Big Tab One
On 2/4/2000 I became I mother for the first time. I left the hospital later that same day with empty arms and a tear streaked face. Emotionally stunned, what jarred me into reality were the congratulations from well-meaning hospital visitors in the elevator that saw my pink wrist band, which meant I had just had a baby girl. Those congratulations were confirmation that my shocking night was real.
Backing up a day to 2/3, I was not yet 7 months along, having an uneventful first pregnancy. That evening (sorry for being gross) I felt gassy so I lay down after dinner, relaxed, and fell asleep with the tv on. I woke up a few hours later and felt worse. And then worse. I was home alone and it was well after 10pm so I didn’t want to bother neighbors to ask for help. Eventually I got to the point where I decided to drive myself to the hospital (it was just 2 miles away) to see if maybe they would keep an eye on me/help somehow because, damn, that was some serious gas! (Did I mention I was new at this?)
The hospital staff took me in swiftly, strapped the baby monitors on, hooked up the ultrasound machine, and declared that I was in labor. WHAT? The idea had not occurred to me AT ALL. This was a small mountain community hospital that did not have facilities appropriate to handle my situation so they called for a chopper to take me down to a larger hospital that had an excellent NICU facility. Clearly this was not just gas. By this point I knew that, too.
This was winter in the mountains so there was snow everywhere, the ski resort lights were on, so looking out the window was beautiful and peaceful as we flew out of the mountains. I was very calm, completely trusting all of the help I was receiving. 21+ years later I can recall the EMTs, the smells, the views, the genuine care.
Once we landed it was a lot like a “chopper landing on a hospital roof scene in a primetime hospital tv show”, people rushing, orders flying, everyone moving fast. The moments of calm around me were over yet I was still calm inside myself, completely trusting everyone.
It was now around midnight and the next few hours blurred together. Doctors were trying everything to stop the labor. I was not allowed to have drugs but I received surfactant injections for her lung development and magnesium and whatever they could throw at the situation. Yes, no, yes, no… ultimately I couldn’t stop the labor and had to push her out. I remember feeling her tiny body move through and out of mine and then listening to the silence afterwards. She was too young to cry or breathe and then was whisked away to receive help before I could even take a breath of my own.
I was left alone to wait awhile. It was calm, quiet, and total limbo.
And here is where my massive life shift happened.
Once an army of medical staff had tended to stabilizing her and assessing her viability, one of my life’s best teachers came to visit me. I don’t recall her name, but I will forever remember her face and our conversation. She came to tell me my daughter’s status and to talk about my choices. Her chances of survival were slim and she wasn’t getting much oxygen to her brain, just 30%. She was barely 2 lbs, her eyelids were still fused, and she was far from being able to breathe on her own.
My teacher needed to know – What did I want to do? Push for her survival, or let her go?
Given the information and her grave condition, it felt entirely selfish to push her to survive. I had to let her go. This decision was sad but it was not difficult.
Then my best teacher said I should go see my daughter and hold her. Here is where my calm vanished and my life changed forever.
I didn’t want to go.
I didn’t have the courage to be the mom, to put the needs of my baby before my own, to direct the situation rather than simply receive the help, to ultimately bond and validate our experience together while holding her for her precious few hours of life. Oh. My. God.
My best teacher told me “she needs you” and in that very moment I shifted. She was right. I got up out of that bed and walked out of my room, across the way to the NICU room that she was in and got courageous. She needed me.
The birth happened and was completely out of my control, but now was my moment to take control and make the best of what the situation delivered. She couldn’t survive and I couldn’t put her back in, but I could hold her, let her feel me close, talk to her, sing, be fully present and love her with every part of my being. So that’s what I did.
She was so tiny, so fragile, and had so many tubes and wires and things connected to her. Time stopped during that period I spent with her so I’m not sure how much time passed, but it is such a permanent memory for me that time doesn’t even exist there. It’s a forever moment where time doesn’t matter.
I can recall every feature about her, her smell, the softness of her see-through skin, the way her fingers reached up and wrapped around the breathing tube, the hints of tiny vocal sounds, her teeny tiny eyelashes that were just beginning to form, her brown hair, the tiniest toes you’ve ever seen, and the angel’s kiss birthmark on her forehead. She was pure beauty.
But, she was suffering so it was time to let her go. One by one the nurse detached the tubes and wires so I was left holding just her. I brought her up close to feel her last breaths and breathed them deeply into me, as if to forever hold her breath inside of me, as if to forever keep a piece of her soul with me. I held her like that as she died in my arms.
It was the bravest and most difficult thing I have ever done.
I held onto her for awhile, memorizing everything about her I could, taking in every part of who she was, savoring every part of the extremely short time we had together as mother and daughter.
Eventually I was taken to my room again and left to process alone for a few hours before I was finally discharged. I was in shock, disbelief, confused, and devastated.
Processing
I spent the next days and weeks crying. A lot. This was not in my nature but I knew that this was something I needed to feel all the way, in every way, in order to process and heal from. This was way too large for my coolheaded self to tuck away and handle internally. I had great friends that let me share and talk and process, and therapists and other professionals that listened, and lots of Puffs+.
Then I had lots of questions. How did this happen? Was there a way to find out? The doctors said she was perfectly healthy, just premature. I was healthy, too. I had just had a checkup and everything looked perfect. I made so many phone calls and pushed but nobody had answers and just chalked it up to being “one of those things”. I get it, these things happen. Life is unpredictable and nothing is guaranteed. But, what if there was more to it that could help with future pregnancies? I didn’t want to go through that ever again.
So I don’t leave you hanging here, I finally did get my answers a couple of years later with my next pregnancy. Now pregnant with my first son, we could see at around 24 weeks on ultrasound that I had incompetent cervix. I was dilating. Within two weeks I was on hospital bedrest to keep him in for the duration of the pregnancy. We made it to 37 weeks 5 days!
With the next pregnancy, my second son, I got a cerclage placed to reinforce the cervix. Even with that I was still opening up so again we did hospital bedrest for the entire third trimester. Again, we made it to 37 weeks 5 days!
With my final pregnancy, my second daughter, we did a cerclage again but this time nothing opened. Even after we removed the cerclage. It was bizarre. She went all the way to 41 weeks 2 days!
Healing and Recovery
Backing up to the time between searching for answers and finally getting them, what did I do with myself to heal and recover? This was my first huge massively transformative event in life so I hadn’t developed the toolbox I have now. I didn’t have life experiences and perspectives to draw upon. All I knew to do was to feel it deeply and find the positives in it, as backwards as that sounds.
How does one find the positives in having your own baby die in your arms? Nothing could bring her back, but I could choose to grow from it.
The one tool I did have was visualization, all the way back from when I was a little kid. So, I spent a lot of time visualizing a future where I had healed from the grief, where I had successfully birthed more children, where I could smile at the memory of my daughter and feel her energy with me. I knew that there would never be a “getting over” but I could create a “living with and becoming better because of”.
Prior to all of this, I was self-centered. I don’t mean that in a self-bashing way, just as statement of fact. Most young people are self-centered but I think I was a higher achiever than most here. I also didn’t feel deep gratitude for others, go out of my way to think of or serve others, or generally express myself openly. My world was about me.
But, wow, how this changed me! The moments with my best teacher flipped my whole self right side up into a much better version of me. The birth of my daughter was also the birth of me. I was so grateful for everyone that had helped me – during and after her birth. I began thinking of others and how I could be of service. I began to feel out loud.
This is what taught me to be there for someone that needs me rather than looking out just for myself and my own feelings.
This is what taught me deep gratitude, and for that I am forever grateful.
Gratitude
When I was in the hospital for 3 months for each of my sons’ pregnancies (6 months total, same room, same streaky green-tinted tv on the wall) I was incredibly grateful to all of the hospital staff, formed special friendships with some of them, and did whatever I could to help make their job with me easier. Staying in the hospital for that long is not fun or anyone’s dream way to spend a pregnancy (no cute maternity clothes, no baby showers, nobody to adore your glow and growing baby bump) but I was 100% grateful to be there because it meant we could get through it and deliver a full-term baby.
The birth of my first son was healing. I had a full-term, healthy baby. I left the hospital with my arms and heart full.
The birth of my second son was also healing, plus my visualization of a life with more children was becoming my reality.
The birth of my second daughter was the final piece of healing I needed. Her pregnancy and birth were 180° different than my first, as perfect as I could have ever imagined, giving me peace and integration in my heart.
Integration
So how does this tie into my current hip and pelvis story? I’ve had 21+ years to reconcile and heal from her birth, which I have totally done, so why am I including this? There are a few reasons.
First, it illustrates how I learned gratitude and how I learned to feel and care for others. But it also illustrates the power of perspective. This traumatic life experience is my most difficult experience, so anything else compared to it isn’t such a big deal.
Without having had this experience, my 11, soon to be 12, surgeries might be my most difficult thing and therefore tougher to process. Just as with her birth, the surgeries happen to me, out of my control. But the recoveries afterwards are what I own. So, compared to recovering from her birth, my surgery recoveries are easy.
I have hills to climb after each surgery, but nobody died.
Plus, I have a massive toolbox now that I didn’t have before.
But, it also goes deeper. Just as I had questions after her birth as to the cause, I’ve returned to having more questions. My major medical issues are all centered around the pelvis – dysplastic hips, hip joint damage, osteitis pubis, polycystic ovaries (that miraculously vanished), incompetent cervix (that also miraculously vanished), irregular periods that somehow became regular only after my last birth. Are these all related somehow? The hip dysplasia is congenital, a birth defect, but the osteitis pubis is damage from birthing, a birthing defect. Are the rest protective measures, protecting me from having babies because of the damage that would be done to my body as a result?
Also, now that my bones are fusing, permanently closing the pathway that all of my babies came through, I can’t help but look back and seek to integrate all of it together. I feel mixed emotions. As I birthed my babies, they tore my bones apart to the point of needing all of these surgeries to repair the damage. But, because of their births and needed surgeries, I am becoming whole, birthing myself, and completing the cycle.
I’m a better person for all of this and I have my daughter’s mighty spirit with me at all times. I would never wish a tragic experience like this onto anyone, but in my own way I’m grateful for what I’ve been able to gain from it. I feel like it has given me a superpower that I bring to everything I do and that her life continues with me everyday. It is a fascinating energetic cycle that leaves me sad but also empowered.
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