Living in a Disabled World

I am going to write down everything that happened on the 15th August 2008 before my memory is clouded as I want to treasure the day forever.

I woke up at 5am and couldn’t get back to sleep.  I nipped to the toilet and got myself a drink.  I lay next to Keith willing sleep to come but it wouldn’t.  I played Mahjonng on the DS until 0715am.  I had a shower and packed up my wash things.  I had a banana for breakfast as I felt so sick I didn’t think I could eat anything else.  I sipped water for the morning which turned out later to be a good decsision.  I woke O up at 0845am so I could have a cuddle with him before we left for the hospital.  He was all squidgy and warm snuggled in his bed.  I carried him downstairs to the sofa and hugged him close.  I explained Mummy and Daddy had to go out for the day to the hospital as Mummy was poorly.  He hasn’t mentioned the baby since Monday at the last scan and I don’t want to awaken questions in him he doesn’t need to know the answers to.  He wasn’t too happy about us both going for the day but as soon as Granny said she was going to take him on the bus he was more than happy to stay at home.  We left him eating his weatabix and drove off.

The drive to Musgrove was tense.  I was upset and so was Keith.  We sat in the carpark at the hospital as we were a little early and talked.  Keith said we could get through this we had each other and he would always, always be there for me.  He held my hand and we cried together today was going to be so hard to get through but we had to, what choice do we have.

We walked into the Maternity Unit and I told the older lady on the desk my name.  She said “yes we are expecting you on Willow Ward”.  A few minutes later a sister appeared and took us through she apologised for keeping us waiting we had only been there for 3 minutes hardly the wait you would normally get on the NHS….  She showed us to a nice room called “The Rowen Suite” this is a brand new room for bereaved parents and was really well though out.  A normal divan bed, tv, cd player and en suite bathroom, modern furniture, pictures and modern decoration.  Tea and coffee facilities in fact all the trappings of a Premier Inn tastfully bedecked in creams and beiges. 

Our midwife came in to introduce herself her name was Rosemary, she was an older lady, practical but caring.  She asked me if Mr Fox had explained what was going to happen, I said “yes I was going to be given 2 tablets every few hours until I went into labour”.  She then explained that they reccomend you have the first and last tablets vaginally, I wasn’t really expecting that although maybe I should have been as Diz had mentioned the night before they might do that.  She said if I was uncomfortable with having the tablets vaginally I could take them orally and the last lot they would prefer vaginally but that would give me time to prepare myself.  Rosemary then left the room, Keith said if they reccomended vaginally they did it for a reason and it might be a good idea to except it, so I did.

Lots of form filling and questions came next, did we want a post mortem, I explained no we didn’t.  We knew our baby had lots of problems and I didn’t want him cut up to find out what had eventually killed him.  We would however like the placenta and some tissue looking at to see if it was a chromosome problem just to give us closure on the whole event really.  Rosemary asked if we had a name for our baby and we said yes we had names for a boy or a girl.  She then explained it is not always possible to tell the sex of a baby at this age and even if they can they are not allowed to tell us.  This shocked me why couldn’t we know the sex of our baby?  Rosemary explained that it is quite hard at this stage of pregnancy to tell the sex and in the past midwives have said they thought it was a girl or a boy so the parents named the child only to find out after further tests that the baby wasn’t the sex they had thought which caused further hurt and pain.  So I asked if we were allowed to look at the baby and would we be able to tell the sex.  Rosemary explained we could look at our baby as much as we wanted and if we could tell the sex that was fine.  She said sometimes people choose a nuetral name that can be for a girl or a boy incase later on they find out the baby wasn’t the sex they thought it was.  We decided to stick with the names we had chosen we had always felt our baby was a boy so if we couldn’t tell we would name him Finley James if we could tell our baby was a girl her name would be Hope Kate, Kate after my Nan and Hope because that is what she had given us for 16 weeks.  Finley because that is what Keith had called him from the day we found out he was poorly.  If our baby later on turns out to be a girl then I am sure she won’t mind having a name we chose because we loved her so much.

Rosemary then explained that we could see the chaplin about burial arrangements which we said we would like to do.  I asked if the chaplin would bless our baby when he was born and Rosemary said yes that could be arranged.  The Chaplin (Eric) came quite quickly to see us and I sat and cried as he spoke.  He gave us a number of options, we could have our baby cremated and interned in Taunton, or we could have our baby buried or cremated and interned in Bridgwater, the hospital arranges all of this for you for free as a gift of condolescene.  At first I thought I would like him buried in Bridgwater where I could visit him when I wanted to and be near him, K however had a better idea.  We would get him cremated and when we go to Wales next year on holiday we will scatter his ashes in the sea there.  Keiths family all go to the same place every year and have been for generations.  The place holds special memories and Fin would join the good memories there.

After all the form fillling and a lot of tears, Rosemary led us into another room next door.  This was more of a medical room although they had tried to make it as nice as possible.  I was given 4 antibiotics to take to guard against any infection.  I then had to undress and lay on the bed.  Rosemary examined me to see how my cervix was.  She said it was very long but forward which was good as my cervix is normally backward.  She said it was good and bad I still had quite a way to go with it being long.  She then inserted the tablets.  After a few minutes I had some niggly pains K asked if I wanted some gas and air I said “not yet it’s a bit early”.  Rosemary then inserted a venflon in my left arm and explained that she needed to take a lot of blood for testing.  The venflon wouldn’t yeild any blood though so she flushed it and tried with a needle in my arm, all my blood had run away, she said she wouldn’t try again but leave it for the doctor.  As she was doing it the waves of pain started to come, I wasn’t expecting it to happen quite so quickly Rosemary asked if I wanted pain relief.

I had been thinking about pain releif and I didn’t know whether I wanted to have any or loads, I kind of felt that I should feel the physical pain of loosing my baby but a small voice told me to accept the relief and why punish myself, this wasn’t my fault.  I said yes I would like some morphine.  A few minutes later Rosemary arrived back with the injection, some antisickness jabs and sick bowls.  After about 10 minutes the pain subsided and I lay on my side drifting in and out of sleep.  I wanted peace and quiet to give birth to my baby.  The time was now 1130am.

After an hour lunch was bought around, they gave K food too which was really nice of them to look after him.  I sat up and was promptly sick.  I managed to eat some crisps slowly and was sick again.  I sipped some orange juice and was sick again.  I had some more pain releif and some more anti sickness.

I drifted in and out of sleep, K played on my DS to pass the time.  He was in so much pain as his back was playing up and sciatica had set in.  He could barely move and each movement hurt a lot.  At around 2pm I think Rosemary came to say she was going to go home and Andrea would be looking after us.  Rosemary sat with me for a while was I was sick again.  The pain was getting worse again so another injection was given.  Rosemary left to go home.  Andrea went to get me some more pain relief and told me to use the gas and air to get through the waves of pain.  At about 3pm I felt wet down below so removed my knickers a bit of blood and water was there.  10 minutes later a gush and my waters went.  I knew this was going to be the end I was loosing my precious baby.  Andrea came back with some different pain relief that I could have every 5 minutes along with the gas and air.  I breathed through the pain using the gas and air.  Andrea said that did I mind if she went for a wee and then she would examine me again and put in the next lot of tablets.  I had been due them at 2pm but because of the sickness and pain they had delayed this as they didn’t want to over stimulate me.

Andrea came back and sat next to me.  I breathed through the pain with the gas and air it was quite intense now.  Andrea said she would examine me if that was ok.  I suddenly felt sick again and sat up to use the sick bowl.  The baby was there I could feel it and I said “the baby is coming”.  I remember sobbing and saying to K “I don’t want this to happen”.  Andrea asked to have a look and could see nothing she said how did I know, I could feel him just inside the opening I said.  One pain and a small push and he was out.  Andrea cut the cord, the placenta hadn’t come out.  Andrea wrapped our baby in a towel and handed him to me.  She warned me he was very red and bloated.  Underneath the red swelling that was like a jelly I could make out our perfect baby.  The top of his head was totally normal, I could see his eyes, nostrils and ears.  You could not tell what sex he was, he was just too swollen.  I looked at his tiny legs and yes the right foot was turned inwards in fact the whole leg looked slightly twisted.  He had tiny hands and tiny feet but was perfectly formed underneath his swelling.  He really had been very poorly and how he had survived for 16 weeks and 3 days I don’t know.  It must have been his and my determination combined that had kept him going.  The swelling at the back of his head was like a deflated cushion behind him.

I held him close even in his deformed, ill state he was perfect to me.  Finley James was born at 1537 weiging 92 grams.  The exact time O had been born. 

I needed to get the placenta out next and this took some effort and pushing, trying to hold my baby and use the gas and air.  With one last big push it came away, I breathed a sigh of relief the last thing I wanted was to have an operation for a retained placenta.  Andrea cleaned me up, cleaned Fin up and put him in another towel.  She then went to get the scales to weigh him.  When she gave him back to me again he was in a tiny basket wrapped in a fleecey blanket all snug.  She took some pictures of him for me.  One of me holding him, one of him wrapped in his blanket in the basket and one unwrapped.  These will be private pictures than noone else will ever see.  Whilst this was going on K went next door to make a cup of tea.  He hadn’t wanted to see Fin but had for me just breifly.

I was left until 5pm to rest and look at Fin.  Keith sat quietly next to me and I drifted in and out of sleep, I was so tired and just having Fin near me gave me enough comfort to sleep now.  At just before 5 pm I woke up and we went next door back into the suite to have a bath.  I was sick again and started to loose a lot of blood.  Andrea gave me an injection to slow the bleeding so I didn’t loose lots of blood like I did with the triplets.  I had a lie in the bath with K pacing around, his back was sore and his legs aching.  Whilst in the bath Andrea took Fin to take a piece of his skin for testing, all the time she was gentle and kind with him never once showed that she though I was odd for wanting my baby near me, which was very kind of her.

Fin was bought back to us and I climbed into bed and slept for a good hour.  Eric the chaplin then came to see us.  K told him our plans for the burial of Fin which he thought was lovely.  He then said a few prayes for Fin and blessed him with Oil from Wells Cathedral.  It was a lovely short service very respectful and kind.

Andrea managed to get me some more anti sickness and I fell asleep again, waking at about 8pm.  I got up and had a cup of tea with K the first cup of tea for 4 months.  I went to the bathroom and then Andrea came in to see if I wanted to go home.  I said “yes I would”.  In fact K and I had just been discussing if I wanted to go home or stay there for the night, to stay with Fin would have been lovely but I was so tired and K in so much pain, and I knew O was at home waiting for us.  Fin was at rest now O still needs us.   She asked if we would want to see Fin again I said “no not after today thank you”.  She explained he would be taken to the mortuary and then a local funeral director would take him and cremate him and we could collect the ashes from Eric in about a weeks time.  Fin would be returned to us in a small white casket with his name engraved on a brass tag.

I had a sandwich to eat slowly I was still very sleepy and managed to eat a tuna a cucumber sandwich inbetween snoozing.  Andrea bought in 2 tablets to take to stop my milk from coming in, I wondered if I would produce milk so it was a relief to know that I wouldn’t be now, it would have been a painful reminder.  K packed up my bag and went out to get the car.  I knelt by the side of Fins basket and said goodbye to him.  I said sorry for not being able to help him survive any longer and thanked him for fighting as long as he could.  Looking at him he does look like he might have Trisomy 21 he has the square sort of face, we would have loved him what ever he had he is our baby.  Saying goodbye finally was the hardest part leaving him there on his own.  Andrea came in to walk me to the car she said she would look after him for me.  Going home was always going to be the hardest time.

As I left the hospital I gave Andrea a hug.  The midwives and doctors had been lovely, you couldn’t have asked for more care.  The whole day went exactly as I wanted it to, peacefully and quietly.  Everything was very gentle and kind.  I couldn’t have asked for more from K he was brilliant and there for me all the way even in his pain and grief.