ready. Was this about midnight, that you started to leave for the hospital?

    Jonah 7:28
    No, it was a little before that. So it was before 11 o’clock, and all this stuff started. So we got to the hospital late. That’s about a 45 minute drive, something like that from where we lived at the time. Couldn’t figure out what entrance to get into, we were on the wrong side of the hospital, I had to go around to the other side. Then we got in there, they got us back into one of the rooms.

    Jonah 7:54
    They started off doing a Doppler and I can remember, there were two or three nurses in the room. They just kept trying to do an audio capture of the heartbeat and they couldn’t find it. Then they got the doctor who was there that night. He came in for an ultrasound, I can remember as clear as day seeing our daughter inside of my wife’s belly. Seeing her face, I can remember her face. She was laying on her right side. You could see the outline of her rib cage, all of that. I remember clear as day. You could just see her heart that wasn’t beating. So that’ll be something that sticks with me the rest of my life. It was absolute shock, disbelief. The doctor said I’m sorry, but your baby doesn’t have a heartbeat.

    Jonah 8:58
    It’s just the exact opposite of what I was literally thinking when we left .I was fully expecting that something would happen and we would deliver. Even though it was at 30 weeks I was still expecting somehow that we would deliver a baby that night. And in a couple days we’d come home and that you’d be home and my wife would be fine. Our baby would be fine. So it was definitely not the exact opposite so.

    Lee 9:27
    Yeah, no. It seems like it’s a running thing with parents. It’s always like, you never expect that. You never expect to not come home with a child. I remember cause we were sitting in church and my wife’s like, Oh, I haven’t felt him move in a while. I was like, No, he’s just getting big. It’s no– there’s not a lot of room in you for a baby. So we went up to the hospital. The whole way there I was like, yeah, I’m glad we’re going because it’s going to put her at ease. I never expected like what you said, I never expected to hear those words. That your child, your child’s not alive.

    Jonah 10:11
    Yeah.

    Lee 10:12
    About what time was this just to sort of set? You left about 11 o’clock. You got up to 45 minutes ish to get to the hospital?

    Jonah 10:22
    Yeah, it was probably after one o’clock. When they actually did the ultrasound and they determined that her heart wasn’t beating.

    Lee 10:33
    What are the next steps after that? Did the medical staff give you options? With us they said we could start the delivery process right now. We can hook you up to pitocin and get you guys going. You can go home? What were the options in the steps that they told you?

    Jonah 10:52
    Yeah, they did, I guess, give us the option. I do remember them saying something about, you guys could go home and come back for delivery, but you’re gonna have to deliver the baby. So we did not do that, we stayed there. So at the time, we had a dog. So I think we had to call a neighbor or friend to take the dog out that kind of stuff. So we stayed in the hospital, though.

    Jonah 11:23
    They moved us to another room. The experience and I guess this is kind of like a bittersweet thing to say. The experience that we had and the care that we received in the hospital was spectacular. The nurses were amazing. I would say as bad of a situation as it could have been. It was great to have the care and the staff that were taking care of us.

    Jonah 11:53
    Still to this day, my wife is friends with a couple of the nurses who were there. So, each year we try to go back on her birthday, October 13th. We try to go back and take doughnuts over to the labor and delivery or something. Treats or something like that. We’ll see some of the nurses that had been there that night and talk to them and whatnot.

    Jonah 12:20
    Anyways, we decided to stay there. They put us in another room that was kind of away from the rest of the other rooms that had mothers and babies in them. Extremely difficult. Slept in the room and Danielle probably didn’t really sleep a whole lot. Then it was late. I think they induced the next morning and she was in labor for several hours. Then we delivered the next day later in the day early evening. That was on the 13th we went in on the 12th. So on the 13th we delivered in the evening. Then I think we stayed a day after that.

    Lee 13:06
    So let’s go back to the labor. Was it an extremely hard labor for your wife Danielle? Was it like, with our situation winter got an epidural. She was already in a lot of pain, mentally. She’s like, I don’t really want to experience it physically. So we had an epidural. It was yeah. It was good for us to do that. But how was it for you guys? Was it a long?

    Jonah 13:38
    Yeah.

    Lee 13:39
    Or?

    Jonah 13:39
    Yeah. Yeah, I think it was. I mean, obviously the mental state of my wife at least was not good. Understandably so. I believe she tried to go without an epidural. It was either with Lydia or maybe one of our next children. But she did get an epidural. So yeah, so I’m pretty sure they induced in the morning. Then it was 10 ish hours, maybe around 8 to 10 hours of labor.

    Lee 14:20
    You mentioned that you guys had moved from a different part of the country to the Carolinas. Did you have family that had come in? Or do you have family in the area or friends that came in to support you? Or did you guys just want to be alone?

    Jonah 14:35
    At that time we had my mother in law and her husband were there as far as family goes. Then we had friends from our small group from church. People were still in contact communication with at least via social media like today.

    Jonah 14:58
    So I had called people to let them know. I called my family, called my wife’s family, and let them know. Her family was there pretty quickly. Her dad flew down from Virginia, which was awesome. He made the sacrifices and did what he had to do to get there so quickly. Then my mother in law and her husband were there, not too long, and then our church group friends were there very, quickly as well.

    Jonah 15:35
    That made a big– that had a significant impact. Just the negativity, the weight of the negativity that comes with the loss of a child. It’s necessary to have friends that are supportive, and want to help. And want you to not hurt and to be in pain and, and all that. So, they were, it was great support that we had was awesome.

    Lee 16:05
    That’s good. That’s good to have support and people who love you, around you, so.

    Jonah 16:11
    Yeah. It’s necessary.

    Lee 16:13
    And so you said that you were able to be with Lydia for about a day?

    Jonah 16:19
    Yeah. Yep.

    Lee 16:21
    How was that stay in the hospital for that day?

    Jonah 16:25
    So it was obvious we had no expectations of how it was going to go. I was battling internally about what to do. How to handle the situation, as far as I have my firstborn child here that I am never going to get to see again. In a matter of hours, and I kept debating or battling within myself about should I take pictures of her? Is there something wrong with that? Is that acceptable? Is that not? Is that normal? Is that not normal? That kind of stuff. Fortunately, one of the nurses had mentioned something to us about an organization called now–

    Lee 17:14
    Lay me down to sleep?

    Jonah 17:15
    Yeah, Now I Lay Me Down to Sleep. They said that they have a photographer that can come in and take pictures. We were definitely like, Yeah, absolutely. So, I took a few pictures on my phone. Then we had her come in, and that was awesome. We still have those pictures of her up still at our home. So that we see her every day.

    Jonah 17:38
    But it’s just the people you don’t know what you don’t know. Then when you’re in one of those situations, you have all these thoughts going through your head and the emotions of it all. It’s just, you don’t know which way is up. You don’t know which way is right thinking, or which way is wrong thinking. To have somebody be able to say we have somebody that can take pictures, so that you can remember your daughter. It was something that was in my head before they had mentioned it. Then I kept battling with myself about whether there’s something wrong with wanting to take pictures of my daughter, even though she’s not alive.

    Jonah 18:25
    So, fortunately as I said, before we had a nurse that mentioned that to us, and they came in and we took several pictures. That was, again, as bad an experience that it can be there was good. We now have pictures that we can have forever, and our children, after Lydia will be able to see pictures of their big sister.

    Lee 18:49
    It really is one of those weird things, nobody in the hospital really knows what to do. It seemed in our situation, nobody really knows what to advise you to do. I sort of sometimes wish somebody was like, yeah you should do this. Or you should think about doing this. You should think about doing that. And it really was like, fly by the seat of your pants and you hope you’ll never regret it. There are things that I personally regret that I didn’t do or that I did do or that I didn’t ask. I don’t know. Yeah.

    Jonah 19:02
    Yeah.

    Lee 19:02
    I’m glad you guys were able to get some photos.

    Jonah 19:29
    Yeah.

    Lee 19:30
    What happened after you guys left the hospital? Did your wife Danielle, have any complications? Or I don’t know how to say this. Was she released on a clean bill of health? And you guys had to go home and figure out stuff?

    Jonah 19:46
    Yeah, I think we stayed like, at least part of an extra day. So that we could get, I guess. Well, our time that we had with Lydia was limited. Just due to her state decreasing.

    Lee 20:05
    Yeah the body is decomposing.

    Jonah 20:07
    Yeah, yeah, exactly. So our time was kind of limited. We had to see her for like kinda periods of time. She couldn’t stay with us the entire time. She had to go back into where the nurses were. Back in the room. So, after they were like, we have to take her. She’s not in a good place right now and it’s gonna get worse soon.

    Jonah 20:29
    We stayed a little bit, like at least half a day longer just because I think it was best for Danielle. She needed to have other people around her and that sort of thing. Because it was just her and I at our home. Being very new in the neighborhood and living there only two months. We hadn’t made a bunch of friends and all that. Both of us are, for the most part, pretty quiet, not like super extroverted. I’m quite the opposite of extroverted.

    Jonah 21:16
    It was just the atmosphere was good, because of the things that the staff had done for us there. So it was, I think that was the best place for her. She was released with a clean bill of health and all that. Then going home was difficult, we had painted the nursery, gotten everything set up and all that. So she really wasn’t comfortable, and wasn’t able to go into the nursery. I think we closed the door for a period of time. Then as time passed, she was able to get into the nursery and start going through the clothes and whatnot.

    Jonah 21:55
    One of the things that I think that I kind of battled with a lot was life afterwards. I had spent hours and all possible time that I was able to just thinking about that scenario of not really moving on, but moving forward. The thing that I had kind of thought of, or that came to me was that life was, there was a new normal that was created by this event. I think that I had read some things about that afterwards where that was something that other people would say that you’re not moving on or away from that experience and whatnot, but you’re moving forward. Creating a new normal with the memory of your child. So it’s not you’re not forgetting just moving forward which we know we have to do that’s what life is.

    Lee 22:59
    I’ve heard that phrase moving forward not moving on. That is a good way to put it. That event is such a the event of losing a child is such a life changing, life shattering. You’re not able to put it behind you and say that it was a good experience. But you have to move forward, so.

    Jonah 23:24
    Yeah, that was difficult. Danielle being at home by herself. Working at home. All of the alone and kind of secluded time so to speak I think that maybe made things more difficult.

    Jonah 23:43
    We did go to some– found a support group through one of the hospitals in Charleston. That was really good. Met some friends and some families there. Got to hear others talk about their experience and whatnot.

    Jonah 24:03
    My I guess kinda grief process. I took– I was off work for about a week. Then I went back to work. My grief process kind of unfortunately had to deal with anger. So that was kind of my main reaction: anger and impatience, that kind of stuff. None of it was towards Danielle or anything like that. It was just kind of general impatience and anger about everything or anything.

    Jonah 24:39
    So we were in our group for pregnancy and infant loss. Then I started seeing a counselor through work as well. Sure talking about the extent It’s that’s. I guess that’s fine. It wasn’t, I didn’t feel that it was super beneficial. But it’s always good to have somebody that is there to listen to your thoughts on things that you’re going through. Sometimes it’s difficult to talk about all your problems with somebody that you’re in the middle of this kind of a situation with, because it’s like, obviously, you’re both down low, and then the PAL, you’re bad or you’re low, from your day on to the other person who’s already low can make things a little bit worse.

    Lee 25:39
    So sometimes it feels unfair to be like, Oh, sure, I can’t, I can’t do this, and I can’t have you do that on me too. So?

    Jonah 25:47
    Yeah, yeah, we both are, I guess, kinda introverts. So we literally had to tell each other to talk to me. Tell me how you are doing. Tell me where you are. We have to make sure that we’re not doing the things that we feel we want to do. Make an effort to do the things that we know, that we should be doing.

    Jonah 26:14
    So we had some friends and family come to our home. One of the small groups kind of arranged things. We had people from out of town come in, and it was great, but still being very fresh off the loss of a child. Both not being big people, people. I guess, we kind of had to take breaks from things and kind of get our time. Where it was the two of us and get our thoughts and minds back in order.

    Jonah 26:53
    So, but it was, yeah, I mean, it’s necessary again. My natural tendencies are to just push everybody away. Go off by myself, figure it out mentally. Decide on how I’m going to proceed and get through and make it happen. Being relatively newly married, and having done those things throughout the course of my life. Then going through this experience, and then my wife is almost the opposite of how– handles things almost the opposite of how I handle things. There’s a whole bunch of consideration and thinking that has to be done to understand that she doesn’t handle things differently. Her experience with this loss is much different than mine, or having carried a child for 30 weeks, and the child living inside of her. That’s something that I’ll never understand, just to respect and support, so.

    Lee 28:04
    The experience of each individual is so unique to them. And you mentioned that you felt the anger and frustration. I felt those exact same things. I had to, and I couldn’t, I didn’t, like you said, I didn’t show the anger to people, or the frustration. It was all internalized. It just ate me up. Until I– and counseling helped me quite a bit to understand. I could feel those basic feelings of anger and frustration. But I didn’t have to hold on to them. Like, I could feel them. I didn’t have to act on them. Then I could release them. It was like, until I could understand that I always had– I can’t pin it on anybody, so I’m just going to pin it on myself. But yeah, the individual’s experiences are so unique to themselves. So yeah.

    Jonah 29:09
    I discovered that for me my outlet or release of anger was managed by doing something. Being active using my hands to do something, refinishing furniture, building something, fixing something that was broken like whatever. I mean, something along those lines, and that’s how I figured out that kind of my release of anger. And that helped me tremendously.

    Lee 29:46
    You were able to parlay that anger and that frustration into something that you could release it into something so.

    Jonah 30:16
    Yeah.

    Lee 29:53
    That’s good. Did you have a service for your daughter? Did you bury her? Did you have I was that being a young husband and father? For myself, I had no clue what to do. I’ve only been to funerals that were planned by somebody else. And it was– So I had a one track mind. I got it done, but I had no clue what I was doing. And it happened. There was a lot of help from the people around me. But I didn’t– I don’t know how that funeral ever got planned. Nothing, I really did myself. How was it for you? How was it for you guys?

    Jonah 30:37
    Yeah. So we did, we did have a viewing or memorial service. Then also a funeral where she is buried in a mausoleum, so she’s not like down in the ground. So she’s on a structure above ground. So we had a chance to remember who I guess it was somebody from the hospital, who had given us suggestions on different funeral homes or whatnot. They literally had a list of five different places. Their list was like, this places the nicest, this places the next nicest, this is the next on then the bottom one. The bottom one, basically, they said, this is the one that’s the least nice. It was the closest to our home. That’s what was important to us. So that’s what we went with.

    Jonah 31:05
    At the time, I would pass that cemetery every day, twice a day minimum, when I drove to work and took my kids to school. Then when I drove home from work and brought my kids home from school it was less than 15 minutes from our home. Early on, after we put her in the mausoleum or buried. We would get over there more frequently for visits.

    Jonah 31:54
    So as far as planning everything. We had family members present to help with planning and organizing. My parents were there, my brother, one of my brothers was there, my father in law, and maybe my mother in law and her husband as well. So we had input from family as far as how things were to go. How we should kind of proceed with things.

    Jonah 32:42
    We were completely blessed by our, my father in law, and my brother who and this is just a horrible thought, but you know, horrible thing, but it’s something that’s necessary. All these things have to get paid for. So we were completely blessed by my father in law and my brother, and they paid for everything. So, a blessing that was to us that we didn’t have to pay for any of that. It’s just an absolute, it’s mind boggling to think that parents should be paying or parents have to pay for their baby’s funeral. But I mean, when reality is that there are things done, and people have to, unfortunately get paid. In that situation for that.

    Jonah 33:31
    So our family was a huge part and helped to organize the funeral service. We had a viewing and it was an open casket. That was something that we debated as far as where we’re going to barrier, or cremation. We didn’t do the cremation. We got a casket and buried her. Again, as we were talking about earlier, you don’t know what you don’t know. Just how odd and unreal the situation is of carrying your daughter out in a tiny casket into the back of a car. Then riding to a cemetery and then putting the casket inside of a tomb, or whatever they’re called the mausoleum. It’s just yeah, it’s difficult to describe.

    Lee 34:33
    I got to carry my son in his casket. I’ve been pallbearers for a couple of other funerals. It’s usually with six people. I was able to carry my son by myself.

    Jonah 34:47
    Right.

    Lee 34:47
    It was such a juxtaposition to how small and delicate it felt. To pick up and carry my child to his final resting place. It was like, Oh, thank you for talking about that.

    Jonah 35:08
    Sure.

    Lee 35:08
    Is there anything else that you would like to talk about?

    Jonah 35:12
    I would say the impact that this child still has in our lives, six and a half years later, it’s indescribable. I mean six and a half years later, I’m talking to a stranger that I just met about an hour ago. We’ve been talking about our children for the past hour plus. Like I mentioned early on, I’m always trying to find the good in situations. Again, has terrible of a situation this is it’s created new ways of seeing things and life and value. In things that I never would have considered before or would have just taken for granted.

    Jonah 36:08
    Giving thanks for every single thing that we have that I don’t deserve, and all these things. So it’s her life. While it was brief, in terms of, from when she was conceived till the day that she was born. Just that 30 weeks time frame has changed my life and so many other people’s lives. And will continue to change until the day I’m no longer on this earth. So I’m thankful for that experience and thankful for being able to see things from that perspective. To allow them to change me as a man to be a better man, a better father, a better husband.

    Lee 37:00
    It is amazing how impactful the situation is.

    Jonah 37:05
    Yeah.

    Lee 37:05
    As you said, the brief life of Lydia for 30 weeks has impacted you and will impact you and your whole family for the remainder of your lives.

    Jonah 37:16
    Yeah, absolutely.

    Lee 37:18
    It’s all awe-inspiring and sad.

    Jonah 37:22
    Yeah, there’s no single word. I don’t think there’s any single word to define all the emotion. From all the different directions, the highs, the lows, yeah, it’s very difficult to describe or define.

    Lee 37:43
    Well, Jonah, thank you so much. Thank you for coming on the podcast and thank you for talking about your wonderful daughter, Lydia.

    Jonah 37:52
    You’re very welcome. Thank you. I appreciate your time.

    Transcribed by https://otter.ai

    Filed Under: birth story, late term stillbirth, podcast episode, stillbirth Tagged With: stillbirth

    Baby Lydia’s Birth story | Stillborn at 30 Weeks

    February 17, 2022 by Winter

    Mom Danielle recounts the stillbirth story of her first pregnancy with baby Lydia and how incredibly excited she and her husband Jonah were to have her. Near 30 weeks, she noticed that Lydia wasn’t moving around as much one day, and were concerned enough to go in to be checked out. They didn’t find a heartbeat, and Danielle later delivered Lydia, who was born sleeping.

    Watch here (YouTube):

    Listen here (podcast):


    Time Stamps:

    00:00 Lydia Jaelle
    01:23 Introduction of Danielle and Jonah
    04:17 Pregnancy
    11:20 Lydia’s name
    17:08 Less movement and going to the hospital
    27:45 Silent, silent, silent
    31:12 Birth
    38:02 After birth
    45:42 Pictures
    47:35 Arrangements and Lydia’s service

    You might appreciate these other episodes:

    • Watch/listen to Danielle‘s advice episode of daughter Lydia: Click here
    • Watch/listen to Jonah‘s birth episode of daughter Lydia: Click here

    Wanna help?

    • DONATE! Consider giving a one-time or recurring donation to help with production and hosting costs: Go here for more information.
    • SUBSCRIBE! Head over here to subscribe to our YouTube channel and our podcasts.
    • SHARE! Spread the word to a loss mom or dad, or those who may be supporting a bereaved parent. Send them a link to this post. Pin one of our graphics on Pinterest.
    Baby Lydia dressed in a tiny gown

    Full Transcription:

    Danielle 0:00
    Lydia Jaelle.

    Danielle 0:08
    She was absolutely beautiful and perfect in every way. She had curly brown hair. She had my chin and her daddy’s feet, the cutest button nose. And she was just absolutely adorable at three pounds eight ounces.

    Winter 0:26
    Welcome to Still A Part of Us a place where moms and dads share the story of their child who was stillborn or who died in infancy. I’m Winter.

    Lee 0:32
    And I’m Lee. We are grateful you joined us today. Please note that this is a story of loss and has triggers thanks to our loss parents who are willing to be vulnerable and share their children with us. If you’re listening to this podcast, just know that on our YouTube channel, there are pictures and videos that are related to the stories that are being shared.

    Winter 0:39
    Subscribe and share it with a friend that might need it and tell them to subscribe. Why? Because people need to know that even though our babies are no longer with us. They’re Still A Part of Us.

    Winter 0:43
    Danielle, thank you so much for coming and talking with us today on Still A Part of Us. I have heard about you for so long. And now it’s just a privilege to meet you. And have you on today to talk about your sweet Lydia. So welcome. Welcome, welcome.

    Danielle 1:05
    Thank you. Thank you for having me. I’m excited to be here.

    Winter 1:07
    Yeah, we’re excited for you to be here. So can you tell us a little bit about yourself? Tell us about who you are, kind of what you do. Right right now? And then can you tell us a little bit how your family looked? When Lydia was born?

    Danielle 1:16
    Absolutely. So I live in South Carolina and the Charleston area with my husband and two living children, Luke and Lyla. I work full time for a large Senior Living company doing leadership development for our team members. I’ve been in this role now for almost 10 years. I’m actually working remotely from here for that company. So I work full time. My husband, Jonah, and I, we’ve been married for almost nine years. So yeah, we moved here to South Carolina, about eight. I guess it was almost eight years ago, I always get so thrown off by it. So this is not our original home.

    Winter 2:28
    Oh Okay.

    Danielle 2:28
    We just wanted to come south.

    Winter 2:31
    Why not?

    Danielle 2:32
    My husband had found a job here. So we kind of made our way here. But yeah, that’s a little bit about us. Just staying busy with work and with my five year old son and three year old daughter.

    Winter 2:46
    I’m sure that they do keep you busy. Do you guys like to do you guys have any things that you guys like to do as a family or any personal hobbies?

    Danielle 2:55
    Yeah, um, we really love the outdoors, we like doing anything outside, whether it’s going on a hike, or even just hanging out in our backyard or going to the park or the beach. We’re not too far from the beach. So we love doing outdoor stuff. I also really enjoy shopping. More antique kind of shopping, like people are really cute antique shops down here. So I really like going to those and looking for unique home decor or furniture or things like that. And my husband’s pretty into that kind of stuff as well. So that’s kind of a non kid related thing that I like to do. And then I spend too much time shopping for my daughter as well.

    Winter 3:42
    Little girls are super easy to shop for. I’m just saying. Boys. Boys are just the clothes are just not as cute. Exactly. Oh, that’s awesome. Okay, well, and as a little bit of just background, how long ago at the time of this recording was Lydia born?

    Danielle 4:06
    She was born almost six and a half years ago. So it’s been a good while now. It was October 13, 2014.

    Winter 4:17
    Yeah. So it’s been a few years now. So I’m grateful that you’ve come on, because I think this will lend a little bit of a different perspective, having a little bit of time. Since your loss. So thank you again, for coming on.

    Danielle 4:31
    Of course. Yeah.

    Winter 4:32
    Um, so I understand that Lydia was your first child. Is that right?

    Danielle 4:38
    Yes. Yep. She was our first baby.

    Winter 4:40
    Were you guys planning on getting pregnant with her? Was that something that was a little bit more of a surprise, or did you guys have fertility issues, I think kind of runs the gambit. Right?

    Danielle 4:51
    Yeah, I laugh a little bit because we weren’t exactly trying. But there’s a little bit of a story to it. So we had started to talk about trying, and my husband didn’t really quite feel ready at the time. But I had been on birth control for many years before that. Once I stopped my cycles were so out of whack. Really long, and I was worried about it. I’m like, oh, gosh, am I gonna have trouble conceiving, and I went to my doctor and talked to him about it. He’s like, well, it’s possible, you’re not ovulating. He had given me some tips on tracking it.

    Danielle 5:27
    So in the meantime I had started researching, and I came across this herbal tea called fertility. I had read that it could help get your cycles on track. Like, oh, let me try this because I love to drink tea.

    Winter 5:41
    Yeah.

    Danielle 5:42
    I was not intending to get pregnant quickly on it, I was really only taking it just to get my cycles to be regular. So that we’d be ready when it was time to try. So I started drinking the tea. I don’t know how long it was like, probably a month later. I noticed like, I don’t know, I started getting these weird symptoms. I’m like, Huh could I possibly be pregnant? I didn’t exactly miss a cycle because I had such long cycles, but I ended up taking a test. Surprisingly enough, I was pregnant within a month of starting that tea and I’m like, What?

    Winter 6:22
    That was not the intention.

    Danielle 6:22
    Like I did not really know it was gonna happen so fast.

    Winter 6:28
    So you were kind of planning, but not necessarily planning it either.

    Danielle 6:32
    Yeah, I’d say buying that tea kind of pushed things along, but we were both super excited over the moon. Yeah, we were just really, really thrilled. So it was the best surprise. Yeah, it was a little bit of a surprise.

    Winter 6:47
    Yeah. Had you guys been– You’d been married for a few years by that time?

    Danielle 6:54
    Yeah, we had been married. Gosh, I guess it was. I want to say a year and a half. It was either a half or two and a half years. I get so confused thinking about the timing of all that.

    Winter 7:05
    Yeah.

    Danielle 7:06
    But we had just, I guess it was a year and a half because it was July 2012. When we got married , we had just moved to South Carolina. The summer prior.

    Winter 7:17
    Oh Okay.

    Danielle 7:18
    The spring got right after we had moved and I found out I was pregnant. So we’re in this new place.

    Winter 7:25
    Yeah.

    Danielle 7:26
    New job. No family around.

    Winter 7:28
    Yeah.

    Danielle 7:29
    Yeah. And now we’re gonna have a baby. So it was a crazy, but exciting time for sure. .

    Winter 7:35
    Yeah. Sounds so yeah. Always crazy. It happens that way. So how was your pregnancy? It sounds like you were a little on the sick side. Or had weird-

    Danielle 7:45
    Yeah.

    Winter 7:45
    –symptoms.

    Danielle 7:47
    My pregnancy really wasn’t too bad. I did have some nausea with her. That was the worst of it in terms of symptoms. It really was not that bad. The nausea was on and off. Just in the first trimester. We were really nervous when we found out. We were afraid to tell people because we do know people who’ve had miscarriages. We knew that that was really common. So we waited until we had our first ultrasound before we really started telling too many people, but then the pregnancy itself went really well.

    Danielle 8:24
    Again, I didn’t have any issues. I felt great after the first trimester. Yeah, I was just super happy. I felt really good. Everything was just going perfectly.

    Winter 8:36
    Yeah.

    Danielle 8:37
    Really and she looked great. Every time we went to the doctor to have our appointments, everything always looked perfect with her. So we really didn’t have any concerns, especially after we passed the first trimester. Because at that time, I was under the mindset that once you get through that point and your anatomy scan. If everything looks good with those two things, then you’re fine. I guess I was one of those people who thought, oh, we’re gonna bring home our baby, everything’s going so well. So yeah, I really didn’t have any, any big issues or, or concerns or anything like that throughout the day. And it was, it was a blessing to feel so good.

    Winter 9:19
    Yeah. Oh, yeah. It is totally because some people are just sick the entire time. And you’re like, yes. Yeah. And at her anatomy scan, were you guys planning on finding out the gender?

    Danielle 9:30
    Yes. So I am rather impatient. So actually, I booked one of those little boutique ultrasound. I don’t remember if it was 14 or 16 weeks. Whenever it is that you can book those and find out the gender. So we went to one of those places to do that. And we did it in a little bit of a unique way. My husband found out the gender but I did not and then he surprised me and captured it on video. So we went to the store and picked out a boy outfit and a girl outfit. He was supposed to wrap up the outfit in the bag and then watch me open it and record me opening it just to capture the surprise on camera. The ultrasound person told him the gender and then we went to this little Greek restaurant and sat outside and we have a really nice video where I opened it up and Oh no, the little pink outfit.

    Danielle 10:34
    I was really shocked to be honest, for some reason I always had in my mind that I would only have boys. I don’t know why, oh. I always wanted a girl but I just always was like, I’m never gonna have a girl. I know I’m only gonna have boys. I’m not saying that there’s anything wrong with having boys. But I just always had that in my mind that I would only have boys. So I was really surprised. Super happy. My husband was surprised too. And yeah, that’s how we found out that she was a girl.

    Winter 11:09
    Awesome. And did you guys choose the name Lydia for? I guess I guess when did you guys choose the name? Did you kind of start formulating when you found out that she was going to be a girl?

    Danielle 11:20
    Yeah, we started thinking about it pretty early on and debated for a while. And then we picked the name Lydia. Probably sometime when I was in the second trimester, so not too long before she was born. But yeah, we decided on the name Lydia, my husband really wanted it to be a bit biblical name. So I was kind of going through all the female names in the Bible. I really liked Lydia. I liked that it’s somewhat unique as well. Just a pretty name.

    Winter 11:52
    Yeah.

    Danielle 11:52
    So that’s how we picked Lydia. Her middle name is actually pretty unique as well. Again, it’s Jaelle. J-a-e-l-l-e. My husband had read about a name and the Bible, which I think is your L is JL it’s like a heroine in the Bible. I don’t know, I was familiar with it.

    Winter 12:13
    Okay.

    Danielle 12:14
    And I was like, Well, if we spell it j-a-e-l. People are gonna think it’s jail. We gotta change it. I was not really feeling it. So we had not actually decided on her middle name. But then when we were at the hospital after I gave birth to her, I thought that it was the best name because I knew my husband really liked it. It was unique and, and on. Another cool part about it is the e-l-l-e it’s kind of like my name, Danielle.

    Winter 12:45
    Yeah.

    Danielle 12:46
    There’s a little bit of tie.

    Winter 12:47
    Yeah.

    Danielle 12:48
    That it has that feature. So that’s how we picked her name.

    Winter 12:50
    Yeah, very cool. Very cool. Okay. Well I always like to know how the names come about. So. Yeah. So everything is looking great. You’re feeling good. And tell us what happens? What? Yeah. So when do you find out?

    Danielle 13:08
    Yeah, everything again, was going really well. Actually, at that point in our life. We had rented a place when we first moved here to South Carolina, and there are at least came up. So we ended up house hunting, and bought a new house in August. Then again, Lydia was born in October. So we had just moved into a new house. Every house we went into we were imagining this is where we’re gonna raise our baby.

    Danielle 13:36
    So anyway, we had moved into this new house, everything in life just felt like it was going so good. We were approaching the end of the pregnancy, or at least I was getting to the third trimester. So I had a baby shower. We had started painting her new room in our new house, and getting the crib set up and everything like that. Everything was just going perfectly fine.

    Danielle 14:02
    I even remember at one point I just felt so guilty. I kept thanking God every day that we were being I just felt like we were so blessed. We had this beautiful new house. We lived in this new location. We’re having a baby. I don’t know why. I just felt like things were going so good. I just had this weird worry in my mind that something was gonna happen. I don’t even know how to explain it. I just remember having that feeling. Now looking back on it, I’m like, oh, I don’t know. It just always stands out to me that I kind of had that feeling before anything that actually happened.

    Winter 14:38
    Yeah.

    Danielle 14:40
    Anyway, yeah. So everything had been going well for about a week or I guess it was two or three weeks before. We had the baby shower and everything. And so it was then a weekend when everything kind of happened. I had been a little bit sick the week before. With sore throats and I can’t remember if I had a little bit of a fever or not. So I had been a little bit sick the week prior. Then by the time the weekend rolled around, I started feeling much better. So I was just excited to be feeling better and doing a lot of stuff. It was a beautiful weekend, we were running errands and going to lunch, and I was washing the mountain of baby clothes that we had for Lydia. We had tons of stuff, not just from our baby shower and gifts that we were given like hand me downs.

    Winter 15:35
    Oh yeah.

    Danielle 15:35
    When we were in Virginia for my baby shower we stumbled upon a yard sale that had tons of the cutest baby stuff really lined up all the way up to 18 months.

    Danielle 15:49
    So anyway, I was doing all this laundry and folding the baby clothes, and I just have this vivid memory from that weekend, standing in my laundry room looking at the little bitty socks and just smiling to myself thinking about how excited I was to be become a mom and how close we were getting to her being born. Again, just feeling so grateful and excited. Because nothing was wrong at that point.

    Danielle 16:20
    So that was that was Saturday and then also into Sunday, I was still kind of doing doing the laundry. Sunday morning, we actually let me backup. So that Saturday, I went to chick-fil-a for dinner, and picked up food and I picked up a strawberry milkshake because that was one of the things I always craved with Lydia.

    Winter 16:43
    Really?

    Danielle 16:44
    Strawberries and ice cream. So I treated myself to a strawberry milkshake that night and came home. I remember saying to my husband, oh, Lydia is dancing around like crazy. Tonight, like she was going nuts in my belly. And I thought it was so cute. Like, Oh, she loved that strawberry milkshake.

    Winter 17:04
    Was she fairly active generally, or like,

    Danielle 17:08
    It was on and off. So at that point in my pregnancy, I was 30 weeks. So once you get to 28 weeks, their movements should be pretty predictable, which I had no idea at the time. But I have since learned that. But yeah, her movements would kind of be on and off. So even the weekend prior to that, and the weekend before that there would be times where I’m like, is she moving enough? And I wasn’t really sure.

    Danielle 17:35
    I had expressed it to my husband and I even mentioned it to the nurse at my last doctor’s visit, which was two weeks prior to the time we lost her. I said is it normal for her to be quiet sometimes and not move as much? And she’s just like, Well if that happens, just drink some juice, lay down, or eat something cold, some ice cream. And that should get her going again. So she really kind of just made it seem like it wasn’t a big deal. Maybe she just needs something to wake her up. So I had that in the back of my mind. And I’d even I guess mentioned, I don’t remember this specifically, but my husband remembers me asking the doctor at that visit. Should I be counting kicks? Because he asked me Are you feeling the baby move? That’s all the doctor asked.

    Winter 18:25
    Yeah.

    Danielle 18:25
    I was like, Well, yeah… What is strange? I don’t know. That’s a strange question to me. Because that’s a yes or no.

    Winter 18:32
    Yeah, yeah.

    Danielle 18:33
    A question. And yes. Like, that’s not really going to tell him much. And then No, it’s like, that would be a horrible thing.

    Winter 18:40
    Yeah.

    Danielle 18:40
    Just here.

    Winter 18:42
    But you basically asked him, you specifically asked him if you should be counting kicks?

    Danielle 18:48
    Yes. So you didn’t even remember it till my husband brought it up. Then once he mentioned that, I do kind of remember asking him that, like, do I need to count the movements because I wasn’t really sure what you were supposed to do.

    Winter 19:00
    Okay. Okay.

    Danielle 19:01
    And my doctor was a much older doctor. So he’d been practicing for many years. I kind of feel like he had that old school mindset. I would ask him different things. I even asked him Can I sleep on my back? Because I had read that you should not sleep on your back during pregnancy, and I was having trouble getting comfortable. He told me Oh, that’s fine. It’s an old wives tale, do what you need to do to get comfortable. So, I’m like, okay, so looking back on it, I’m like, oh, I loved him as a person. He was a great man. But as a doctor, I’m like, gosh, I really, really wish I had gone to somebody who was more focused on the latest research.

    Winter 19:44
    Right.

    Danielle 19:44
    Really telling me what I need to do to keep my baby safe.

    Winter 19:48
    Yeah.

    Danielle 19:48
    Versus thinking these things are old wives tales. So anyway she again, she was somewhat active I guess, but I just wasn’t. I was not aware that I really needed to pay attention to her movements that like. It wouldn’t be normal for her to slow down sometimes.

    Danielle 20:07
    Yeah.

    Danielle 20:09
    I was in one of those due date groups on Facebook. I don’t know if you’re familiar with those, but

    Winter 20:15
    Yep.

    Danielle 20:15
    It’s the December due date group for all babies.

    Winter 20:19
    Yep. Yeah.

    Danielle 20:20
    We’re all women who were pregnant with babies during December. So I was in one of those. I remember sometimes I’d see people post about their baby not moving much. Then everyone’s like, oh, they’re probably just sleepy. Like, my baby did that too, when they woke up. So I remembered reading posts like that. So I just assumed that sometimes babies get sleepy and they slow down.

    Winter 20:40
    Yeah.

    Danielle 20:41
    So that’s all I knew about movement. So anyway, that Saturday night again, she was moving around like crazy. Then my husband and I watched a movie. It was super late that night. I went to bed, and I was wiped out that night. I remember laying down in bed. I do remember thinking at the time Oh, she’s not kicking around. Usually when I’d lay in bed, she’d give me some kicks once I lay down, but I was like, Oh, I’m up later than normal. I’m so tired. I’m sure she’s tired.

    Danielle 21:13
    So I went to bed and I swear, I slept on my back that night, because I was so tired. Again, my doctor, I remember thinking I probably shouldn’t, but I’m like, well, he said, it was okay.

    Winter 21:24
    Yeah.

    Danielle 21:24
    I’m so tired. I just need to get comfortable. So I slept that way that night. Then the next morning, it was a Sunday. So we got up and went to church. Like we normally do on a Sunday morning. After church, we went to lunch, and we finally decided, like, yeah, let’s get maternity photos. I was gonna book those. Then we went out shopping for rugs. It was just a totally normal day.

    Winter 21:55
    Yeah.

    Danielle 21:57
    Then we got back home. And I started doing more of that laundry that I was talking about earlier. At one point that day it was probably mid afternoon. I was just sitting on the floor, in the room going through that laundry, and my sweet dog was there with me. I remember I was sitting on the floor, and she came in and rested her head by my belly. I just thought it was the sweetest thing. Like she wanted to be close to the baby or something.

    Winter 22:24
    Yeah.

    Danielle 22:24
    At that moment, I remember I just started crying. It was so weird. I just felt really emotional out of the blue. Now when I look back on it, I’m like, did I subconsciously know, something was going on? Did my dog know something was going on? At the time, mentally I didn’t think anything was wrong, but I was super emotional. My dog was being all cuddly.

    Danielle 22:49
    Then soon after that, I was like, gosh, I’m really not feeling Lydia move much today. So I went downstairs and told my husband, he was outside on our screen and porch. I told him, I was feeling a little bit worried because she really wasn’t moving much. We talked about it for a few minutes. But he’s like, Well you’ve felt that way last weekend, too. Which was true the weekend prior I was like, is she moving enough? So we talked about what we’re like, Yeah, that’s true. She’s probably just sleepy. So we decided there’s really nothing to be worried about, and carried on about the day

    Danielle 23:29
    that I remember, I took my dog for a walk and the day kind of went on.

    Danielle 23:34
    Then that evening, like I mentioned being emotional before , I wasn’t in a horrible mood. I just wanted to cry about everything. Again, it was so weird. I didn’t want to cook dinner, like we had nothing to cook. I remember we drove to Walmart, just to go get something to cook up really quick. And I just wanted to get out of there cause again, I was so emotional for whatever reason, and then came home and cooked dinner.

    Danielle 23:34
    We sat down on the couch after dinner. At the time, we were really into this show The Walking Dead, which is not something I would typically be into zombies, but my husband was totally into it. And I got into it. So we sat down to watch the walking dead. And gosh, she’s not moving and that was really concerning to me. Because after dinner at night when I sat on the couch that was her guaranteed movement is now. So since she still wasn’t moving, and I had already been worried earlier in the day, I was like okay, this is freaking me out a little bit, but I didn’t actually say anything to my husband yet. I didn’t want to overwhelm him.

    Danielle 24:42
    So I got up and I made a bowl of ice cream. I was doing everything that the nurse told me to do. I got ice cream. Then I drank orange juice right after. It was a really disgusting mix. I’m like all the sugar.

    Winter 24:55
    I know I’m like you’re all sugared up now.

    Danielle 24:57
    Yeah, like oh, I was doing anything I could to get her to move and poking my belly.

    Winter 25:04
    Yeah, yeah.

    Danielle 25:05
    And nothing was going on. And so in my head, I’m really starting to worry, but trying just to stay calm. And then I started texting my best friend Nancy. She’s had a baby before or had a baby before at the time. So I was just telling her what was going on. I’m not really feeling the baby move. I don’t know what to do. And she was like you probably should call your on-call doctor, just to let them know.

    Danielle 25:34
    At that point, it was a Sunday night. So I’m like, should I really call or should I just wait till tomorrow? I was like, Yeah, she’s right. So I called. And they said, Yeah, why don’t you come on down to labor and delivery, and we’ll hook you up to the monitor and check things out, just to be safe. And that has always kind of stuck in my mind that she said, just to be safe. Um, so I was like, okay, so I went back downstairs, told my husband everything that was going on. At that point, I hadn’t even told him I was calling because I just didn’t want to know. And he was totally supportive. You know, all right. Well, let’s go.

    Danielle 26:15
    So we went and started getting ready. We almost didn’t even take our dog out to go potty cause I was thinking we’re gonna go, we’ll be back in a couple hours. But we decided just to let her out real quick. So we took her out. Then I changed my clothes. Again I lost it in the bathroom. I just started bawling. I didn’t really think that something terrible had happened to our baby. The last thing on my mind was that she had died. But I was just so worried and like, what’s going on? Are we going to have a baby tonight? I’m not ready yet.

    Winter 26:49
    Yeah.

    Danielle 26:51
    Because again, I was 30 weeks at the time. So I just was like, What is going on? So we made our way to the hospital, which was about 30-35 minutes from our house. Yeah, I vividly remember that drive. My husband held my hand the whole way.I just had my hand on my belly. In my head praying and praying and talking to Lydia in my head, like, come on, just kick me just do something. And I felt one time I thought maybe she did kick but I wasn’t really sure. Um, so we got to the hospital. And we had to go in through the emergency room, because of the time of day, it was late at night. I don’t know, 10 o’clock by that point. I even remember, I was like, I’m sorry to my husband, cause he had to work at five the next morning. I’m like, you’re going to be so tired. I was just worried about all these random things.

    Winter 27:44
    Yeah.

    Danielle 27:45
    So anyway, we got to the hospital. And then this nurse from labor and delivery, named Susie, she was super sweet, super cheery and upbeat. She came in and greeted us. We were just making small talk walking down to the labor and delivery and we got to a room, she had me change into a gown. I did that and I remember changing into the gown and feeling like okay, we’re finally gonna make sure everything’s fine.

    Danielle 28:15
    So I got into the hospital bed, and Susie got the Doppler out to try to find Lydia’s heartbeat. And yeah, at that point it was, I know, a lot of people saw this. And it really was the loudest silence I’ve ever heard. It was just pure seeing if she’s moving all over my belly. And usually right away, they pick it up at that point.

    Winter 28:39
    Yeah.

    Danielle 28:40
    It was just silent, silent, silent. But then a few times, they would pick up my heartbeat. I didn’t know that it was mine or hers. But I’m like we found it! Oh, there it is, but it was just mine. So that was going on for what felt like forever, but I don’t know how long that was. She went and got another nurse to come and help her. So she came in, they were scrambling around. I’m just thinking in my head what in the world is going on? My husband’s next to me holding my hand still. Then they’re like, Okay, let’s go, we have to go get the doctor to do an ultrasound. So I’m like, okay finally please bring the ultrasound in here. Let’s see that everything’s fine. I was getting really kind of frustrated in my head at that point, because I just wanted to know that everything was fine.

    Danielle 29:34
    So this doctor came in who we had never seen or met before, and rolled in this little ultrasound machine and pulled it up on my left side. I looked over and first thing I saw was Lydia’s perfect little profile with her little button nose and then he moved the wand and it was right over her heart. And he said, I’m very Sorry, I can’t remember his exact words. It was like, I think at first he said I think there’s no heartbeat. But then he’s like, I mean, I know there’s no heartbeat. She’s gone. I was just in complete shock. I couldn’t look at him, I couldn’t look at my husband, I was just sitting or laying there in the bed, and looking at this wall in front of me staring at this wall in complete shock, trying to understand what he just said.

    Danielle 30:35
    It was just the worst, worst possible thing to have to hear. As a mother that was really, really hard to take in. Immediately I started thinking what did I do? How could this happen? You know? Did I? Was it something from me being sick last week, the nurse told me I could take a Tylenol should I have not taken the Tylenol? Like, did I eat lunch and not microwave it long enough?

    Winter 31:09
    Yeah.

    Danielle 31:10
    Every-

    Winter 31:11
    Every possible thing.

    Danielle 31:12
    I was totally blaming myself. What did I do? Because I am her mother. And it was my job I felt to protect her. I was just completely shocked and we had known that at that point that she was healthy. So it didn’t seem like something else happened. But we weren’t really sure at that point. But anyway, I was just laying there in shock. And my sweet husband dropped down to the floor and started praying, which was very sweet and needed at the time. Then, after the doctor left the room I don’t even remember the conversation my husband and I had, we were both just completely shocked, and trying to understand what happened.

    Danielle 31:59
    Then they had the doctor on call come in the one who I had called, and she came in soon after, and started talking about the plan. Obviously, she said, She’s very sorry, she was very caring and everything like that. But then it’s like we need to talk about next steps. You need to be induced. I hadn’t even thought about that yet.

    Winter 32:21
    Right.

    Danielle 32:22
    Like, wait a minute I just found out my baby died. I guess my mind hadn’t gone yet to what happens next., Obviously, she’s not just going to disappear. Um, so she started talking about that. And I had already been like, I don’t know why I was so terrified about the whole process of giving birth, even to a live baby. So I was way even more terrified of having to do that with my baby who died. So I’m like can’t we do a C-section? Is there anything else? At that point my mind’s not really even working the way that it should? I just wanted wanted it? I don’t know, I don’t know.

    Winter 33:07
    Yeah.

    Danielle 33:07
    It’s like, is a C-section an option? She said that it was but that they wouldn’t recommend it, the recovery is longer. Then also that would make it more difficult for having another baby or like, we’d have to wait longer, we wanted to have another baby. I thought about it some more. It was so late that night, they weren’t going to start anything till the next morning. So I did think about it more and decided to move ahead with the induction versus doing a C-section. But they did end up rolling us to another room where that would be a little bit more private, because we’re in labor and delivery. There’s all these moms giving birth to living children, lots of crying, lots of baby noises going on. So they moved me down to another room. That would be a little bit more private.

    Danielle 34:02
    At that point my husband, I asked him to let a few people know. I think my best friend Nancy had been checking in on me since I had been texting with her and he called my dad and at some point called my mom too, and I don’t know, I just couldn’t bear to talk to anybody. I couldn’t bear to text anybody. I just could not bear to be the one to get the words out to anybody to let them know that our daughter had died. So thankfully, my husband found the strength to make those phone calls and, and do those things.

    Danielle 34:56
    So anyway, we stayed at the hospital that night. I guess somehow I slept. I think they’d given me some Ambien. So I slept for a little bit. Then the next morning, early in the morning, they put in the site attack and started the induction process. By then, my dad had driven down from Virginia. I think he drove down. Yeah, I think he drove down. He was in New York and flew back to Virginia and drove down to be with us and my mom and stepdad, they were living nearby at the time, they had just moved down here as well. So they came to the hospital and visited with us.

    Danielle 35:42
    But anyway, early that morning, they started the induction process, and that kind of went on throughout the day. I did have an epidural. That was recommended to me and I was just like, so nervous about the pain and stuff. I was like, okay, so I did the epidural.

    Danielle 35:56
    Then throughout the day things were progressing slowly, they weren’t, weren’t really moving along that fast. I even remember early evening, I wasn’t that far along. I don’t remember how dilated I was, but it really wasn’t that much. So I was okay, but then all of a sudden not very long after the doctor checked me. I started feeling a lot of pressure and had to get them to come in and check.

    Danielle 36:10
    All of a sudden I was ready to go. They’re like, you need to start pushing now. I was like no. I don’t know, at that point. I guess waiting up to it I was obviously very upset throughout the day. But I was hanging in there. But then once I found out it was time to push I was so upset. I guess I just didn’t want– I felt like I was approaching the end, I guess. Once she goes out this is really going to be over. I didn’t feel ready, but I don’t think I ever would have felt ready.

    Danielle 35:56
    So anyway, I started pushing and it really wasn’t anything too bad. I don’t know exactly how long I pushed, but throughout the whole thing, I just kept praying for a miracle. Like, please God, let them be wrong. Please, let us hear her cry. This is all still thinking in my head. There can be some kind of miracle. They could be wrong. But she was born and that. I know. I said earlier that not hearing the heartbeat was the loudest silence, but I guess truly once she was born, and we heard the silence that was really the loudest silence I’ve ever heard.

    Danielle 37:40
    I knew she was out and I wasn’t hearing anything. They had asked me like, did I want her to be cleaned up before they handed it to me? Or did I want them to just hand her to me and I was just so scared. I didn’t know what she was gonna look like. So I’d ask them to clean her up.

    Winter 37:58
    Nobody had talked to you and none of the nurses or doctors had?

    Danielle 38:01
    Well..

    Winter 38:02
    Talk to you?

    Danielle 38:02
    That is a good question. They did. The nurses there were amazing. They were so sweet. and supportive. Yeah, before I gave birth throughout that day, they talked to me some. Do you want to hold her and I was like, Oh, I don’t know. I was so scared and didn’t know what to do, but they really encouraged me to do that. I’m so– I can’t imagine if I hadn’t held her.

    Danielle 38:29
    Then they also talked about Now I Lay Me Down to Sleep photography. They asked if we wanted pictures. Again at that time I’m like pictures? It’s not something I ever thought about, but I’m so grateful that we said yes and opted to do that. But yeah, they did say I could have cleaned up, or put on me. They didn’t really know how she would look. I guess it’s kind of hard to say cause they don’t know how long she has been– Yeah, how long she’d been gone and that kind of thing.

    Danielle 38:59
    So I had them clean her up, but I could see them taking her over to the warmer thing to get her cleaned up and I remember it was so sad. I’m like I just want her now. That’s what I was thinking of, like give me my baby. But they cleaned her up and handed her to me and she was just absolutely beautiful. I was truly amazed because I didn’t know what to expect especially since she had passed away, but she just looked perfect. She looks like a perfect beautiful baby. She had these cute little lips and again, I was shocked by her hair. I couldn’t believe she had dark hair. The little waves in it were so cute. She was just precious and so beautiful. I held her in my arms and did not want to let her go ever.

    Danielle 39:58
    We did learn that the umbilical cord was very tight around her neck and her right ankle both. It was so tight that there were indentations on her neck and her ankle. So they were fairly certain that is what happened to cause her to pass away, unfortunately. It was 7:56pm. Okay, and that is so weird. I literally just said that and the clock on my laptop is 7:56pm.

    Winter 40:33
    Yeah, I was about to say I was like, Oh, yeah, that is so.

    Danielle 40:37
    Um, so she was born at 7:56pm. We held her that night for as long as we could. Again, my dad was there, and my mom and stepdad, they all got to meet her. At the time again, we were new to South Carolina, we didn’t have many friends here or much of a support system. But we had been in a small group at church and had some friends through that.

    Danielle 41:07
    They were just the biggest blessing throughout all of this. They came to the church to or I’m sorry, to the hospital too. A couple of them got to meet Lydia at some point. We were just so grateful. I was proud to show her off. It is kind of weird. You know it was so horrible what had happened. But to me, she’s this beautiful, perfect baby. I wanted everybody to see her and know her. I wanted as many people to know her as we could.

    Danielle 41:39
    So anyway, late that night, the nurses did suggest that she go to the morgue. I don’t think they actually said it that way. I wasn’t even really thinking about it. But they really encouraged me to try to rest. They would bring her back in the morning. So I reluctantly agreed to it. They had to give me Ambien to get me to sleep again. But I did sleep a little bit.

    Danielle 42:07
    Every time I woke up, I’m just like, Where’s my baby? I want my baby back. So as soon as I woke up that morning, I was trying to page the nurse to bring her back to me as quickly as possible. Because it was terrible to be without her. I just wanted her there. I wish I could have held her all night like I wanted to. But I was afraid that I dropped her or something because I really was getting so tired. And they brought her back that morning. And then we spent some time with her for several hours that day, the day after she was born.

    Danielle 42:45
    We didn’t have a cuddle cot or anything like that. So I just held her in my arms, and my husband held her some. But I will say I do feel kind of guilty that I didn’t really let anybody else hold her other than my husband. I never let my mom or my dad hold her. I really wish I could have given them that experience. My husband’s parents did come down too, but it was later that day. So they didn’t actually get to hold her or anything either. It makes me sad now that nobody else got to know what it was like to hold her except for me and my husband. But selfishly, I was like, this is the only time I’m going to get to hold my baby. I want to do it for as long as I can.

    Danielle 43:33
    So we had talked to the doctor about whether or not to do an autopsy. The doctor that we had seen at the time did recommend it just to make sure there were no other issues. It was pretty obvious that it was the cord accident. But with that being our first baby, they said it’s probably good just to rule other things out. So we did agree to do the autopsy.

    Danielle 44:00
    So throughout that morning, the nurse kept talking to me about how they have to start the autopsy within a certain amount of time. That we’d have to move ahead with that fairly soon. Throughout that day, Lydia was changing a lot. Her color was changing her skin, it started peeling some and that was really devastating to see. In my mind it wasn’t gonna. I was gonna hold her forever. Nobody was gonna take my baby from me, but the nurse kept telling me. Then my husband, he’s like, It probably is going to be time soon just because of how she was changing so.

    Winter 44:43
    Did your hospital have a policy on how long you could actually keep her? Or was they didn’t tell you and there was nothing in particular?

    Danielle 44:51
    Yeah, they didn’t really say anything like that there was any sort of policy but yeah, let’s just like that next morning after we had are they Were pretty, like, I felt like the one nurse. Like she was trying to be nice, but I felt like she was getting a little pushy like with, we have to, it’s time to take her. I don’t know exactly what time it was, but it was probably around 12 or one that day that I handed her over to the nurse, which was really hard to have to hand her over kind of for the last time. So

    Winter 45:24
    Yeah, that’s the worst thing ever.

    Danielle 45:27
    It really is. Yeah. So that was our time spent with Lydia at the hospital. Sorry if that was a super long story.

    Winter 45:37
    I actually wanted to ask you so you got your picture. At least you got pictures, say and with. So I lay me down to sleep. And were you guys able to get handprints or footprints or molds or anything like that while you were there?

    Danielle 45:52
    Yes. Yeah, the now I leave me down to sleep photographer. She was amazing. She got beautiful pictures that I’m forever grateful for. They did get Lydia’s handprints and footprints, which I’m so thankful for as well. I do wish I had been given more guidance in terms of how to make the most of our time with her because I just felt so scared. I just had her wrapped up in that blanket and her gown for so long.

    Danielle 46:22
    I was scared to really look at her all over. I didn’t think that I could give her a bath. None of these things crossed my mind, or brush your hair. Things that I’ve heard other parents have done when their babies are stillborn. I wish somebody had told me I could do those things. Because, again, they didn’t cross my mind. I was just too scared to even think about it. I was too scared to lift up her gown and see all of her because I didn’t know what she would look like?

    Winter 47:00
    Yeah.

    Danielle 47:00
    So, I’m very grateful for what they did to give us just those things. I wish we could have done– I wish there was some kind of guide book for somebody who’s lost a baby. Which I’ve actually thought about making one to give to the hospital to give to parents going through loss. Just things for them to consider because nobody goes in there prepared for that, or knowing what to do.

    Winter 47:27
    No, you don’t have any clue what you’re doing.

    Danielle 47:31
    Yeah.

    Winter 47:32
    You have no clue. It just blindsides you.

    Danielle 47:35
    Yeah. Also in the hospital they’re asking us what we plan to do. Do we want to have her cremated or buried? That was an awful decision to have to make, we had no idea what to do. It felt like they kept coming in asking have you made your decision? Have you picked your funeral home yet? I’m like, No, like, I don’t even know anything about a funeral home. What ones there are.

    Danielle 48:05
    Eventually, we just picked one that was somewhat close to home. For me I could not let my mind think about cremation as an option at the time. I guess it was just too much for me to understand. That she would just suddenly like, I don’t know, I felt like her body would just suddenly disappear. I just couldn’t for myself. I couldn’t wrap my head around it.

    Danielle 48:30
    I remember some people trying to encourage me to do that because then she could technically be with us wherever in our home. Again, we were new to this state. So we don’t know where we’ll be buried one day. We did not have her cremated. So what we did is we found a cemetery that has a mausoleum.

    Winter 48:49
    Oh okay.

    Danielle 48:51
    She’s in a mausoleum so she could easily we could take her casket out and move her at some point. But I have mixed feelings about that now too looking back. When she first passed away we would, I could not go to sleep without going to the cemetery and telling her goodnight. I just felt so terrible leaving her there all by herself.

    Danielle 49:18
    Even now six and a half years later, every time I visit her, I’m just like, I’m so sorry. I hate leaving, even though I know she’s not actually there. Personally, I believe she’s in heaven. But just remembering her little cast it in her body going in there is really hard and leaving her there, but that was kind of what I guess was best. At the time when we had to make that decision that that was all I could get myself to do.

    Danielle 49:50
    We did have a memorial service for her. It was a smaller service. My best friends came down for it and some of Jonah’s family up in Virginia and West Virginia came down. We did a service for her a few days later.

    Danielle 50:11
    We had opted, even for an open casket, because again I just felt so proud of her and wanted people to meet her and see her. That was really hard. I wasn’t expecting her to look so different. In the casket I felt like she didn’t look like the Lydia that I held a few days before. So that was really hard. I kept holding, or putting her hand around my finger, and her hand was so stiff. That was just really, really hard for me. But I was really grateful to see her again, though, and give her that service. That service was really difficult for me. I can hardly remember anything about it other than actually seeing her and touching her. I don’t remember anything that anybody said, or anything like that. I was just still in too much shock.

    Danielle 51:11
    I do remember my brother asked if I wanted him to take any pictures at the service, which I think was really nice of him to ask. He and my sister in law had come down a couple days prior to that to be there for us. I was like, No. I don’t know, I was just so angry to be at a funeral service for my daughter. I told him no, but looking back, I really wish I had said yes, because I don’t remember a lot about it. I was not in a good place at the time. But I really wish I could have had some memories of that service to look back on.

    Winter 51:52
    Yeah.

    Danielle 51:54
    Then when we got to the cemetery. That part was nicer. They had taken us in one of those small limos, my husband and I. It was just such a surreal experience. We were in the backseat, me, then our daughter’s casket and my husband. I remember driving there and like, this is not real. This is not happening.

    Winter 52:13
    Oh.

    Danielle 52:14
    It was so bizarre. Then we got to the cemetery. My best friends had gone and picked up my dog, which was so sweet. So she could be there. We had balloons, so we did a balloon release and laid her to rest there. So that part of it was beautiful. I do remember that. It’s just the actual service itself was really hard for me. I wanted to hide from everybody. I actually did go in this back room for a while just to hide because I couldn’t face everybody. Everybody was so sad. Obviously I was so sad too. But at that point, I couldn’t even cry anymore, because I was in this weird shock phase. I was like, I just want to be alone. I just don’t want to be here.

    Danielle 53:01
    Yeah.

    Winter 53:02
    Yeah. Yeah.

    Danielle 53:04
    So yeah, that’s kind of how we, how we honored her life at the time and laid her to rest. Which is still so bizarre to say and think about that.

    Winter 53:21
    I’m so sorry. I really appreciate you telling that story. I

    Danielle 53:27
    Thank you for listening.

    Winter 53:29
    Yeah. I just, there were quite a few things that you said that brought back some memories and some emotions and Yeah, kind of a little bit of regret, actually. Because of Yeah, I wish I would have done this or so. But thank you so much for sharing. About Lydia. I think that’s

    Danielle 53:50
    Yeah, anyway the story is. I love any opportunity I have to share about her and just let people know how loved she was and how precious and important she was to us. The event itself is sad. The fact that she died is sad, but she herself. She’s an amazing little girl. So I just don’t know, I love sharing about her any chance I can.

    Winter 54:18
    Because you’re a proud mom. So I think that’s great. That’s wonderful. Thank you so much again, Danielle. Thank you.

    Transcribed by https://otter.ai

    Filed Under: birth story, late term stillbirth, podcast episode, stillbirth Tagged With: stillbirth

    REMEMBERING GEORGE | Stillborn at 39 Weeks During COVID-19 Pandemic in England

    February 17, 2022 by Winter

    This is the stillbirth story of George Robert, told by his mom Miranda. Originally from Canada, Miranda and her husband Graham have been living in London for work, and they made the decision to start trying to have a baby. She talks about her pregnancy and “going to” appointments (telemedicine) and how George was progressing during the COVID-19 pandemic.

    After feeling no movement from George one morning around 39 weeks, Miranda headed to the hospital to be checked. They couldn’t find a heartbeat, and Miranda gave birth to George the following day. She and Graham did not want to see George after he was born, and with some encouragement from their bereavement midwife, they both did see him and spent time with him. This is George’s story.

    Watch here (YouTube):

    Listen here (podcast):


    Time Stamps:

    00:00 George Robert
    02:21 Introduction of Miranda and Graham
    09:01 Pregnancy
    19:10 Something is wrong and going to the hospital
    30:09 Birth
    36:26 After birth
    41:17 Leaving the hospital
    45:50 Funeral
    55:04 Autopsy

    You might appreciate these other episodes:

    • Watch/listen to Miranda‘s advice episode of son George: Click here
    • Watch/listen to Tiffany‘s birth episode of daughter Khyana’s: Click here

    Wanna help?

    • DONATE! Consider giving a one-time or recurring donation to help with production and hosting costs: Go here for more information.
    • SUBSCRIBE! Head over here to subscribe to our YouTube channel and our podcasts.
    • SHARE! Spread the word to a loss mom or dad, or those who may be supporting a bereaved parent. Send them a link to this post. Pin one of our graphics on Pinterest.
    George’s 17 Week Ultrasound

    Full Transcription:

    Miranda Markham  0:00  

    My baby’s name was George Robert.

    Miranda Markham  0:08  

    Things I remember about him most of all. The first was that throughout the entire pregnancy, I was absolutely convinced he would be blonde like me. I don’t know why it’s the recessive gene. My husband and I have dark brown hair, but I just assumed 100% he’d be blonde. He was born with a full head of dark brown hair, which surprised me. The other thing was that leading up to his birth, the weather was unseasonably warm, beautiful sunny days, pure blue skies every day for what seemed like weeks on end. Then he died five days before his due date. On his due day, the sixth of June, the weather absolutely turned, it got really cold. There was a thunderstorm. I do remember sitting and staring out the window and watching the rain pour down and just think this is so perfect. I couldn’t stand a happy, sunny day on what was the saddest day for me. I just felt like the world was grieving with me somehow. I don’t know, it felt like a very fitting weather turn to mark what should have been a very joyful day.

    Winter  1:21  

    Welcome to Still A Part of Us. A place where moms and dads share the story of their child who was stillborn or who died in infancy. I’m Winter.

    Lee  1:28  

    And I’m Lee, we are grateful you joined us today. Please note that this is a story of loss and has triggers.

    Winter  1:34  

    Thanks to our lost parents who are willing to be vulnerable and share their children with us. 

    Lee  1:38  

    If you’re listening to this podcast, just know that on our YouTube channel, there are pictures and videos that are related to the stories that are being shared.

    Winter  1:45  

    Subscribe and share it with a friend that might need it and tell them to subscribe. Why? Because people need to know that even though our babies are no longer with us. They’re Still A Part of Us.

    Winter  1:58  

    We are so grateful to have Miranda on with us today to talk about her son, George. This is actually kind of a fun experience to get to know Miranda. So I’m excited to have you on today. Miranda, welcome. 

    Miranda Markham  2:10  

    Thank you. Thank you so much for having me. 

    Winter  2:12  

    So tell us a little bit about yourself, Miranda. Who you’re married to, where you guys are living right now, and what do you do on a day to day basis?

    Miranda Markham  2:21  

    Yeah, sure. So my husband’s name is Graham. We just celebrated our 8th wedding anniversary on the 13th of April. 

    Winter  2:29  

    Congratulations.

    Miranda Markham  2:31  

    16th of April. It was in 2013. We are originally from Canada. We moved to London, England six years ago, both of us had job opportunities that came up around the same time. It was not in our life plan. We had just got married, we just bought a house and lived in that house for approximately a year. It was very much the plan to stay in Toronto, where we lived. We just kind of packed it all up and fled with the intention of staying in London for two years. That was six years ago. 

    Miranda Markham  3:15  

    We both changed jobs a couple times since moving to London. But broadly, my role has been in the world of public relations. I’ve worked in all sorts. Started in consumer PR, so for large consumer businesses and then transitioned into health and fitness PR specifically, which is very much my area of expertise and my passion. My husband’s done a fairly significant career pivot after a career in mining. He went into an MBA program at the London Business School, and decided he wanted to get into the world of food tech, which is where he’s working now. So plant proteins and alternative meat. Yeah,

    Winter  3:55  

    Very interesting. So you guys have just found yourself in London. Do you enjoy living there? Has it been good for you?

    Miranda Markham  4:04  

    It’s been amazing. I think we wouldn’t have stayed, we wouldn’t have stayed for three times the length of time if it wasn’t. I think we were really naive when we first moved to London thinking that after two years, we would have done it all and seen it all. Done everything made all these friends and could have just packed up and moved to Toronto. I mean, I think it really took us two years to feel like we lived in London, and to make some solid friendships. By the time that had happened, it seemed like a shame to reverse it all. So we just stayed, but the city is amazing. I mean, there’s everything you have at food entertainment events. I think a big thing for us was proximity to the rest of Europe and an opportunity to travel extensively which we’ve done over the last six years.

    Winter  4:51  

    Which is so wonderful. You kind of alluded to this that you are very much into the– you do PR for a fitness company. I know that you are a big runner if I’m not mistaken. Tell me a little bit how long you’ve been running? Is that like a pretty big hobby for you?

    Miranda Markham  5:12  

    Running was a huge part of my life. I started running in my late 20s. A friend of mine was the leader of a local running club and basically invited me to come and join at a time where I never really put two feet in front of her. I really enjoyed it. So I kept going back. As part of the group she was in, they wanted two new runners to train for and run their first half marathon and blog about it in exchange for free clothes and shoes. So I thought, Yeah, why not? Why not? I had every intention of running one half marathon and saying that was what got my free shoes. I’m out of here. 

    Miranda Markham  5:54  

    Obviously, you know where the story goes. But I fell in love with it. I suddenly just awakened to this desire to see how far I could go. If I can do this, how much more can I run? How much faster can I get? How much further can I go? It was just this massive source of pride and accomplishment for me. So I continued, and over the last decade or so, less than a decade, I’ve run over 55 different races. All my two full marathons and five triathlons. I would say I’m still very much a recreational runner, but posted some times in the past a couple years that I would have thought inconceivable in my early days. So, I think there was something really rewarding about getting older and still being able to improve. 

    Winter  6:45  

    Yeah. 

    Miranda Markham  6:46  

    So I say it was a big part of my life. I think it’s sort of dropped down the priorities these days. But it’ll be there for when I want it back again.

    Winter  6:55  

    Yeah, exactly. That’s a nice thing about it. So it sounds like as a couple you guys like to travel. Any other things that you like to do in London or around?

    Miranda Markham  7:08  

    Definitely travel, but eat. Think of there’s no shortage of amazing cuisineI in London. I think it gets painted with a bad brush. People think that English food is just a bunch of fish and chips and fried stuff. I mean, if you want that you can have it. But it’s also a very worldly city where if you want any type of cuisine from anywhere around the world, you can get it. 

    Winter  7:31  

    Right. 

    Miranda Markham  7:32  

    So I think nights out with friends and enjoying great food. Either in their homes or at a restaurant has been a huge part of our social calendar. I think just the entertainment side of things. I mean, there’s aside from the obvious theaters, and kind of Western shows, there are just so many interesting events that you can go to. Whether it’s festivals or secret cinemas, or interactive art exhibits, I mean, it’s endless. You can find something to fill your weekend, every week, if you want.

    Winter  8:02  

    That is so fun. I think that is great. Thank you for letting us know. I think you’re technically our first international. Yeah, international guests. So welcome.

    Miranda Markham  8:14  

    Hey! All Right. 

    Winter  8:15  

    Yeah. For a little bit of context, can you also tell us how long ago George was born at the time of this recording? 

    Miranda Markham  8:24  

    It was coming up on 11 months ago.

    Winter  8:29  

    Yeah, it’s right. June.

    Miranda Markham  8:31  

     So it was June, June of 2020. 

    Winter  8:33  

    Right. Okay. So it’s you and your husband, Graham, and any other members of the family? Just, it’s just the two of you. Right?

    Miranda Markham  8:43  

    It’s just us and the puppy who joined us in December of last year. 

    Winter  8:48  

    Okay.

    Miranda Markham  8:48  

    His name is Eddie.

    Winter  8:50  

    Wonderful. So were you guys planning on getting pregnant then? Was that part of the big picture? Or was that something that was a little bit of a surprise?

    Miranda Markham  9:00  

    It was not a surprise. I think we really, as a couple, I don’t want to say struggled, but certainly postponed the idea of starting a family for quite a long time. We like our lives. The freedom of being able to pack up and travel and do whatever we wanted when we wanted. It was really difficult for us to envision a life where that suddenly came to a standstill. 

    Miranda Markham  9:29  

    I think at the same time, both being very career focused. We were busy. It was hard to imagine how a baby would fit into our lives. So we really delayed our thinking around starting a family for quite a while. But I think we sort of have complete predictability. The second I turned 35 I suddenly felt like okay I’m ready now and we need to start. We need to start because obviously there’s no reason to believe that we would have any issues, and I wasn’t concerned about any fertility challenges. But I think age being a factor certainly weighed on my mind. It sort of felt like it was now or never. 

    Miranda Markham  10:15  

    I think the other thing was that I’m an only child. I always said my whole life that I would want to have two kids. So it was trying to plot that timeline. I’m a bit of a control freak. So trying to plan how that would look. Really sort of thought, okay, at 35, we’ve got to start the process. I think we took a very sort of laid back approach to it. It’s not like I was tracking anything, we just sort of, I don’t know if they say this and other countries that pulled the goalie, as they say. We just said, and just thought, if it happens, it happens. And that’s how it will be. 

    Miranda Markham  10:53  

    So it wasn’t a quick process, because, as it turns out, it’s really actually hard to make a baby. You spend your whole life worried that you’re gonna get pregnant by accident. And when it comes down to it, it’s like some Einstein level science experiment where the moon has to align with something or another. Anyway, it eventually happened. A month before my 36th birthday, I found out that I was pregnant. 

    Winter  11:18  

    Awesome. Were you guys excited? Was that just like, okay, we have been planning for this. How did you feel about that?

    Miranda Markham  11:24  

    I remember the day that I told Graham, I was pregnant. I did the test in the morning before work, and it was positive. I came and told him. We both kind of went, hmm, all right. Well, I gotta go. We’ll talk later. It was like the most anticlimactic thing there was no celebration, jumping up and down. It was kind of like, Okay, this is the thing we’ll deal with later. 

    Winter  11:44  

    Yeah. 

    Miranda Markham  11:46  

    So I wouldn’t say the initial emotion was one of overwhelming excitement. I think there was certainly happiness, but also an element of being terrified as well. This is suddenly everything is going to change. 

    Winter  12:01  

    Yeah. 

    Miranda Markham  12:02  

    So we could eventually talk about it. I think as time went on, I became more and more excited. But yeah, certainly it was scary. I think we were mostly focused on how our lives would change. 

    Winter  12:15  

    Yeah because it is a big change when a child comes into your life. How was the pregnancy? Were you? I would say that you are relatively fit. I’m just wondering how the pregnancy went. Morning sickness. How did the baby look?

    Miranda Markham  12:32  

    Yeah. I mean, overall, I would say my pregnancy was really smooth and really easy. I had really intense food aversions in the first trimester, which caught me a bit by surprise. I thought I knew about morning sickness, obviously I didn’t know that I would literally feel like rushing at the smell of my own refrigerator. I subsisted on a diet of bagels and crackers for probably 12 weeks. I also made hiding the pregnancy from people at that time extremely difficult knowing both my love of food and my high level of activity, when suddenly I started acting like a slob and eating nothing but carbs. It was a rather difficult thing so I’m sure most people had a suspicion before I ever mentioned this. 

    Miranda Markham  13:24  

    Otherwise, I think as soon as I passed the first trimester, I felt great. I had a high level of energy. I continued running until I was 25 weeks pregnant, I think. Carried on with a fairly high intensity fitness schedule. Group after five classes modified Of course. I also worked with a personal trainer who specialized in prenatal fitness, just to make sure that I was– I have a tendency to push myself too hard all the time. So I needed someone to kind of pull me back and make sure that I was still exercising safely. 

    Winter  13:53  

    Yeah.

    Miranda Markham  13:54  

    But yeah, and we still traveled. We went to Mauritius, when I was probably about 26 weeks, maybe 24 weeks pregnant, and had a luxurious holiday at this beautiful resort. Then in March of 2020, we went to France and my friends went skiing. I snowshoed and booked a massage therapist to come to the chalet and massage me. I mean it’s all very luxurious. 

    Winter  14:20  

    Yes, that sounds nice.

    Miranda Markham  14:22  

    Yeah, I didn’t have any issues. I was very mobile, very new. I felt good. I felt great. There were certainly no warning signs that anything would go badly. 

    Winter  14:35  

    Yeah. I am not totally sure how healthcare is in London or in the UK. But do they generally also do a kind of anatomy ultrasound around 20 weeks? Is that a fairly common practice still?

    Miranda Markham  14:51  

    Yes. So I think similar to most places, they do a 12 and 20 weeks again. My particular hospital also offered a third a six week scan, but due to COVID, it was canceled. So I never actually had that one. But I think potentially unlike other countries, I don’t know this for sure. But there’s lots of private care options where there’s several clinics that will do private scans for a fairly reasonable price. So if you are concerned, you can book what’s called a reassurance scan and go in and have another scan. Your cost, of course. 

    Winter  15:24  

    Right, right. 

    Miranda Markham  15:26  

    It’s certainly affordable, I think, for most people, and I think what’s the price of reassurance?

    Winter  15:31  

    Yeah, yeah. So you guys got your scans at 12 weeks and at 20 weeks. And how was George looking at that time at those times, looking good?

    Miranda Markham  15:41  

    He looks great. He was, I mean, it was, I think we totally took for granted at the time, but I went into all of those appointments, assuming that it would all be everything is fine. All graphs trending upward. Everything is perfect. So I always left feeling quite smug that everything was great. And therefore everything would be great. 

    Winter  16:01  

    Yeah. I know. So tell us a little bit. So you, just to kind of back up a little bit. I just want to point out that you had George, basically in the middle of the pandemic. It was probably full, like you guys had shut down? I mean, I think the UK had shut down quite a bit of stuff by June, May, June. 

    Miranda Markham  16:20  

    Yeah, so just to set the sort of timeline. I think I was entering my third trimester in March of 2020. 

    Winter  16:29  

    Okay. 

    Miranda Markham  16:30  

    So right when the world was basically pulling the panic alarm on COVID. I left work one afternoon of I think, March 17, or so. thinking it would be thinking it would be a couple of weeks, and I’d be back. It was the last time I was ever in the office.

    Winter  16:49  

    Right.

    Miranda Markham  16:49  

    I haven’t been back. Everything shut down. Like fully locked down after that. It was at first kind of a funny thing, a novelty. But it was this sort of bizarro world that everyone assumed would be temporary. And it was made bearable by the fact that the weather was beautiful. 

    Miranda Markham  17:12  

    Oh good. 

    Miranda Markham  17:13  

    I just thought, well, great. I’m working from home, I’m pregnant, I don’t have to get on public transit. I’m just going to lounge in the garden and drink 100 iced tea while in between meetings. 

    Miranda Markham  17:25  

    I don’t think initially, I was terribly concerned. I think when things started to become more concerning was when obviously hospitals became overrun. The NHS was at a breaking point in terms of being able to accommodate all the critical patients. Of course it wouldn’t have necessarily impacted maternity care. But what they did do in order to prevent more people from entering the hospital was to cancel what they called all non essential appointments. So for anyone like me, that was deemed low risk and healthy. 

    Miranda Markham  18:03  

    Pretty much all of my appointments, with the exception of one of 38 weeks was canceled, or done over the phone. Which I was deeply concerned about, at the time, because I thought, How on earth could they possibly know, if something’s going wrong with a phone call? I panicked. I remember calling multiple other hospitals to see if I could switch. But they all basically had the same rules in place. So there was no point. I kept trying to tell myself that they have to make changes in an unprecedented situation. So if they tell me that this is the right thing to do, and that the risk of going into the hospital is greater than staying home, then I have to just believe that that is in fact, true.

    Winter  18:51  

    So you have had basically telephone phone call, I mean, telephone appointments, and or none at all, basically, for your last trimester?

    Miranda Markham  19:00  

    Correct. 

    Winter  19:01  

    Were they having you do any sort of checks of, say blood pressure or? So nothing extra?

    Miranda Markham  19:10  

    No. So I think this is the other thing I thought normally they take blood or they check your urine, or they do your blood pressure, none of that was happening. They basically just asked how I was feeling. I think the question that stays with me is the midwife who called me and asked, Are you happy with the baby’s movements? And I thought, like, what an absolutely absurd thing to ask a first time mom, and I said, I don’t know what you mean. Like, yeah, like, give me more to go on. What should I be looking for? I remember her sounding quite exasperated with me, as if I was just wasting her time. And she just basically asked if the movements were regular. If I’d noticed any difference in the patterns and at the time, I just thought, I mean, I’m not paying attention. I was working 15-16 hour days because working in the fitness industry, when all of our clients that basically had to shut our business was in a tailspin. We were trying to save clients who were leaving us in droves. It was really stressful. The last thing I was paying attention to was counting my baby’s movements. So I just sort of said, Yeah, I guess so. And she said, Great, okay, call us if anything changes. The conversation lasted 45 seconds.

    Winter  20:24  

    So you’re in your third trimester, you are told to note down. I mean, it sounds like there was not very good direction given regarding what you’re supposed to be looking for in regards to movement. 

    Miranda Markham  20:36  

    Not particularly.

    Winter  20:37  

    Not particularly and they are and you are just kind of starting to get worried. Right. I mean, I would be, like you said,I would be panicking. 

    Miranda Markham  20:47  

    I panicked, I was properly panicked. And not just about the baby, but about all aspects of my life. What was going to happen with my company? What was happening? It sounds trivial now. But fitness was such a huge part of my life, and all the places I would go to fit and do classes were shut down there for the foreseeable. I mean even our families for travel, they live in Canada, they wanted to come visit us when the baby was born, would that be possible? 

    Miranda Markham  21:15  

    I remember, I was awake in the night, I couldn’t sleep because I was so worried about things. I woke up and I wrote, feverishly, six pages of worries. Months and months later, I went back and looked at those and it is shocking. How many of those things actually happened. Most people say when you write down your worries that most of them end up not coming to fruition. In his particular case, I would say 50% plus actually, indeed did happen. Which is a terrifying thing. 

    Winter  21:45  

    Yeah, it is. So tell me what happened. Yeah, tell me kind of what happened when you found out about George.

    Miranda Markham  21:55  

    I mean, things carried on through the third trimester. I did actually go to an appointment at 38 weeks, where everything appeared to be fine. So then I carried on working right up until the end. I worked until the 30th of May. I think that was the right day, 30 or something around there. 

    Miranda Markham  22:15  

    I remember being quite smug having done the best job I could, I was on great terms with my boss. We’ve done a lot of great work together in order to kind of salvage a lot of things that were going wrong. So we had a friend over that evening, and you’re having some food in the garden. I remember feeling quite smug. I could feel George moving around, and was feeling quite good about everything. 

    Miranda Markham  22:40  

    I woke up the next morning, I guess this was now June. June, the first, which was Monday, my very first day of maternity leave. I sat up in bed, and I just remember I normally every morning when I would sit up in bed, and I would have my morning drink, the baby would start moving. He’d start moving straight away. I start noticing his movements, especially if he could hear me or Graham talking. But this morning, there was nothing. I didn’t panic, not straight away, because I knew not to. I’d read enough by this stage on my own and based on my own research that you shouldn’t panic. 

    Miranda Markham  23:17  

    So I did everything that I was told to do. I had something cold to drink, I ate something sweet. I lay down on the couch, and I tried to feel if I could feel any movements. I still didn’t believe that there was anything too wrong. So I had a shower, dried my hair. By this point, more than an hour had gone by, and I still hadn’t felt anything. I thought I should just go in just to be sure. I’m sure it’s fine. But I’ll go in. I told Graham not to come even though I think he could have despite the COVID restrictions, but I told him not to go because in that moment, I was sure that everything would be okay. 

    Miranda Markham  23:58  

    I remember getting in. I just took an Uber to the hospital. I remember on the way there. I didn’t know just suddenly getting this increasing sense of dread. I even googled, I know I did this because like the web page was still open on my phone weeks and weeks later I googled rate of stillbirth. I just I don’t know, I just had a horrible dreadful feeling that something was wrong. I got to the maternity ward and they still had me wait, even though I said I was concerned about the baby’s movements. I still waited in the waiting room for 25 minutes before someone saw me.

    Miranda Markham  24:36  

    Then finally a midwife came and put the doppler on me and couldn’t find anything. That’s when I really started to panic. I kept shouting at her, is something wrong? Something is wrong and she just kept telling me that it was fine and not to worry. They brought in a different midwife and she checked and still nothing. 

    Miranda Markham  24:53  

    Then they told me to move and I had to go to a different area where they did a proper ultrasound with a more senior I don’t know if she was a midwife or an obstetrician, I’m not sure. That’s when she told me, well, she didn’t actually need to tell me. I just remember looking at her actually all three of them. There are three midwives there. They were all wearing masks because of COVID. I just looked at her eyes. They were filled up with tears. I knew before she even said anything. She just said the words I’m so sorry. I don’t know. I kept screaming at her. Are you sure? I demanded that she check again, over and over. She kept telling me that she was so sorry that he had no heartbeat. 

    Miranda Markham  25:42  

    After a few moments of trying to absorb this news, she told me that we had to go to a different room. I mean, understandably, I was hysterical. We’re separated by curtains in a room full of other pregnant women. Obviously, it’s not a good scene. I couldn’t function, I couldn’t move. Then I obviously had to call Graham, I had to call him, how do you call your husband and tell him that your baby’s dead? I’ve somehow managed to get through to him. I just shrieked something down the phone and then threw my phone at whoever was sitting or standing next to me and told them they had to sort it out. 

    Miranda Markham  26:25  

    So they took me to this other room. I remember sitting there just crying and asking, are they sure ? They kept telling me they could check again. But the woman who checked me is the most senior. I don’t know what her title is, a senior kind of ultrasound technician in the hospital and that if she had not seen a heartbeat, it was very unlikely that it would be any different. I remember I just kept asking what do we do now? What do I do? What do I do?

    Miranda Markham  26:56  

    They wouldn’t answer me forever, they just wouldn’t tell me anything, they wouldn’t speak to me other than just to sort of try to calm me like they wanted Graham to be there first. In hindsight, that was the right thing to do, because I don’t think I would have heard, or I would have heard, but I wouldn’t have listened to anything they said.

    Miranda Markham  27:16  

    Anyway, eventually he arrived. We talked about the different options, it is exceedingly difficult, in that moment of extreme shock to try and make rational decisions about what to do next. They give you the sort of doctor’s perspective of you can have a C-section or you can be induced, and they give you a bunch of various sort of sexual risks and benefits of each. But ultimately, it’s up to you to decide. And that’s horrible, because all I wanted in that moment was for somebody to tell me what to do. So to force me to make decisions like that, I think was cruel and horrible. And equally, I think the worst thing was that even once we decided, it’s not like it could happen immediately, we had to just go home. 

    Miranda Markham  28:05  

    At this stage, maybe 10 o’clock in the morning. We just had to go home to a house that had a baby’s room completely set up and ready for a baby that was never going to use it. And just sit with that fact for an entire day and night, that was the worst. I think people often say to me how awful they think certain things would have been like the funeral or packing up his room, or all these different things. But I think for me, that was the worst, having to turn around and leave the hospital and go home, and just be there with that. With that feeling completely helpless and out of control, and not able to do anything to help myself or the baby that had died. It was the worst 30 hours of my entire life.

    Winter  29:01  

    Did you guys decide to be induced or to have the C-section then?

    Miranda Markham  29:07  

    I think that if they had told me that I could have had the C-section immediately, I would have done it. Because I couldn’t imagine the idea of what I’ve just described as having to go home and just sit with that fact that they said regardless of what option I chose, it would have to be the following day. They had explained that the induction would be safer for me. An easier recovery and the safest option should we want to try and have children in the future. That seems like a good enough reason to me. So that was what we decided despite the fact that the thought of it was utterly inconceivable. But based on those facts alone, that’s what we decided.

    Winter  29:53  

    When Graham finally came, got there and everything, was he also in shock? I just imagine him getting the news on the other side of the phone. Do you know how he reacted?

    Miranda Markham  30:09  

    It’s really hard for me to remember because I was so in my own head, but I remember him running in. He had my hospital bag, I remember the one that I had packed for going to the hospital if I was in labor. I don’t know if he brought that out of his own accord, or if they told him to. He just ran in and hugged me. I don’t know if he cried, I can’t remember. He’s a very sort of practical and rational person. I think that in that moment, in those, especially that momentum, the many moments to follow, he really sort of assumed the role of sort of managing all practical things. Being the clear headed one that is going to deal with the sort of administrative and necessary parts of this. Because I couldn’t, I was incapable. So he asked all the questions and he listened to the answers. He knew where we had to go and when, because I just didn’t have the capacity to listen.

    Winter  31:13  

    So you guys stayed at your home for the day and for the night, and then went back to the hospital the next morning?

    Miranda Markham  31:23  

    Yes.

    Winter  31:24  

    It was obviously going to only be you and Graham that were able to come in. 

    Miranda Markham  31:30  

    Yeah, I think that was the only time certainly in the early days where I saw Graham panic. When we woke up the next morning we’re just sort of forcing ourselves to eat breakfast together. I think he just, I don’t know. I just remember him panicking, and he called our friend and told him what had happened. I don’t actually know what he asked him for. Now, I’m saying this, but I think he just needed it. I don’t know, he just needed to tell someone and to let them know that if he fell apart and needed help that somebody could help us. 

    Miranda Markham  32:07  

    But somehow we managed to choke down breakfast and call ourselves an Uber. I remember the Uber driver asked if I was in labor, absolutely the worst journey to the hospital ever. The worst part is that Uber driver actually lives in our area. So I see that van multiple times a week parking near our flat, even today. Every time I just shudder to think that was the vehicle that drove us to the hospital that day. 

    Miranda Markham  32:39  

    Anyway, yeah, so we got there sometime in the morning. I remember they brought us to, I guess, like a delivery suite or delivery room. Then we waited forever. We needed some additional, some kind of tablet to start the labor. We waited for it for four hours. I remember thinking like, how can this not be the hospital’s number one priority? Like, we’re just supposed to sit in this room and just do nothing, for four hours? They kept apologizing and they kept coming back being like we’re looking for the pharmacist, we’ll get it soon. I just thought like why would you have me come in at 9am or 8am. 

    Miranda Markham  33:25  

    Anyway, so eventually, we got the tablet that was required. Very thankfully, things progressed really quickly from there. It sounds weird to say, but I was so thankful to just start the process. Because I felt so helpless before, at least now there was something I could actively be doing. It meant that we were moving forward from this extremely painful state of limbo. 

    Miranda Markham  33:29  

    Once things started, they were quick, the entire labor was only three and a half hours. There were no complications at all. There was, I mean, I don’t even remember it being particularly painful. Other than emotionally painful. I didn’t have an epidural. I remember they sort of thrust this pamphlet of pain relief options at me and sort of had me decide which one I wanted to go with. All I can remember reading on the pamphlet was all these sort of vanishingly small risks associated with the different options for pain relief. I remember thinking to myself, well, I can’t have an epidural because I’ll probably be paralyzed. Like anything that was on there. I was just convinced that the risk would happen. So I just said, I don’t want any of it. 

    Miranda Markham  34:09  

    I ended up I don’t even remember what it’s called, but taking some kind of pain relief. It’s administered through the cannula like the intravenously I guess. With gas and air, I don’t think it was tremendously effective because it was one of these like self administered ones that you have to use. I had to press a button preemptively to every contraction and it’s like you’re not even, I don’t know who can do this effectively. So I would say it virtually didn’t work. Whether it worked or not, who knows. 

    Miranda Markham  35:12  

    Anyway, thankfully, everything was fast. George was born. I mean, that’s another horrible moment is the silence that followed that. I mean, they just whisked him away so fast. I remember I didn’t even see him. I was facing away sort of on my knees on the bed. George came out, and they just– by the time I’d turned around, he was gone. It was like he didn’t exist. Now, in hindsight, Graham tells me that they asked if I wanted to see him. He says that I’d said, No. I have zero recollection of that conversation ever happening. I trusted that it did happen. I probably just don’t remember due to some cocktail of emotions and drugs. 

    Miranda Markham  35:58  

    So I suppose they were doing what they thought I wanted. But it’s very weird to give birth to a baby and turn around and there’s just nothing. Nothing there. So yeah, and that was kind of it. It was kind of anticlimactic after that. I didn’t have any significant tearing. I think they put too little stitches. Then I took a shower and went to another room to recover.

    Winter  36:23  

    So you really did not see George at all?

    Miranda Markham  36:26  

    No.

    Winter  36:26  

    Not that day?

    Miranda Markham  36:27  

    Not that day.

    Winter  36:28  

    Okay.

    Miranda Markham  36:32  

    After that they eventually introduced me. I think the same day to a woman named Sarah, who was our bereavement midwife. She was amazing. She continued to encourage me to see George even though I was convinced I never wanted to. Eventually, not on the day he was born, he was born on June 2, on the third. 

    Miranda Markham  36:59  

    We were still in the hospital, they basically said, we can stay as long as I wanted, even though there was no real medical reason for me to be there. I didn’t know where to go. We didn’t know where to, we felt like we couldn’t go back to the flat. So we just sort of stayed until we could formulate a plan.

    Miranda Markham  37:17  

    Anyway, Sarah continued to give us the option to see George and encouraged us to do it. Graham eventually went to see him first. That was extremely hard for him, really emotional. I think he felt like at that time that he was doing that for both of us. And that I would never see him and that he felt like he needed to go and say something to our son on behalf of both of us. Eventually, Sarah suggested that I might like to look at some photos that they had taken of George first and see how that felt. 

    Miranda Markham  37:50  

    Again, at first I said no, that I couldn’t do it. So then on the morning of the fourth of June, we were still at the hospital. I remember I started feeling a bit jealous that Graham had seen George and I hadn’t, which I thought was an odd emotion even at the time, because I kept asking what did he look like? Did he look like this? Did he have this shape of nose? What color was his hair? What does his hand look like? And he’s just, I don’t know Miranda. It wasn’t on the top of his mind to strip the baby down and look at his, every crevice of his body. 

    Miranda Markham  38:22  

    I remember feeling jealous that he got that opportunity and I didn’t. So when Sarah came back, I said, I did want to see the photos. So she brought them in for me. I looked at them. I remember immediately I thought my reaction might be that I’d be scared or horrified. That he would look like a baby that he’d look like some horrible version of a baby. I was completely just like, took my breath away, just to see him that he just looked like the perfect sleeping Angel. I wasn’t scared of him at all. I was actually the emotion that I remember having overwhelmingly was that I felt proud. I felt proud of him. So right away I said I wanted to see him. That I needed to see him. 

    Miranda Markham  39:25  

    Two days later, after he was born, I finally saw him. They brought him into my room. Graham left because he couldn’t he couldn’t see him again. They brought him in this little thing they called a cold cot. A horrible little refrigerator instead of a nice warm bed. He still looked perfect. Like he literally looks like he could just start moving at any point.

    Miranda Markham  39:54  

    I remember asking what he was wearing because it didn’t occur to us to bring clothes to the hospital for a baby who had died. But he was wearing a little baby outfit and a hat. She said that there’s a woman who knits things for babies that have died. So he was wearing one of those hats and this little outfit that was too big for him. So I just spent some time with him. I held his little hand and I talked to him.

    Miranda Markham  40:36  

    I don’t know, even now I look back and think that it just wasn’t enough. I’m so grateful that I saw him at all because there was a long period of time where I wasn’t going to. I know deeply now that would have been such a huge source of regret for him. One of my biggest regrets now is that I didn’t hold him. I couldn’t at the time, I just like it just seemed inconceivable to me. But I just keep reminding myself that I did. I did the best I could at the time. 

    Winter  41:08  

    Yeah. So you left three days later, after he was born? Is that right?

    Miranda Markham  41:17  

    Yeah. So I think we left on the morning of the fifth of June. Again, we didn’t feel like we could go back to the flat. But while we were in the hospital, they were really kind to us. They fed us really well. And they were really attentive. I had really low blood pressure, actually. I actually fainted and fell in the hospital, which was not right. If you were to have this conversation with Graham, he would recount that story as being one of the worst and serious moments for him. For me, I barely remember it. I do, however, remember the massive bruise I had on my head for the six following weeks. In fact, I would even maintain that that fall in the hospital hurt more than the birth is an absurd thing to say. 

    Miranda Markham  42:11  

    Anyway, we stayed there and they were very kind to us. While we were there, we basically formulated a plan that initially we would go to a hotel. This doesn’t sound like a tremendously large undertaking, except that you have to remember that this was in the peak of Coronavirus, lockdown, and only key workers were allowed to stay in hotels, otherwise, they were completely shut down. So a very kind friend of ours called a local hotel and explained our situation, basically begging them to give us a room. Very thankfully, they agreed. 

    Miranda Markham  42:49  

    I think that was a good thing for us to do, at least initially, because it afforded us a bit more time to just be in a neutral space. Away from all the reminders and everything in our flat and work out what we were going to do next. Just the way to shut away from the world for a little bit. So we stayed in that hotel for I think three days. I barely left the room. It’s funny now, it’s hard to remember what we did all day. I mean, we never turn the TV on. We barely left. I don’t know how we filled the days. But somehow we did. 

    Miranda Markham  43:31  

    We got through it and eventually made the plan to go to Edinburgh. My parents own a flat there. It’s normally a rental property, especially in the summertime, but again, because of COVID it was vacant. Nobody had been there for many, many months. Actually my parents were thrilled to be able to offer it to us and be just that somebody would finally be going there and checking on their place. 

    Miranda Markham  43:57  

    It did mean that we had to go back to the slot. We had to pack up some stuff. So we did so in the most sort of formulaic and sort of mission critical kind of way. I made a list. It was very rigid. I went in with the sole purpose of putting stuff in a bag and then to leave immediately. That’s what we did. Then we stayed in Edinburgh for two months. 

    Winter  44:19  

    Wow, that’s– Yeah. Did you and– I’m assuming you guys just took some time off. You were on maternity leave. 

    Miranda Markham  44:28  

    Yeah.

    Winter  44:29  

    Graham was able to take some time off I’m assuming too?

    Miranda Markham  44:31  

    Yeah, so I was already on maternity leave. So obviously there was no work obligation to do anything. By that point, we had communicated with sort of the main people what had happened. My team was included in that. Graham took a month off work. I don’t think it was really ever like an agreement. I think it was his boss at the time who basically just said, do whatever you need to do. 

    Miranda Markham  44:59  

    His full time job essentially became taking care of me. I was– I could– I didn’t– I couldn’t have taken care of myself. I would not have gotten out of bed, there is a 0% chance I would have done anything. I wouldn’t have eaten. It took me months to get my appetite back and enjoy food again. Eating was such a challenge. I made a goal for myself in the early days to eat breakfast before noon. That was my only day objective was to get out of bed. I didn’t even have to put clothes on or shower, just go and put food in my mouth. Even that would take me hours, hours and hours. Those were really hard days. 

    Winter  45:41  

    Yeah. When you guys were in the hospital, did they approach you about what you guys wanted to do with George’s body?

    Miranda Markham  45:50  

    Yes, they did. They very kindly talked us through the different options. I remember we continued to ask well, what do people normally do? Because there’s no rulebook for this. I think when you’re so blindsided as we were, you have no guideline. 

    Miranda Markham  46:15  

    I think for lots of families, religion often becomes something to lean on when the unexpected happens. There are very specific customs and traditions around what happens when someone dies. I think for us we’re not tremendously religious, or spiritual people, or we weren’t prior to George’s death. We had nobody in our lives, other than you know grandparents had died. That wasn’t really our responsibility to arrange any funerals or anything right? We had no idea what to do. Our families couldn’t really help us because they’re so far away, and with no option to get to us. 

    Miranda Markham  46:59  

    So we were told many, many times, we didn’t have to decide right away at any point. Again George, because stay at the hospital, and he would be well taken care of, and that we could decide when we decided. 

    Winter  47:16  

    Oh, okay. 

    Miranda Markham  47:17  

    I remember waking up in an absolute panic on so many occasions, just needing to know where George was. Where is he ? Who is taking care of him? Is someone looking after him? Calling the hospital and asking our bereavement midwife, if she could just tell me where he was at. Every time she would very kindly go and check and tell me that he was in the, whatever they call it mortuary or morgue, and that a really nice man named Simon was looking after him. It did provide me with a bit of comfort, whether or not Simon was actually looking after him or not, I don’t know. I just thought his little body is just locked away in some cold, dark place, and we’ve just left him there. It defies every instinct in your body to do. 

    Miranda Markham  48:14  

    Your body still reacts as if you’ve had a baby, it still thinks you have one. Mine thought I’d abandoned ours. It was really, really difficult. So for that reason, the easiest thing to do was not make a decision about what to do, because that felt very final. We didn’t want to do anything impulsive, because we didn’t want to regret it. So we took our time, and ultimately decided that we would have him cremated for the probably most practical reason. Which is we’re not sure that we will stay in London forever. If we bury our son there, and we leave the country, it’s like abandoning him all over again. I couldn’t do that. 

    Miranda Markham  49:02  

    So we decided to have cremated. Once we decided that we were given a date, that we could do the funeral. I didn’t actually know this, but you legally must hold a funeral. For anyone that dies, including–

    Winter  49:18  

    Oh!

    Miranda Markham  49:19  

    –a baby. It was some sort of legal requirement. I mean, I think we would have liked to anyway, but I’m probably paraphrasing that too, simply. I remember it being that we had to conduct some kind of funeral for George, which was fine. 

    Miranda Markham  49:34  

    So I think the sad thing was that nobody could attend. It’s not like we would have had a big congregation of friends and acquaintances, but I think it would have been nice for our families to be there. Unfortunately, given the fact that they’d be flying from all over Canada and the US. None of them can come because this was now July of 2020. 

    Miranda Markham  50:01  

    So we were given the option to do a live streaming thing of the funeral, which we both just felt was really sort of weird and trivialized the whole thing. So instead, what we did was, we arranged the funeral we picked songs and readings that were meaningful. We both wrote quite lengthy comments to say to George. The only other attendee at the funeral was Sarah, our bereavement midwife.

    Winter  50:32  

    Oh really?

    Miranda Markham  50:33  

    She is the only other person on planet Earth who met George. So we felt like that was appropriate. She offered to come, which I don’t know is her usual offer. I like to think that we were special, but maybe she makes that offer to everyone. I don’t know. But it was nice to have her there. So we did our little funeral, we had a 30 minute slot. That was that.

    Winter  51:03  

    Just at the hospital then?

    Miranda Markham  51:05  

    So it’s arranged through the hospital with the City of London cemetery and crematorium. So we didn’t have to pay for it. Which I’m sorry I don’t know it sounds awful to be talking about the practicalities of such a thing. But I know lots of people are concerned about how do you pay for a funeral? It was just part of what was offered, which, I mean, maybe I need to go and reflect on that and be more grateful for it. I think if financially that became a concern, that would have been another layer of challenge on an already very challenging situation. It was all sort of coordinated and paid for through I’m not really sure through who. Through the NHS, the National Health Service, and in collaboration with the City of London.

    Miranda Markham  51:52  

    The cemetery that we went to was beautiful. It was a beautiful, sunny, gorgeous summer day. This I mean, if it sounds awful to say, but the funeral was really nice. It was I think the absolute best thing we could have done for a send off for George. 

    Miranda Markham  52:12  

    My aunt had sent me and members of the family this storybook called wherever you are my love will find you. It’s a children’s book, but I think that it seemed very appropriate. As the final thing on the agenda for the funeral, I read the story to George. Because I always thought about reading stories to him as a child or boy. So it was just a nice way to end it. 

    Miranda Markham  52:41  

    Then afterwards, because it’s I mean, obviously it’s a city run thing. So there’s funerals right before one and after another. It just was sort of a conveyor belt of funerals. Which just sounds awful again, but it wasn’t. There were loads of people outside after who were all gathering for other people who have died, mostly much older people.

    Miranda Markham  53:03  

    When people are cremated, they put these little stands with their name on it in this area where you can come and lay flowers, but nobody told us that. So we didn’t have any flowers. So George’s little stand was just there. It said baby George Robert and nothing. Somebody had put this dried old flower on it from I think somebody else’s area. I just felt so guilty that we hadn’t brought flowers. Then this really lovely family that was next to us, who were sending off their grandmother Jean came and gave us this huge bouquet of white flowers. They told us that we could leave them for George.

    Miranda Markham  53:56  

    I just thought it was so nice, because I just couldn’t leave without his little area being there. So they also told us about Jean and said they were releasing balloons for her and they would release one for George too. So they tied it together with one and said it was for both of them. There was such a nice gesture from complete strangers. So that really stayed with us and felt like a really important way to end that day. 

    Miranda Markham  54:29  

    I think we both felt sort of a sense of closure after that. Because I mean George was born on June the 2nd and his funeral was the 31st of July. So I mean, this is a long time after. It took us a long time to just figure out what we wanted to do and then get it sorted. I did feel guilty about that. But I’m happy that we took time to do it right because I don’t think we have any regrets about his send off. I think it was the best we could do. 

    Winter  55:03  

    Yeah. Did they find anything conclusive about what had happened? Did you guys do an autopsy? Was that something? I’m not? Like I said, I’m not totally sure about the UK health system. So was that something that was offered? Or is it pretty typical? Tell me a little bit about that?

    Miranda Markham  55:22  

    Yeah. So along with everything I think they were very persistent in a kind way about all of our different options. Including having a postmortem or sort of autopsy for George. We didn’t need a lot of convincing. I think both Graham and I were very convinced from the very beginning that if there was a way to get answers and information we wanted it. I don’t know if I ever said this out loud. But I was fairly sure in my head before we even left the hospital that we would try for another baby. I needed to know that if there was anything wrong, that caused George to die, we needed to know about it. 

    Miranda Markham  56:07  

    So many, many weeks later, this is now sometime in mid August, they finally got the results of the postmortem. It was actually the same day that we were allowed to go pick up George’s ashes at the crematorium, which seems like an odd thing to do on the same day. But I remember we drove back to the crematorium, picked up George, and then drove to the hospital to do his post mortem review. I remember Graham and I parking the car. And I said to him, what should we do with George? And he looked at me, he’s like, we can’t leave him in the car. That’s just bad parenting. I was like how can you make jokes? How? So that’s how George ended up in my handbag, at his own postmortem. Honestly, it’s so terrible. But it’s also amusing, in a way. 

    Miranda Markham  57:07  

    So I carried him in my case, it was in a little box. And he sat in my handbag, so we brought him back to the hospital where he was born. He sat in the room with us with the obstetrician and Sarah, the bereavement midwife. We went through his whole post mortem and in great detail, they were very generous with their time. Ultimately, they told us that his cause of death was growth restriction as a result of my placenta, which was very small. So under fifth percentile. 

    Winter  57:40  

    Oh!

    Miranda Markham  57:40  

    So basically, it just failed to support him. I think that it’s odd to say that we feel grateful for that result. But I think it’s because we now know that loss families never get an answer, and it’s inconclusive. So for us to now know that this is the thing that happened, there is no reason to assume that it would ever happen again. But if it did, there are things that we can do to prevent it. 

    Miranda Markham  58:12  

    So what they would do for a subsequent pregnancy is more regular growth scans starting from 20 weeks. What baffles me is that we can literally see a baby growing inside of someone, but we can’t measure the size of the placenta. Apparently you can’t. I don’t know why. But what they can do is make sure that the baby is growing properly, and the right sort of rate of growth. Also I can be induced early. So basically what we know is that if history were to repeat itself, we know that the placenta was good enough until 39 weeks. So basically, I would get to full term, so 37 weeks, and they would induce me early. 

    Miranda Markham  58:54  

    I think for us that was a real comfort, because it sounds like this is not likely to happen again. But even if it did, history will repeat itself. So we and then of course alongside that, I mean, we absolutely grilled them on everything we wanted to know in terms of what if this had happened, would this have made a difference? I was particularly adamant about the missed appointments and had the 36 weeks appointment had happened would this have indicated that there was a problem. The response that I continue to get was that it may or may not have made a difference. It’s impossible to know, that’s a really hard thing to live with. Because I think in my mind, it definitely would have made a difference. 

    Miranda Markham  59:42  

    Even having spoken to third party Obstetricians in the aftermath of George’s death, a lot of them have said that based on what they see and all of my information, everything was done exactly as it should have been. Regardless of what hospital I was at in London. It likely would have been the same outcome. That’s also hard to hear. But it’s also a bit of a reassurance. I think there was a time where I held a lot of anger towards the NHS and to the hospital for letting me down and that they had failed. I think just to set the record straight, there was no negligence. I’m not claiming that they did anything negligent or wrong. I think they had to make changes given an unprecedented situation. It’s impossible to know if those changes contributed to George’s death. Personally, I believe that they did, but we will never know.

    Winter  1:00:36  

    How big was George when he was born?

    Miranda Markham  1:00:39  

    He was small, he was 5.9 pounds, so just under six pounds. It is interesting because I had a private scan at 36 weeks. 

    Winter  1:00:50  

    Oh, okay. 

    Miranda Markham  1:00:50  

    No, sorry, maybe slightly earlier, 34 weeks, because I was worried. With everything happening. I just thought it’d be good to go get a bit of reassurance and make sure he’s growing okay. At that stage everything was fine. He looked really good. They projected his birth weight would be seven and a half pounds. 

    Winter  1:01:07  

    Oh.

    Miranda Markham  1:01:09  

    So, you can clearly see that’s quite a shortfall. Obviously, at some point between 34 weeks and 39 weeks, his growth just plateaued, basically. Because it wasn’t being checked regularly, no one would have noticed. And because at 38 weeks, as far as they were concerned, he still fit within the range of what was normal. I’ll be it perhaps a bit small. It was nothing. It would have not raised any alarm bells for anyone. So, that’s frustrating. Because I think in my mind, had they been measuring me more regularly, they would have seen that graph had suddenly leveled off instead of increasing upwards. But as it was, I was only measured twice the entire pregnancy. 

    Winter  1:01:54  

    Right. Yeah, that would be frustrating. Miranda, thank you so much for sharing George’s birth story. I had one last question that I want to ask you. How did you guys choose the name George?

    Miranda Markham  1:02:06  

    Right. I came up with it I think when we were on our trip in Mauritius. I’d love to have the story that it was this family name and it has all this meaning. But ultimately, we wanted a boy’s name that was easy to pronounce, easy to spell. Could also translate reasonably well to other languages. My sister in law, husband is Spanish, my husband loves speaking French. So George is a name that kind of can work in all those languages. We also like that George is the patron saint of England; he’d be born in England, which is nice. It just sort of felt right. 

    Miranda Markham  1:02:49  

    His middle name Robert does have family significance. Robert is the name of my husband’s grandfather, who was a much beloved patriarch of the family. He lived to be 97 years old, and was an excellent member of the family. ‘m so grateful that I got to spend some time with him before he passed and got to get to know him. So we wanted to honor him and his legacy with the firstborn grandson of the family.

    Winter  1:03:23  

    That is wonderful. Thank you so much. That was very good to get to know George A little bit better.

    Miranda Markham  1:03:30  

    I’m very happy to talk about him. So thank you for asking me all those questions and giving me an opportunity to talk about George.

    Winter  1:03:38  

    Of course.

    Transcribed by https://otter.ai

    Filed Under: birth story, late term stillbirth, podcast episode, stillbirth Tagged With: stillbirth

    Mom Jess: C-Section Birth and Death of Our Baby Addelyn from Fetal Hydrops During COVID-19 Pandemic

    February 10, 2022 by Winter

    Mom Jess recounts the birth story of her daughter Addy, from their planned pregnancy during the pandemic and her pregnancy being perfect until around 30 weeks. Jess tells about how she became more swollen and gained 22 lbs in 2 weeks, and one of her non-stress tests came back abnormal. They discovered that Addy had a severe case of hydrops, where there was a lot of fluid buildup in her body, and Jess also had developed Mirror Syndrome (mimics preeclampsia), where as Addy became sicker, so did Jess.

    Jess and her husband Patrick decide on a Caesarean section, since Jess was getting so sick, so Addy was born on October 8, 2020. Addy was later diagnosed with hypoplastic left heart syndrome, where the left side of her heart stopped developing, as well as underdeveloped lungs, from either being too early or from the hydrops. Addelyn deteriorated within 8 hours of her birth and passed away peacefully, surrounded by her parents.

    Watch here (YouTube):

    Listen here (podcast):


    Time Stamps:

    00:00 Addelyn Renee
    01:49 Introduction of Jess and Patrick
    04:38 Pregnancy
    08:28 Anatomy Scan
    15:37 30-Week Appointment
    24:29 Mirror Syndrome
    30:50 C-section
    41:58 Saying goodbye
    49:58 Spending time with Addy after her passing
    54:04 Discharge and home
    01:03:51 Autopsy

    You might appreciate these other episodes:

    • Watch/listen to Jess’s advice episode of daughter Addelyn: Click here
    • Watch/listen to Tiffany‘s birth episode of daughter Khyana’s: Click here

    Wanna help?

    • DONATE! Consider giving a one-time or recurring donation to help with production and hosting costs: Go here for more information.
    • SUBSCRIBE! Head over here to subscribe to our YouTube channel and our podcasts.
    • SHARE! Spread the word to a loss mom or dad, or those who may be supporting a bereaved parent. Send them a link to this post. Pin one of our graphics on Pinterest.
    Baby Addelyn’s hand

    Full Transcription:

    C-Section Birth and Death of Our Baby Addelyn from Fetal Hydrops During COVID-19 Pandemic

    Jess Hennessey 0:00
    My daughter’s name is Addelyn Renee and we lovingly nicknamed her Addy. So Addy or Addelyn Renee.

    Jess Hennessey 0:03
    I, you know, remember so clearly about her is she actually has my dark hair, had my dark hair. I threw out my pregnancy expected her to come out with really light colored hair like my husband and I did as babies. He still has really light, lighter color hair, and she came out with really, really dark hair.That was not how I pictured her when I was pregnant and it was such a surprise to see that.

    Jess Hennessey 0:19
    Welcome to Still A Part of Us a place where moms and dads share the story of their child who was stillborn, or who died in infancy. I’m winter.

    Lee 0:23
    And I’m Lee, we are grateful you joined us today. Please know that this is a story of loss and has triggers.

    Winter 0:27
    Thanks to our loss parents who are willing to be vulnerable and share their children with us.

    Lee 0:30
    If you’re listening to this podcast, just know that on our YouTube channel, there are pictures and videos that are related to the stories that are being shared.

    Winter 1:02
    Subscribe and share it with a friend that might need it and tell them to subscribe. Why? Because people need to know that even though our babies are no longer with us, they’re still a part of us.

    Winter 1:17
    Thank you again so much for joining us here today on Still A Part of Us. We are excited to talk to Jess who is going to tell us a little bit more about her sweet daughter Addy. This is Still A Part of Us and here we are talking about our babies and infant loss and stillbirth. So please keep yourself protected. Once again. Thank you so much for being here today, Jess. Can you tell us a little bit about yourself? Who are you? What do you do on a day to day basis? Where are you guys? Where are you based out of?

    Jess Hennessey 1:49
    Yes. So I am an HR Manager. I have been working in HR for seven years. At the time when it was, you know, I was pregnant. When she was born I was an HR Manager. And still currently am and during the time of my pregnancy and her birth, I was actually living in the Vancouver Washington area. So right outside of the border of Portland. Then my husband and I recently relocated to Sacramento, California, in January of this year, actually. So she was born in Washington, in the Portland area. Now we are in California, which is where I grew up. So we came back home.

    Winter 2:28
    Gotcha. Okay, that makes sense. Do you guys you referred to we, so is that you and your husband?

    Jess Hennessey 2:35
    Yes. Yes. And now our 19 week old Golden Retriever puppy, Kelso.

    Winter 2:39
    Wonderful, wonderful. And what do you guys like to do? Just like hobbies, things that you like to do on a regular basis and in your free time.

    Jess Hennessey 2:49
    We are big advocates of getting outside as much as possible. So camping, hiking, especially during the last year of COVID were huge activities, anything outdoors,we could get our hands on. We also really enjoy TV shows together. So you know rewatching a lot of Gordon Ramsay shows.

    Winter 3:04
    Oh!

    Jess Hennessey 3:06
    Yeah. So a lot of cooking shows, and fun kind of like survivor Shows like, you know, Wilderness, Naked Afraid. Anything where people are putting themselves in crazy situations. They’re like, I could never do that.

    Winter 3:18
    I know, I couldn’t I always freak out when I was like, Oh, that’s making me anxious. I’d be dead, I think.

    Jess Hennessey 3:26
    Yeah. Then the last few months have just been really all about, you know, we recently moved and we bought our first home and we bought our first dog. So the last few months have been really just centered around, you know, building our new home and getting it to where we want it to be and hanging out with our new puppy and being close to family. Finally, for the first time in my adult life.

    Winter 3:45
    That’s great. I think that’s awesome. I think we’re gonna get a little bit more into your move as well. So I do want to touch on that in a little bit. Just a little bit of context for our listeners. Tell us how long ago was Addy born?

    Jess Hennessey 4:02
    Yeah, so she was born October 8 of 2020. She passed away October 10 of 2020. Today the day we’re filming this is exactly six months from the day that she passed away.

    Winter 4:16
    Yeah. So I think it was kind of fun to like let’s do this is a nice way to honor her. I really really liked that we chose this day for you so.

    Jess Hennessey 4:24
    Me too. I cannot think of a better way to put value, or continue to put value to her life, you know to celebrate such a turbulent time and coming out on the other side of it and being able to look back at the last six months.

    Winter 4:37
    Yeah, exactly. So were you guys planning on getting pregnant then with Addy was that part of the whole grand scheme of things for your family?

    Jess Hennessey 4:48
    Oh man, her pregnancy. It was so planned. It is not even. I mean it was so planned to the month. At the time that you know my husband and I had so much going on, you know. We were approaching 10 years together, we were approaching six years married. I always joked with him, I really wanted to be together with him for 10 years and kind of live our young adult life. Then I really wanted to get a master’s degree before we had children and started a family.

    Jess Hennessey 5:14
    So, I got pregnant with her, we found out April 1, 2020. We had been very meticulously planning getting pregnant. Doing the whole regimen, six months prior to pregnancy and getting our bodies in good shape and good health. I actually graduated with my Master’s in August of 2020. I was almost six months pregnant. So we had planned it to be like, Oh, yes, I’ll you know, get my, finish my degree while I’m pregnant. Let’s do it, and then we’ll be in tandem with what our plans were. So yeah, she was very much, we set a month. And we said, This is when it’s happening, and we felt very lucky that it did. It happened almost immediately for us.

    Winter 5:54
    That is awesome. That is impressive, Jess, it sounds like you guys are very like we’ve got our stuff together.

    Jess Hennessey 6:01
    I would absolutely say I am very much a planner. My husband is more let’s go with the flow. Let’s see what life throws at us which in this case, he was obviously very thankful that like you planned this really well. I’m like, thank you.

    Winter 6:15
    Yes, I did plan that very well, didn’t I?

    Jess Hennessey 6:19
    Yeah, she was very much planned and very much wanted.

    Jess Hennessey 6:22
    Oh, that is wonderful. So how did your pregnancy go? Was it fairly easy? I mean, you were six– you graduated in August. I’m like, can you– I’m just thinking I’m like, oh, if I was pregnant while I was going to school, that would have been rough. So how was your pregnancy?

    Jess Hennessey 6:40
    You know, I knew what I was getting into, towards the tail end of school. And of course, we found out we were pregnant, just as stay at home shelters were put into place. So she was actually conceived prior to the kind of shelter in place happening. We didn’t really know how big COVID was gonna get. So in my mind, I mean, there were so many other obstacles that happened in my pregnancy, but I felt very thankful I was healthy. I had a very easygoing pregnancy. I think I experienced some, you know, first trimester symptoms, a little bit of nausea, exhaustion, and headaches, but nothing that didn’t stop me from working full time. I worked full time, even though it was in remote capacity because of COVID. I went to school full time, and that all became online. I actually felt like I was so thankful, like, wow. COVID and what happened what’s still happening is awful. But I got to be pregnant at home. Basically, I’m like, I couldn’t have planned this better. And this wasn’t even my plan.

    Winter 7:34
    Yeah, that’s a little bit of a silver lining, isn’t it? I just–

    Jess Hennessey 7:38
    Yeah!

    Winter 7:39
    It’s kind of as awful as the pandemic has been. There’s definitely some silver lining to that. So that’s good. I’m glad to hear that your pregnancy wasn’t too awful.

    Jess Hennessey 7:49
    No! You know, I was active. I went on walks almost every day. And yeah, I had no hiccups in my pregnancy whatsoever.

    Winter 7:58
    That’s awesome. So when you guys hit, like, how were your doctor’s appointments? Were you looking good? Was Addy looking good?

    Jess Hennessey 8:06
    Everything was normal. My doctors– during COVID, I went to not everything alone, they let my husband and for a lot of big milestone appointments. But–

    Winter 8:19
    That’s good, because I know that there were a lot of people that did this alone. And that is crummy. So I’m glad that he was there for some of those appointments. Great.

    Jess Hennessey 8:28
    Yes, he got to be there for the anatomy scan, we actually had two anatomy scans. Just because of some imaging that they could not see. Then we were able to see, but outside of that every appointment was very normal. I was growing and gaining weight appropriately. She was growing and gaining what she needed to do. And I felt good. I loved being pregnant. Everyone just thought I was just beaming. I just loved it. It was one of the best times in my life.

    Winter 8:56
    Oh, that’s so good to hear. You’re one of those pregnancy unicorns. Did you know that? That’s what it sounds like.

    Jess Hennessey 9:04
    It was just it was– I mean, it was just incredible. I couldn’t have imagined when I had put this plan in forth for me and my husband and what our life would look like. I just, I couldn’t have imagined how wonderful it truly would be right? You can’t plan how incredible it’s going to feel to have a baby kick inside of you, or to be so empowered to finish.

    Jess Hennessey 9:26
    I remember giving my final speech for my master’s program in front of a large audience on zoom, which was not how it’s supposed to be. But she was kicking inside me as I was giving this final you know, I mean, those are just things. It was incredible. And I loved every minute of it.

    Winter 9:40
    Oh, that’s so great. That’s so great. So you guys did go and do the anatomy scan at 20 weeks isn’t? Well, yeah, at 20 weeks, probably around there. Did you guys plan on finding out if it was a girl or a boy?

    Jess Hennessey 9:54
    Yes, we did. We actually found out with the first genetic testing blood work. She was 10 weeks old at that point.

    Jess Hennessey 10:02
    Oh okay,!

    Jess Hennessey 10:03
    We did all the genetic testing the first trimester. We actually held the results until the Fourth of July weekend because we wanted to be surprised with my whole family. She was the first grandbaby across the whole board.

    Jess Hennessey 10:16
    Are you serious? Oh.

    Jess Hennessey 10:18
    Yeah. So my in-laws, and my dad, my mom has actually passed away. So my dad like she was the first grandbaby in the whole family. We wanted to be surprised together that she was a girl. I genuinely thought she was a boy. So when I found out at 17 weeks that it was a girl, I was shocked. I was like, there is no way. I just always pictured her being a boy. So yeah, we had the genetic testing done for blood work. Then we were able to find out a little bit earlier than the anatomy scan, but we actually had two anatomy scans, one at 18 weeks and one at 22 weeks.

    Winter 10:52
    Okay. And those looked good. And I was gonna ask, did the genetic test, how did that look?

    Jess Hennessey 10:59
    Fine, everything was great. They didn’t see any chromosomal issues. Everything looked good. Same with the anatomy scans. We went for my first one at 18 weeks. They were able to get good imaging, except for they wanted a little bit more of her brain and a little bit of her heart. She just would not position correctly. It was not a big deal. They were like she’s really stubborn. So we’re just gonna come back in a couple weeks, and we’ll get those images.

    Jess Hennessey 11:27
    So we felt lucky, because we’re like, great, we get to see her twice, then almost a month later, we got to have basically a repeat. An hour with our baby seeing her. They got all the scans that they needed of her brain and her heart. There was no concern after that. That was at 22 weeks.

    Winter 11:45
    Okay. That’s great. It’s always kind of reassuring to have those kinds of time points. But I love the fact that you guys were able to get to see her twice, in a sense, right? I mean, you get to see her on the ultrasound, which is always I think it’s a special treat, actually.

    Winter 12:01
    Okay, so you’re, you’re going along, and you have defended your masters. I don’t know if that’s defended your masters, but you did your final presentation for your masters, and everything’s going really well. Can you tell me a little bit more of what happened then?

    Jess Hennessey 12:16
    Yeah, absolutely. So in terms of timeline, so I finished up my master’s degree in August, I actually came back to California for my baby shower. We had a really small get together. But this is where my family is from. We were able to make it happen even during COVID. It was everyone again, she was the first baby in the family. So everyone just really wanted to celebrate her.

    Jess Hennessey 12:38
    So at 28 weeks, I actually came home at the time we were building our house. So we had purchased a house in early June after we found out we got pregnant. It was a new build, so I actually was able to come into the house with my mother in law, my dad, and my sister. We looked at the house, it was now about halfway being built. I’m you know, being pregnant, and we got pictures of me in the front door that was incomplete. It was so fun.

    Jess Hennessey 13:04
    I had my baby shower in late September. Then I got home and at that point, so I would say very late September to early October, I definitely started feeling pretty significant third trimester symptoms. I became really swollen, a lot of pelvic pressure, a lot of back pain. At this point, I’d had no kind of concerns in my pregnancy.

    Jess Hennessey 13:31
    She wasn’t moving as much as normal. Which again, I know my doctor, she explained to me that hey, you know, things are gonna move a little bit differently in the third trimester. They’re a lot bigger, they’re not gonna have as much room. I’m 5’1. She started like, you don’t have a lot of capacity to begin with. So it wasn’t in my mind a big concern, but a little bit of decreased fetal movement, just not as you know. jabby kicking and still very active after eating so she would still move around with sugar and things like that.

    Jess Hennessey 13:56
    But yeah, I just started just getting really swollen and tired even more. I knew that was in my mind, at least, you know, that’s the third trimester. Right? Everyone says the third trimester, you get really tough, right? You’re past that glowing second trimester, and your body’s preparing for the birth. So I just attributed all of those things to I’m going into my third trimester.

    Jess Hennessey 14:19
    I remember trying to stretch at night and every night my thighs were more and more swollen. I couldn’t stretch as far as I remember telling my husband, you know, getting really uncomfortable. So I had seen my obgyn at 28 weeks right after my baby shower.

    Winter 14:37
    In person? Was it in person?

    Jess Hennessey 14:38
    In person.

    Winter 14:39
    Okay.

    Jess Hennessey 14:39
    Yup in person. I addressed the concerns of being a little bit more swollen. She actually had said that my belly was measuring a little bit bigger at that point, but nothing that gave her concern. I mean, even at my baby shower is still one of the things that’s difficult for me to hear. But it’s true is you know, some of my family and friends and they said this out of complete love. They’re like, wow, you’re really, really big for being 28 weeks. I had been so normal sized. And I mean, I’m like, Yeah. I mean, maybe she’s just really growing and she’s got long legs that we know of.

    Jess Hennessey 15:10
    So I definitely was getting bigger very quickly. And it was not a normal speed, essentially. And I was getting uncomfortable. So my obgyn just said, Look, at this point, I don’t have any concerns. You’re still walking, you know, we’re not really seeing any symptoms of potential concern for you at this point, or her. So we’ll just keep going through the program. And if things change, let us know. At that point, I started seeing my obgyn, it was on a two week schedule.

    Jess Hennessey 15:37
    So I saw her again, for a normal, just a normal appointment. That morning of my appointment, it was just a normal appointment. I remember feeling something was wrong, and I couldn’t pinpoint it. I did not think it was what had, I didn’t think it was as extreme as it was. We found out what’s going on. I just figured something was a little off.

    Jess Hennessey 16:01
    The night before I actually she was moving, but not as much. Actually my husband and I took out our doppler and we listened to her heart and everything sounded fine. She was moving just not as much I couldn’t pinpoint it.

    Jess Hennessey 16:13
    So I went into my obgyn that morning, the morning she was born, which was October 8, for a normal appointment, it was my 30, about 30 week checkup. I was 30 weeks and three days at that point. I just was feeling uncomfortable. I got on the scale, and I gained 22 pounds in two weeks. I knew something was very, very wrong.

    Jess Hennessey 16:33
    I was not one of those, you know, for me, I did not weigh myself frequently, when I was pregnant. I really wanted to let my body do its job. My obgyn agreed to that, because I was not, you know, I wasn’t gaining weight at a rapid–, you know, it was very normal, essentially. So she had no concerns with me just getting weighed at my appointments, we didn’t see a concern with that. So I knew something was very wrong at that point.

    Jess Hennessey 16:58
    I knew I’d been feeling more uncomfortable and clothes weren’t fitting like normal. Again, I just thought maybe the third trimester. But she was okay, she was moving, her heartbeat was beating. So I got back into the exam room and I just at that point, lost it and just broke down. You know, my obgyn came in and said, You know, that’s a lot of weight to gain in a short period of time, it’s obviously fluid. So we need to have a closer look at the baby and you.

    Jess Hennessey 17:23
    So we got her on a stress test. I am so grateful I actually recorded that thinking, I’m going to go home tonight and be able to share this video with my family. I did not know what was about to happen. I just didn’t know. I got a video of me and my big belly and the stress test on and I’m you know listening to her heartbeat. I remember thinking in that moment, like she’s okay, that’s what mattered, right? She’s okay, she’s here heart’s beating, she’s wiggling. But I still have that sense that something was wrong.

    Jess Hennessey 17:53
    So after the stress test, my obgyn looked at the results. And you know, I could see her face looking at that piece of paper, and I knew I could just sense something was a little bit more serious than we thought. She said, “Well we’re seeing some normal rhythm, but we’re seeing quite a few not normal rhythms. I listen back to the video, I hear it now. There were drops in her heartbeat.

    Winter 18:17
    Oh.

    Jess Hennessey 18:18
    Yeah. So we decided that it was time to get an ultrasound. So they decided to admit me into the OBGYN floor, or the birth center floor. Which was on the fifth level of my hospital. We had actually never been up there. It was like this kind of coveted you only go up there when you’re in labor, active labor. It was a brand new floor. I asked my obgyn if I should call my husband. She knew my husband, Patrick. She’s like, yes, you should call Patrick. He was at work. And again, it had just been a normal appointment. I was used to doing that.

    Jess Hennessey 18:48
    So I called Patrick and I said, you need to get over here. And I don’t know how long we’re going to be. So we met in the lobby, and we went up to the fifth floor together. I called my boss and I had some scheduled interviews that day. I just said, I’m so sorry, you need to take my calendar and I just don’t know what today is going to look like. But I should be home tonight. I remember just thinking in my head telling my family and my employer, I’m going to be home tonight. We’ll talk about it then we’ll figure out what I missed. I’m so sorry. You know, putting on the career woman part of me.

    Jess Hennessey 19:18
    We headed to the fifth floor and got admitted. They immediately started me on some IV’s which I’ve never had it before. It took like six or seven pokes in different spots on my hands. I just remember thinking like, Oh my gosh, I mean, it’s fine. This is the worst of today, which absolutely was not the worst day of being poked at least. But I finally got a couple IV’s in and they started me on fluids. Then the ultrasound tech came in and she spent probably I would say about 30 minutes on ultrasound and it was very quiet. Which had not been the previous experiences during my anatomy scan. She was just very quiet and could go after–

    Winter 19:59
    Could you see the ultrasound while she was doing it?

    Jess Hennessey 20:02
    You know what if I, my husband remembers it perfectly. I actually think at this point, I was starting to block out some of this, I knew something was wrong. I was getting that feeling. I remember looking at my husband more than the computer screen. I just, I don’t know, I didn’t know what I was supposed to be looking for. But I knew something was wrong.

    Jess Hennessey 20:26
    I guess the last ultrasound I’d had, she was 22 weeks and she was perfect. Right? That was the last time I saw her.

    Winter 20:31
    Right.

    Jess Hennessey 20:31
    It was the joyous moment. I just didn’t want to take away from that. So I remember, just almost trying to not look at the screen. It was fully visible if we wanted to look at it. I didn’t know what we were looking at. Then I remember at the end of the ultrasound, the tech said, Hey, you know, I want to show you guys something, and she was putting on you could tell, she was trying her very best to put on a smile for us. And she said, I want to show you her spine and her legs and her arms. She just said, I just really want you to look at this. I just and at the time, I didn’t know. And we’re like Okay, thanks.

    Jess Hennessey 21:07
    I didn’t realize she was trying to show us probably the last time we’d see her on the screen, at least in this form. She was trying to make that part of it at least still somewhat positive, which I appreciate so much. I’m so grateful she did that because then I looked and there was my Addy. She was perfect, right.

    Jess Hennessey 21:27
    I still, you know, couldn’t tell what was going on. I just thought, you know, she was kind of moving. I could feel her with the ultrasound, she didn’t really like being probed. She would move around with it. And I’m like, Okay, and so then, at that point, everyone kind of left the room and my husband actually called my sister, who is a nurse. She is not an OB, she doesn’t work with an OBGYN directly. She knows about the time that most nurses have during nursing school for, you know, birthing and care of infants. My husband called her and just said, Hey, like, this is what’s going on. I remember my sister saying if they give her magnesium, something is seriously wrong. Just you need to call me immediately because at that point, they had just been giving me fluids. So if they give her magnesium, something is wrong.

    Jess Hennessey 22:20
    So I kid you not two minutes later, in comes a nurse with magnesium shot. I said what’s going on, and they’re like, your doctor is gonna come in, and they’re gonna let you know. I’m like, okay, and I didn’t realize it, but magnesium at the time, but magnesium is to help the baby’s brain develop more quickly. They gave me a steroid shot as well. That’s supposed to help with their lungs for premature birth. So that’s why my sister had said, they’re giving her magnesium. I don’t remember if she had said steroids, but she just said then something is gonna happen. Something’s wrong.

    Jess Hennessey 22:59
    So my obgyn about 10 minutes later came in and she sat on my bed and she took my hand and she said, Addy has something called hydrops. I said, What is that? And she said, there’s quite a bit of fluid buildup inside of her. It’s pretty significant. It’s around her vital organs, including her lungs, her heart. It’s around her brain. She actually pulled up the ultrasound and showed us kind of the rim of her head specifically, I remember that. She said there’s about a two centimeter gap basically, between where her skin line and her skull. She said, That’s fluid. That’s not supposed to be there.

    Jess Hennessey 23:44
    I just remember being like, oh, and then she said the other thing. So Addy has hydrops. She’s, it’s very severe. We need to get her out. And I just said what I said she’s 30 weeks. I just remember at this point, almost like going into that, like fight or flight. Like what? My obgyn had two premature, beautiful baby boys. That’s partly why we connected and they were premature. I mean, she had twins and I really liked that about her. So that’s why I chose her as my ob. I just thought you’ve got this experience. You’re a mom of two boys that had twins. She said, you know, my boys were born at 30 weeks. She kept grabbing my hand and she started to cry, which I know as a doctor.

    Jess Hennessey 24:29
    She knew what was coming and she knew what I mean she must have known at that point. But of course, my hospital was a small local hospital not equipped to take care of and NICU baby in this capacity. So at that point, she said the other thing that’s going on is that you have something called Mirror Syndrome, which happens to about 50% of cases with babies with hydrops. It is when the mom is essentially getting sicker the sicker the baby gets.

    Jess Hennessey 25:00
    She said at this point, have you felt any type of tightening in your belly over the last week? And I said, Well, yeah, I mean, but I thought that was Braxton Hicks. Right? I’m in my third trimester. That’s normal, right? And she said, “No, I think your body’s been in labor for about a week. It’s in complete distress right now. You’re dying, if we don’t get her out, mirror syndrome is very serious. It’s basically mimicking preeclampsia.” And even though I didn’t have some of the other preeclampsia symptoms, like headache, and you know, my blood pressure at this point was okay, I was getting incredibly swollen. She said, “We need to get her out.” They said, “We can’t perform care for her here.” We’re going to send you to basically OHSU, which is the major hospital in Portland. They have a fantastic NICU unit.

    Jess Hennessey 25:51
    We said, okay, and she’s like, the ambulance is going to be here in five minutes to come get you and you have to go. I’m like, Patrick can’t drive me and she’s like, no, you’re you’re in critical condition as well. I’m like, Oh, okay. I remember at that moment, you know, looking at Patrick, and I said, How long are we going to be there? I asked my doctor, and she’s like, I don’t know. She didn’t have a lot of answers. I asked if the baby, for sure was coming tonight. She’s like, I don’t know, I asked if it would be a C section. She said, I don’t know. So I looked at my husband and said, I just remember blurting off, like, we’re gonna need our pillows, and I need you to feed the cat. I need you to pack me a couple of sweatpants. And you know, we didn’t have our hospital bags together and like, we’re 30 weeks pregnant, we didn’t have our plan in place at this point for being such a planner.

    Winter 26:38
    So they were just going to transfer you there? Then hand you over to I’m assuming maternal fetal medicine, or some the basically the doctors, they’re the team of doctors at OHSU?

    Jess Hennessey 26:50
    Yes, exactly. They said, at that point, they’re going to reassess me and Addy, and then they’ll be able to put a plan of care for me together based on what they also come up with, and some of the resources that they had there.

    Winter 27:04
    Yeah, yeah. Okay.

    Jess Hennessey 27:08
    So after that, I had to pee, of course, because when you know you pee all the time when you’re pregnant. So I went finally, for the first time in this whole event. I finally had a minute to myself and my husband came into the bathroom, and he was crying. I said, What’s going on? I said, we’re going to be okay. I said, you know, this is not the plan. But you know, we’re going to get her out. It sounds like there’s gonna be a plan in place, and we’re going to care for her and we’re going to the right place. And he said, I googled hydrops, Jess and it’s not good. He said, we’re going to need a miracle.

    Jess Hennessey 27:40
    I think at that moment, I knew, I think I knew that it switched in my mind from you know, she’s really sick. And I’m really sick. But it’s, you know, we live in 2020. There’s a lot of resources available to care for sick babies. I realized that this was a lot bigger than just that.

    Jess Hennessey 28:03
    Then we got transferred to OHSU, where they got me set up. My poor husband had to deal with multiple cars and his work and trying to manage getting the house together. He did such a great job. And I’m over there, getting examined some more so they have their own team. So we had about a team of six people pretty immediately taking care of me and Addy. So during our ultrasounds, they had the echo cardiologist for her to take a look at her heart primarily and some of her other organs had two doctors at that point. It all happened so quickly.

    Jess Hennessey 28:42
    They had two Fetal Medicine specialists come in after everything and say, you know, at this point, I think you really have three options and they said it doesn’t look good as of right now. So we need to move quickly. Option A is we can continue monitoring you and her things are moving very quickly and pretty significantly and at that point, they were actually able to measure that fluid buildup was increasing even inside me from the time I left my normal local hospital. to OHSU you could already tell that more fluid is building up. So they’re like this isn’t getting, it’s not getting any better.

    Jess Hennessey 29:24
    But we can continue to monitor and they also recommended at that point we would go in with my gosh, what are the needles called? It’s blanking– With a–

    Winter 29:35
    Epidural?

    Jess Hennessey 29:37
    Pericardiocentesis.

    Jess Hennessey 29:40
    I see what you’re saying.

    Jess Hennessey 29:43
    Yeah, to basically start draining her fluid and some of the fluid surrounding her in my stomach. And around the placenta, to try to provide some relief. They said, you know, she’s continuing to have buildup of fluid so, that would be a short term fix. They also said we could induce you. I was at that point just in active labor, but distressed labor. So even though my body was in distress, there was no movement in terms of dilation, or effacement. So she, it would be, you know, let’s reduce her, and then we could get her out. But it could be anywhere from 24 to 48 hours. They said your health is incredibly declining very quickly. So they said, those are two options, but we don’t recommend them.

    Jess Hennessey 30:28
    And I said, I understand why they said she’s going to pass away probably anyway, tonight, if we don’t get her out. So they said, The other option would be an emergency c-section. They said, that’s what we would recommend, we could get you ready for surgery and get her out. Then you can begin your recovery, and we can get you stabilized. Then we can assess her on the outside, because there were still limitations with, you know, the scans. They, at this point, had suspected potentially something could have been wrong with some of her other organs .

    Jess Hennessey 31:02
    So her heart, they couldn’t get a full visual. But while she, while we got some scans, you know, there were some concerns with her heart growth and prolonged development. They said at least we could assess her on the outside. It was without a question that that’s what we needed to do. And I said, get me ready for surgery.

    Jess Hennessey 31:19
    When I thought about getting pregnant, I absolutely knew that C-sections are a life saving surgery, and in my mind, I’m like, I just will never have that. Like it just never crossed my mind, even though it was always possible. I’ve never been in any type of major surgery before. And so I’m like, we’re doing this.

    Jess Hennessey 31:43
    My husband is updating our family. I didn’t even know where my cell phone was, at this point. I hadn’t looked at anything, which sounds so silly, like in the, in the moment, I just remember feeling so discombobulated and not oriented. At this point, I hadn’t eaten anything in the morning, since my first cup of coffee that morning, because my OBGYN kind of knew what was coming. She’s like, no more food and more liquids. I mean, she probably anticipated the C-section, so I was hungry. So all of those things. And I just didn’t feel ready to meet my daughter. I was like this is happening very quickly. It happened in a matter of six hours. She was born within eight hours after my appointment.

    Jess Hennessey 32:25
    So they prepped me for surgery. I went back and I mean, I think a C-section if it wasn’t something that we were ready for mentally it was something Patrick and I we hadn’t discussed or what that looked like, I don’t even think he understood really what a C section was. I mean, we were still finishing our birth classes. Right. So yeah,

    Winter 32:47
    Yeah.

    Jess Hennessey 32:49
    So he didn’t know and he remembers the sounds very vividly. But we got her out. I remember them holding her up in front of me and looking at her for the first time. She was perfect, but she was so sick. Her ears were so swollen. A little face. I mean, she looked like a newborn baby. She did not look like she was 30 weeks. She had 10 perfect toes and 10 perfect fingers. They told me she’s a big kid. And we all kind of joke in my pregnancy. She had longer legs, but she looked like a full size baby because of all the fluid right?

    Winter 33:39
    Yeah.

    Jess Hennessey 33:41
    They immediately took her way. I remember Patrick asking me, what do you want me to do? I’m like, go with her. Like, go and he said okay, and he followed them into the NICU when they started. I know she was breathing, but not very well. So they were doing some resuscitation with her.

    Jess Hennessey 34:03
    Then they were working on me. I remember the doctor, the surgeon, she was so wonderful. After everything was done and I was of course very loopy, disoriented and in shock. I was shaking and she put the curtain down and she’s like, I want you to know, I did a standard bikini cut basically. I said okay, she’s like, it means that you’re likely going to have healthy pregnancies and potential vbacs in the future. I just remember her saying that because this whole team of doctors they all knew what was going to happen. They all knew and they just were all trying to give me comfort in their own way. I remember being so appreciative.

    Jess Hennessey 34:38
    So yeah she was in the NICU and they got me. They got me into the postop room and Patrick was able to come visit while I was still waking up from surgery and kind of getting myself oriented. He would be bouncing back and forth between the NICU room and coming to see me. I mean the next 20-26 hours. It’s something yeah. It was really difficult. It was having a lot of people coming in and out to check on me at that point. Thankfully, after I gave birth, I became more stabilized. Because I think in this whole scheme of things, you know, Addy was very sick. We knew, I mean, I think at this point, there’s a pretty well rounded decision that she needed to get out, and she was probably going to pass away, but we’re at least going to give her a fighting chance.

    Jess Hennessey 35:39
    Based on statistics, and the doctors, you know, telling me it was less than a 5% chance of how severe her hydro drops were. Then if there were other concerns on top of that, which there was that we found out, she was born and assessing her. I mean, it was just very, very slim. Even if it was any type of chance to get through these hurdles, her quality of life would be very, very poor. She would likely never, ever be able to walk. We didn’t know her brain functionality. I know she knew who I was.

    Jess Hennessey 36:15
    I got to meet her about two hours after she was born. Officially meet her. She was in one of those little NICU beds with the heating lamps and they took it off for me to see her. I remember putting my hand right next to her fingers. And at this point, she was not sedated. So they resuscitated her but she was not sedated. So I was able to still, you know, she was still wiggling a little bit. I remember putting my finger right by her hand and saying, Hi, Addy. She just squeezed it. It was the most magical moment. She knew exactly who I was. You know, they spend how many months in your belly listening to you. As an HR manager, I did. I cannot even tell you how many phone interviews and conversations I would have and over zoom, and she was right there for it all. She was my little buddy in quarantine. Being alone and pregnant for the first time. I always had her. So yeah that was really the last time I saw her up until she passed away.

    Jess Hennessey 36:16
    There were some steps in place, which I don’t— I have no ill will towards the hospital. They were incredible. I still am very close with some of the nurses who took care of me and were there for me. But I was trying to get through having a C-Section A major surgery. They wanted me to walk and they needed me to go to the bathroom and things like that. As soon as I could hit some of these milestones, I could go see her again. My husband was able to go see her as often as he wanted. So he’d often bounce back and forth.

    Jess Hennessey 37:50
    Then they moved us from you know, we were in the mother’s quarters. When we first got kind of wheeled into our room for the night. All I heard was the crying babies and I said I can’t be here. They were able to move me. So I got this kind of private quarters in the hospital, which still is very quiet. That night, it was just a lot of monitoring me because I was trying to get stabilized and Patrick going back and forth between visiting me and Addy. She was breathing at that point. They don’t like to put a couple chest tubes in. We didn’t know the extent to what else was going on. Besides they were trying to drain fluid at this point.

    Jess Hennessey 38:29
    Then the next day, which was the 9th. The next morning, I woke up to my sister who flew in, she lives in California, but she actually was on vacation in Boston at this point. So that was another whole— Yeah. Because again, we had planned everything, you know, up until we thought her due date, really. So she had planned this trip. I woke up to my sister in the hospital room. I just remember saying how are you here? We’re in COVID.

    Winter 38:59
    How did they get you in?

    Jess Hennessey 39:02
    My sister and I were very close. She’s a year and a half younger than I am. Which does not matter. But she’s a little bit younger than me. Our mom passed away three years ago, and we went through that together.

    Winter 39:02
    Yeah.

    Jess Hennessey 39:14
    I actually live a mile away from her now. So we purposely bought our home and—

    Winter 39:18
    Oh! That’s great.

    Jess Hennessey 39:20
    Yeah, we live a mile away from each other because we always imagined raising our children together and being so close. I woke up to my sister and she was able to tell me that they made a hospital exception to let her in, which is incredible. She actually had just gotten back from the NICU. She got to be with Addy. They could only allow one person at a time, but she said I’ve seen Patrick and I saw Addy. She’s beautiful. She’s perfect.

    Jess Hennessey 39:49
    The next part of that day was spent with a lot of specialists coming into our room. You know, hey, I’m so and so I am at Addy’s cardiologist or different specialties, and we found out that she was very sick. Her heart was very sick as well with something called hypo plastic left heart syndrome. Essentially, her left heart chamber had stopped developing, and it wasn’t detected at 22 weeks, which is incredible because it is usually something that’s caught usually between 13 to 17 weeks is what the doctor explained. So normally, it’s that in itself as a terminating illness, you have to have heart transplants if the baby’s healthy enough, and she obviously was very sick with hydrops. Even though they were how I kept trying to understand, as I said, she’s got these and her lungs were underdeveloped. So I said, all these different things were happening. And I said, but they’re different things. So it’s not like one caused the other it’s not good causation. I just kept trying to ask those questions and understand, and they said, correct. So she has had a heart condition, likely since conception that was undetected, her lungs then stopped really forming probably in the last, three to five weeks, because then she developed hydrops. They’re all kind of interrelated to just that she’s sick, but it’s not like one caused the other.

    Jess Hennessey 41:12
    That was really hard for me. I remember just trying to understand because I was so—everything was so confusing. I was so lost, and you know, eight hours prior, and now the next day. I mean, she was healthy in my belly, and now it’s not healthy anymore. She’s not well, and so yeah.

    Jess Hennessey 41:28
    We have a lot of specialists coming in telling us different things. Essentially, you know, we were at this point where she was making some very small improvements, and then would take 10 steps back. And essentially, they just said, Look, you know, we will continue giving her and you the best care possible until it’s not. It’s not appropriate anymore. I said, Okay, I said, my biggest thing is, she can’t suffer. I said, I’m her mom, like, she can’t suffer. They agreed. So I said, If I asked you how she is, be honest with me, and this was her doctor, he’s amazing. And he said, I promise you, I will.

    Jess Hennessey 42:09
    So it was nine o’clock the night post surgery. So it was the ninth of October. At this point, I can see my cell phone, my sister’s there and my husband’s there. They’re updating the family, which is all that mattered. I didn’t realize all of my in-laws had driven into the hospital. They were all five hours away from us. They were all there, but they could not physically get in the hospital.

    Winter 42:30
    Right.

    Jess Hennessey 42:30
    Because of COVID.

    Winter 42:31
    Yeah.

    Jess Hennessey 42:31
    So they’re literally on the outskirts of the hospital hanging out in parking lots and bringing my husband and my sister food. Jenny, my sister, Jen. Jen, and Jess, my mom, and dad were very creative. She would just kind of go run and eat and go check on me and go check on Addy. It kind of became this circle thing.

    Jess Hennessey 42:48
    I of course could not go see Addy until I met those milestones. When I did, it was amazing. It was about nine o’clock at night. I was able to go see her. They wheeled me down. She at this point was sedated. So she wasn’t moving. She still was all toasty in that heat thing. I remember saying I need to stand up and they’re like, you just had surgery I’m like I don’t care. I’m like, I want to get as close as I can to my daughter because I don’t know how much time I have left. So I stood up and I was able to talk to her. I actually had a little cuddle lovey that they gave me which I thought was very sweet that they said just you know, cuddle with this. We’re going to give it to her so that she has your smell. We did that. So she had my cuddle little lovey.

    Jess Hennessey 43:32
    At that point when it was time to say good night, I was really tired. I needed some more medicine. I was in a lot of pain. So they got me back up to the room. I got some medicine, my sister Patrick and I went to bed. Then at 12:26 they woke us up. The nurses came into my room and said, it’s not good, something’s not going, it’s not good. I’m not, it’s not well, it’s not good. We need to get down to the NICU right away.

    Jess Hennessey 43:57
    I just remember postsurgery flying out of my bed and adrenaline is rushing in. They put me in a wheelchair, they wheeled me down right to the NICU. My sister had to stay outside, but they let Patrick in. Because they only allowed one person and of course in this instance her doctor, who I am so grateful for. I looked at him in the eyes and I just knew. He said I could put another chest tube in. Another chest tube and at this point it was five chest tubes. And I said no. No. My husband and I looked at each other. I just remember saying I’m not ready. I’m not ready to say goodbye

    Jess Hennessey 44:41
    But as a parent, and I waited— Sorry. Sorry Winter. Okay.

    Jess Hennessey 44:51
    I’m a parent and being a first time mom. She was my first baby. I couldn’t ever let her suffer. I knew she was suffering. This was not giving her the life she deserved or the quality of life that she deserved. So we said just stop. And they did. They took all her chest tubes out, and they were able to hand her first to me. And it was the first time I held her. She was so perfect. The nurse had told me she weighed five pounds one ounces. So I got to hold her. Then they handed her to my husband. Actually, that is the first baby he’s ever held, which is very, very special. So she will always be the first baby he’s ever held.

    Jess Hennessey 45:37
    Then the hospital again, we’re just incredible. They let my sister into the room. My sister got to hold Addy while she was still alive. So the three of us got to be with her. It was incredibly peaceful. If you can imagine being in turbulence, and having that moment with her was just, I mean, it was my goodbye. But we got to hold her. And she passed away. Somewhere in between me and Patrick. Patrick and I, she said she passed away. But she was pronounced deceased. She was pronounced dead in my arms. We got to meet her. We got to hold her and she passed away in our arms. Yeah. So that was her birth. She’s perfect.

    Winter 46:33
    Yeah.

    Jess Hennessey 46:34
    She has, you know, it’s amazing how life can change so quickly. Eight hours is, you know, from the time of her diagnosis to the time she was born. And of course, all of the aftermath following, but in those few moments with her. Some people don’t get that opportunity and I did. And so I’m very lucky. She was perfect.

    Winter 47:04
    Jess, can you tell me how you guys chose her name because it’s so beautiful?

    Jess Hennessey 47:08
    Oh, thank you. Absolutely. So really, her first name is a really fun story actually. So we—

    Winter 47:15
    Oh is it?

    Jess Hennessey 47:15
    Yes. So I told you, we thought she was a boy. So we had all of these boy names lined up. We’ve been thinking of boy names. Really since you know we first met. We never— Yeah, my husband has brothers. There’s just a lot of boys in the family. So we just kind of assumed we’d have a boy. So there’s an app called Kinder and it is a name app. Similar to Tinder.

    Winter 47:40
    Yeah?

    Jess Hennessey 47:41
    Where you swipe left, it’s exactly what it is. Swipe left for a name that you like, swipe right for a name you don’t. You match with your partner’s phone. So if it’s a name that you both matched on, it’ll Yeah— So we and I don’t remember, I must have heard that from one of the mom apps or the mom podcast, I was listening to you. I’m like, this would be fun. So we were actually on our living room couch one night. This was before we found out she was a girl and the only name that we matched on that was for a girl was Addelyn. So yeah, the only name matched on so we’re like, great. So if it’s a girl, it will be Addelyn and it was so fun how we came up with that. Now her middle name Renee is actually my mother in law’s middle name. So it is a name a namesake for the family.

    Winter 48:27
    Right.

    Jess Hennessey 48:28
    My mother in law is one of the most important people in my life. I could not think of anybody more deserving to have a name and baby named after her. So that’s where Addelyn Renee came in. So yeah, Addelyn was really fun and Addy. We just thought that was so cute. You know, I can picture her so perfectly, a little Addy. You know her blonde pigtails is how I pictured them running around and crazy.

    Jess Hennessey 48:52
    Yeah cause she would be the only girl really and the first grandbaby. So that was really exciting for everybody. Just Oh, it’s a girl. And, you know, she’s the first and yeah, she would have been. She would have been a little princess. I just imagined her like that. Getting anything she wanted. My husband always said, oh, we’re in trouble. Because you know, she’s gonna get whatever she wants. And so yeah, that’s how we came up with her name. And I love her name.

    Winter 49:20
    I love it. It’s so cute. I just love the story behind it. That’s so great.

    Jess Hennessey 49:27
    So I read this app. I’m like, geez, and so of course, we still have all of our boy names. Don’t have another girl name, but we have Addy.

    Winter 49:37
    That’s good. That’s good. Oh, man, that is? That’s great. Tell me a little bit more about after Addy passed away though. So you guys, she was in the NICU. So I imagine you guys were able to stay there for a little bit? What was the policy? I don’t know the policy at OHSU.

    Jess Hennessey 49:58
    We were able to stay and spend some time with her. Then they asked if we wanted a professional photographer to come in. They had a volunteer service. We said absolutely. They were able to actually capture some pictures which are so treasured. Her little toes and her little feet, her hands and her fingerprints. Then she also, the photographer was able to capture some pictures of us holding her while she was still alive.

    Jess Hennessey 50:23
    Then after she had passed away, I don’t know if I was in a state of shock, necessarily, or just, I mean, I was still feeling all that pain. I think at this point, it was probably more hard, you know, emotional pain and physical pain. But they said, Do you want to go back to the room for a little bit, and we’ll bring her to you. I said, I would actually love that. To have her in an environment that’s not so busy with the doctors and the nurses kind of standing around.

    Jess Hennessey 50:50
    So my sister actually was able to stay with her while they dressed her. They asked if there was a specific outfit we had brought, which we didn’t. Even though I had the entire nursery set up and all of her clothes, they were all at home. I already had everything ready to go. But of course I didn’t. My poor husband, when I told him to pack everything, you can. He didn’t pack that because we didn’t know.

    Winter 51:10
    Yeah, of course.

    Jess Hennessey 51:11
    They did have some nice options. So we were able to choose an outfit for her. Actually, my sister stayed and was able to change her diaper for the first time and dressed her. So her Auntie had that privilege. I am so grateful.

    Winter 51:25
    Yeah.

    Jess Hennessey 51:25
    She was absolutely my sub in while I was not myself and physically not doing well. I was still recovering from ear syndrome and all that. So then they were able to— about I would say an hour later, they got the pictures of her hands and her feet. They got the prints. They were able to do a mold for me of her feet and hands. So they did all that.

    Jess Hennessey 51:45
    Then they brought her to me. Then surprise, the hospital made another exception. My mother in law and my father in law. So my husband’s mom and dad. They had been kind of on the outside of the hospital. They let them both in to meet Addy.

    Winter 52:01
    Oh!

    Jess Hennessey 52:02
    So they got to both be with Addy. She had already passed. But my mother in law got to hold her and be with me to comfort me and Patrick. That was really a difficult moment, of course, to be in that room with them because she was the first grand baby. I think we all— Yeah, so. But we did get to spend some time together with her.

    Jess Hennessey 52:23
    They really gave me unlimited amounts of time. I don’t remember how much time had passed. It was all just very, you know, I held her and was with her. But at some point, it just felt like it was time to say goodbye to her body because her soul, her soul was perfectly perfect. So, they took her. At that point, they asked Patrick and I if this was okay. We said yes. Then it was just Patrick and I. I’m pretty sure they gave me some really great sleeping meds because I was able to sleep a little bit.

    Jess Hennessey 52:56
    Then the next morning, they asked some of those logistical questions that you don’t think about when you get pregnant. Like would you like to cremate your daughter? Or do you want to have her buried? I think COVID posed an entirely new element to the conversation. Like we might need to embalm her or preserve her. Those are just things that you don’t want to hear as a parent and going through this horrific experience. So OHSU is also a school for the it’s not a university, but it’s a school study program. They do a lot of Medical Teaching.

    Winter 53:33
    Yes, yeah.

    Jess Hennessey 53:35
    Yeah, so they asked if they could keep her organs actually, for studying. because babies with hydrops are still pretty rare. Then to have all these other kinds of things going on with her organs, they asked if they could preserve them to study them. We said yes. We couldn’t imagine a better place for her to hopefully help other future babies. It would be the idea and continue to give value to her life.

    Winter 53:58
    Yeah, that is Oh, that Wow. Okay, that’s so great. I just yeah.

    Jess Hennessey 54:04
    So we were able to, we consented to having them preserved her organs. And then we had the rest of her cremated. I remember, you know, just like during that period in the hospital, we’d try to make light of Oh, well, this is a less crappy thing that happened. One of the less crappy things that happened was this incredible funeral service home, anybody who lost a child, they would do all the services 100% free.

    Winter 54:31
    Oh!

    Jess Hennessey 54:31
    So I just remember thinking like how? I didn’t even think that was people— when you’re a parent, and you’re so devastated. You lost your baby and to just have some type of like, wow, there is still good in this world and how I felt at that moment, at least. So, you know, we talked through the logistics of transportation. They said they’ll come pick her up and this is where she’s going to be. She’ll be safe here at the hospital. We’ll move her there. Then you guys will go and find paperwork with her there. You can ask them whatever you need. They could do more prints for you guys. But it’s typically about a week to two week turnaround until you get her ashes.

    Jess Hennessey 54:32
    I had all of my family there. So I wanted to be at that point admitted out of the hospital or discharged as soon as possible. So I was actually only in the hospital for another day.

    Winter 55:02
    Oh for a C-section?

    Jess Hennessey 55:21
    Yeah, yeah. They let me go home. I think it’s partly and also at that point, I’d made huge recovering strides with my mirror syndrome. I was losing fluid like crazy. In fact, in the month after her birth, I lost, I think, 60 pounds.

    Winter 55:33
    Oh!

    Jess Hennessey 55:34
    All of it was fluid. Yeah.

    Winter 55:36
    Oh, my goodness.

    Jess Hennessey 55:37
    Yeah, it was I mean, so I was losing weight rapidly with all the fluids coming out. I think so too, because my sister had been there. She was a nurse and she ended up living with us for three weeks after Addy had passed. My mother in law was there, they felt comfortable discharging me. I had made all the right strides.

    Jess Hennessey 55:54
    After that, I just wanted to be home. At that point, as difficult as I knew that going home would be to her things, all of that without her. So I was able to get home discharged as soon as possible. I think within a day or two, we went to the funeral home, and we signed paperwork, and they did some more prints for us. They didn’t ask if we wanted to see her there. I wish I would have thought about that. Because I know that some funeral homes allow you to go see babies. Your baby or family or loved one after they’ve deceased that passed away. I wish I had asked maybe to see her. I would have liked to have seen her one more time, but I didn’t .

    Jess Hennessey 56:34
    They were incredibly kind. My sister and I went online. We found this amazing place in Maine who did custom urns. We were actually able to get her feet and hand next to her name on her urn. So it’s actually her life size hand and footprint which is incredible.

    Winter 56:52
    Yeah.

    Jess Hennessey 56:54
    They were able to rush ship so that way we could get it to the funeral home. We were able to have her and you know, within a week, we went and picked her up. We actually my dad, he offered to pay for things that needed to be paid for which were 100% free. One thing we did buy is her colors. In my mind, like I said she was a little princess, were pink and white. My whole baby shower. I’m not the girly girl type. So it was always this joke. Like I never wore pink in my life. Then all of a sudden I have pink flowers around me. We’re gonna make a garden outside of our new house that is pink and white flowers only. My dad actually bought this beautiful little metal flower that was pink, and we have some of her ashes stored in there as well. That’s a little bit more mobile.. It’s a little bit more mobile.

    Jess Hennessey 57:44
    So we were able to donate her organs to be studied, and we decided to have her cremated and we actually kept her in her safe box. We did not take her out and actually have her here until we moved into our new home. So that was the first night we moved in. That was a big moment for all of us. We took out the urn, and she was here with us. So yeah.

    Winter 58:07
    Wow. So many— That was hard. I was like, I don’t know how you guys did it? I don’t know how you did it. I am sure that that was very, I guess I kind of want to know how you were feeling after she passed away was it— I’m sure that there was some gratitude for being able to show her off to your family since they were able to come in which is so great. But were you also feeling— I mean, I guess tell me how you’re feeling after all of everything. Because it is just a whirlwind sometimes. It’s just like how do I feel about all of this that just happened?

    Jess Hennessey 58:46
    I was, I think, first just very numb. I tend to, you know, when horrible things happen. I tend to go into what I call a kind of automation mode. So I remember coming home and wanting to just clean my house and pack up her things and just, I don’t know, feel some type of normalcy. So I was like, numb and wanting and seeking normalcy.

    Jess Hennessey 59:12
    Then I became incredibly sad and actually very anxious. In the days following her passing I had some incredibly severe anxiety attacks, which was the first time in my life I’ve ever suffered through anxiety. I remember , you know, we were talking about vitamins my sister and I something so miniscule, and she had said Oh, too much potassium, you know, could cause heart defects. It was not that intent, but I immediately just had a panic attack. What if I did this right? What if that’s what caused this?Or, I was cleaning the showers when I was pregnant once and and oh my gosh, what if that chemical caused this? Or even I was so careful or that one glass of wine I had, you know a week before my two week waiting period. What if that caused this? I just remember having a lot of feelings of this is My fault I caused this. Then having that sadness of what if I did cause this? What if this was my fault, and it was all of this heartbreak and trauma in her life, it was my fault. I remember being incredibly sad, and then moments of numbness, but a lot of anxiety in those few days following her passing and even coming home, a lot of anxiety, which was not normal for me.

    Winter 1:00:23
    That has got to be such a traumatic experience also, just in general. So I can imagine the anxiety like I can relate to the anxiety.

    Jess Hennessey 1:00:33
    It’s a different type of anxiety, right? It’s, for me, I never I mean, like I said, I’ve had nervousness or, you know, moments of it before. Job interviews or wow, you know, looking back at a day, like it was a really bad day.

    Winter 1:00:47
    Yeah.

    Jess Hennessey 1:00:47
    Feeling anxious about it. But this was like, wow, I had life inside me. Then it was just suddenly, like, my pregnancy was ripped from me. All of a sudden, I was still feeling like the Phantom kicks, right? So your body is still trying to adjust to not being pregnant now. And it was. Then I think that anxiety morphed pretty quickly into anger. I had a lot of anger, following her death, and just feeling different things at every moment, which was not normal for me. As the planner who is structured, who has all these things in her life, just kind of meticulous, and you know, my whole house is in baskets normally. Then to have all these feelings that are all over the place, and not being able to control them. Because you’re just in such a traumatic state at that point. So that’s how I was feeling post her death. Yeah.

    Winter 1:01:37
    Yeah. Just, it’s just so it’s devastating. It’s Yeah. Jess tell me I just want to hear a couple last things about Addy. I want you to tell us something that you remember about her that you want to just share with people. Like I kind of want to know a few more things like, How big was she and how long was she? You said she had dark hair when she was born, which was a surprise to you, which is so delightful. I was like, oh, that wasn’t I didn’t expect that. Tell me tell me a little bit. Last things that you want to tell us and remember about your Addy?

    Jess Hennessey 1:02:14
    Yes, I would love to. So she was born 15 inches long, which at 30 weeks. I mean, we knew she had long legs. So that was, you know, right in line with what we thought so she was 15 inches long. She was born five pounds one ounces, which a lot of that I know was maybe fluid. Her little hands and little pills were perfect. She had dark hair just like me. It was actually very thick. I’m like, wow, this I mean, I can she had a full head of hair. She’s gonna have a full head of hair and no wonder I had all that heartburn. The only thing is that we did not get to see her eyes because they were so swollen when she was born. But my husband and I both have pretty blue eyes. I can just imagine her blue eyes if we had been able to see them.

    Winter 1:03:01
    Did you guys end up having an autopsy or anything outside?

    Jess Hennessey 1:03:05
    We did.

    Winter 1:03:05
    You did? Okay. Anything inclusive in that? I mean, were they able to kind of pinpoint any other things?

    Jess Hennessey 1:03:15
    That’s a great question. So we did have an autopsy. They found nothing conclusive. Besides that she had hypoplastic left heart syndrome with just an underdeveloped left heart chamber that, you know, resulted in blood flow being improper. The valves are not closing. They also found that her lungs were underdeveloped. The hydrops was likely again, a symptom not a causation necessarily of one or the other. It was not an immune hydrops. So the difference between immune hydrops is that it’s usually related to the mother and the baby’s blood, which is pretty meaning they’re different. And it causes basically kind of—

    Winter 1:03:50
    — attack on the—

    Jess Hennessey 1:03:52
    Yeah, exactly on the immune system of the baby. But that is pretty rare now because they test the mother and the baby’s blood very early on. So she had non immune hydrops. So essentially, it could be a variety of different things, mostly related to some type of defect in the heart or major organ. But all of her chromosomes came back completely normal. So genetically, there was nothing. We actually went and had further testing done. OHSU continued to advocate for Patrick and I, and, of course, wanted to continue our journey to having a family. We had maxed out all of our insurance claims for the year. So we said why not? Let’s go get this crazy, you know, $10,000 genetic tests, but I also might as well moving forward. We actually had that done in both of them and came back that we were completely compatible. So there were no genetic potential abnormalities if we were to try to conceive again, and there was nothing that through those tests, either that came back that they could see an ad each genetic testing, and so everything was 100% fine.

    Jess Hennessey 1:04:51
    With all of the tests. Her autopsy just showed things that we knew essentially led to her being so sick and passing away. They could not find a cause. So they said that this is— they can’t explain why this happened. The only thing that they told me is that it likely happened at conception. So whatever that looks like, and I they’re like, so you did nothing wrong. That is so hard to hear, because I almost wanted to know, this cause this caused this and here we are today, right? That’s not her story. You never know what happened, or why it happened. So yeah.

    Winter 1:05:28
    Thank you for sharing that. Jess it has been delightful hearing little Addy’s story I just I am so grateful that you were able to give voice to her and, and share her with us. So thank you so much.

    Jess Hennessey 1:05:41
    Thank you for having me. And thank you again, for everything that you do for this community. Winter, you and Lee, and a time of real sadness and feeling very alone, essentially, in COVID times I found your podcast, and I found a community of incredible parents who we all have a very different story. But it feels very nice to not be alone when you face something this horrid. So thank you for doing this and allowing me to be a part of that and hopefully reaching others the way that you’ve reached me in this time. So thank you.

    Winter 1:06:11
    You’re welcome! It is our pleasure. It is our pleasure. I mean, as much as it stinks to be a part of this club, right.? We’re in it together.

    Jess Hennessey 1:06:11
    Yes we are.

    Winter 1:06:23
    Well thank you again.

    Transcribed by https://otter.ai

    Filed Under: birth story, early neonatal infant death (<7 days), infant death, podcast episode Tagged With: infant loss

    C-Section Birth Story of Ezra, Stillborn at 33 Weeks | Rest In Peace, Sweet Baby Boy

    February 9, 2022 by Winter

    Mom Angelica, a NICU nurse based in Idaho, USA, tells of how she and her husband Nick expecting her 2nd baby Ezra. Her pregnancy was going fine till around 33 weeks, when she noticed that he wasn’t moving around as much during a work break. She went home, worried and tried to calm her fears, but got even more worried when she couldn’t find his heartbeat using her own stethoscope. She and her husband wen to the hospital (during the COVID pandemic), and were told that there was no heartbeat.

    Angelica delivered her son Ezra in June 2020 via C-section. Despite all the restrictions due to the pandemic, their parents and some family were able to meet Ezra after he was born. At the time of the recording, the cause of Ezra’s death was unknown.

    Watch here (YouTube):

    Listen here (podcast):


    Time Stamps:

    00:00 Ezra
    01:22 Angelica’s intro
    05:32 How was pregnancy
    12:06 When they found out
    31:27 C-section and meeting Ezra
    36:57 Time with Ezra
    48:07 Funeral arrangements
    53:50 Did they find anything?

    You might appreciate these other episodes:

    • Watch/listen to Angelica’s advice episode of son Ezra: Click here
    • Watch/listen to Tiffany‘s birth episode of daughter Khyana’s: Click here

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    • DONATE! Consider giving a one-time or recurring donation to help with production and hosting costs: Go here for more information.
    • SUBSCRIBE! Head over here to subscribe to our YouTube channel and our podcasts.
    • SHARE! Spread the word to a loss mom or dad, or those who may be supporting a bereaved parent. Send them a link to this post. Pin one of our graphics on Pinterest.
    Angelica with her sweet Ezra

    Full Transcription:

    Angelica 0:00
    Ezra Wilde

    Angelica 0:08
    He had dark blonde hair, and his second toe is longer than his big toe. Just like his papas. And when he was born he looked like his sister.

    Winter 0:22
    Welcome to Still A Part of Us a place where moms and dads share the story of their child who was stillborn or who died in infancy. I’m Winter.

    Lee 0:29
    And I’m Lee, we are grateful you joined us today. Please note that this is a story of loss and has triggers.

    Winter 0:35
    Thanks to our lost parents who are willing to be vulnerable and share their children with us.

    Lee 0:39
    If you’re listening to this podcast, just know that on our YouTube channel, there are pictures and videos that are related to the stories that are being shared.

    Winter 0:46
    Subscribe and share it with a friend that might need it and tell them to subscribe. Why? Because people need to know that even though our babies are no longer with us, they’re still a part of us.

    Winter 1:02
    We are so excited to have Angelica here today to talk about her sweet son, Ezra. Angelica, thank you so much for coming on to talk to us about Ezra. Tell us a little bit about yourself. Where are you? Who are you? Where are you from? What do you do? Yeah, where? And guess where you were at the time of Ezra’s birth.

    Angelica 1:22
    Thank you for having me. I really, really appreciate you wanting to hear his story. My name is Angelica. I am 32 years old. I live in Idaho. I’m a registered nurse. I have worked for eight years, but the last four years have been in the neonatal ICU, which has been kind of an especially interesting challenge as of late.

    Winter 1:49
    Yes, I am sure.

    Angelica 1:53
    But I was working full time when I was pregnant with him. Kind of through COVID, too, but nothing really ever changed for me because I was still working in a hospital setting. So–

    Winter 2:06
    Yeah.

    Angelica 2:07
    Still going in a few days a week.

    Winter 2:11
    Great. And what does your family look like who you mentioned Ezra’s papa? So–

    Angelica 2:20
    I have been married for almost 10 years to my husband, Nick. We have a three and a half year old little girl named Philippa.

    Winter 2:30
    Awesome. That’s wonderful. And anything you guys like to do in your spare time, any hobbies as a family? Or personally?

    Angelica 2:39
    My husband and I met in college in the marching band.

    Winter 2:43
    You did?

    Angelica 2:44
    Yes.

    Winter 2:45
    So what Okay, I got to ask what did you play in the marching band? Because I was in the marching band too.

    Winter 2:51
    Oh, really?

    Winter 2:52
    Uh huh.

    Angelica 2:52
    Oh, I played alto saxophone.

    Winter 2:55
    Nice.

    Angelica 2:56
    Nick played the trombone.

    Winter 2:59
    Wonderful. That is, I have fond memories of the marching band. So I love that you guys met in the marching band.

    Angelica 3:08
    I mean, after college, we would play in wind ensembles together. But it kind of dwindled after Philippa was born. Now with COVID it’s not really all that safe to be playing the wind instruments.

    Winter 3:22
    Exactly.

    Angelica 3:25
    But that was what we used to do for fun. Then just spending time with our family. We have extended family fairly close. Nick’s parents live about two minutes away. Mine are about five minutes away.

    Winter 3:37
    Oh, that’s great.

    Angelica 3:39
    My brother and sister in law live about two minutes away as well.

    Winter 3:42
    Now, that’s a blessing I have found to have family nearby. So that’s wonderful. I know we’re going to touch on this a little bit later. But I just wanted to point out that you are a NICU nurse. That is quite heavy I’m sure. So I appreciate you coming on because this can probably lend a little bit more of a different perspective for our listeners. So thank you so much for coming on again.

    Angelica 4:13
    Thank you so much.

    Winter 4:15
    So yeah, and when was Ezra born? Can you give us kind of some context, you don’t have to give his exact birth date, but can you give us like, how long ago was it that he was born?

    Angelica 4:27
    He was born on June 1st of 2020.

    Winter 4:30
    Okay.

    Angelica 4:31
    It has been a little over 10 months?

    Winter 4:33
    Yeah, it’s still very new for you. I’m so sorry that it is so raw still I’m sure for you. So tell me, were you planning on getting pregnant with Ezra, any fertility issues, or was that something that was part of your general family plan?

    Angelica 4:54
    We were really fortunate to not have any fertility issues. But it did take us about seven months before we found out that he was on the way. It took a while and sometimes it can feel like forever. When you’re trying.

    Winter 5:09
    Yeah.

    Angelica 5:10
    When you’re talking when you’re trying to build your family, and you have this timeline in the back of your head, and you just realize exactly how little control you have over it.

    Winter 5:20
    Yeah, it’s so frustrating. But that’s great that you guys found out you’re pregnant. So he was planned and how was your pregnancy?

    Angelica 5:32
    It was actually, it was really good. Until, it wasn’t.

    Angelica 5:36
    Yeah.

    Angelica 5:37
    We found out we were expecting him in November of 2019. I just remember being really excited, but also really nervous, kind of anticipating something bad to happen before anything ever did happen. You know, I’ve just always been a very anxious person, and especially working in the NICU. I know, I’ve seen a lot of things that can go wrong. So I guess, in my head I’m trying to anticipate those things all the time. Which is not especially good for my mental health, but I was kind of cautiously optimistic.

    Winter 6:18
    Okay.

    Angelica 6:18
    When we found out that we were expecting.

    Winter 6:21
    Now as I’m actually a little curious, how did Philippas’ pregnancy go? Were you still cautious? Because of that?

    Angelica 6:28
    Yeah, probably for different reasoning. Well, somewhat. So I had just started working in the NICU when we found out about Philipa.

    Winter 6:39
    Okay.

    Angelica 6:41
    Before that I was working in the adult world. So they put me into all of these kinds of orientation types of courses with the new grads, because working with the neonatal population is very different. So I was learning about all of the things that could happen as they were happening. As I was meeting each of these milestones in my own pregnancy with my daughter. I was so worried, just so anxious that something could happen. Kind of bracing myself for something to happen and nothing did. I just was building up all of this anxiety. And oh, gosh, I don’t know. It’s just the way that my brain works I guess. If there were an Olympic event for worrying, I would have so many gold medals. I wouldn’t know what to do with it.

    Winter 7:43
    Yeah, I usually am very, I guess, cautiously optimistic as well. Because you know, you just have a few things. You’ve seen enough things you’re like, something’s going to go bad. Yeah. So your pregnancy was good. Did you guys find out that he was going to be a boy at the 20 week scan? Is that something you guys wanted to do and make sure that you knew?

    Angelica 8:10
    Yeah, mostly because when it comes to naming our children, we wanted to cut the name cooldown by half if we could.

    Winter 8:21
    Smart.

    Angelica 8:22
    So, it was actually about 17 weeks that we found out that we were having a boy. We were actually able to bring Philippa with us to that appointment, not because we planned it that way. But we just couldn’t find anybody to take care of her that particular day. So it was the three of us there. They didn’t plan to do an ultrasound, but did one so that Philippa could see him and hear his heartbeat. And the doctor said, “Well, you know, we’re still a few weeks early, but would you like to know if it’s a boy or girl?” And he said, “Tentatively, I can tell you you’re having a boy.” And then three weeks later, it was confirmed.

    Winter 9:03
    That’s great. Oh, that’s special that Philippa was able to be there too. That’s so fun. That was probably before. I mean, that was probably in the middle of COVID, too, wasn’t it? When you had that appointment?

    Angelica 9:16
    It was before lockdown.

    Winter 9:18
    Okay.

    Angelica 9:19
    Before lockdown at that point they were still allowing family to come with you–

    Winter 9:26
    Okay.

    Angelica 9:26
    –To your appointments. They hadn’t told us anything about not allowing children and we just figured that we would keep her the distance in case she happened to be one of those asymptomatic carriers, or something like that. Keep her away from the other parents.

    Winter 9:40
    Yeah.

    Angelica 9:41
    Then bring her into the office and keep her on the opposite side of the room from the doctor, but just you’re considering what happened. I’m just so grateful that she was there. I know that she probably won’t remember it. But–

    Winter 9:54
    Yeah, what a blessing really that is so special. For her to have been there. How are your other appointments? Were there? Was there anything at all that was of concern? I guess?

    Angelica 10:06
    Not really, actually. That was one of the things that made me feel so perplexed about this, just this feeling of impending doom that I constantly had through the pregnancy. About the only thing that was a little bit abnormal, was during the 20 week ultrasound when we were taking a look at his heart. There were three areas of echogenicity. I think it was his left atrium. Philipaa had one in her left atrium as well. I talked with the doctor about a little bit, but he said, “Unless there were more, more spots or more areas of echogenicity, that you can see that, he wouldn’t recommend a fetal echo.”

    Winter 10:53
    Okay.

    Angelica 10:54
    Just that they were small areas of calcification, and that he wasn’t concerned about it. So I tried to not be concerned about it, too. But he was healthy and strong and so active. I remember Philippa, she moved around a lot, but he was a little ninja in there.

    Winter 11:21
    Oh, that’s so great. So super active?

    Angelica 11:26
    Yes, extremely active and his movement was extremely predictable too. Which was something that I was really grateful for. Because that gave me a little bit of solace, when I would start to worry about something, you know. I think to myself, “Oh, I haven’t felt him move for a little bit.” Then he would give me a little jab and I know, he was okay.

    Winter 11:47
    Like, I’m hearing you mom. So that is going along just fine. Tell me what happened. What were those series of events that led to you finding out that Ezra was going to be still born.

    Angelica 12:05
    So it was a string of three days that I was working, starting from May, oh goodness, I think it was May 29. It had been really busy on the unit, just a lot of acuity. High census. Just a lot of work for all of us to do. I got to day number three.

    Angelica 12:35
    So at that point it was May 31st. I had a really busy assignment, and was finally able to slow down and get some lunch. It was about three o’clock at that point, three, or three thirty. I remember feeling him move around the time when I was eating lunch. But then I went back to my assignment. With everything that I was doing, I guess I just wasn’t paying attention to see if he was moving anymore, or at any point after that.

    Angelica 13:05
    So I finished up my shift and gave a report. I still had so much charting to do. So I sat down and was drinking cold water, expecting him to move, but he wasn’t moving. That set off alarm bells in my head. But I know that I’m an anxious person already. So I thought that I was just overreacting a little bit, that something just didn’t feel quite right.

    Angelica 13:38
    I finished charting and left the unit. I was walking to my car, and just checking my phone for any messages that I had missed. My mom had sent me a photograph of my grandmother. I realized that it had been 12 years since her passing. So she passed on the 31st. I don’t know why I felt like that was strangely significant. I just felt so sad.

    Angelica 14:11
    But you know, I was still talking to Ezra, still kind of rubbing my belly and walking to my car. Telling him that we were going to go home and see what his sister and Papa were doing. I got home and I remember just thinking to myself, like he hadn’t moved while I was in the car. I told my husband and at that point Philippa was already in bed asleep. So I actually think I’d given her a kiss on the forehead that morning when I went to work, but I hadn’t seen her beyond that. I was so preoccupied with the fact he wasn’t moving that I didn’t go in to kiss her goodnight.

    Angelica 14:55
    So, we had dinner and I tried to kind of elicit a little bit of movement. I think I ate an orange, trying to get him to move. Even brought out ice packs and kind of held them on either side of my abdomen to see if I could get him to do anything. My husband said, “Oh there, I thought I felt something.” And so I took a little bit of a deep breath. I thought, okay, well, maybe I’m just overreacting at this point.

    Angelica 15:27
    I took a shower, but I still wasn’t feeling that really significant movement I was accustomed to, and then we started to get ready for bed. It was a Sunday. My last day of work, I wasn’t going into work the following morning, but Nick was. So he started to get settled for work, or settle the bed prior to the new work week.

    Angelica 15:53
    I see that for a little bit and started a kick count. I actually pulled out my stethoscope and tried to find him. I could usually find him if I couldn’t hear him terribly well, at the very least I could hear his heartbeat. Even if it sounded distant there, you know, but I couldn’t find him. I started to panic a little bit. So about 23 minutes into the kick count, I stopped. I knew that I was supposed to go for about two hours or so, but I just haven’t felt anything for at least that one. So I called L&D and asked them what they thought, because I wanted to get their opinion. And make sure I wasn’t going in unnecessarily. They told me to go.

    Angelica 16:50
    It was also very late at that point. It was after midnight. So at that point, Nick had fallen asleep. So I went and I got dressed. I even remember looking up and down at things in my closet thinking to myself, okay, so if something is wrong, there’s something really awful has happened. What clothing do I not mind hating for the rest of my life?

    Angelica 17:18
    I woke my husband up and I told him that I was gonna go to the hospital. He asked me if I wanted him to have him go with me. I told him not to because if I was overreacting, I didn’t want to wake up our family and make them worry for nothing. Especially since everybody else had to work too. So I told him to stay with Philipa.

    Angelica 17:47
    I left and I remember leaving with a phone charger that I could have in my hospital room, my ID, my insurance card, my clothes and that was it. I didn’t even have a hospital bag packed and honestly, the unpacked hospital bag is still hanging where it was 10 months ago. I haven’t been able to touch it.

    Winter 18:16
    Angelica, can I ask you a quick question?

    Angelica 18:19
    Yeah.

    Winter 18:19
    What week are you at this time?

    Angelica 18:23
    Oh, sorry about that. At this point I am 33 weeks and five days.

    Winter 18:28
    Okay.

    Angelica 18:28
    Gestation.

    Winter 18:29
    Okay.

    Angelica 18:30
    I remember that really distinctly because I remember having read so many stories, just with COVID-19 being so unpredictable. I had read a story about a mother who had lost her life at about 33 weeks or so. And because we were about at the same place in our pregnancies, I thought to myself, okay, if I can just to get through this week, I’ll be okay. If I can get to 34 everything will be okay.

    Angelica 19:06
    I was seriously doubting that things are gonna be okay, at that point. So I was driving, and I went to the same hospital that I work at. Triage for labor and delivery is right down the hall from the NICU. So I had been there earlier in the day. I could have gone at any point in the day. And that’s been a really hard thing, actually, knowing that I was there all day long. I could have gone over and that maybe things would have been different.

    Angelica 19:39
    So I’m driving and I’m talking to him. I’m driving in silence. Just thinking to myself, what might be happening. Considering what could cause decreased fetal movement in him at that point. Trying to determine what was going on, if anything. How he was going to do if he was going to be delivered that night, or I guess at that point that morning, because it was really early on June 1st. I kept telling him, it’s okay, we’re gonna be okay, you’re gonna be okay.

    Angelica 20:18
    I arrived to the hospital and I parked the car. I had forgotten the mask. So I entered through the emergency room, which is where they were having everyone enter, and they handed me a mask. The nurse who was at the front desk asked me if I knew where L&D was, and I told them that I did. Then, you know, seeing me with my giant protruding belly, he looked at me, he said, good luck and sent me upstairs.

    Angelica 20:50
    I just remember feeling so much dread, at that point, so much dread walking those halls and waiting for the elevator to come up, or to come back down. The elevator to come down to get checked in to triage. They got me into my room and started to set up the doppler, but my nurse couldn’t find him and couldn’t find Ezra anywhere. She asked me where we normally were able to find him. So I pointed on my abdomen to where she could go and still nothing. She told me, she said, “You know what, I’m going to call the doctor and see if the doctor can bring down a machine. An ultrasound machine so that we can see what’s going on.”

    Angelica 21:44
    There’s a part of me that knew what was going on when she said that, but I didn’t want to believe that anything was severely wrong. So I just kind of took a breath and talked to him until the doctor came. I ended up falling asleep a little bit. Because I hadn’t slept at all since about 6:45am the morning before. So I was nodding off. I thought to myself, there’s no way that I could be falling asleep if something is seriously wrong.

    Angelica 22:26
    I was awoken by the doctor on call coming through. He said, “I am so sorry that it took me so long.” He said, “I got here as soon as I could and they even said some prayers on the way down.” There was a part of me that thought that is so sweet, but then there’s another part of me that thought, oh, gosh, you know, if you’re praying that things are okay, then my guess is that things really aren’t. So he even told me to take my mask off at that point. I told him “No, it’s okay. You know, I feel fine. I’m comfortable. It’s okay.”

    Angelica 23:02
    So he started the ultrasound. Taking a look at Ezra and the screens at a little bit of an angle and there was no movement. As he was passing up along his rib cage, I was trying to see if I could find his heartbeat, but I couldn’t see anything. I wasn’t hearing anything either. I thought to myself, this is not okay, something is really, really not okay. But then I thought to myself, you were not trained to do an ultrasound. So just take a minute. Maybe everything’s fine. He traced back and forth along my abdomen for a long time. At least it felt like a long time.

    Angelica 23:52
    Then he looked up at me, and his eyes had started to get a little bit glassy and said, I just need to be absolutely sure. In the back of my brain I’m screaming, absolutely sure of what? Absolutely sure of what? Then he put the wand down and he looked at me and he said, “I am so so sorry.”

    Angelica 24:20
    At that point, nobody, not one of us had said the words gone, dead or no heartbeat. He didn’t need to say anything more for me to know what happened, or to understand what he saw or didn’t see. I started to fall apart. The nurse asked me if there was anyone that I needed for them to call. I said yes please to my husband.

    Angelica 24:55
    At that point I felt my phone buzz and I guess Nick had woken up and realized how long I’d been gone. Asked me if everything was okay. So I told him and I was just in tears struggling to get words out. I didn’t even tell him what had happened. All I asked him was if he could come to the hospital. I don’t know if it was because I genuinely was just forgetful. Like I had forgot to mention something. Or didn’t want to say it out loud, because that would make it real. And he said, “Yes, yes. You know, I’ll be there. I’ll be there soon.”

    Angelica 25:43
    He started to call around and try to find someone to be there with Philippa. To stay with her overnight. So I hung up the phone, and my doctor was really kind. He sat with me for a little bit, but then he had to go. It took Nick about 20 minutes to get to the hospital. We live about 15 minutes away. But he struggled to find anybody awake at that point. It was two am I think, two, two 15. But he ended up getting ahold of his dad. His dad came to stay with our daughter.

    Angelica 26:36
    That time period, it felt like forever. But for that time period, I just remember rocking back and forth and crying. Holding, clutching my abdomen and then saying I’m so sorry. I’m so sorry. Over and over again, I didn’t know what to say, or what else to do. When Nick arrived I gave him a big hug.

    Angelica 27:06
    It wasn’t too much longer after that, that the doctor came back in with the ultrasound machine. He said, “Guys, I’m sorry, I’m not trying to torture you here. But this is the doctor in me wanting to be 100% sure of what I saw. Because if I’m wrong, then there’s no way that I can forgive myself.” So he did another ultrasound. At that point, Nick knew. Nick knew it. Later when I talked to him, he said “That I almost didn’t need to mention what had happened. To say out loud what had happened. Because he knew something was very wrong. Like beyond, we’re going to deliver him tonight and he’s very sick, wrong.”

    Angelica 27:59
    So after that second ultrasound, the doctor dealt with one, he said, I’m so sorry again. Then he told us that he and his wife had experienced a loss like that about a decade before. He said not to blame ourselves for anything. And not to turn pain and the anger inward. You know, he said that he would come back in a little bit for us to determine what the next steps were going to be.

    Angelica 28:36
    At that point Nick he held my hand. He said what are we gonna call him? ”Philippa, what are we going to call him? And we had actually narrowed our names down to Felix and Ezra. For some reason, blessed you know, the days leading up to that I had been calling him Ezra just kind of trying, you know, it felt great. That was what we named him. Ezra Wilde like Oscar Wilde because Philippa, his middle name, is danger.

    Winter 29:26
    I love that so much.

    Angelica 29:30
    It was Nick’s idea. So we figured we needed to follow the theme. Then Nick looked at me, he said, “Well, at least the hardest part is over.” And I looked at him and I said, “No, the hardest part is not over.” You know, for as awful as it is to be told that your child is dead. Now we have to deliver him.

    Angelica 30:04
    The doctor came in and talked a little bit about it. We have a scheduled c-section that we had actually made at eight weeks, which I thought was way too early for them to be putting me on the OR schedule. Just nursing superstition, I guess, very much akin to that feeling that you get when somebody says the word quiet on the floor?

    Winter 30:30
    Yes.

    Angelica 30:31
    You know that he was scheduled c-section repeat c-section because I’d had a C-section with my daughter and been diagnosed with a supple pelvic disproportion. I just was not built to have a vaginal delivery. So instead of attempting a V back, I said, “No, just go ahead and put us on the schedule whenever.” I was fine with not waiting until my doctor, my attending actually came on to came on duty. The anesthetist came and chatted with us too. He was surprisingly cheery, which I thought would be bothersome, but it really wasn’t. It was almost kind of helpful.

    Angelica 31:27
    Then I fell asleep. And I woke up a few hours later, when they came in for surgery. They put me on the schedule for about 630 or so. Yeah, I remember waking up and then all of a sudden I felt cramps. You know, just kind of the beginning of contractions, I thought anyway. I started to feel really sick to my stomach, just really, really nauseated. They had, they’d already talked to me. So they wheeled me out and said, “Don’t worry, we’ll get something in your system.” They started an IV, they did a lot of blood, a lot of blood for testing on me to determine what had happened.

    Angelica 32:29
    They wheeled me into the OR, and put me onto the table and told me that we’re going to do a spinal block. So they kind of sat me up and Nick was getting ready into hospital scrubs. So they told me to sit up and I did. When I did, I looked off into the corner where my heart chart was sitting and there was a giant butterfly pasted on the front of it. Then I fell apart I just fell apart. Because that made it that much more real.

    Angelica 33:08
    Then at the same time, I was thinking about the fact that before my husband even knew the true nature of what had happened my co-workers probably knew because they probably saw 33 weeker coming to triage. We’re anticipating potentially getting said 33 weeker. Then the status went from you know, absent fetal movement to fetal demise, and just all of it just was too much. It’s just way too much.

    Angelica 33:39
    They pulled up the drape and started the surgery. Shortly before that my husband had come in and he was sitting at my side. I mean, neither of us really were in a great headspace. We just didn’t know we were both in such a shock. For Philippa’s birth Nick brought in his phone, and he was taking pictures as they were doing surgery. This time around, he forgot his phone. So the only photo that we have in the OR is the one that the anesthetist took for us with his phone. I’m just laying there and just crying. The OR is silent, just painfully silent.

    Angelica 34:34
    Later someone asked me “Oh, which NICU team came to attend your C-section?” Because that’s just standard protocol in the NICU. You attend every c-section. I had to look at them and say nobody was there. Nobody attended my C section because why would a NICU team be there for a babys who dead?

    Angelica 34:54
    I felt a lot of pressure and then I felt no pressure at all, just emptiness. That was when I knew that he had been born because I could just tell he was gone. I just thought, you know, hr is not physically there anymore. No one had told me that he had been born, but I could hear a nurse begin to cry. And she said, “Oh, he’s so beautiful.”

    Angelica 35:26
    She brought him over to a little warmer, and laid him down on a swaddle blanket. The swaddle had trucks overtop of it. And she began to swaddle him up. My husband went over a little warmer and took a look at him and said, “He looks just like Phillippa, he looks just like her.” Just if I had started to get any degree through the calm. It was shattered at that point, and I just started to sob again. Then the nurse handed him to my husband, and he brought him over put his cheek against mine. If I didn’t know any better for as warm as his cheek was I would have thought that he was still alive. He was born at 6:42am on June 1st.

    Angelica 36:27
    Not too long after that my attending physician came in. He said, “I’m so, so sorry.” You know, he just kind of ducked into the OR. He said, “I’m so, so sorry. We’ll figure out what happened. We’re gonna figure out what happened.” And he gave my shoulder a squeeze and he left. They took Nick into the recovery room before they had finished closing on me.

    Angelica 37:00
    It wasn’t very long before they dropped the drape. I could tell that the obstetrician who was working on me he was the same doctor who told us that Ezra was gone. I could see that he’d been crying the entire time. His eyes were beat red. And I asked him “What happened?” He said, “I’m not sure.” He said, “The assessment looks perfect. It’s perfect. There’s nothing wrong with the umbilical cord. Nothing that I could see. I’m not even sure that y’all want to have the placenta tested, because I just don’t see anything. Well, I don’t see anything wrong. I’m not sure what happened.”

    Angelica 37:48
    So once they were done, they wheeled me out. They took me into labor and delivery. I thought that maybe they were going to take me on to a different floor, or something away from other laboring moms and living babies. But I was wheeled into room 10 I can remember. I remember going in there thinking to myself, the last time I was in the room, we were here for a code for another baby. Just, you know, the awful things that you remember, having worked in the same hospital.

    Angelica 38:24
    When I got in there, Nick was cradling Ezra. They got my bed situated. They helped me to sit up a little bit. Nick looked at me and said, “I heard another baby being born a few minutes ago.” While they were kind of showing him into the room. I started to cry again. And he said, “No, no, it’s okay. I’m just so grateful that their baby is okay.”

    Angelica 38:56
    We got to rock him, talk to him, and sing to him. We weren’t sure because of the pandemic if our family was going to be able to come and see him. But we talked with our nurse and she talked to her charge. The charge talked to the house supervisor and they’re like, “No, we’re going to get people in here for you. Just give us a list of names.”

    Angelica 39:19
    So they allowed my parents, Nick’s parents, my brother and sister in law to come up. Nick has a sister and a half brother, but both of them live Upstate. Then he looked at me and said, “Well, wait a minute, what about Philipa?” And I said ,”No.” I would have loved her to be there. For her to have been there. I would love that. But at the same time, I didn’t imagine that they would be too keen on the idea of having a two year old in my hospital room.

    Angelica 39:59
    So slowly, our family members started to trickle in all of them just as just as red eyed and perplexed, as we were. Our nurse got a bunch of footprints, she got sets of footprints for all four couples. So my husband and I, his parents, my parents, my brother and sister in law.

    Angelica 40:32
    They told us that we could have two visitors at a time. So they came in couples. It started with my parents. They went to leave and my nurse came and she said, “Oh, you know, wait a second, you know, weren’t your parents going to stay for longer?” And I said, “No, we’re only supposed to have two sets of parents, to two visitors at any one given point in time.” She’s like, “No, forget about that. You can have all of them in here if you want, we don’t care.”

    Angelica 41:07
    So we called them back. Then all the grandparents were there with him at the same time. Eventually, when everybody had a chance to say hello, and goodbye. They all left. There was just the three of us. I asked Nick if he wanted to call one of our family members and show Phillipaa her baby brother. He said that he wasn’t sure that he could handle that. He wasn’t sure that she would really understand what was going on anyway.

    Angelica 41:50
    I kind of regret it at this point. Not at least asking if we could have had her come up. Even for a couple minutes. Not being more insistent on having somebody call us and show her Ezra through the phone.

    Angelica 42:11
    I remember holding him. At that point he was swaddled, but he was swaddled with his arms straight down. I wanted to see his hands. So I unswaddled him a little bit and brought his arms up. I remember saying out loud, he should have been swaddled with his hands close to face, because that’s what was developmentally appropriate. Then I realized how ridiculous that sounded. I just held them.

    Angelica 42:47
    I remember holding his hands and staring into space. We kind of looked at his hair. Nick said his hair was so dark. And I said, “No, it’s not. He just hasn’t been washed yet.” And so he kind of dusted up and held his hair a little bit. And I said, “No, look at his hair. It’s blonde, it’s dark blonde.” For anyone who maybe isn’t looking at a picture of me at this point, I am not blonde haired or blue eyed. I have relatively dark skin, hair, and eyes. So, you know, the fact that either of my children had blonde hair is it, I have no idea where they came from.

    Angelica 43:35
    I just looked him up and down which was just so amazing. Someone loved him. He weighed 4 pounds, 15 ounces, which is a pretty decent size for a 33 weeker. I was worried that maybe he wasn’t getting enough or something. No, he was getting enough.

    Angelica 43:54
    We were able to hold him for almost nine hours. They would have let us keep him for longer I think. At that point we noticed that his skin started to shear a little bit in different places. It was just getting progressively worse as time passed. So at that point, I mean, I didn’t even think to ask someone to bring clothing for him. I didn’t have a going home outfit for him, or anything like that I had nothing prepared for him. So he wasn’t clothed, and we didn’t bathe him because I had just been through surgery and I couldn’t breath very well.

    Angelica 44:39
    I was just so worried about damaging his skin that much more. So I didn’t want them to bathe him because even though I knew it wouldn’t hurt him. It would break my heart to continue to injure his skin. We sang to him, we gave him a bunch of kisses and I handed him over to Nick. I said, “Here you hold him last.” He said, “No, no. You should be able to hold him until he goes. I said, “I had 33 weeks with him. I got to feel him move. I think that you deserve to hold as long as we have him.” When the time came, we handed him over to our nurse and that was that.

    Angelica 45:46
    They gave me a weighted bear afterwards, which I proceeded to sleep with for about six months straight. We ended up staying in the hospital another two nights and going home on Wednesday morning. I remember my doctor, my own personal obstetrician coming in and he said, “Hey, you look like you’re feeling okay? Do you want to go home today?” I just thought to myself no. There is no way I can go home just yet. Not yet not to silence. I ended up staying for two nights and going home on Wednesday morning. They ended up putting me in a different department, so that I didn’t have to be up on newborn where you could hear babies cry. And that’s Ezra’s birth story.

    Winter 47:06
    Thanks for sharing that. I’m so glad that you got some time with him. That your hospital was willing to get your parents in there and your brother and sister-in-law. That just made me happy to hear that. I’ve heard so many stories that people have not had that chance and it’s so sad.

    Angelica 47:35
    It’s absolutely heart wrenching. This pandemic has made that process so much harder than it already is to begin with.

    Winter 47:49
    Yeah. You guys gave them Ezra and you stayed in the hospital for a couple more days. Did you guys end up deciding to have a funeral, or was he cremated? What did you guys decide to do with him?

    Angelica 48:07
    I actually grew up alongside an undeveloped portion of land built into a cemetery. It’s the house that my parents still live in. So we decided to have him buried there. I’ve had a couple of coworkers, three of them who have lost babies.

    Winter 48:31
    Oh really?

    Angelica 48:33
    Yes and their babies are buried in the same cemetery. Most recently, a friend of mine, she lost her little girl. She was about a month old or so. She had been in the NICU. She was very tiny, very premature. But she passed away. I remembered where she had buried her little girl. So that was actually when I was still in the hospital that my husband and my father-in-law, because my father-in-law and my mother-in-law, offered to pay for everything. For everything that the funeral home didn’t cover. For everything that the cemetery didn’t cover. They offered to pay for everything. Then they went over and we’re looking for a plot. So I told my husband to look for my friend’s little girl. It turns out that the plot right next to her was vacant, so they’re buried side by side.

    Winter 49:43
    That’s so nice.

    Angelica 49:45
    We didn’t get to have a funeral per say. We were raised Catholic, but at that point, you know, having a mass for him was completely out of the question which I completely understood. That was okay. So we had a graveside committal. The priest came in, he did a blessing over Ezra’s grave.

    Angelica 50:11
    We only had a small group of people there, including my friend. Because her little girls are right next to my son. We had a very small group of people and all of us were spread out because of the pandemic. Trying to keep this the cemetery’s staff safe in the process.

    Angelica 50:40
    Then, after that, I feel bad because I feel like there are so many things that I could have done, but did not. Because in the moment, I just wasn’t thinking about it. I was just shocked that this was happening. You know, I always knew that it could happen. I always knew that there was a possibility that something like this could happen. But regardless of how much I thought and I understood about child loss prior to this, as a nurse, I knew nothing. I knew nothing. What I understood, barely scratches the surface.

    Angelica 51:22
    So you know, in that moment, we didn’t play any music or anything like that. One of my other friends is super sweet. She brought a couple of pinwheels for him. We knew that eventually the pinwheels would be taken away because the cemetery cleans everything up periodically. So we buried one of them actually in there with him.

    Winter 51:45
    Oh you did?

    Angelica 51:46
    He was a pinwheel on top of his casket. Then my husband he quoted I don’t know if you’ve ever seen a Muppet Christmas Carol.

    Winter 52:01
    Yes, we love that movie.

    Angelica 52:05
    It’s the scene after they find out that Tiny Tim has died. He said in this life, there are meetings and partings. That is the way that we will never forget Ezra and the love that he brought into our lives. It was something along the lines of that I very distinctly remember the reference to Muppet Christmas Carol.

    Angelica 52:37
    Then that was it. There was a small gathering that my mother and father in law had at their house. My brother and sister in law came from Washington. They cooked everything you know, made sure that we didn’t have to do anything. He just had a small gathering with everybody who was able to go to the service. Yeah. And it was wonderful. In a very melancholy kind of way.

    Winter 53:14
    Yeah. I’m so glad that you were able to be with family and friends it sounds like.

    Angelica 53:25
    We were very fortunate.

    Winter 53:28
    Angelica did you? I know that your ob said that he was going to try and find out as much as possible of what happened. Did you guys end up having an autopsy done? Sounds like you got blood also taken? Were they able to find anything, or is there anything conclusive about what happened to Ezra?

    Angelica 53:50
    No, unfortunately. We ended up drawing blood on me to determine if there was some kind of a clotting issue. Everything came back normal for me. They also wanted to do a cytogenetic microarray to determine if there was anything you know, anything genetically that would have caused his stillbirth. That was all completely normal as well.

    Angelica 54:27
    Originally, we thought that they were going to have to do the cytogenetic microarray on his own tissue. So you know, kind of maybe a tendon or something in the back of his ankle. But they were able to do it on the placenta. That came back normal with the offer to do an autopsy.

    Angelica 54:50
    I wanted to know what happened. So I was leaning toward yes, but my husband Nick didn’t even pause. He just said, “No. No, we’re not doing that.” You know, and the same thing with cremation. He said, “No, no, I just can’t, I can’t envision us doing that to him.” He said, “I know that he’s gone. And I know that he doesn’t hurt me more, but I can’t do that to him.” So at this point, we don’t know why. I don’t think we ever really will.

    Angelica 55:28
    I later asked the OB who delivered him. If under the same circumstances, he would have had an autopsy done. And he said, “As the doctor who has done autopsies on infants I don’t think I would have. I don’t think that there would have been anything of note to find, just based on his physical assessment.” He said, “He was perfect. There was nothing to indicate that there was an infectious process and the blood work showed that as well.” He said, “I just don’t know that we will have any answers. I don’t think we’ll have any answers. But under the same circumstances, no. I would not have done an autopsy on my child.” So it’s still just kind of up in the air.

    Winter 56:22
    It is kind of nice to hear and hear somebody say he looked perfect. And like he said, all intents and purposes he’s perfect. Angelica, thank you so much for sharing your story. It never ceases to surprise me how much I cry on this podcast even though I’m very familiar with some of these stories already. I appreciate you coming on and sharing Ezra with us.

    Angelica 56:48
    Thank you for allowing me to share him.

    Transcribed by https://otter.ai

    Filed Under: birth story, late term stillbirth, podcast episode, stillbirth Tagged With: stillbirth

    Birth Story and Death of Premature Baby Girl at 26 Weeks | RIP Baby Khyana

    February 7, 2022 by Winter

    Mom Tiffany tells the birth story and death of her daughter Khyana, of how she got pregnant with her boyfriend at the time, but she found out that she had an incompetent cervix. She was 1-2 cm dilated around 24 weeks, so they admitted her to the hospital. Tiffany’s water broke a few days later and she developed an infection a week later. She was induced and gave birth to her daughter Khyana, who needed to go to the NICU because her lungs were not developed and needed assistance breathing.

    The doctors discovered an infection, likely due to a hole in Khyana’s bowel, and were prepping her for a procedure to fix it, but her heart stopped before the surgery and she died 4 days after she was born.

    Watch here (YouTube):

    Listen here (podcast):

    Time Stamps:

    00:00 Welcome
    02:43 Pregnancy
    05:51 Problems with pregnancy
    07:13 Admit to hospital
    10:47 Giving birth to Khyana
    20:03 Khyana in the NICU
    23:49 Khyana has an infection
    26:45 Her heart stops
    31:49 After she Khyana dies

    You might appreciate these other episodes:

    • Watch/listen to Tiffany‘s advice episode after Khyana‘s death: Click here

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    Baby Khyana in the NICU

    Full Transcription:

    Tiffany  0:01  

    Khyana.

    Tiffany  0:08  

    I loved her hair. She was so small. I wasn’t expecting her hair to look like that. She has beautiful black hair.

    Winter  0:19  

    Welcome to Still A Part of Us, a place where moms and dads share the story of their child who was stillborn or who died in infancy. I’m Winter.

    Lee  0:26  

    And I’m Lee, we are grateful you joined us today. Please note that this is a story of loss and has triggers.

    Winter  0:32  

    Thanks to our loss parents who are willing to be vulnerable and share their children with us. 

    Lee  0:36  

    If you’re listening to this podcast, just know that on our YouTube channel, there are pictures and videos that are related to the stories that are being shared. 

    Winter  0:43  

    Subscribe and share it with a friend that might need it and tell them to subscribe. Why? Because people need to know that even though our babies are no longer with us. They’re still a part of us. 

    Winter  0:56  

    Tiffany, thank you so much for coming on our podcast today. And we are so so grateful that you have joined us and are willing to tell your story about Khyana. Tell us a little bit about yourself and kind of who you are. What you do, where you’re located currently, and maybe where you were located at the time of Khyana’s birth.

    Tiffany  1:18  

    Well, at the time of her birth, I was in the DC area that was actually working in DC. That was the first job I had out of college. I’d been there for a little over two years at that time. A little over two years, I think. Um, and now I am in Japan.

    Winter  1:43  

    Okay, so you’re in Japan for your work specifically? 

    Tiffany  1:47  

    Yes, ma’am. 

    Winter  1:48  

    Awesome. And are there any things that you like to do per your, like, as hobbies? Or what kind of things do you like to do on a regular basis?

    Tiffany  1:57  

    I like to travel. That’s been hard with COVID. But I like to travel and see new things. Since I just got here. I can see new things. Because they’re new to me right now. I know later on they probably won’t be new. Right now. I’ll see new things. 

    Winter  2:15  

    Yeah, I’m sure you are enjoying that. That’s great. That is awesome. So and then just as a little bit of credit, for context. How long ago did Khyana’s birth happen?

    Tiffany  2:27  

    Next month it will be three years.

    Winter  2:29  

    So it’s been three years since that. So it’s, there’s a little bit of time that has passed by. Okay, well, then, can you give me an idea of what your family looks like? At the time of the birth?

    Tiffany  2:43  

    At the time of the birth it was just me and my boyfriend. He’s my ex now. But it was when we were together. 

    Winter  2:51  

    Gotcha. Okay.

    Tiffany  2:52  

    I don’t have any other kids.

    Winter  2:54  

    Okay. Were you always planning on getting pregnant? Was that something that was on your radar?

    Tiffany  3:02  

    No, it was just something that happened. I actually just had PRK about a month before I had gotten pregnant. You’re actually supposed to wait, if you are going to even try to get pregnant. You’re supposed to wait six months to a year. So it was a surprise. Luckily, I can still see.

    Winter  3:22  

    That’s good. Just for everybody PRK is a surgery for your eyes so that you can see a little bit better. Is that correct? 

    Tiffany  3:29  

    Yes. It’s similar to LASIK. 

    Winter  3:31  

    Yes. Okay. Wonderful. So you were that was a little bit of a surprise for you. Um, so were you concerned about that? Was that something that you were, you know, mad about? Or happy about? Like, were you okay with it? I guess that is the question. 

    Tiffany  3:50  

    Um, I was actually kind of surprised that I was pregnant at the time. I was shocked because first like I said earlier, I hit PRK. So it’s like, oh, you’re not supposed to get pregnant. I’m like, I wonder if I lose my eyesight. But the second thing was like okay, we’ll be here in the DC area. Is it expensive to live in the DC area, but I was actually kind of happy. 

    Winter  4:16  

    Okay, that’s great. What about your ex? Your boyfriend at the time? What did he think about it?

    Tiffany  4:24  

    He was happy when he actually believed I was pregnant. I don’t know what was going on with him. He was like the pregnancy test lies, but I feel horrible. I feel terrible right now. Like, I feel so sick. Like this is my way of telling the lies out. Eventually I got another test to confirm and he was excited about it after that. He thought the pregnancy test was wrong.

    Winter  4:48  

    You’re like it’s a false positive. Come on. No. Okay, well, that’s great then. How did your pregnancy go? Was it okay? Was it? Were you really sick? It sounded like you were a little sick.

    Tiffany  5:05  

    I was sick. At the time, I was actually morbidly, I’m not morbidly obese anymore, but I was morbidly obese. Um, I had bad eating issues as well. Like my throwing up. I constantly threw up. Anything in my stomach was going to come right back up. 

    Winter  5:23  

    Oh.

    Tiffany  5:24  

    Yeah, that first trimester was pretty rough. They told me what medicine–The doctor told me what medicine to take. And it helped a lot. By the time the second trimester came. I was a little more comfortable.

    Winter  5:37  

    Great. Okay, well, that’s good. I know. It’s always tricky. How were your checkups? And as you were going along, were there any health issues, anything that was brought up that was of concern?

    Tiffany  5:51  

    Well, um, first trimester other than I was like throwing up and being morbidly obese, I was fine. The second trimester, they discovered that I had an incompetent cervix. It’s called IC. And with that your cervix is dilating before it’s time. It wasn’t really a fertility issue, it was an issue of staying pregnant.

    Winter  6:14  

    Yeah. Did they do– did they propose anything to try and help make sure that you didn’t go into premature labor?

    Tiffany  6:23  

    They tried. What happened was they gave me progesterone pills to use. I had to take those. Well it took about a week because of insurance to even get them. So they had to do some kind of authorization. As soon as I got that I took them religiously. I went back to the doctor to find out that I am like a centimeter or two dilated already.

    Winter  6:47  

    What week were you with that– would you say that was?

    Tiffany  6:50  

    That was 24 weeks. 

    Winter  6:53  

    Oh. 

    Tiffany  6:54  

    I was about to be I think I was about 25 weeks. I was 24 weeks. I had just taken a picture with a sticker saying “I’m 24 Weeks Pregnant.” 

    Winter  7:02  

    Okay. Oh, man. Okay, so you were taking the progesterone, any other things that they were trying to help? Kind of, like you said, Keep you pregnant.

    Tiffany  7:13  

    They admitted me to the hospital when they saw that I was dilated. I stayed in the hospital for I think about two weeks. 

    Tiffany  7:21  

    Oh.

    Tiffany  7:21  

    Yes, in the hospital for about two weeks. And that included having her, but before they found out I was dilated, they took me to I guess like labor and delivery and put me on magnesium to help keep her in. 

    Tiffany  7:37  

    Then I went down to another floor after that. The labor and delivery floor was more serious. So after they put me on a magnesium, I was done. They took me to another floor. I forgot the name of it. But it’s for people who are waiting to have their babies who don’t need to be in labor and delivery. They might have a few complications or people who’ve already had that baby. 

    Winter  7:54  

    Gotcha. Okay. 

    Tiffany  7:54  

    They put me in that area and they gave me– tried to give me medicine and stuff. And make me do bed rest. But unfortunately, it didn’t work. When they were thinking about sending me home, because they thought it might be good to go home soon. So like probably the next day or two. Something like that. That same day my water broke. 

    Winter  8:16  

    Oh, it did?

    Tiffany  8:18  

    It was the same day that I was trying to get home. I don’t like hospitals. 

    Tiffany  8:23  

    Yeah.

    Tiffany  8:23  

    I don’t like hospitals at all. My water broke that day. So I called the nurse in and they took me back upstairs. They gave me more magnesium, and a ton of pills and antibiotics. Then they took me back downstairs again because they were gonna try to keep her in even though my water broke. As long as I didn’t have an infection.

    Winter  8:45  

    Gotcha. And tell me were you feeling any sort of contractions or anything? Nothing?

    Tiffany  8:50  

    I never felt contractions during that time. 

    Winter  8:53  

    Okay, so they were just basically trying to see if she would stay in. As long as there was no sort of infection then they would just kind of proceed as like just keep her in there as long as possible so that she can grow?

    Tiffany  9:06  

    Yeah, they were gonna try to keep I forgot how many weeks 32, 35 or something like that. They were going to try to wait. As long as I wasn’t sick there wasn’t a question. Nothing was going too bad. They have to keep me in the hospital because my water broke. So I couldn’t leave the hospital after that. 

    Winter  9:20  

    Right. 

    Tiffany  9:21  

    Anything can happen.

    Winter  9:22  

    Yeah. Yeah, exactly. And just to go back a little bit, did you?– It sounds like you guys found out that you were having a girl at maybe the 20 week ultrasound scan?

    Tiffany  9:34  

    Yeah, I think it was around 18-20 weeks. 

    Winter  9:37  

    Okay, great. Yeah, yeah, that’s so exciting. 

    Tiffany  9:41  

    We both wanted a girl.

    Winter  9:42  

    Really?

    Tiffany  9:42  

    We thought she was gonna be a boy at first, that’s the thing. Because I went to an ultrasound before that with my regular Dr. They were like well, I think it is because I was like, Can you see if it’s a girl or boy? Because it was around that time. She’s like, I can’t make any promises, but I’ll try. She tried to look and she couldn’t really see much because she didn’t want to move. So she’s like, well, I think it might be a boy but don’t buy clothes yet. She’s like, I’m 80% sure it’s a boy. So I was like, wow, okay, and then we had another ultrasound two weeks after that. We found that it was a girl. So we were very happy because we both wanted a girl. 

    Winter  10:19  

    That’s so great. That’s kind of fun or different. You’re like, Oh, just kidding. I guess we are having a girl. That’s great. 

    Tiffany  10:26  

    Yes.

    Winter  10:28  

    Okay, so then you were in the hospital. You have been on bedrest? Yeah, you’ve been on bed rest for two weeks. Then the day that you decide to go, you’re like, we’re going to get you discharged. They are trying to get you out of your water breaks. Is that 26 weeks at that time, then?

    Tiffany  10:47  

    Um, so I was on bed rest. I got there around 24 weeks. I was on bed rest for like, a few days. Then my water broke. It was close to a weekend when my water broke.

    Winter  10:58  

    I see. Okay, yeah. Okay. 

    Tiffany  11:01  

    After that, then they say, okay, we’re gonna try to keep her in. But about a week after my water broke, I had started feeling very bad, I felt bad. I woke up one morning and was just really tired. I tried to do the normal stuff. There was a set schedule every day. I knew what was going on. I was laying in bed, a bunch of doctors coming in. That was what’s going to happen. I knew the same shows on TV already, because I had been watching TV. 

    Tiffany  11:31  

    So that day, I felt really bad. Later on that evening, I couldn’t eat. I could barely eat lunch. That was weird. I was always hungry. I could barely eat lunch. Then later, I just started feeling worse. So that was like, what you call it, maybe a resident or something came in and I told him I said, You know, I don’t I really don’t feel well. He asked me if I had a fever? I thought it was their job. But he asked me if I have a fever. And I was like, I don’t think so. He was like, oh, okay, then you’re probably just tired or something like that. But it’s the thing. It was the evening. So the doctors come back to that . 

    Tiffany  12:10  

    So even though he said that there was gonna be somebody else coming in at least two, three minutes later. They always play me like that in the evening. I said that, I’m just going to talk to the next nurse. I said, I want to talk to the next doctor nurse that comes in here. 

    Winter  12:22  

    Yeah. 

    Tiffany  12:22  

    So another two or three minutes later, another nurse came in. And I told her, I said, I don’t feel good. She asked me a few more details to describe what was going on. I did and she was like, hold on. I’m going to go and get something to check your temperature. I’ll be right back. So she came in, she checked my temperature. And she was like, Okay, I gotta look at the doctor. Because I had a fever and the way I was describing how I was feeling, she was like, yeah, I gotta go get the doctor. I’ll be right back okay. 

    Tiffany  12:48  

    So the doctor came in and the doctor was like, I’m gonna do some more blood work on you. But I think we need to go to labor and delivery. And she’s like, I’m gonna get you prepped and I’m gonna do the blood work really quickly. I’m gonna get you prepped, then we’re gonna go up to labor and delivery. It is time for you to give birth because you have an infection. I think you have an infection.

    Winter  13:08  

    Okay. What were you thinking at that time? When they’re like, Okay, it’s time. 

    Tiffany  13:12  

    Yeah, I cried. I cried when she told me that because I was only like, 26 weeks, 26 and a half weeks. So I cried. My ex at the time I called him because he was at home. So he came to visit and stuff of course, but he was working. 

    Winter  13:27  

    Yeah. 

    Tiffany  13:28  

    He had gotten off at the time. So he was at home. I thought he was at home. I call him like, Hey, I’m gonna have to give birth, you’re going to have to come up here. And he’s like, Okay. He’s like, he was leaving the grocery store or something. He’s like I’m gonna throw this in the house. Then I’m coming right up there. 

    Tiffany  13:44  

    So he came. They put me in a room. They put me back on magnesium again. And they let him in. And then they gave me the pitocin to induce contractions, because throughout the whole thing, I never had contractions. I never really was in pain the whole time until they gave me the pitocin to start the contractions. 

    Tiffany  14:10  

    Yeah. And those can be powerful contractions.

    Tiffany  14:15  

    Very powerful contractions. It was pretty bad. So because I wanted to give birth without an epidural, but because I was given pitocin I was like, I need the epidural.

    Winter  14:25  

    Yeah, you’re like, bring it on.

    Tiffany  14:28  

    Yeah, I’m basically like, bring it on. But it was pretty quick. Because that night is when I was induced. I had her that next morning. 

    Winter  14:34  

    Oh, wow. Okay. Yeah, very quickly. Um, so obviously, when you were told that you had to have your baby basically because you have an infection. You’re at 27 weeks, have the doc-

    Tiffany  14:49  

    –26 weeks.

    Winter  14:50  

    Excuse me. 26 weeks, had the doctors talk to you about what that meant if the baby was going to be born at that time. What did they tell you?

    Tiffany  15:01  

    Um, they told me about learning disabilities and breathing issues. They told me that when I first got to the hospital and got admitted in general I was like 24 weeks. They tell me that then. Then as I was, before I gave birth, when I was laying in the hospital bed on labor delivery, before I had her. They were telling me about the complications. They told me that girls have a slight, slightly higher chance of surviving the boys. They told me neurological issues, you know, things like that could happen. Breathing issues, and they told me that they were going to try to help her. And you know, stuff doctors usually say.

    Winter  15:38  

    Yeah. What were you thinking about what they were saying? Were you worried about all those things? Well, I guess the other thing is that you were worried about the possibility that she wouldn’t make it?

    Tiffany  15:51  

    I was. I told my ex when we first got to the hospital when I was in labor and delivery. I told him at the beginning I said, she’s not gonna make it. I said, she’s gonna die. We’re gonna lose her. I told him that at 24 weeks. I said she’s not gonna make it. He said yes she is. I’m crying and I said no she’s not. She’s not going to make it. She’s not gonna make it. The second time that the doctor was talking to me right before I gave birth. I was actually Okay, at that point. I wasn’t crying or anything. I was fine at that point.

    Tiffany  16:29  

    When I gave birth to her that morning, she came out and she didn’t cry. I was like why? I couldn’t see it at first, because the way they had me positioned. Why wasn’t she crying? Why didn’t she cry? My ex Corey is explaining that she’s just looking around. Like, she wasn’t crying. But she was so amazing. She was so surprised she couldn’t cry. So I was laughing because she wasn’t crying. She tried to cry a little bit after they tried to get her away. But she was so surprised. She just looked around the whole time.

    Winter  17:03  

    Really?

    Tiffany  17:05  

    Really.

    Winter  17:05  

    She’s just looking around observing the world. She’s like, wait a second.

    Tiffany  17:09  

    In shock observing the world. That’s why she didn’t cry. So she came out and my ex is like, look I told you she was gonna be okay. Look, she’s looking around. She’s looking around. She’s, she’s gonna be okay. He went over there to look at her while they were doing work on her and stuff. They took her as soon as I had her. They took her and they put her in a room kind of connected to mine. They put her in that tube and put the bags and everything on her. And he was like, you know, I looked over and she’s okay. She’s fine. And I was like, okay, and one other thing. They told me before I gave birth, they say I might not see her for 24 hours. And I was thinking why I said I was like, that’s not gonna happen. But oh, yeah, I made sure that didn’t happen. I went to see you.

    Winter  17:51  

    Oh, good. So you labored. They started you on pitocin the night before. And then you gave birth to her in the morning? What time is it in the morning? 

    Tiffany  17:59  

    I think it was like five. I’m not exactly sure about the time. I forgot the actual time. It was like five or something in the morning.

    Winter  18:06  

    Okay, so several hours of laboring and when you gave birth, what, what was your feeling? Like? And it sounds like you were a little concerned that she wasn’t crying. But um, how did you feel?

    Tiffany  18:18  

    I was happy after I gave birth to her. So they said, you know, we’re going to take it to the NICU. And after they took her away, I fell asleep immediately.

    Winter  18:24  

    Oh?

    Tiffany  18:24  

    Like as soon as they  took her away, I fell asleep. And then after that, I woke up and I was like— because they told me before I fell asleep they said call us when you’re ready to get up and go to the restroom. Okay. So I fell asleep and I woke up and I was called by the nurse. I said, Okay, I’m ready to go to the restroom and I’m ready to see my daughter Khyana.

    Winter  18:46  

    Okay, yeah. 

    Tiffany  18:48  

    They helped me and put me in a wheelchair. The first time I went down there.

    Winter  18:53  

    Okay.

    Tiffany  18:54  

    To see her because it was a lot. Then they moved me. They made sure I was okay and they moved me back downstairs again since I’ve given birth. After that, I knew what they showed me where the NICU was at. So I just used the rail and walked myself— using the rail I dragged myself down there. Kind of like walking. They were like Wow, you’re doing great. I was like yeah my daughter’s in the NICU. I can’t wait for somebody to bring me a wheelchair. I gotta go see her. 

    Winter  19:19  

    Yeah, that’s great. Was it on the same floor at least?

    Tiffany  19:24  

    It was on the same floor.

    Winter  19:24  

    Okay good because I was like oh man! 

    Tiffany  19:25  

    It was a long hallway or what felt like a long hallway. It was on the same floor.

    Winter  19:31  

    Okay. 

    Tiffany  19:33  

    Yeah, everybody’s like you’re doing amazing after all that. I can’t believe you can get up and go down the hall. Because of everything that happened. I was like, yeah.

    Winter  19:42  

    Yeah. So she is. So when she came out, was she breathing on her own? Was she doing okay, like how? Was there any physical things that she was kind of struggling with? I guess she is only 26 weeks old. So that’s why I’m wondering.

    Tiffany  20:04  

    She didn’t have anything like her outside. She didn’t have any physical deformities or anything. They did have to help her with breathing. They actually took her off the breathing thing at one point for a very short period of time, I think maybe about an hour, hour and a half. But she wasn’t ready for it yet, so they’ve kind of put her back on there.

    Winter  20:24  

    Yeah.

    Tiffany  20:25  

    It was mostly her inside. Her outside was perfect. She is still very small, but she was a pound and 14 ounces.

    Winter  20:32  

    Oh, that’s small. 

    Tiffany  20:33  

    Extremely small, but her outside looked perfect. It was the inside that we’re having the issues with.

    Winter  20:39  

    Yeah, so her lungs were probably not developed and any other things that they told you about?

    Tiffany  20:46  

    It was mainly just her lungs and there’s like, you know, certain parts of her, you know, insides might not have developed fully, but it was mainly I think her lungs until she was about four days old.

    Winter  20:59  

    Gotcha. Okay. So tell me her name is Khyana. How did you guys choose that name? Is there any special meaning behind it?

    Tiffany  21:10  

    Not really. See we didn’t want her to have a name that everybody else had. My ex and I were watching something on TV and something or someone’s name was Tiana. He was like, he was like, how about Tiana? I said no, not Tiana. He was like, Okay, how about Khyana? I was like okay, I want to do Khyana. So that’s what we decided to call her and my sister actually came up with the spelling. So I wasn’t sure how I was going to spell it. My little sister came up with it.

    Winter  21:40  

    Nice. Okay, well, that’s, I love it when people are like, this sounds good. This fits her.

    Tiffany  21:46  

    Yes. That’s basically what happened. 

    Winter  21:48  

    So she is in the NICU and you are basically hanging out with her going and visiting her as much as possible. So what happens when she’s in the hospital?

    Tiffany  22:01  

    So the hospital that I gave birth at that’s where she stayed until she was four days old. So I told my boyfriend at the time. I was like, Can you bring a children’s book up here so we can actually read to her while she’s in the NICU. So that’s what we would do. We would both go to the NICU together and we would sit down and read to her.

    Winter  22:22  

    That is great. She’s all hooked up though. And everything to a breathing machine. 

    Tiffany  22:28  

    Yeah. It was hard. The first time I saw her I broke down crying because I saw all the tubes and stuff. All these machines and I started crying.

    Winter  22:37  

    Yeah. Were you able to hold her at all

    Tiffany  22:41  

    Not until she passed away unfortunately. I was able to hold her hands and stuff. But they wouldn’t let me pick her up and hold her out of the incubator type thing until she passed away.

    Winter  22:52  

    Yeah. That’s that doesn’t. That’s not great.

    Tiffany  22:57  

    Yeah. It was horrible.

    Winter  23:00  

    Yeah. So you guys are taking some time and spending it with her. She’s doing okay. It sounds like for a few days. Obviously, she can’t breathe on her own. But she is still doing okay. Is she putting on some weight.? I’m assuming they were giving her some tube feeds or something like that?

    Tiffany  23:17  

    Yeah, they were tube feeding her. And I was also pumping.

    Winter  23:21  

    Oh Okay.

    Tiffany  23:22  

    She did end up losing an ounce though. Going down to a pound and 13 ounces. And yeah, that was pretty rough. But I mean, it was only so much feeding her and giving her stuff that they could do to keep her weight up.

    Winter  23:36  

    Yeah. And babies usually do lose a little bit of weight while they’re in the hospital. In that first little bit. So what then happens?

    Tiffany  23:45  

    Day four we go in and we leave the house. We leave our house, we drive to the hospital. We go in and we see this x-ray machine over her. I was like why do they have that x-ray machine over her? The doctors are just like standing around. I noticed her stomach was distended. I was like what’s going on. The doctor was like, you know, we need to talk to you. I guess we came in at perfect timing before they called us. I was like, No. They said well we need to talk to you. They thought she needed surgery. She had some issue with her bowel and she needed surgery. And we need to transfer her to another hospital. To a children’s hospital with a level four because that’s a level three NICU I was at with her. She needed to be transferred to a level four NICU for surgery.

    Winter  24:40  

    Oh, wow. Was that hospital far away from the current hospital? 

    Tiffany  24:45  

    They were actually right beside each other. 

    Winter  24:47  

    Oh, okay. 

    Tiffany  24:47  

    So they are pretty much beside each other. 

    Winter  24:49  

    Okay, so it wouldn’t have been a super crazy trip or anything to get her there.

    Tiffany  24:56  

    Yeah, it wasn’t a crazy trip. It took a minute though because the ambulance had to get all the equipment on her. Then get her there with all the equipment and stuff. So that’s what took a minute really.

    Winter  25:12  

    When the doctor said that there was something wrong with her bowels, did they tell you it was a blockage? Did they give you any idea of what was going on specifically and what they would have to do for surgery?

    Tiffany  25:26  

    Yeah, they thought maybe there was a hole or something in her bowel. They kind of told me it was some procedure that they wanted to get the air out because her stomach was so distended.

    Tiffany  25:35  

    Okay. 

    Tiffany  25:37  

    So they want to do something to let the air out of her stomach when they transfer her. They couldn’t do it there, so they want to do it the other hospital.

    Winter  25:44  

    Okay. So they transferred her and then she went into surgery. Is that right?

    Tiffany  25:51  

    Yeah, I told her bye at the hospital. That was the last time I saw her alive at that hospital. At the level three NICU the one I gave birth to her in. When they transferred her. I didn’t see her. I saw the cart. The thing that she was in, but I couldn’t see her when they went past me. 

    Winter  26:12  

    Because you are still admitted in the hospital? 

    Tiffany  26:15  

    I just got out like I think a day or two before that. I just got out of the hospital. 

    Winter  26:19  

    Okay, so you really had not you hadn’t been spending tons of time with her. You were there and I’m sure you were in the NICU a bit, but you didn’t really get that the last time you saw her alive was right there in the NICU. So, what kind of risks and I guess what kind of odds and risks did the doctors tell you about even that surgery as she was going into it?

    Tiffany  26:44  

    They told me that the surgery, it does come with risk, but it will. It will help and it’s better than leaving her the way she was. The thing is she never ended up getting the surgery. They were preparing to give her the surgery. They were prepping like cleaning up like wiping down stuff like that. They were prepping her for surgery. That’s when her heart stopped. 

    Winter  27:09  

    Oh?

    Tiffany  27:10  

    So, she never even got the surgery. 

    Winter  27:12  

    Oh, wow. So her heart stopped when she was in the OR basically. I’m assuming they tried life saving measures as best as they could?

    Tiffany  27:24  

    They did. They came out and they told us about her. Because I heard a light go off. I saw a light go off. I knew honestly I just didn’t want to believe it. But I knew it was hers.

    Winter  27:37  

    Really?

    Tiffany  27:38  

    It was code blue, or something like that. A light had gone off. It was making noise and everybody took off into that room. So we weren’t in the room at the time it was in a waiting room.

    Tiffany  27:47  

    I knew it at the time before they even told us. I knew. We both– me and my ex we both kind of figured that was hers. 

    Winter  27:54  

    So you see everybody head off into that room. You kind of have this feeling. Do they come out and tell you shortly afterward? What’s the time timeline of events there?

    Tiffany  28:07  

    They tried. They came out and told us. 

    Tiffany  28:09  

    Okay, so after we saw everybody go into the room somebody later came out. It was two people who later came out and they said hey, like we’re trying to resuscitate your daughter. We are trying the best we can and stuff like that. It was another parent. There were more parents in the room. I started crying after that. That’s before we even got to go back there. But I started crying and everyone was like it’s okay, this happened to my son as well or something like that. She said that this happened to my son before to– Yeah, I think it’s her child. Her child as well and she’s like it will be okay because I was crying in the waiting room. 

    Tiffany  28:47  

    So the next time somebody came back out, they took us back. They didn’t tell us that they wanted to stop at a time. They just said we’re gonna take you back there with her. We walked in and we saw all these people over her like people putting drugs into her IV. Trying to give her CPR. We saw all of that when we walked in. I was just shocked. 

    Tiffany  29:11  

    The doctor was like,– what was the exact word that she said– There’s only one next step to take or something like that. And I was like, What is it? So we want to stop with resuscitation. We want to stop. And I started crying. The doctor put her hand up. She told him to stop. But after that honestly I do not think there was no bringing her back anyway. But the doctor told her to stop. 

    Tiffany  29:42  

    After that my ex stormed out of the room. I was just in the room crying because somebody had brought me some water in there or something. So, somebody went and found him and brought him back, but we were devastated. 

    Winter  29:59  

    Yeah. Yeah, how could you not be? So did you get to spend some time with her?After she passed away? 

    Tiffany  30:08  

    After she passed away, they let us hold her. They let us hold her and hold as long as we wanted to. Someone, I think a chaplain or pastor asked if we needed anyone at the moment. I was like no. No, we don’t want to talk to a chaplain or pastor or anything right now. 

    Tiffany  30:31  

    Then, you know, the doctors and nurses, they kept coming in and checking on us. They let us do the molds with her, as well as let us take pictures with her after she passed away. I can’t look at those pictures that they took. It’s been almost three years and I still can’t put that jump drive into my computer and look at them.

    Winter  30:50  

    Yeah, it’s too hard. Sometimes. It’s so hard.

    Tiffany  30:54  

    Yeah. There was actually a nurse there that had lost her son. Her son was I think her son was stillborn. So she came in and checked on us a lot. She was really sweet. She actually started crying too because I was asking her what to do? And she started crying too.

    Winter  31:13  

    Yep, it’s such a terrible thing. It’s so yeah, it’s devastating. And to have to remember all of that. So were we able to do the hand and foot molds?

    Tiffany  31:25  

    Yes.

    Winter  31:26  

    Awesome. 

    Tiffany  31:29  

    One they did with her father actually came out better than mine. Those did come out a little better.

    Winter  31:38  

    Then you guys got some photos, which is great. And Was that something that the hospital did like that? Were they able to take pictures? Or were you guys just have cell phones and that type of thing and took pictures with her?

    Tiffany  31:49  

    Actually, right after she passed? I told my ex I wanted a picture. I wanted a picture with them. So I can look at the one that was actually on my phone. I took a picture with her. I’ve never posted it. I never shared it with anybody. Because for me personally, I didn’t see her alive. I don’t want to post pictures of her not being alive.

    Winter  32:10  

    Yeah.

    Tiffany  32:11  

    So that was it for me. Like they’re there for my viewing only. They’re not for like the world’s viewing. So I’ve never shared those.

    Winter  32:19  

    Yeah, those can be so precious. And so personal and private. I think that’s great. That those should be yours. So you’re in the hospital. You guys get to spend some time. What were the next steps? What did they tell you about that? About what needed to happen after she passed away?

    Tiffany  32:44  

    Oh, they basically told us a social worker will be in contact with you. I remember that part. They gave me a few resources, but those were the main two things. I had a doctor. Well, I think she was a nurse who came out and told me she was like, you know, I didn’t know her long. But she was very feisty. Yeah it hurt a lot.

    Winter  33:10  

    Yeah. I like that. She was very feisty. 

    Tiffany  33:13  

    Yeah, actually, I was happy that you know, someone said something good about her.

    Winter  33:17  

    Yeah, exactly. We want people to talk about our kids in a good light, right?

    Tiffany  33:24  

    Yes.

    Winter  33:26  

    So a social worker comes in, you get some resources. Do they tell you what needs to happen? Like do they offer like, okay, you need to figure out what, what needs to happen in regards to her body. 

    Tiffany  33:39  

    Um, that came later the social worker came later they gave, they said, someone’s got to be in contact with me. So I think there was a social worker there. But that’s not the person that I ended up talking to afterwards. They assigned me to someone else. She was the one who called, she told me about, well, first, I need to think about it after she died. 

    Tiffany  33:59  

    That’s the weird thing. I didn’t think about what to do with her body. I never thought about that part. Like it never crossed my mind until they called me and asked me if I wanted to cremate her or have a funeral. I told them I will call them back later while I was crying. Because at that point, well, I’m not gonna back up a little bit. So I might Yeah, I might start off a little bit. So we left the hospital.

    Tiffany  34:22  

     Okay. 

    Tiffany  34:23  

    With the baby stuff. Like all the stuff we had her because we were in a program. There was some program in the DC area where if you went to a few classes, they would give you stuff for your baby. So all this stuff, my ex had gotten the stuff while I was in the hospital and put it in the house because he was like, okay, so she’s in the hospital and now she’s probably going to give birth early. We’ll go ahead and give you everything. 

    Tiffany  34:46  

    So all the stuff was basically in the living room. 

    Winter  34:48  

    Oh?

    Tiffany  34:50  

    I went immediately to our bedroom and cried. I couldn’t I couldn’t deal with the stuff in the living room. 

    Winter  34:58  

    Yeah.

    Tiffany  34:59  

    I had my ex move everything into the second bedroom that we had at the apartment,so I can come out. My family actually came the next day after everything happened because they’re in Georgia and were in the DC area. So they were afraid. 

    Winter  35:18  

    Yeah. 

    Tiffany  35:19  

    So they ended up coming as well.

    Winter  35:22  

    That’s great. So they were able to be with you and help you with everything.

    Tiffany  35:28  

    Yeah, they were able to come and help me. Um, it was pretty difficult because I would just wake up and I would cry every day. Pretty much like that’s there. Yeah, the first few days that she died every day, I woke up in the morning, just crying because I knew she wasn’t there anymore.

    Tiffany  35:42  

    I couldn’t pump because I was full of milk, but I couldn’t pump it because I’m like, I don’t want to use the machine. I just didn’t want to touch it. I guess it hurt. It hurt too much emotionally to touch it. So I was just in pain. I could get a little bit out like in the shower and stuff. But I was hurting a little bit physically too. Someone told me some over the counter stuff that can help. I did stuff like that. That dried it up versus trying to pump anymore. 

    Winter  36:13  

    Yeah. Okay. 

    Tiffany  36:15  

    I couldn’t do it anymore. I couldn’t do it. 

    Winter  36:18  

    Yeah, it’s just another painful reminder. I think it’s another painful reminder that your baby’s not there. It stinks. So your family’s home with you. It sounds like obviously, you are so sad and crying a fair amount. Then is that when the social worker or the hospital calls and asks what you guys want to do with Khyana’s body? 

    Tiffany  36:42  

    Yes, she called right– Because my ex, he actually went back to work like two days later, I think. Because the next day was a holiday, Memorial Day. The next day was a holiday. The day after that he went back to work. So he wasn’t there, my family was there, but he went straight back to work immediately. 

    Tiffany  37:01  

    So when they called the social worker, I talked to her a little bit before that. But then she called one day and asked. I knew they were doing an autopsy. So I knew that part. But I didn’t. I just didn’t think about what they would do with the body afterwards like no clue. When they call and ask, I’m like, I don’t know what to do. I’m just crying really hard. My mom, she kind of brought me down. 

    Tiffany  37:24  

    So my ex came, my boyfriend at the time, he came to the door. We talked about it because at first I kind of wanted to do a funeral. Then I decided not to. I didn’t do that. To me. Me personally. It feels weird to have a body just sitting in the ground in a casket forever. So I didn’t. I didn’t want that for her. So we decided on cremation. We actually were able to actually cremate her for free. 

    Winter  37:54  

    Okay. 

    Tiffany  37:55  

    Yeah, it was some program that they had.

    Winter  37:58  

    I do want to go back, Tiffany about the autopsy. So they wanted to so I’m assuming you consented to having an autopsy on Khyana to figure out what happened. So what was it? Was there anything conclusive about that?

    Tiffany  38:13  

    Um, yeah, they told me that when it was finally over with, they called me up. They called me up and picked out a day. They told me that it was– a hard day because the doctor that was there for the day a social worker was like, “Hey, we thought she was going to be available. She was supposed to be available, but something happened. Did you want to reschedule it, or do you just want to talk to the person who did the autopsy?” I’m like, well, I’ve been waiting long enough for this at this point. I’m like, I just want to talk to the person who did the autopsy?

    Winter  38:47  

    Yeah. And how and how long was that? Before you got that information?

    Tiffany  38:52  

    Um, I can’t quite remember. I think it was about two months. 

    Winter  38:56  

    Okay. I was gonna say–

    Tiffany  38:57  

    –It wasn’t an immediate thing. 

    Winter  38:59  

    Yeah, exactly. I know a lot of people think that the autopsy is done. And then it’s like, oh, it’s like a you know, three days later, but I think that’s one thing that people–

    Tiffany  39:07  

    I wish. 

    Winter  39:07  

    Yeah, that’s one thing people I don’t think realize is that autopsies take a lot of time to do because they have to evaluate tissues and write reports and everything like that. So it does take like two months, like two or three months sometimes. So you did talk to that doctor, or yeah, you probably talked to the doctor who performed the autopsy. So what did they say?

    Tiffany  39:28  

    Um, they told me that because of the hole in her bowel. She was it— the whole in her bowel was pretty much what killed her and the fact that she was only like a pound and 13 ounces as well. I think that’s– I’m not really sure what they said about her heart and lungs and stuff. I think those were kind of weak as well, which was typical. But the main thing that killed her was her size and the infection that she had because she also had an infection in the hole in her bowel. 

    Tiffany  39:58  

    Yes, okay. So that would be so hard. Did you guys do any sort of memorial service? I know that you cremated her, but did you guys have any sort of yeah memorial service for her? Since it sounds like your family was there and or nearby anyway?

    Tiffany  40:19  

    Um yeah, we did. We went to Georgia and had it because my ex he’s from Georgia and I am as well. We’re from different parts of Georgia.

    Winter  40:27  

    Gotcha.

    Tiffany  40:28  

    We are both from Georgia. So we went to Georgia, and went to my parents house and hadit. His side of his family came as well. We had this big cookout. We had someone say a prayer before we ate it. It was nice. We had drinks. It was fun. It was fun. I enjoyed it wasn’t like a sad thing. That’s why I don’t like funerals personally. 

    Winter  40:53  

    Yeah.

    Tiffany  40:54  

    I wanted to do a celebration of life thing and just enjoy the life that– the short life that she did have. I don’t want to sit around and cry at a funeral that is just me personally. 

    Winter  41:04  

    Yeah, yeah. No, no, I think that’s how you would want to honor her. Right? I mean, you don’t want to be sitting around being sad. So that was probably quite the, that sounded like that was good. Maybe healing to have that time together as a family and to think about her. Now I guess the question is, how are you doing now? Like, how has it been for you?

    Tiffany  41:33  

    The month of May is always the hardest for me because her birthday ,her death day, and Mother’s Day are all in the same month. 

    Winter  41:40  

    It is just that’s like–

    Tiffany  41:42  

    -It destroys me every year until the end. I managed from the beginning of that month to around the 29th or 30th is when I’m okay. 

    Winter  41:51  

    Yeah.

    Tiffany  41:52  

    But that whole month I am a disaster. 

    Winter  41:55  

    Yeah. Just a reminder, right. 

    Tiffany  41:58  

    A painful reminder.

    Winter  42:01  

    Just a reminder. Well, can you tell me a little bit more? Anything more that you would like to tell us about Khyana about who she was and like yeah anything that you want to tell us that you’d like to remember about her?

    Tiffany  42:17  

    Um, I like to remember how sometimes she actually had a tight grip to be so small with her hands she actually had a really tight grip. I was really happy that she actually was –I mean she was four pounds 14 ounces so she was weaker, but she really didn’t look like it. She actually was a little strong. I saw muscles in her calf and stuff. I was like wow, I wasn’t expecting that. I was expecting a frail baby. A very frail deformed baby. I wasn’t expecting that. I know her insides we’re not formed correctly, but on the outside. She’s just an extremely small baby.

    Winter  43:04  

    Yeah. Yeah. That’s awesome.

    Winter  43:11  

    Well, Tiffany, thank you so much for sharing the story of your sweet daughter Khyana. We appreciate you sharing it. It’s always hard and I hope this honors her. 

    Tiffany  43:24  

    Thank you.

    Transcribed by https://otter.ai

    Filed Under: birth story, early neonatal infant death (<7 days), infant death, podcast episode Tagged With: infant loss

    A Father’s Birth Story and Death of Son via Emergency C-Section at 26 Weeks

    February 7, 2022 by Winter

    Dad Matt shares the birth story of his son Owen David at 26 weeks and his subsequent death a few hours after he was born. His wife Lori Ann had a cerclage put in earlier, but her water broke at 21 weeks. Lori Ann stayed on bed rest till 24 weeks and was admitted to the hospital so they could do everything medically possible to keep Owen alive.

    She developed an infection and Owen was delivered by emergency C-section at 26 weeks. Owen was unable to breath on his own, and Matt and Lori Ann were able to be with him and hold him before he died.

    Watch here (YouTube):

    Listen here (podcast):

    Time Stamps:

    00:00 Baby’s name

    You might appreciate these other episodes:

    • Watch/listen Lori Ann’s (Matt’s wife) birth episode of son Owen: Click here
    • Watch/listen to Lori Ann’s advice episode after Owen’s death: Click here

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    Matt and LoriAnn with their son Owen

    Full Transcription:

    Matt’s Story of Son Owen 

    Matt Liddle  0:01  

    My child’s name is Owen David. 

    Matt Liddle  0:10  

    I remember the moment he opened his eyes. There’s a lot of tubes and a lot of people but the moment he opened his eyes, they were just so precious. No surprise, he had a full head of hair. I thought he was perfect. He was something else.

    Winter  0:30  

    Welcome to Still A Part of Us a place where moms and dads share the story of their child who was stillborn or who died in infancy. I’m Winter.

    Lee  0:37  

    And I’m Lee, we are grateful you joined us today. Please know that this is a story of loss and has triggers

    Winter  0:43  

    Thanks to our loss parents who are willing to be vulnerable and share their children with us.

    Lee  0:47  

    If you’re listening to this podcast, just know that on our YouTube channel, there are pictures and videos that are related to the stories that are being shared.

    Winter  0:54  

    Subscribe and share it with a friend that might need it and tell them to subscribe. Why? Because people need to know that even though our babies are no longer with us, they’re still a part of us.

    Lee  1:07  

    Now Matt, please tell me about yourself. 

    Matt Liddle  1:10  

    Okay. So right now every day is a little different for me. I wake up feeling great and other days, and I wake up feeling extremely sad and depressed. On days I’m feeling down, it’s very hard to get out of bed, nevermind accomplishing anything. 

    Matt Liddle  1:31  

    Currently, I’m unemployed due to COVID. And to be honest, I’m not ready to go back to work yet, even if COVID wasn’t a thing. It’s hard to really truly accept what happened. I think I’m at that point now where I’m kind of dealing with it. I’m really finally allowing it to go through. 

    Matt Liddle  1:55  

    Before Owen passed I was actually living my dream job. I’ve had a pretty complicated childhood. And it’s because of things outside of my control and I have zero consistency in my life. So what better job to do than to find something to fix problems. You have a star consistency and training program. 

    Matt Liddle  2:23  

    So I started working in a pot room and a fragrance company is a very big company, but I just needed to get my foot in the door. I’m the kind of guy who thinks it’s not where you are in life, but it’s where you want to be. I just wanted to get my foot in and prove myself faster, multiple promotions, and I ended up working in the office as opposed to working in a union at the plant. I was figuring out ways to cut production time and at the same time saving the company money. So I felt great. 

    Matt Liddle  3:01  

    Yeah, so I was the first person in my family to graduate high school. So, me going anywhere for a job was huge. The main goal for my life was, oh, you’re going to be on welfare, just like your parents, and stuff like that. But I met Laurie Ann. She really changed my life. I felt like I could do anything and I wanted to give this girl what she deserves because I didn’t really feel like I deserved anything at all. 

    Matt Liddle  3:36  

    Push came to shove, I started doing very well and got a great job. I was actually in the middle of the interview when I found out that she wasn’t doing well. So I went home that night and her water broke. 

    Matt Liddle  3:57  

    We were actually sitting in the living room and do you ever see a look on the person you love’s face and you can just tell something’s completely wrong, but they’re kind of stuck in like shock? 

    Lee  4:12  

    Yeah.

    Matt Liddle  4:12  

    So I started trying to talk to her and she’s like, my water broke. At that point, we’re only 21 weeks. This is impossible, but for some reason my mind just went. I said go to the bathroom by yourself. In the meantime, I went and I packed the bag and I did all these things. Because we weren’t even to that point where you should have a bag and stuff. 

    Lee  4:43  

    Yeah. 

    Matt Liddle  4:43  

    So I kinda wasn’t thinking and the car ride down. I was just trying to make her feel better. I don’t know if it’s a man thing, or a husband thing you kind of just always want to make your wife feel better. Kind of put your emotions to the side. We finally got to the hospital. I felt like it took an eternity. But finally we saw a nurse. She did a swab and it came out the color blue. 

    Matt Liddle  5:14  

    I remember the color and everything she said,” I’m really sorry to tell you that your water broke.” The only thing I remember, which still haunts me, is just my wife’s face. She just put her hands on her head and said the F bomb. Like, that’s it. That’s all she could say. And she couldn’t move. At that point, I was in complete shock. I had no idea. What do you say? What do you do?  

    Lee  5:43  

    Yeah, there’s yeah.

    Matt Liddle  5:46  

    I mean, it was horrible. Then they told us that we actually had to wait until the next day to speak to a doctor. So we’re like–

    Lee  5:56  

     Was this later at night? Where was it?

    Matt Liddle  5:58  

    Yes, it was later at night. It was I believe it was around one o’clock in the morning. Her gynecologist just wasn’t at the hospital. None of her team wasn’t at the hospital or anything. So that night, we’ll go back to talking about things that I don’t remember, because it was so stressful. I don’t remember what we did that night. I don’t know how it made it through that night.

    Lee  6:24  

    Were you at the hospital? Or did you have to go home?

    Matt Liddle  6:26  

    Yes. Okay. Yes, we were at the hospital at this point, because they said we want you to stay here until you could speak to your doctor and kind of come up with a plan. 

    Matt Liddle  6:39  

    So that night passed and the doctor came in and told us we had two choices, you have one you terminate right this second. Two, you go home and let your body naturally do what it does. So there’s no infection at the moment, and you’re not doing contractions, so you need to make a choice. 

    Matt Liddle  7:09  

    I mean, our world was upside down at that point, because we had done tons of fertility treatments. It took us our third try of IOI just to get pregnant. So we’re like, we’re not going to give up now we’re fighters. We’ve got to do this. Let’s find out the information on how it would go either which way. 

    Matt Liddle  7:30  

    So they said you can go home, let nature run its course, unfortunately, we couldn’t do anything for you here at the hospital, you’d have to go back home. We wouldn’t take you until 25 weeks. 24- 25 weeks, something like that. They couldn’t give us a real recommendation, because we were at that point where it’s possible that Owen will be okay. But it’s also possible that he won’t be whatsoever and he’s in a gray area at the age that he was in that they can’t say. 

    Matt Liddle  8:11  

    So it’s after talking that night, we decided there’s no way we fought too hard. We were going to fight for this. So we spoke to the doctors and then we decided to go home. The hospital doesn’t consider pregnancy viable until I believe 24 weeks. So we had to go home. 

    Matt Liddle  8:38  

    We live about an hour from the hospital and my in-laws live about 30 minutes. So we said we should probably stay at the in-laws, in case something happens. We want to get there as soon as possible. 

    Matt Liddle  8:52  

    Just to rewind a little bit, our main concern was that Owen wouldn’t be in any pain whatsoever. If we went forward with this, we do not want any pain. Clearly there is a chance he won’t be okay if he did survive. He wouldn’t be screwed completely. 

    Matt Liddle  9:16  

    So we went to the in-laws, we started staying there and trying to I mean, Lori Ann wasn’t possible at the time because she was to the point where she wouldn’t give you a hug because she feels like she would jinx it. For some reason. Her mom would say, oh, let me pet your belly, rub your belly and she’d say, No, I don’t want you to jinx me just like that. Like. So, clearly she was petrified. 

    Lee  9:49  

    Yeah.

    Matt Liddle  9:49  

    During all this I was working at my dream job. I started at the pot room and I worked my way up from an office worker to a trainer so it just kept going. At that point, I had to make a decision, be there for my wife, or work. Right? My wife, completely petrified. Neither of us had any idea what could happen if she went into labor at any moment or an infection. 

    Matt Liddle  10:23  

    So I decided, let me try to go the family leave route, spend as much time as possible with my wife. We actually ended up making it to the point of the baby being viable in the hospital’s eyes. So we ended up going back to the hospital. That was around. My wife’s gonna kill me if I say this wrong. So if I think we got back to the hospital at 23 weeks, they let us come back. Yes, twenty three weeks, and then we’re able to start the whole process of maybe saving Owen. We started antibiotics, so she wouldn’t get an infection and things like that. 

    Matt Liddle  11:10  

    At that point. My job was extremely busy, and they’re giving me ultimatums. Well, for myself, I had to be there. There was nothing, I don’t care if I lost everything outside those hospital walls. Nothing else mattered to me more in the world than my wife and my child.

    Lee  11:32  

    Yeah, yeah. 

    Matt Liddle  11:33  

    So, I ended up parting ways with my job. I wouldn’t take that back, I would have made that choice a million times. Because my wife’s my superhero. I don’t know how it is for you, but my wife is one of the strongest people I know. Anyone in fertility treatments, anyone who deals with this kind of stuff. They’re very strong people.

    Matt Liddle  11:59  

    I was literally watching her demolish into nothing. Because of the constant fear of being on bed rest, not being able to do anything. Like, I couldn’t do it. Like I had to be there. I had to sleep there. I wouldn’t even go home. I would sleep there. 

    Matt Liddle  12:21  

    The doctors would come in twice a day to do ultrasounds. It was the scariest point of my life. Anytime the ultrasound would happen, my heart would stop. He even thought my wife was completely fine, I was fine. No worries. But every single time my heart would just drop, like no feeling. I can’t even describe the feeling. I feel like the fear is worse than any fear in the entire world. It’s unbelievable. 

    Matt Liddle  12:57  

    So push came to shove after all this, I lost my job. I had nothing. I had nothing outside of work besides my wife and my child. We had to figure out a way to get through it. Everyday stuff.

    Matt Liddle  13:16  

    It was horrible because we were on bedrest for three weeks at the hospital before they were able to do anything at all or until Owen came. After this whole situation. I can’t get out of bed. Nevermind work or live daily. I don’t know if that answered that question fully.

    Lee  13:46  

    I just feel for you. That’s all I can say is I feel for you. 

    Matt Liddle  13:51  

    Yeah. 

    Lee  13:53  

    So you were able to make it to the hospital. After you were about 34 weeks. Did you say? 

    Matt Liddle  14:01  

    No. Only 24 weeks. 

    Lee  14:03  

    Oh, yeah. 24 sorry, 24 weeks.

    Matt Liddle  14:10  

    Then what happened was 24 weeks. 24 weeks was when we were allowed to go back to the hospital. That’s when they were able to put her on antibiotics and monitor her twice a day. 

    Lee  14:25  

    How long were you in the hospital with that?

    Matt Liddle  14:27  

    So we ended up going till she was 26 weeks pregnant. So we were there for four weeks. I slept on a cot next to the bed every day. I wouldn’t leave like I couldn’t leave–

    Lee  14:47  

    Yeah, your life is in that room.

    Matt Liddle  14:53  

    Exactly. Yeah, it actually got to the point where the nurses would leave and I literally taught myself how to read all of the equipment. I mean the heart rate. I knew where it should have been. I studied that thing. It was and it’s unbelievable how clueless you are, when you’re in these situations. I feel like it would help a lot. If you knew. I mean, you if you knew any of this stuff. If your baby’s heart rate is too high. If there’s an infection or, when you hear the nurses say these things, in medical terms, you can get confused. 

    Matt Liddle  15:39  

    They’re so quick in and out. You sit there clueless, and your mind just keeps going. So I had to learn how to read the computer. I just wait till they leave and read. That’s the only thing that maybe kind of helped me feel better. To see a normal heart rate.

    Matt Liddle  15:59  

    So I literally slept on a chair next to her for 26 weeks. 26 weeks came and she woke up in the morning, and she wasn’t feeling well whatsoever. I knew something was completely wrong. So we called the doctor in and within a half hour, they said that we’re going to have to go in for an emergency surgery. For a C section, the baby has to come out right now. 

    Matt Liddle  16:34  

    I was supposed to be in the room for the C section, but maybe an hour before they gave her medicine for blood clots in her legs. So she was going to bleed a lot. So they decided that, oh, let’s put her out. So they made me suit up. I’m sitting in the room waiting. Then the doctors come back out. They say I need you to come into the room where Lori Ann was ready, she had the gown on and the hat. She was already on the metal table. I spoke to her for two seconds. I said I love you and went into the hallway and waited for the C section. 

    Matt Liddle  17:15  

    When I was out there. I was just not a sensitive guy in the past. I’m not a very sociable person. But I just broke down in the middle of the hallway. Nurses came and hugged me and they’re asking me questions. I was just so scared because it’s still so early. 26 weeks is really, really early. It felt like an eternity. But I just sat in the hallway and I cried and I cried. 

    Matt Liddle  17:53  

    Then they came and got me. They said your son’s been born and he’s doing fine. He’s doing great. He wants to come back and see him. So I saw him. Going back to one of the first things I noticed about him was his eyes because he opened his eyes and he looked right at me. It was really nice. There’s about four or five NICU doctors there. There’s so much going on. The machines are going. Then you kind of step back and you’re kind of speechless.

    Matt Liddle  18:28  

    You still have no idea if your babies are okay. 

    Lee  18:34  

    Yeah. 

    Matt Liddle  18:34  

    We got the escort up the elevator and into the NICU. He seemed fine. Everything was looking good. So I decided it’s time to go downstairs and talk to my in-laws because I had called them to tell them to come. To tell them what was happening. I said everything seems to be fine, but I want to go see my wife. 

    Matt Liddle  19:01  

    Then the doctor comes downstairs and gets me and he says, “I need you to come upstairs to see Owen and I just need to talk to you about some things.” When I got up there, there was a heart doctor there and their stuff was all over him. His feet are everywhere. 

    Matt Liddle  19:23  

    I was so scared. This is one of the biggest things I regret. I was so scared because everything was going on. There’s so many machines and noises that I was just too afraid to touch him. I put my hand in there once and he grabbed my finger. But then after that, I was just terrified to touch him. That’s one of the main things where I feel so guilty because I could have spent more time with him than I did. Because I went to my in-laws and my wife.

    Matt Liddle  20:02  

    I was just too scared. The heart doctor was there and all these machines were going off. People don’t explain to you that stuff because they’re way too busy trying to save your child. What was happening was that his blood pressure kept dropping, and they couldn’t tell why. 

    Matt Liddle  20:23  

    So they told me that they were going to try some meds and I should go down and spend some time with my wife. If anything’s really bad, I’m going to have to come and get you in, we’re going to have to go talk to your wife and have your wife come up and see the baby. See, she had the C section. So we knew something was wrong, if they were gonna come and get her to look at the baby.

    Matt Liddle  20:45  

    About two hours go by, and we get a knock on the door. It was the doctor, and he pulled me outside and said I’d like to speak to you about what’s going on. He said, listen, the blood pressure medications not working. it’s really not looking good. You might want to think about getting your wife upstairs. 

    Matt Liddle  21:07  

    So we went back to the room together. And when my wife saw the doctor, he said “I really want you to come upstairs to see your child.” I’ll never forget that look on her face. She just looked terrified, like completely terrified. 

    Matt Liddle  21:31  

    We went upstairs. They told us that there was really nothing they could do for the baby. The baby’s heart was checked so the only thing we can do at this point is take them off the ventilator and hold them until he goes. So my wife grabbed him. I’ve really regretted not holding him more and stuff. But I was just so scared.

    Lee  22:06  

    You probably felt lost too, scared and lost. 

    Matt Liddle  22:10  

    Very lost. Yeah, it was. It’s an experience that you wouldn’t wish on your worst enemies. My wife and I have been through a lot together with a lot of things. She has always been my superhero. Just to see her so broken. On top of watching my child pass away. 

    Matt Liddle  22:41  

    I mean, I don’t know how people are always worried about the women, but I don’t know how the men survive it to see the person. I mean, at least in my relationship, the person that means more than anything to me just collapses. It was very hard to take that in.

    Lee  23:04  

    Yeah. 

    Matt Liddle  23:04  

    I mean, it was really bad. It’s like, I’m speechless about this whole situation. Like I just shut down. I really don’t know. Because it’s like one of the hardest things that anyone can go through in their entire life. 

    Matt Liddle  23:21  

    I know on the paper it says what’s your hobbies and stuff? I used to love going fishing, playing with my dogs. I used to love life and now my hobbies. I mean, my hobby is nothing. I mean, not doing anything whatsoever. 

    Lee  23:44  

    You lose yourself. 

    Matt Liddle  23:45  

    Exactly. Yeah, yeah. You really do. You really find it. There’s like no words. 

    Lee  23:56  

    Yeah.

    Matt Liddle  23:57  

    I’m really not now, did your wife have a C section?

    Lee  24:02  

    No, no she had a vaginal birth with our son, Brannan. He was ready to go. When he passed away he was– with our first daughter with our firstborn we had a C section. But with our son Branna, he was born vaginally.

    Matt Liddle  24:21  

    No doubt that as a husband part there. I don’t know. So for me, when she comes home, she can wash herself in the shower and stuff. I handled all of that. The lactation and stuff. I mean, that destroyed me watching her go through that.

    Lee  24:45  

    It is such a cruel– the body after it’s such a cruel trick that that the body plays on the woman because–

    Matt Liddle  24:53  

    –Horrible

    Lee  24:54  

    Yeah. It really was painful to watch my wife and I’m sure it was painful for you to watch your wife have to go through all that. And nobody tells you, nobody tells you about it. Nobody tells you that the body still thinks that there is a child, even though the brain knows that your son has passed away. 

    Matt Liddle  25:16  

    Yeah, it’s cruel. I can’t believe it. I’m helping her shower, and she’s lactating. Up to a week, two weeks later. I mean, it went like eight, nine weeks. It’s cruell. It is horrible. It’s just a reminder that your son’s not there. You’re alone. You went through all of this to be alone right now. 

    Matt Liddle  25:44  

    I mean, I know he’s there he’s in–. I’m not a very spiritual guy at all, but I’m trying to learn to say that he’s here with us, or he’s in the sky or in heaven. Just because it’s cruel. Like, it’s, I don’t know, how do you? How do you put that into words? Like, how do you watch your wife go through that alone? I mean, not alone, but how do you? We’re men. We hurt. It really hurt her. It affected us. 

    Matt Liddle  26:20  

    I mean, for me, at least it killed me. But I’m not the one to carry that baby. I’m not the one who had to deal with lactation. And all the complications that come from the C .

    Lee  26:34  

    Post recovery and post op recovery.

    Matt Liddle  26:37  

    It’s terrible. Like, did that kill you as well? was that like?

    Lee  26:43  

    Yeah, yeah, it really, it really was one of those. I felt absolutely helpless and worthless as a man, as a husband, and as a friend to my wife, because there was nothing. I can make her as comfortable as possible. I can bring her anything, but there was nothing that I could do to alleviate her pain. And her and yeah, it really was just, it shattered me as a man. It killed me. It killed me as a man.

    Matt Liddle  27:19  

    And do you ever feel like you’ll pull yourself back up from that if I don’t know if I do?

    Lee  27:26  

    No. It’s both a no and a yes answer. Am I able to recover? No. Am I able to learn and change? Yes. Because what happened after the birth of our son? What happened after the death of our son that destroyed everything up to that point. And after that point, I had to rebuild. And I lost my son. My family is different. My relationship with my wife is different from what it was. My relationship with friends is different than what it was, was I able to recover? No, was I able to build new? Yes, I didn’t want to be the same person I was before. 

    Lee  28:21  

    I wanted to be a different person. And I’m able to start laying the foundation for the type of person I want to be and the type of person I need to be for my family. And like you said, the most important thing was my wife, and my daughter. For you, it was your wife, your wife was the most important person for you. And I had to change for the future. I couldn’t just be the same person with a different experience. I had to be a whole different person. I had to change, I had to be destroyed, I had to hit bottom and then forget who I was before, and go forward as an end build new. 

    Lee  29:11  

    Was able to recover? Yes and no. And I hope you are able to find what helps you. Because you’re a different person now than you were a year ago. 

    Matt Liddle  29:26  

    Oh, yeah. For sure. 

    Lee  29:28  

    You can’t be the same guy you were ten years ago, five years ago, three years ago. 

    Matt Liddle  29:36  

    There’s one who asked me what’s wrong. And I say have you ever felt a pain that you can never imagine in your life that you would actually survive? No, not really. But then don’t ask me that question. Because you wouldn’t really understand my answer.

    Lee  29:55  

    Because I’m feeling it every single moment of my life. 

    Matt Liddle  29:58  

    Yeah.

    Lee  29:59  

    Like you are feeling that pain that you never could have imagined every single moment of your life.

    Matt Liddle  30:08  

    Now we’re starting fertility treatments again very soon. Because it took us a very long time to even get pregnant. We got Owen when we had two failed IUI’s, and the third one actually worked.

    Matt Liddle  30:29  

    So, now we’re starting this whole thing all over again. But it’s gonna be in vitro. It’s kinda like, for me and I’m sure it’s like this for a lot of people, you feel like you would never ever survive something like this again, right? 

    Matt Liddle  30:49  

    But there’s where I’m wrong,  because I don’t know if I’ll have to survive this again. I’m assuming that I am. Because it happened in the past. I can’t I can’t think like that whatsoever. But it’s very hard not to. Because of everything, and to be honest, the scariest time of my life. 

    Lee  31:14  

    Yeah. 

    Matt Liddle  31:15  

    I mean, I lost my brother, my father, and my son, all within a year span. A year well over two years span. I don’t think I know how to explain it. It’s just like, it’s just being there bringings back everything, really rehashing everything. Even if you had someone to talk to, you’re not really talking to somebody unless they’ve exactly lived through it because they truly don’t understand whatsoever.

    Lee  31:59  

    Even though our situations are similar. They are light years apart. I can never fully understand what you’ve gone through. Nobody can truly understand us. 

    Matt Liddle  32:10  

    No. 

    Lee  32:10  

    Nobody. 

    Matt Liddle  32:11  

    Unless I mean, unless you can understand them. Because you can understand that pain. You, yeah. 

    Lee  32:20  

    It’s one of the– there’s the word empathy and sympathy, and I’m not good with which one means which. One means I can imagine what you’re going through. And one means I know what you’ve gone through. And because I’ve gone through what I’ve gone through, I think I can better understand what you’re going through. It’s not that I’ve had this same situation as you. We’ve had similar situations. I cannot try to help you. And you because you’ve gone through your situation. You can understand my situation a little bit better. 

    Matt Liddle  33:04  

    Yeah.

    Lee  33:05  

    Is it a perfect understanding? No. But they’re a lot similar. 

    Matt Liddle  33:12  

    There’s respect there. 

    Lee  33:13  

    Yeah. Respect. Yeah. Respect would be a good way. But yeah, it 

    Matt Liddle  33:20  

    I’m not good at talking. 

    Lee  33:25  

    Yeah. And it’s such a loaded reminiscence. When you talk about your son Owen. When you talk about his situation like his life and his birth and his death. I’m sure you want to shy away from stuff I’m sure you want to not talk about because I’m in that same situation, especially a year out from the birth of my son, Brannan. And his death. I didn’t want to talk about it. I sort of had to force myself to, it’s no fun no matter what. 

    Matt Liddle  34:01  

    No, not at all. 

    Lee  34:04  

    Going back to when the doctor came and got you and your wife. And he said that. Owen– and it’s not looking good for Owen. And they took him off of life support. And you got to be with him. How long did he live after being taken off of life support?

    Matt Liddle  34:25  

    Actually I mean, he wasn’t breathing on his own whatsoever. So they gave him phenytoin. So basically, we wouldn’t see him struggling for breath and all that. But now this is hard for me to tell you i

    Lee  34:45  

    If you don’t want to talk about it, don’t. 

    Matt Liddle  34:47  

    No, no, no, no, no, I do. So, now again, everybody’s different. Now he’s not living anymore. And the woman and my wife are talking about, Well, why don’t you bathe him and change him. I remember at that moment, like, he’s gone. 

    Lee  35:18  

    Yeah.

    Matt Liddle  35:21  

    The worst part that kills me is I look at my wife, and she’s gonna be the most amazing mother in the world. She’s so caring and loving. I remember the first words, the moment she saw him, she looked at me and said, he is perfect. Yes, he was perfect. But she was able to hold him, change him, bathe him and do all these things. I’m looking at her like, wow, I would never, in my wildest dreams, be able to do that. 

    Matt Liddle  36:11  

    I’m just watching you do it. I mean, we don’t give women enough strength. I mean, and same thing with men, like, none of my friends really know how I feel. They don’t really care. They have their own problems, they may care, but they don’t really know how much it does affect you or your wife. 

    Matt Liddle  36:41  

    I’ve heard things where people said, well, other women? Well, I’ve had a C section, I’ll see what the big deal is. I don’t know why it’s so hard for them. Yeah, but you have a reason to make it through all of that you had your C section, you have your baby there. You’re not waiting for your breast to get rock hard. So your milk will go away, you have no one to give the milk to. It’s unbelievable.

    Lee  37:12  

    Yeah.

    Matt Liddle  37:12  

    If you’re not a part of this club, which I really don’t want anyone in this club ever, you would never truly understand the pain that people really endure and what people have to go through just to have a child. Then you see all these people pushing out all these kids and having all these kids and it’s just like, It’s unbelievable. How is that fair? That’s another big thing I always go back to. It’s not fair.

    Lee  37:46  

    Yeah, it’s not fair. It is, and people will always say, well, life isn’t fair. But it just seems like such an injustice to me. But yeah, and there’s nothing I can do to change that injustice. 

    Matt Liddle  38:02  

    No.

    Lee  38:02  

     It is, it is what it is. But it just doesn’t. It doesn’t seem fair.

    Matt Liddle  38:08  

    One thing that I do really need help with is, how did you swallow your fear and everything and try again? Was your mind in a place where you weren’t scared at all that nothing would happen bad, or like I don’t? It’s hard to get going again. To try to have a kid.

    Lee  38:35  

    Yeah. Now, because we were about two years out before we started trying again. 

    Matt Liddle  38:45  

    Okay.

    Lee  38:46  

    I was scared. I was anxious. I was everything. I was apprehensive. I was scared. I was fearful. But we had a real, honest discussion, my wife and I, about what we want our family to be? Because we have an older daughter. We have our son Brannan. Are we okay, as a family like that? And yes, we were okay. As a family like that. 

    Lee  39:24  

    Then we discussed well, do we feel that we should? Because we are religious. Do we feel that we should add another member to our family? We’re not talking about whether we should add 15 more members to our family. But should we add one more? And there really was some serious internal dialogue. 

    Lee  39:52  

    There was serious communication between my wife and I. There were a lot of sleepless nights. Just pondering and praying and hoping that there some sort of enlightenment or some sort of prayer was answered. I felt that as a family we should have another. No, it wasn’t like, Oh, we should not have a child. I think we should try.

    Lee  40:19  

    We gave ourselves– because we had infertility issues as well. We said well let us try and we gave ourselves X amount of months, let’s try this amount of months.We were seeing as fertility specialists and so it was like if it doesn’t happen within this time, we’re okay. We’re okay if we don’t have a child. But if it happens, we’re okay if we do have a child, and there’s all sorts of fear. 

    Lee  40:57  

    You know Matt you’re going to feel it, you’re going to feel all sorts of fear and happiness, you’re going to feel hope. You’re going to fear you’re going to feel like I said, you’re going to feel everything. You’re going to feel good, you’re going to feel bad, you’re going to feel happy, you’re going to feel sad, joy and hate and rage and anger. But you’re going to also feel that good side as well. You’re going to see a child growing, you will feel everything good and bad.

    Matt Liddle  41:33  

    Now that old pregnancy where you completely freaked out, it was gonna happen again. Or was there ever a point where you kind of calmed down and were like okay, I think we’re okay. 

    Lee  41:46  

    Nope, I was a mess the whole pregnancy. So, yeah, it really was just a belief that my wife, my wife’s body can do what it needs to do. My wife tried her best to be healthy. We tried our best to eat healthy and exercise. We’re not Olympic athletes by any means. We’re not even amateur athletes by any means. 

    Matt Liddle  42:17  

    But you’re trying. 

    Lee  42:19  

    Yeah well. Sometimes some days, some days we’re trying. But we were like we will do the best we can to give my wife’s body the best nutrition. I made sure she went to bed. I made sure that she–

    Lee  42:41  

    You know what I have a problem with when she says it’s because of my body. This happened. I get angry. 

    Lee  42:50  

    Yeah. It’s nothing that can really be blamed. It’s not her fault. It’s not your fault. It’s not. It just happened. It sucks. It sucks. It’s unfair. It’s just the worst. But it’s hard to stop thinking like that. Because we naturally want to say we naturally want to have something that we can point to as being the problem. When there’s not a problem, it’s easy to internalize it and say it was my fault. 

    Matt Liddle  43:28  

    Yeah. 

    Lee  43:29  

    But in all reality, it was nobody’s fault. It just, it just happened. It just happened. And it sucks. It’s the worst thing to ever happen. But it just happens. That’s all we could really say it sucks. It’s just the worst.

    Matt Liddle  43:51  

    You kind of feel robbed he was in our arms, he was there.We were right there. 

    Lee  44:00  

    You were approaching the finish line.

    Matt Liddle  44:04  

    So, you don’t know what to be. Or you are all of the things your emotions are angry, sad, like, unreal. Yeah.

    Lee  44:18  

    I love how you put it. You don’t know what to be, but you feel all the emotions. Like you don’t know if you should be angry or mad or sad. I felt guilty for a long time laughing and enjoying myself. Because I shouldn’t feel that my child is dead. I shouldn’t be. I shouldn’t be laughing. I shouldn’t enjoy anything but you do feel all the emotions and there’s a time and place there’s a time to feel joy. There is a time to feel happiness. And there is a time also to feel anger and there’s a time to also feel sadness. So–

    Matt Liddle  44:59  

    –It’s kind of you’re a prisoner of your own mind. Because you can go out saying what, I’m gonna be a good, it’s gonna be a good day. But then you go down to the store and you walk past the baby section and you’re not having a good day anymore. 

    Lee  45:15  

    It turns it upside down. 

    Matt Liddle  45:18  

    Then there’s nothing you can do. I mean, you can’t avoid it. How do you deal with it? What is he dealing with? You can’t really deal with it. I don’t know. It’s just like, I feel like that will never go away. Never always feel like a prisoner of my own mind. Because I could be in the happiest mood. I could be thinking this, but if I see something, it’s over. 

    Lee  45:46  

    Yeah.

    Matt Liddle  45:47  

    It goes right to it. Are you able to, like get back and function to like your normal life duties right away?

    Lee  45:55  

    No, no, not not right away. It does take time. There’s that adage that time heals all wounds. But it leaves scars. Time does heal wounds, but they leave scars. 

    Matt Liddle  46:08  

    That’s very true. And they’ll always be there. 

    Lee  46:10  

    Yeah, like I’ve, I’ve broken many bones in my body. And I still have issues with those broken bones. Did they heal fully? Did they? No, some of them didn’t heal fully, but I’m functioning. Am I whole? No, I am not whole, I am not whole after this, this tragedy. But I am able to continue on. 

    Lee  46:38  

    It took a long time for me to be able to continue on. Because there were times that I just wanted to stay there and just stay in that pain and in that sadness, and in that grief. But there is just like a bone mending after being broken. After a time it will be able to support what you need to do with it. 

    Lee  47:03  

    So it was with me and my emotions and me with my ability to exist. I was able to finally say I can. I can exist. It takes time. That’s all I can say. And it hurts. It hurts. It’s lonesome–

    Matt Liddle  47:25  

    The man never gets the support. 

    Lee  47:28  

    No.

    Matt Liddle  47:29  

    Like a woman does.

    Lee  47:30  

    No. Yep. Yep. Everybody will ask you how it is? How’s your wife doing? Yeah. How’s Lori Ann? How’s Lori Ann doing? In all reality it’s how both of you are doing. When somebody asks how your wife’s doing, how is she holding up?

    Matt Liddle  47:47  

    No one, no one cares about the husband. The father.

    Lee  47:51  

    Yeah, society doesn’t realize that we lost as well. 

    Matt Liddle  47:56  

    That’s right. I lost my son. I lost my son, but it was completely different with our first miscarriage. I didn’t hear the heartbeat. My wife did. But I didn’t. You know that. And I don’t have any problems with that. But I had that boy in my arms. I’ve never had a father in my life. Bad, bad dude. 

    Matt Liddle  48:24  

    I was just so excited to just do everything I missed as a child. Getting older, I just want to be able to have a relationship with a child. I watched a movie the other night, and they’re talking about living and dying and faith. The man says, I only want to live at least another 30 years ago. ” The guy asked him, “What the heck are you going to do in those 30 years?” and he says, I just want to see my children grow up. That’s all I want in my entire life. I just want to see them grow up. 

    Matt Liddle  49:09  

    We’ll never get that chance. It’s really sad. I mean, I hope I do get the chance to have my own children. I’m very blessed that I have someone who’s extremely strong and brave, just even doing the show. 

    Matt Liddle  49:28  

    In a way. I don’t know if this is part of the advice, but I’ve been avoiding these feelings. I haven’t dealt with anything. I mean, I haven’t slept in four days because of this podcast. Because the reality of it is I’ve been pushing it all to the side. So I can help everybody else. But now when I get home, I’m writing 15 pages on what happened. It changes everything. Even having these pages, I couldn’t read them, right? And it’s unbelievable.

    Lee  50:10  

    I hope you were able to find something that can help you. I was in that situation, too, I did not want to address many things that were going on with me. Like you said, I push them, I push them back, I push them to the side. They kept piling up. When I was able to actually address them, everything just crashed down. Then I was able to work through them. I hope you were able to find something that you can do to help you. 

    Matt Liddle  50:44  

    It helps you remember a lot that you really don’t remember. You kind of feel when you’re in the hospital for a couple weeks. Thinking back at the situation, I felt really alone. But then kind of being forced into the situation to look back and think about everything. I realized that I really wasn’t alone. Your mind kind of plays tricks on you too, as well.

    Lee  51:15  

    It’s very selective. Your mind is very selective. Yeah.

    Matt Liddle  51:19  

    Exactly. I feel like my wife said, this podcast helps a lot and helps people and I’m like sitting here writing. How and possible, can this help somebody? I’m the kind of person that tells you your story. I’m gonna take that home tonight, like tonight, I’m gonna feel your story because I’m that type of person. 

    Matt Liddle  51:46  

    Besides your story, me carrying anything and everything out of my head kind of made me feel a little better. It made me feel like, okay, somebody is actually listening. That’s the same shoes as I am. They kind of understand my situation. There is a big difference between females and males, when it comes to situations like this, especially emotions. 

    Matt Liddle  52:18  

    You can’t really go to your best friend crying as a man, right? I mean.

    Lee  52:23  

    Yeah. 

    Matt Liddle  52:24  

    This is one of those situations where you can’t do it alone. But you can’t do that with your wife, at least in my situation, because my wife is so far more advanced than I am in here. She got mad at me one day, because her home screen is Owen. And I’m like, she wanted to show me pictures. I said, I can’t look at that right now. Like, I’m sorry. To her, it was like, You can’t look at your own child? What the heck is your problem?

    Matt Liddle  52:54  

    But it’s not that I can’t look at my own child, it’s just that I haven’t dealt with the whole situation in general. It’s like avoiding it. I can’t, because I’m too afraid to deal with it. Because I don’t want to feel that pain even more right now. It’s like, you just don’t want to feel pain whatsoever. 

    Matt Liddle  53:18  

    Then you do learn by talking and stuff like that. The only reason she’s doing better is because she is talking and she is remembering every day. But it’s hard to realize that. Even just to find someone to talk to. I’ve tried to find people to talk to, but everyone’s busy, everyone’s got their own stuff and COVID. 

    Matt Liddle  53:43  

    When we got discharged from the hospital, COVID the day we left, the hospital stopped taking visitors. So, we’re grieving our child, but then we came out and now we’re grieving our life. Because now we’re like, what happened in the last month, like, where are we? Everything changed. 

    Matt Liddle  54:08  

    Then we tried to start looking for support groups and they weren’t around because you can’t meet in person. Then time goes by and you don’t even want to do that anymore. I feel like this is where people make a lot of mistakes if they don’t swallow their pride, put everything to the side and really let it out. Talk let’s figure out how to feel better and how to remember your son but not feel so terrible.

    Lee  54:47  

    Making yourself vulnerable is such a hard thing to do. That’s what this is. What we are doing as when we are reflecting on our sons when we are reflecting upon the situation. We are completely vulnerable. Because we are on the cusp of breaking down we are on the cusp of crying, and just breaking down and becoming vulnerable to our friends to our family to, to random strangers is, it’s hard to do.

    Lee  55:23  

    It wasn’t until I started seeing a professional therapist, and I felt I could break down in front of them. They weren’t going to be there to judge me. They weren’t there either. Yeah, I was paying. I was paying the therapist to listen to me. But I honestly felt that, that my therapist, that she was there, and she genuinely felt concern for me. 

    Matt Liddle  55:51  

    Were you that kind of guy that would never do something like that before?

    Lee  55:54  

    Yeah, yeah, it took a long time for me to go actually, to a therapist. There’s, I don’t know, I’m sure New York has grief support. Like, in Utah, there are two grief support groups, shared by parents. Then like, Oh, I can’t remember exactly what their names are. But they’re now starting to meet online, because we still can’t meet in person. But they have just a monthly meeting where parents who have suffered loss can come together.

    Lee  55:57  

    Winter and I started going to that. There were a lot of mothers there. But there were a couple fathers there too. It was good to see. I’m a dad, he’s a dad, we’ve both lost. We don’t necessarily have to talk to each other. But it’s good to be in the same room. It’s good to be in the same video chat. Yeah, it’s hard. It’s hard because yeah, you do feel alone, you do feel abandoned. You do feel forgotten. Nobody does ask you. Nobody. Nobody does ask the Father. They always inquire about the mother. 

    Matt Liddle  57:13  

    Exactly. Right. 

    Lee  57:14  

    But what’s,–

    Matt Liddle  57:16  

    You’ll never get a random text message. Maybe we saw your own mom in general, your own mother. Oh, hey, how are you? Okay, today with Owen ? In the meantime, the wife’s got about 45 contacts that are like, Hey, are you okay? 

    Lee  57:35  

    Yeah. And it really is. My wife is part of a loss moms group that gets together once a month for dinner. Before COVID they were really religious about getting together for dinner. They would text each other. During COVID, all of a sudden, instead of texting each other three times a day, they’re texting each other 50 times a day. I haven’t received probably one more than 10 texts ever. Yeah, it’s hard for us because we’ve lost too. We’ve lost too.

    Matt Liddle  58:16  

    That is so true. When I met my wife, I was in a time where I felt so alone to begin with I had nothing and nobody. You meet this woman who literally just transforms your life and makes you see life in a completely different way. It’s absolutely amazing how one person can completely, completely change your life. One person, and I’m kind of hoping that this podcast is that one person. That helps me like, my ego stuff’s got to go away. I got to go and get help. I need to talk to somebody because it’s just, you can’t do it alone. 

    Lee  59:13  

    No, you can’t. 

    Matt Liddle  59:14  

    And you can talk to your wife. But

    Lee  59:17  

    But your wife, you’re together. 

    Matt Liddle  59:20  

    Yeah. 

    Lee  59:22  

    It’s sort of one of those you, you and your wife are one entity. So it’s not really you’re talking to other people you’re talking to–You’re talking to each other, 

    Matt Liddle  59:34  

    Yourself. 

    Lee  59:35  

    Yeah, basically yourself. 

    Matt Liddle  59:36  

    Yeah, definitely. 

    Lee  59:40  

    Of course, and I’m not trying to downplay the help your wife gives to you or the help my wife gives to me. But getting an outsider to help you is different too. So.

    Matt Liddle  59:54  

    Yeah, because even different grieving processes. She may be headed towards me and I say something else. It really bothered me, I’m not ready for it. And she’s like, what the heck, and then you kind of feel like shoot. She’s so ahead of me and I’m like, dang. It started to get you going so like, you’re you do need that outside person that isn’t dealing with the same exact situation with you, with your baby. And they’re further along with the grief and grieving process, because she may not.

    Matt Liddle  1:00:34  

    You may get into a fight, because she may not understand the way you’re feeling. She may say, You’re not crying right now, you don’t care. But no, that’s not right. It’s just you’re grieving, here me, I saw this. But now I’m thinking about the Dallas Cowboys. I’m thinking about my football game, because I’m too afraid to think about what you’re thinking about. It’s not that I don’t care, but we’re just two completely different stages. 

    Matt Liddle  1:01:03  

    I feel like it’s so important to talk with your partner to talk about different grieving stages, because I may be really pissed. I may be really angry when someone says something about Owen or something. And she may not be and she may not understand because I’m in a different grieving spot. Yeah. And if you have that outside person, they’re not grieving for you. So you’re gonna get what you need to hear. Then my wife has emotions, and she feels hurt when I say things because she thinks maybe I’ll think you don’t care about your child, because you’re not crying. Well, no, I care so much that I can’t even dream about thinking about it, because I’m going to cry.

    Lee  1:01:54  

    The grieving process and how different people grieve it’s so different. Going back to, right after the birth, and when we were discharged from the hospital, I was a man on a mission on how to, I had to find a burial plot. I was up in the morning, I was doing everything I could to plan the funeral. Once that funeral was done, I was lost again. Then it, yeah, there was no purpose. But when I have a purpose, I’m a man on a mission. My wife when she has a purpose, she’s and we’re just in two completely different spots, because she was able to do this. I was able to do this. And it really is like, people mourn differently. People mourn at different rates. People feel things differently. People process those feelings differently. It’s hard to say, well, I’m here, you should be here with me. Because we’re not the same. 

    Matt Liddle  1:03:05  

    No, no, and we could have been to the same thing at the same exact time. And we still can be in different places. Everybody’s body is different. I mean, my wife actually gets physically sick, physically, when she gets overwhelmed with stuff with Owen. I mean, everybody is so different. 

    Matt Liddle  1:03:31  

    I feel like that’s why it’s so hard to talk to people about this situation. Because everyone’s all over the place only like you, you can talk about these things, right? You’re on the podcast, you’re moving forward. Me? I’m starting to read a piece of paper and I like passed out. I gotta call the cops. Cause it’s like the fear stills you is unbelievable. I’ve seen a lot of bad things in my life. I’ve been in a lot of bad places growing up. I’ve had a lot of bad things happen. And nothing compares. 

    Lee  1:04:16  

    No.

    Matt Liddle  1:04:17  

    Nothing. Nothing. I had a gun shot at me and my friend at the same exact time we kind of did the same thing. I mean, it was a little different. Something like this was the pain that is so embedded in your heart. It’s like, I don’t know. The sad part is if you’re not a part about this club. You really have no idea about it. You don’t really know what these people go through. Yeah, they lost their son. 

    Matt Liddle  1:04:50  

    I had someone say9 to me, just recently it’s been a year since you lost your child and you’re going on this podcast Why? Are you ever going to start moving on? And I was taken back, like, moving on? What do you mean? When are you going to start preparing for your future? Well, listen, I’m trying to prepare for my future. This step is a step forward for me. 

    Matt Liddle  1:05:23  

    I’m sitting here with you right now talking to you about something that, honestly, I couldn’t say two sentences without breaking down. To me that’s positive. That’s gaining. I’m gaining. I’m getting better. Yeah and people somehow still want to judge you where you’re at. That has never been in the situation itself, and they can’t truly understand. It makes it even harder. 

    Matt Liddle  1:05:51  

    Because as a man, you feel even more alone. You’re like, wow, stop being a punk. It was a year ago. I understand that, but I can’t help it. I can’t help that I had the worst childhood of my life. I had a really bad childhood.All I’ve ever dreamed of was doing homework with my child throwing a ball with my child. So, when I found out I was having a boy, I was just like, Whoa! This is the best. I get to do everything that I missed out, like GI Joes. I didn’t do any of that stuff. The only time I’m gonna be a kid again. I’m all Yeah! There’s so many different emotions.

    Lee  1:06:39  

    Yeah. Losing a child is not like having a bike stolen. Yeah, you could easily get over a bike being stolen, you could easily get over having your car break down. You can move on from those things. Losing a child is losing dreams. It’s losing. Like you were saying that you thought of being able to play with your child to help your child. You’re losing all that you’re losing a future.

    Matt Liddle  1:07:08  

    That is right. Yeah, you plan for your future. That’s part of your plan. You’re gonna have a child. So you’re looking at your future like it’s ruined.

    Lee  1:07:17  

    Yeah, you’re not, you’re not losing your whole future. You’re not losing the future. You’re losing a future. 

    Matt Liddle  1:07:25  

    Yeah, it is. I wish more people would understand that we have feelings too. We’ve had people ask us like, Oh, I’m gonna put it in a– and it was on Owen’s birthday. We got a message. Oh, I’m gonna put a pregnancy announcement out. Is that okay? Why are you asking me? That’s your life’s dreams and your dreams. My dreams are completely different. 

    Matt Liddle  1:08:01  

    People treat you differently. They don’t know how to act around you. Even family get quieter. They don’t know what to say to you. Some people think they can relate to you by saying Oh, one of my friends just lost their child or all these things. Well to me what bothers me is why can’t we go back to the way things were before. 

    Matt Liddle  1:08:32  

    The thing will never go back to before, but with all input the relationships with I had my say. Let’s say my mother and father in law are some of my old best friends. It seems like it never went back to normal. They look at you like you’re a damaged goods and they kind of are afraid to talk to I guess, I don’t know.

    Lee  1:08:56  

    It really is one of those people don’t know how to react and interact with you. Not with you, you but with us, people who have lost. Because they don’t know, is this a topic we could talk about? Is it a topic that’s going to cause you stress? Like you said, sometimes you just want to have a normal conversation. But sometimes people don’t know how to do that. I often just say these friends were friends that I had good friendships with. Now that has changed. I have to realize I am a different person and they are a different person. It’s sometimes hard to see those things disappear. Those friendships disappear. 

    Matt Liddle  1:09:47  

    I’m sorry. Still the same person just a little damaged.

    Lee  1:09:52  

    I wouldn’t say damaged. You’re changing. Sure you are training, you’re not damaged.

    Matt Liddle  1:09:59  

    True.

    Lee  1:10:00  

    You have gone through something so traumatic, you have gone through something that has shaken you and destroyed you. You are trying to rebuild who you are, and understand who you are.

    Matt Liddle  1:10:14  

    But how can you do that when your whole past? Everyone around you doesn’t treat you like who you are? 

    Lee  1:10:22  

    Yeah, yeah. And sometimes you just have to just say, this is what I want to be. And this is how I need to be. And this is how I will be. Sometimes it’s hard to make your body do what your mind tells you to do. And sometimes it’s hard to tell your mind what your body needs you to do. So sort of one of those circular logics, we could talk for, who knows how many more hours? It’s probably getting late back on the east coast. I don’t want to hold you hostage for the rest of your life.

    Matt Liddle  1:11:02  

    No, I mean, I just want to appreciate you guys for being so strong and brave, because that’s another thing with my wife. That shows me each time she talks about Owen or anything that has to do with child loss and stuff. To me that is teaching me something. I’m looking at her and saying, Wow, she’s strong. She is so brave, but she’s got no clue that she’s strong and brave. You could tell her all the time. 

    Matt Liddle  1:11:34  

    I just want to thank you, because it takes a lot of courage, acceptance. It’s a lot. I don’t know how long exactly how you’ve been doing this before. But I’m sure it’s a lot coming on all the time and speaking about your story and talking about it. I commend you guys. And if it wasn’t for people, like you, people like me wouldn’t get any better. You’re setting the examples of where I can learn where I could be okay. I’m not alone. I just need to meet the right people and talk to the right people. Maybe I’m not this screwed up for the rest of my life. It gives me a kind of hope that I’ll be okay. So, thank you for real man. I mean it.

    Lee  1:12:31  

    Matt, this is the reason why we set this podcast up so that we can reach out and together talk about our children. And through that talking, we can heal a little bit, we will be able to help those around us who are also struggling. Right now, you might not feel that you can help anybody who has also suffered, but in the future, you will be able to. You will be able to say hey, this has happened to me. This is what I have done. I hope my experiences helped a little bit.

    Matt Liddle  1:13:05  

    Yeah, like I said, you guys are amazing.

    Lee  1:13:11  

    Well, Matt, thank you so much for talking with me. Thank you. 

    Matt Liddle  1:13:16  

    Thank you.

    Transcribed by https://otter.ai

    Filed Under: birth story, early neonatal infant death (<7 days), infant death, podcast episode Tagged With: infant loss

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    We're Winter and Lee Redd. Because of our sweet son Brannan who was stillborn at 38 weeks, we created this place where other moms and dads can share the birth story of their baby that was stillborn or who died in infancy.

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