I really do believe that the next person who tells me that they are sorry about my miscarriage or anything ignorant along the lines of “At least you didn’t know the baby” will feel my complete wrath. Yes, I had a miscarriage. I miscarried twins last summer. This summer, I delivered my stillborn son. Miscarriage and stillbirth are two completely separate things. Don’t get me wrong; both are extremely painful and I am not trying to invalidate anyone’s feelings or lessen anyone’s losses. All I am saying is, my son was not miscarried. He was delivered into this world at 26 weeks like any other child. I pushed him out of my body the same way that I pushed Presley out of my body. The only difference is that Presley was alive when she was welcomed into this world.
When people discover that my son had Trisomy 18, that he wouldn’t have survived even if he had made it the full 40 weeks, the most common thing that I hear is “It was a blessing.” -or- “You are so lucky.” How anyone could really believe this, is beyond me. All I can think about is how it really doesn’t feel like a blessing. I lost my son the moment the doctor told me he no longer had a heartbeat, and once Eli was no longer inside of me, it felt like a new, second loss. As each month passes that I know he should be with me, when his due date rolled around, while watching friends and family members’ pregnancies progress: loss after loss. Time does not heal all wounds. Time won’t magically reunite me with my son, or erase all of the memories that I have or the feeling that he should be here with us.
There is nothing on this earth that I love more than my daughter. I watch her grow with pride each day and marvel at the little girl that she is turning in to. Sometimes when I am watching her do small things like pick up a ball, when I hear her laugh, when the sun reflects so beautifully on her long hair… I can’t help but think about her little brother and the twins that we lost so early on. What would they have been? Girls? Boys? What would my children have been like? I keep thinking of Eli, severely damaged by trisomy 18, and how I could have, would have, loved him anyway. The doctor gave us the option to abort. How could I have done that to my son? Once you start loving something, once you invest in it with personality and presence, how can you ever let it go? I think of my son every day. And I know I will until my very last breath.
If I could tell those children on thing, it would be this: “You may be gone from my body, but you will never be forgotten. Your father and I both love you so very much and we cannot wait to be with all of you some day.”
