Recently I blogged about an article in the Calgary Herald that talked about a stillborn baby and the rights of the baby to dignity and compassion. I didn't get into the story of the baby's mother, mostly because I really don't know what happened there and anything I say will be speculation.
But this mother and her baby stayed in my mind... The other day I spoke with a great friend of mine, Toren's mom, about the mother of this baby. While Toren's mom had so much love and compassion for this mother, I was unsure and skeptical. Why was I feeling this way?
The mother delivered her stillborn baby at home and hid the baby's body on her balcony, wrapped in a plastic bag. How could anyone do that, I thought? There is no way she told the truth, I thought... Until I went back to that awful place I avoid and remembered what it was like to give birth to Amelia.
This conversation with Toren's mom reminded me of the shock, the fear, the unimaginable, indescribable place where time stops and life looses any meaning, a place where the ground falls from your feet and the ceiling spins so hard you can't breathe. This is the place where a mother finds her newborn baby dead. Where birth and death meet and she is in the middle of it all, in pain of labour, in pain of loss. A piece of her dies with her baby. How is she expected to be rational, to follow some rules and norms that make sense to others, yet nothing makes sense to her, when she just died with her baby, all while she still breathes...
On Stillness: Dignity & Compassion
Lilypie Angel and Memorial tickers
22 May 2013
Between two worlds. What a lonely place.
Today I came across a post written by another bereaved momma, with a similar story to mine that happened a few years prior. I'm so grateful that she shared her self, that she spoke out, and that I found her.
Today I went back to the hospital where Mr. Wiggles was born, nothing major, just an ultrasound that I needed to do... Back in the same ultrasound room where we thought we got a glimpse of Mr. W's boy bits, I proudly announced to the tech that I came here a lot when pregnant with my son. It was a happy feeling walking that hallway, that entryway, that block. Mr. Wiggles was born alive and screaming here.
Yet one thing would not leave my mind. As this happened to be almost six months after his birth, I remembered a visit we made to the hospital where Amelia was born, a visit that came exactly six months after. We walked into the hospital through the entrance that I was wheeled out of, in shock, with a box on my lap instead of a baby. Empty bellied, broken hearted. That day, six months after, I returned to the hospital to seek help, gosh, I needed it, I was sinking deeper and deeper into grief, dispair, horror of my life. I didn't get it there. Instead, I had a full on panick attack and emotional meltdown from just being in that place again, some kind woman showed us the back way to the mental health area. Another woman who saw me there told me I needed to calm down. ...
Don't really want to go into this, but it didn't help. At all.
Going back to today, I feel that since Wiggles was born, I've been living between two worlds and it's so lonely here. So. Unbearably. Lonely.
Here is what this other b.momma had to say about that:
"I did not feel like a normal mother. I was happy with Liam but I was incredibly lonely. I could share that there had been a baby before Liam, but nowhere, not in any mother's group or playtime was there the space for me to truly tell my story. Nobody could see me only months before, alone, sobbing on a carpet that was soaked with my tears. Nobody else knew the animal cry of a bereaved mother's wail, ricocheting through the darkness of the night. I was walking around with this living baby, a smile on my face, but I could still hear that wail ripping at my soul. I could still feel the quiet, unmoving baby I had held before Liam. I was the mother of two, yet I was silenced from that truth. I simply assumed this was how it had to be."
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/motherwoman/mothers-speaking-the-trut_b_3248784.html
This is so true, every word of it. I couldn't have said it better.
Today I went back to the hospital where Mr. Wiggles was born, nothing major, just an ultrasound that I needed to do... Back in the same ultrasound room where we thought we got a glimpse of Mr. W's boy bits, I proudly announced to the tech that I came here a lot when pregnant with my son. It was a happy feeling walking that hallway, that entryway, that block. Mr. Wiggles was born alive and screaming here.
Yet one thing would not leave my mind. As this happened to be almost six months after his birth, I remembered a visit we made to the hospital where Amelia was born, a visit that came exactly six months after. We walked into the hospital through the entrance that I was wheeled out of, in shock, with a box on my lap instead of a baby. Empty bellied, broken hearted. That day, six months after, I returned to the hospital to seek help, gosh, I needed it, I was sinking deeper and deeper into grief, dispair, horror of my life. I didn't get it there. Instead, I had a full on panick attack and emotional meltdown from just being in that place again, some kind woman showed us the back way to the mental health area. Another woman who saw me there told me I needed to calm down. ...
Don't really want to go into this, but it didn't help. At all.
Going back to today, I feel that since Wiggles was born, I've been living between two worlds and it's so lonely here. So. Unbearably. Lonely.
Here is what this other b.momma had to say about that:
"I did not feel like a normal mother. I was happy with Liam but I was incredibly lonely. I could share that there had been a baby before Liam, but nowhere, not in any mother's group or playtime was there the space for me to truly tell my story. Nobody could see me only months before, alone, sobbing on a carpet that was soaked with my tears. Nobody else knew the animal cry of a bereaved mother's wail, ricocheting through the darkness of the night. I was walking around with this living baby, a smile on my face, but I could still hear that wail ripping at my soul. I could still feel the quiet, unmoving baby I had held before Liam. I was the mother of two, yet I was silenced from that truth. I simply assumed this was how it had to be."
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/motherwoman/mothers-speaking-the-trut_b_3248784.html
This is so true, every word of it. I couldn't have said it better.
12 May 2013
Dignity. Compassion. Gratitude.
This Mother's Day, I would like to share with you a present, something that was written by a person I never met, decided upon by a person I never knew. Yet, it went right through to my core, gave me strength, hope, and love. Strength to go forward with my story, hope for a better future for all parents of stillborn children, and love for all the kind people in this world.
The story in the article is about a mother, a bereaved mother, and a confusing, awful situation she is in. I can't comment on it as I know nothing about it and don't wish to speculate.
The part that I really care for is where it makes a distinction between a fetus and a child, calling a stillborn baby a "child in the fullest sense of the word, ready to be born, yet a child whose eyes will never open on the beauties of this world." So gently, beautifully, carefully they defend the parent's right to grieve their baby. Not a fetus, not a dream, but a child.
This comes from the compassion within their hearts, backed by the Supreme Court of Canada and their decision to treat a stillborn child as a person. So confidently they make a distinction between a wanted abortion and a dreaded stillbirth, I now can do the same.
My daughter was a child, a child that lived (within me) and died (within me, also). I am her grieving, loving Mother and always will be.
I cannot thank you enough, Calgary Herald, for your compassion. Thank you. This is the best Mother's Day gift our society could give to a mother of a stillborn child, at least in my eyes.
Editorial: An infant’s dignity
The story in the article is about a mother, a bereaved mother, and a confusing, awful situation she is in. I can't comment on it as I know nothing about it and don't wish to speculate.
The part that I really care for is where it makes a distinction between a fetus and a child, calling a stillborn baby a "child in the fullest sense of the word, ready to be born, yet a child whose eyes will never open on the beauties of this world." So gently, beautifully, carefully they defend the parent's right to grieve their baby. Not a fetus, not a dream, but a child.
This comes from the compassion within their hearts, backed by the Supreme Court of Canada and their decision to treat a stillborn child as a person. So confidently they make a distinction between a wanted abortion and a dreaded stillbirth, I now can do the same.
My daughter was a child, a child that lived (within me) and died (within me, also). I am her grieving, loving Mother and always will be.
I cannot thank you enough, Calgary Herald, for your compassion. Thank you. This is the best Mother's Day gift our society could give to a mother of a stillborn child, at least in my eyes.
Editorial: An infant’s dignity
11 May 2013
A friend shares her story of the stillbirth of her son, Toren.
On Stillness: January 6, 2012, 03:00 - 12:47
I really relate to what Toren's mom said about the shock, the feeling that everyone is just staring at you and not doing anything to help, to the feeling of the world just falling away and the mix of death and birth alternating in the mind, mixed with shock. Lots of shock.
Just want to highlight this: I believe parents going through stillbirth are Not Clear-Thinking Consenting Adults. They are people in the state of Acute Shock, and should be treated accordingly. With Care and Consideration.
Lots of love to you all.
I really relate to what Toren's mom said about the shock, the feeling that everyone is just staring at you and not doing anything to help, to the feeling of the world just falling away and the mix of death and birth alternating in the mind, mixed with shock. Lots of shock.
Just want to highlight this: I believe parents going through stillbirth are Not Clear-Thinking Consenting Adults. They are people in the state of Acute Shock, and should be treated accordingly. With Care and Consideration.
Lots of love to you all.
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