Day 1

The first words out of my mouth after Dr. Ward told me there was no heartbeat were, "I understand"

 

I understand? Do I? Does this really make sense? This isn’t fair! I wanted this baby. I don’t even know what I’m having. At that point I began to panic. I don’t even know if it’s a boy or a girl and I already have to say goodbye? Where’s Neal? Seriously…. So many thoughts in such a short amount of time. It was such a blur.

The doctor began talking to me as the nurse took Kate out into the hall. “Erin, I’m so sorry. This is the heart… there’s no movement.” What do I say? What do I say after I’m told that my baby is already gone? “This maybe happens twice a year…. I’m so sorry.” Really? Twice a year and it just happened to be our baby? 1 of 2 out of all his deliveries? Why? Why is this happening?

At this point it started to set in… I needed to get Neal. I sent him a text but then immediately called and told him he needed to come up here. He could tell something was wrong but I refused to tell him over the phone. How am I supposed to say this to him? How do I explain this? I knew the pain that I was feeling and I just wanted to keep him safe from it.

Neal and Liam entered the room and I couldn’t even look him in the eye. I felt so bad. I was so disappointed and heartbroken. I could not bear to watch his face as the doctor delivered the news. I just hung my head and began to cry.

Dr. Ward went over everything with him again. Because of how far along I was, the ultrasound didn’t show too much. He explained that because I’m full-term I would have to deliver. I could do it that night, the next day, or take some time to grieve before delivery. I looked at Neal and we both knew we wanted him out right away.

The doctor left us alone for a few minutes and told us to take our time. I broke down. I couldn’t stop apologizing to Neal. As much as I knew it wasn’t my fault I still felt like I owed him an apology for this pain. It physically hurt.

The doctor came back and handed us a bright blue sticky note with a name and phone number written on it. Russon Brothers Mortuary. What? We have to plan a funeral? To be told that your baby is gone and given a number for a mortuary within 10 minutes of each other is devastating. I remember looking at that piece of paper and thinking, “what is happening?!” Dr. Ward explained that they waive some of the service fees for infants and that we should call them when we’re ready… lucky us… a discounted funeral.

The doctor left again and we both broke down. As I sat on Neal’s lap, with his arms wrapped around me, I just lost it. It hurt so much. I began to feel sick and ran into the bathroom to throw up. How could this be happening?

We finally walked out into the lobby and met the kids. Both Kate and Liam were happy playing with one of the nurses. Neal left to go get his mom downstairs (she works as a nurse in surgery at that hospital). I sat and waited and began to numb myself. The office was quiet, most staff was on their lunch break and no other pregnant women were in the waiting area. I began to think about all the things I had to do and who I had to call.

The thought of calling my Dad and telling him what happened immediately made me cry. I was so hurt and disappointed, how could I share this news with anyone else?

Neal’s mom came into the office and just wrapped her arms around me. I broke down again. The whole situation was just a nightmare.

I left the room to make the phone call to my Dad. I hesitantly called him and delivered the news. It was just as hard as I thought it would be the minute I had to tell him, “The baby’s gone, they couldn’t find the heartbeat….” He was so confused but tried to stay strong for me. I knew his fatherly instincts kicked right in because he immediately became strong for me. He told me everything was going to be okay… which it wasn’t…. but it’s what I needed to hear in that moment. I needed someone to tell me that everything was going to be okay, regardless of if I believed it or not.

Before leaving the hospital we spoke with the doctor once again and told him our decision. We wanted to deliver the baby tonight and we’d be back at 7pm to check in to the hospital.

 We made plans for the kids so we could have some time alone to process everything. Liam went to our sister-in-law’s house and we decided to take Kate home with us to take a nap. When we dropped Liam off at Jen’s she came outside right away and with tears in her eyes she gave me the biggest hug. Just the day before we were talking about how close we were to having our babies! Her sweet girl would be here in just 6 days… our baby was supposed to be a week after that. We didn’t have to say much to know the feelings we felt at that point.

 

Neal and I went home to put Kate down for a nap. We were greeted outside by both of our Fathers. It hurt to see my Dad. I didn't even want to make eye contact with him because I was scared for him to see my pain and disappointment. He gave me a hug, kissed my forehead, and said that he was going to be there for me through all of this. He told me that we'll get through this. I knew he was right, but I didn't want to have to go through any of this at that point. We said goodbye and they left to help take care of Liam and get everything ready for that evening.

I walked in to a freshly cleaned house… something I would have done before bringing home our new baby… but instead- it was freshly cleaned from my efforts that morning. I got home from drill practice and my nesting kicked in. I deep cleaned the house from top to bottom, trying to finish before my doctors appointment.

 

Once Kate was asleep Neal and I went into our room and laid down together. He held me. We cried, a lot. He got in the bath to calm down. I couldn’t bear the thought of seeing my bare belly. It was just too hard and I was still in shock that I was carrying a dead baby inside of me.

After we had some time to process. We began making arrangements for that night. Where would the kids go, who would bring them to the hospital, who did we want to have in the hospital to meet our baby, when would the funeral home come to pick up the body? So many decisions that had to be made but we didn’t want to make them.

 

I wasn’t strong enough to call the funeral home so Neal did it for us. He pulled out the dreaded sticky note and called the number. They were expecting a call from us, thank goodness, we didn’t want to have to say the words out loud that we lost our baby. They were so kind and patient and just told us not to worry about anything right now but to just call us when we were ready for them to pick up our baby. That sucked.