In the Still of the Night

My eyes flutter open in the darkness.  It's three a.m.  Maybe it's four.  Every night is slightly different, but still always the same.  Mike is sleeping next to me, often snoring.  The dog is inevitably sprawled out on the floor doing the same.  My belly, heavy and round, rests on the body pillow at the edge of the bed - and it feels frighteningly empty.   Every night.  Every night, I wake up to an empty stillness.  I can't feel her.  I know she's in there, but the fear creeps in that I've lost her.  That sometime between feeling her flutter as I fell asleep and waking up to silence, she has left me.  As I lay there in the dark, my mind twists and turns down frightening corridors, trying to find its way back to rational thought.   She's okay.  She's fine.  She's just sleeping and comfortable -like I was just a few moments ago.  She's still alive.  But, my mind won't let me believe that.  I need proof.   I need to feel her move.   Sometimes, it only takes her a few minutes of me being awake before she gives me a little pop. (Probably my escalated heart rate wakes her up)  One pop is often not enough for me, though.  What if I just made it up?  What if, in my panic, my body just twitched and that wasn't really her?  I need at least one more, maybe two.  A good punch to really assure me she's still alive.  Most of the time, she gives me what I need within a few minutes, and I can go back to sleep with a little more reassurance.  Sometimes, though, she's not cooperative, and I have to shift myself around.  I turn to the other side.  I try to sit up.  I poke her a little bit.  Anything to get her stirring.  Anything to put my mind at ease.  Sometimes, it takes half an hour or more to get those kicks.  Half an hour, laying in the darkness, worrying about my world crashing down around me a second time - often convinced that it is.  Twice, I have panicked to the point where I actually get out of bed and pull out my Doppler.   I sneak out into the living room so as not to wake up Mike and I search for her heartbeat.  When I finally find it, I cry heaving sighs of relief.  She's still here.  I have kept her alive for another night.

Being pregnant again is no cake walk, as many of you already know.  While I am not completely terrified 24 hours a day, I do think about her safety most of the time.  I have begun keeping a kick-count chart per my doctor's orders.  Three times a day, I have to sit with my feet up for an hour while I record the amount of times she moves.  That's a tall order for a teacher.   If she moves at least 10 times, I can stop counting.  Usually, I can get all of her kicks in within the first 30 minutes.  My students have been fairly cooperative with this new development, which is very helpful.   However, if she kicks less than five times in an hour, I have to start over.  If she still doesn't make ten kicks, I have to go to the hospital.   That's a scary thing to specifically focus on three times a day.  So far, so good though.  

During the day, I'm fairly active and distracted with work and other things.  She's always on my mind, but I can usually remember the last time I felt her move, so I can keep myself calm with those thoughts.  Night is different.  When I wake up in the middle of the night (and I do - every night), I don't know when she last moved because I was sleeping.  I don't know how long it has been.  I know I've been asleep for at least three or four hours, which already surpasses the two hour maximum for my kick counts.  A study I read once, which was a terrible thing to do now that I think about it, said that the majority of cord deaths that occur before birth occur between the hours of 2am and 4am while the mother is asleep.   Looking back on this, that was probably what happened with Kenley.   She left me in the very early hours of Sunday morning.   I can't let the same thing happen to Bean.   It's probably why my body won't let me sleep at that time.  I wake up every night without fail.   I can't lose her too.  I just can't.

So, the darkness and I have become old friends.   It greets me with a soft silence when I wake.  In the darkness, I lay my hand upon my belly and will my daughter into moving, trying my hardest to stay calm, but often failing.  Once she reassures me that she's not going anywhere, I can settle back in with a little calmness - into the still of the night. 

Is this your first?

You're sitting in the mall's food court, waiting for your shopping buddy to arrive.  You check your Facebook page, maybe update your status, and play a game of candy crush.  While you're waiting, a very pregnant stranger sits nearby.  She smiles at you and heaves herself into a slightly more comfortable position.  You smile back, noticing her bulging belly and light glow.  Like you, she pulls out her phone, but before she can settle in behind her wall of technology, you politely ask her, "How far along are you?"   "28 weeks," she says with a soft smile.  The next question rolls off your tongue as naturally as the one before it, "Is this your first?"    "No," she replies, "I have a daughter."   "Oh, how nice!"  you say.  And then, "How far apart are they?"  You and she continue this polite and natural conversation for a few minutes until your friend arrives, talking about her older child, how wonderful it will be for her two children to be so close in age, how wonderful it is to be pregnant and bringing life into this world.   As you get up to leave, you say to her with a genuine grin, "Good luck with the baby!" and you walk away.  It's always nice to have a pleasant conversation with a stranger.

Unless that stranger is One in Four, because then that conversation was not pleasant for her at all.   That conversation was absolute torture.  Each moment, she was wishing and hoping you wouldn't ask that next question.  Each moment, she was trying to make split second decisions about how she was going to answer them, trying to quickly judge your character to see if you could handle the truth, trying to gauge her own emotions to see if she was willing to tell it to you.  Should she tell you the baby in her belly is her first and then wade through a conversation of all the joys she will experience once her baby is here?  Should she deny her first born to you for your own comfort and then spend the rest of the day racked with guilt?  Or, should she let you know she had another child, and hope you leave it there?  She knows you won't.  She knows you'll ask about the other child.  Her age.  Her name.  How she feels about being a big sister.  Then what?  Does she tell you her baby died - and watch as you go from a friendly, well-meaning stranger, to a sad and uncomfortable one?  (Of course you're sorry.  Of course, you didn't know)  Or, does she let you assume her first child is still alive and then participate in a very painful conversation where she has to pretend she has a life she doesn't, but wants more than anything?   She never knows which way she's going to go until it happens.  Each conversation is different, yet always the same.   She begins to hate making eye contact with strangers, afraid that, in combination with her welcoming belly, people will be drawn to her.   She knows everyone is just being friendly.  She knows no one means any harm, and that makes it even harder.  She begins to feel even more out of place.  Before getting pregnant again, very few people felt entitled to know about her children.  She could pass through the world unnoticed.  But as soon as her belly began to pop out, it became an open invitation for conversation.  Her business was their business.  It's not that she doesn't want to talk about the child she lost - because she does - but she knows it's not a conversation to have with someone who's just making polite small talk, and she's rarely in the mood to introduce a stranger to the world of baby loss.

When I was pregnant with Kenley, these conversations didn't really bother me to the extent they do now, but I will admit, they did get annoying at times.  I think almost every pregnant woman, regardless of whether they have lost a baby, gets irritated at times with the forwardness of strangers.  Is it truly your business whether or not we have more children or how old they are?   Would you ask a woman who wasn't pregnant these questions?  Do you really need to know if I am planning a natural birth or if I am going to breastfeed?  With Kenley, I didn't mind that much.  I was often taken aback by the personal information people either requested of me or shared with me, but I'm a friendly person and I just carried on the conversation anyway.   

Things are different now.  I can see it before it happens.  The sideways glance from the stranger nearby.  The slight smile.  It's coming.  I brace myself.   It always starts the same..."How far along are you?"  And then it goes from there.  Spiraling down, down, down the rabbit hole, with them looking down and me looking up, answering their questions behind the mask I put on for just these occasions.   And when the conversation is over, I climb back out of the hole, take off my mask, and continue to live the life that is mine but shouldn't be.

I suppose my point to this post is that I wish more people knew about the different circumstances surrounding pregnancy, and that being pregnant is not an open invitation for conversation.   You never know if the woman you are talking to is carrying her second (or third, or forth) chance.  You never know if she's not the epitome of joy and light you think she is, but is instead full of terror for the life of her child, just holding on to every shred of hope she can that this pregnancy won't end up like the last.  You never know if the child she is carrying is "incompatible with life", and she is listening to you ramble on about the joy of having children while she knows hers will most likely only live for hours, days at the most.  One in four women have experienced the loss of a baby.  One in four.   If someone offered you a lottery ticket that guaranteed you a one in four chance at winning, you'd take it, right?  Because those are pretty good odds.   So, there's a pretty good chance that woman you are talking to about her baby is really wishing you'd stop.

I'm not saying to not be friendly.   "How far along are you?" is a pretty benign question and is probably fine.  And really, 75% of women will probably take no issue with the rest of the conversation.   But, pay attention.  Remember, not all of us have known only sunshine.  One in four of us have just walked through a terrible storm.  Many of us are still bracing against the weather, and trying our best to get to the other side with our rainbow intact.   There's a saying I've seen that says "Everyone is fighting a battle you know nothing about".   Hopefully, this post has given you a little more insight into mine - and the many other women who fight it too.

Happy Birthday, Kenley

Dear Kenley, 

Today is your birthday.  Happy Birthday, Little Ninja!  Today, you would be one year old.  Today, you should be strapped in a high-chair smashing cake and frosting all over yourself.   Today, you should be tearing open presents bought just for you.  Today, I should be marveling at how big you have gotten, how smart you are becoming, and how much of a difference one year can make.   I am still doing that last one, just not in the same way as I wish I was.

I can't believe it has been a year.   Three hundred and sixty five days of waking up without you, of going to bed without you, of living my life without you in it.  There is something about this mile-marker that makes it seem even more real - even more final.  It's not like I have lived all this time in denial, thinking it might all be a dream (although I wished it was).  Every single day has been a harsh reality, even the foggy days at the beginning.   But, there's something about today that solidifies everything.  You are gone, saying goodbye before saying hello.  Even a year later, there are still some things I can't bring myself to think about.  Even a year later, hot tingles of sorrow rise in my chest and tears well in my eyes when thoughts of your beautiful face dance across my mind.  And I realize, that will never change. My eyes will never fully dry when it comes to shedding tears for you, my baby girl.  As the years go by, as more and more of your birthdays pass, I will never stop missing you.  I will never stop aching, and I will never, ever stop loving you.   .  

Today, we are going to go visit your tree.  Allison came down from Virginia, and your grandparents are in town too.  We are going to go take a family photo next to the tree.  My plan is to do this every year on your birthday - as a way to document how our family grows with you still very much a part of it.  I hate that today's pictures will have an oak tree in them instead of a chubby little one year old.  As I think about it, waves of sadness sweep over me, hot and thick, and I have to catch my sobs in my chest before they spill out and get everywhere.  I do that a lot, you know.  I work hard every day to keep my sorrow under control.  I can't say it's really gotten easier.  Easier is not the right word.  I've just gotten better at doing it, I suppose, which is a good thing considering otherwise, I'd be a blubbering mess 24 hours a day.

I think people see me and think I'm handling things fairly well, and I have to say, that's probably very true.  At first, I didn't realize how strong I was.  I didn't see that quality in myself at all.  All I could do was to feel the overwhelming pain of losing you.  But, after arrow after arrow pierced my heart - and I didn't die - I realized just how strong I really was.  What makes me strong is my love for you.  A mother's love is truly the strongest force on the planet, and its power is what has held me together through all of this.  

You are my firstborn.  You are the one who first made me a mother, and I am so grateful for every single second I had with you.  Now, as your sister kicks inside me, I remember that it was you who kicked first.  It was you who nestled into my heart and prepared me for motherhood.  I wish you could be here to watch our family grow.  I wish your sister could play with you as she grows up.  I wish so many things, to list them all would take the rest of my life.   I can't even say all of the things that are in my heart because they are too big, too many, too much.  Sometimes, even I am at a loss for words, little one!

I will end this letter to you with the words that will always make me think of you, "I'll love you forever.  I'll like you for always.  As long as I'm living, my baby you'll be."   Sweet dreams, my darling Kenley.  Happy Birthday.

Love, 

Mom