ten years ago today....great sadness....

I can't just say that today is Robert's birthday. Because he didn't really have a birth. And his birthday was supposed to be in September, not in June. The day he was born was the saddest day of my life. Birth is supposed to be wonderous. Holding that baby for the first time is supposed to make the whole experience worth it. That baby skin, the fuzzy little head, the little mouth that knows what it wants, the eyes of that baby looking at Mama like he just knows who she is. And those little feet, oh kissable feet. I always unwrapped those babies from their swaddling to look at those little toes. But ten years ago today, it was a different story...one I have told before, but cannot help remembering.

On Friday the 13th of June back in 2003, I had a routine appointment with the baby doc. I had noticed that the baby wasn't kicking much, but it was still moving around, I thought. At any rate, I seriously didn't notice anything unusual. Perhaps because Margaret was 6, Kathryn was 5, Evelyn 3 and a half, Suzanne was 2, and Sonja Kathleen was 13 months old. I did have my hands full. (Emily was graduating from high school that week, Abigail was 16, Benjamin 14, Mirielle 13, Joseph 12, Aaron 10, Mali Rose 9, and Sam was 7). Anyway. The midwife didn't get a heartbeat, and I somehow didn't panic. She suggested a sonogram, and I just wasn't too worried. But when she rolled that doppler around and had that serious face, I really started to get it. The doctor came in. He said it. He said, "I'm sorry, but the baby is gone. He has died.". Everything sort of shifted, changed, it couldn't be true. I had to be alone and absorb it. I didn't cry. The doctor suggested waiting until Monday to induce, he said it might be healing to come to terms with it first, that I could have a weekend to deal with it. I just agreed. Now, looking back, I think that was prolonging the agony, and honestly, walking around for those days just knowing that I had a dead baby inside me, it was too much. The doctor asked me if I was okay to drive, if I needed help getting home or if I should call someone. I said I was fine. I even stopped on the way home and had poor Abigail, who was with me on what was supposed to be a quick dr. visit and a shopping trip day, I had her run into the dollar store to get some treats for the kids. From the parking lot I called Kim and asked her to call people for me.

Home. I had to tell Paul. I snagged him as he walked in from work, brought him into our room. Then I lost it. I decided right there not to pretend to be brave or strong. Just to cry, to make it okay for the kids to cry. I needed to be with them, and I couldn't stop the tears, so I went into the living room and sat on the couch, and hugged them, and I cried. They had millions of questions, and I tried to answer them.

Monday morning rolled around. The hospital where 13 newborns were joyfully welcomed to our arms and family was warm and familiar, but we weren't there for happiness. When another expecting mom in the admissions area gave me that knowing smile, ouch.

I have already written, in past years, what it was like to have that floppy little guy put into my arms. The gratitude I felt towards the nurse who so gently wrapped him up and gave him to me, how I felt her pain as well as my own, and loved her for it.

Robert wasn't pretty. No, he was pathetic. My heart broke for him. He was so small, a miniature newborn. So fragile. He didn't open his eyes to look at his mama, he didn't open and close his little mouth.

Margaret graduated from kindergarten that night, my sister so kindly took her.

When the doctor discharged me from the hospital, he told me to go home and enjoy my other kids, they would help me heal.

He was right. They did. It was a hard summer, I stayed up all night with Benjamin and watched the Yankees, me who had never liked baseball. I was in a fog.

As you probably know by now, Jonathan Robert was born the following year, on April 30th. There couldn't have ever been a baby on earth more special and more welcome than him. He cried when he was born. So did we.


Yesterday Benjamin texted me that Ashley hadn't been feeling the baby move. Oh dear Lord, I couldn't bear it. I didn't want him to know how panicked I felt. Perhaps more so because I have been thinking so much about Robert lately, being this time of year and all. I told him to take her to the hospital and to be checked out. Then he texted me and said All Is Good, Baby Is Kicking. And I cried. Happy tears. Going through a loss like that is hard enough, but to imagine your child suffering a loss like that...

And now I will go on with my day. Paul didn't remember that today is Robert's "birthday", nor do the kids. That's okay. I wish I didn't remember, but I do.