PLEASE BE WARNED~THIS IS A VERY DIFFICULT POST AND NOT FOR EVERYONE
******************TRIGGER WARNING********************
POST CONTAINS EVENTS OF A STILLBIRTH
I have been a mom for almost twenty years. I have been a mom long enough to see the 'trends' of how to parent correctly come and go. I am used to getting other people's unsolicited advise. I cannot count how many times over the last twenty years, I have been told that I look too young to have an adult child. Normally I just nod and smile and take it as a compliment. I look 'too young' because I am. I was a teenage mom when I had my oldest child; that is a story for another day.
When I found out that my oldest daughter and her husband were expecting a child of their own, I was excited beyond belief. I looked forward to all the belly pictures that I would get to see and loved the idea of my daughter being a mother of her own. I knew that she would absolutely make a wonderful mom; she's always been a natural at it. She grew up getting to see all the different stages of children since I had four other children after her and they all had at least a couple years between them. She was almost 16 years old when I had my youngest.
As my daughter's belly got bigger, a couple of people made jokes about how I am already a grandmother. The jokes were made in love and came from a place of kindness. I got asked a lot what I was going to pick as my grandma name; nana or granny, etc. I joked right back about how I was going to let my grandchildren pick whatever they wanted cuz I wasn't old enough to know which name best suited me anyways. I was 34 years old with a grandbaby on the way despite the fact that I had only just gotten my first gray hair two years ago. I was going to be a grandma even though I had a four year old at home.
My other children were just as ecstatic as I was about a new baby coming into the family. They all wanted to drive across the entire country to go visit the baby as soon as it was born; I didn't disagree. With six of us, plane tickets weren't going to be feasible; road trip it is! My youngest two wanted to help their older sister pick out names and buy everything they possibly could to make sure that baby was well spoiled. It was a wonderful thing, a new beginning. We were going to add more love to our already huge family.
There are these moments in life that split your world right in half. These moments that define your life before said event and after. I have had a couple of them; none of which I am going to go into now. You can pick these moments out of the timeline of your life more easily than you could ever remember any other time. What is it that happens, that breaks you or makes you? Which side of the fork in the road did you choose? Sometimes, it's not a choice that you get to make. Sometimes the universe pushes you down, kicks the shit out of you, and then spits on you before walking away; leaving you laying on the ground trying to remember how to stand back up. The last week of February 2021, I had one of those moments. Before that was my old life, after that is what I'm left with. I'm still trying to pick up the pieces.
Many, many moons ago, I pulled my best friend to the side and had a conversation with her about how I always wanted to be there for her kids no matter what and I wanted her to be there for mine. We decided that we would always be that aunt to each other's kids in the instances that if our kids didn't want to talk to us about something, we would be their confidant and help them through whatever it was. I know that she would always be there and always love my kids and I, hers. Along with that, I must say that we have been best friends for 25 years. We know each other, we know each other's faults, we have nicknames for each other. She never calls me Ashleigh. Scratch that, she only calls me Ashleigh when something is wrong. That's one of those things that instantly makes my heart race and sets me into a complete panic. If she calls me Ashleigh instead of saying any one of the numerous nicknames, I know it's serious.
During the end of February, my best friend decided to take my youngest two children for a week. I had had some spine injections done and even though my children aren't babies anymore, the youngest two are only seven and four and still require a lot out of me most days. My best friend is the sister I never had, the aunt my kids didn't get and the best person I could have ever asked to have in my life. She is my rock and my crazy side-kick. She is who I would have picked if we got to choose our families. So she decided to take the girls, spoil them, make my recovery that much easier and I was going to pick them up when I was done healing. She lives an hour away, so when she showed up at my house two days early, I knew something was wrong.
On Wednesday, February 24th, she said, "Ashleigh, I need to talk to you right now." She didn't yell it, or say it mean, my best friend just said it. She could have just used 'the mom voice' and it would have made me panic less. I hurried up in the shower, dried off and didn't even dress, just wrapped the towel around me and went out to talk to her. I could see it all over her face, something was absolutely wrong in every sense of the word. I don't think I will ever not hear the words that came out of my best friend's mouth that day. She explained how we both are always there for each other's kids, and that my daughter had gotten ahold of her first and that she was so sorry but she had to tell me that my daughter was losing her baby. In that instant, my entire world fell apart. I didn't want to hear it, I wanted her to take it back, I wanted to run. I don't know how my best friend survived the hour long drive to my house, knowing that she had to be the one to tell me. I can vividly remember her face, she looked terrified and broken. And I knew I was broken. I screamed, I cried, I yelled, I paced; none of it helped.
Somehow, I had to hold it together long enough to call my daughter. I wanted to be the rock for her even though I was 2,600 miles away. There isn't very many awful feelings that go above the feeling of being completely out of control when it comes to protecting your children. That was just it though, there was literally nothing that I could do for her.
I can't take this awful thing from her and deal with it for her; instead of her.
I can't make it better.
I can't make it stop.
I can't do shit!
My daughter was losing her daughter and I couldn't do a fucking thing about it.
How do I change it?!
How do I make it better?!
Why is this happening!?!
I begged, "Please, just let me fix it and make it better. I'll do anything."
Nothing changed.
No matter what I screamed at God or begged the universe for, no matter what I pleaded and prayed and cried for, nothing changed. My daughter was going to lose the baby and I couldn't do anything about it.
When you have kids, you always want to protect them from anything that could harm them or break their hearts. Remember when they were just days old and they had to get a shot, remember that awful scream? Oh that heart breaking, lip quivering howl that just made your insides die a little. That feeling never goes away. NEVER. My oldest daughter has been on the outside of my body for almost 20 years and it still hurts every cell of my body when she hurts. Now, she was going to be a part of the club that no one ever wants to be in. The club that too many people are in. The club that drags you in and you don't ever get to leave. She was going to be in the 'I am a mom without a baby' club.
Septo-optic dysplasia (S.O.D.), I had never heard of that in my 'before' life. I never had a reason to even have that birth defect on my radar. It only effects 1 in 10,000 babies. There are varying degrees of it. All the research and reading I did about S.O.D., didn't help. It didn't make me feel better, it didn't fix what was happening, it didn't heal my grandbaby. She still had it and she wasn't going to make it to full term, let alone ever have anything but an awful life. The hospital gave my daughter all the info at once and then suggested a potassium injection; effectively stopping the baby's heart so she wouldn't be in pain during the very early birth.
As soon as my daughter asked for me to come out, I was gone. I can't explain what kind of force was even driving me so crazily through the country to get to her as fast as I could. I put hundreds of miles behind me as fast as I could, just trying to get to her. When I wasn't driving, her dad was, we only stopped for gas and we slept in the car while the other one drove. I just needed to get there as fast as I could.
On Thursday, my daughter had to willingly let a doctor inject her baby's heart with potassium and then go home for the night.
Let me say it again.
My daughter, pregnant with her own daughter, had to have a procedure that killed her baby and then go home and go to sleep until she was induced the next day.
I don't even know how else to say that. I don't know how my daughter went through that. I don't know why this happened. I still can't fix it.
Throughout the drive, we kept in contact with my daughter. She was open and honest about every little thing that happened and it broke my heart. Listening to her explain how heavy and different her belly felt after the potassium shot was heartbreaking. Listening to her cry, made me ache. Not being there made me sob. My granddaughter died on February 25, 2021. She died while still in the safe womb of her mother. She died while I was speeding across the country. My grandbaby died and I felt my heart break and shatter into a million, unfixable pieces.
On Friday, my daughter had to pack her things and go to the hospital to be induced. She got hooked up to machines and got ready to deliver just like a lot of other mom's do, only her birth wouldn't result in having a baby to take home. That evening, my daughter gave birth to a stillborn weighing in at almost one pound. There was no baby's cries to be heard. There was no rush of nurses to clean her and warm her with smiles on their faces. There were no congratulations being said. My granddaughter was stillborn. My daughter and her husband named her and held her. They got to cuddle her and take pictures. They talked to her for a few hours and sang to her. Then they had to give her up.
We got to meet her over Facetime while we were stopped at a gas station in the middle of the desert. It was the most beautifully painful, awful thing I have ever experienced. My daughter was now a mother without a baby. Her husband was a father without a baby. My other children were aunts and uncles with no niece to spoil and love.
I sobbed for hours after that call. I would never get to meet her face-to-face. I would never get to hold her, or spoil her. I would never get to sneak her chocolate while her mom wasn't looking. I would never get to watch her grow and become her own little person. Grandmas are supposed to give their grandchildren cookies before dinner and let them play too long. Grandmas are supposed to give lots of hugs and kisses and send a card for every occasion. Grandmas are supposed to be able to laugh at their kids attempting to wrangle a threenager. I don't get any of that. I am a Grandma with no grandbaby.
By the time we arrived at my daughter's apartment, she and her husband were home from the hospital. The room they had set up for the baby they didn't get to keep was shut off and still full of presents and baby clothes. Just looking at the crib felt like someone shoved a dagger into my heart. There were boxes full of pink, frilly, newborn clothes and all the tiny headbands you could think of. All the many things that she wouldn't wear or use, sitting there waiting for the baby that wouldn't get to come home.
I don't know that my daughter and her husband will ever really heal from this. I know that they were great parents, they had to make the worst possible decision and they lived through it. But how much do you get back from your 'before' life after something like this? This is one of those wounds that time doesn't heal. I wouldn't wish any of this on my worst enemy.
I got to enjoy a few weeks with my daughter and son-in-law. I was able to watch them try to heal and take comfort in each other. I was able to hug them both when they needed it, cry with them when they cried, and watch them enjoy the rare, little happy moments along the way. Before we ventured back home, I went through all of the baby items in the room, boxed them all up and put them away. It took hours for her dad and I to finish the room and take the crib apart; I had to walk away several times while hyperventilating. I don't know what happens from here. I don't know what 'healed' looks like now. I do know that my daughter and son-in-law will forever be changed, as will I. I know that a rainbow baby (whenever they are ready) will bring so much joy, and sadness too. I know that my daughter and son-in-law were meant to be parents and when they have their rainbow baby, it will never go without all the love in the world.
I know that my first grandbaby will never, ever be forgotten.
