A year ago today – Day 2

 

A year ago today I was laying in a hospital bed confused, scared, sad, mad, heartbroken and pretty much any other emotion you can imagine. Its something that really can’t be described adequately with words.. its something that you have to experience to really get it. And I hope you never have to experience it.

We arrived early at the hospital, our check in time was 7 A.M., Johnny and I walked up to the nurses station, the same nurses station that only 14 months before I had checked in about to be induced with our beautiful baby girl, only this time it was different, it was with a very heavy heart. The nurses were getting ready to change shifts as we showed up, the first nurse I saw I told her that my name was Heather Clear and I was here and they were supposed to have a room ready for me, instantly she knew who I was and walked me to our room, I was already crying, I stood in the middle of the delivery room feeling so lost and scared and she cried along with me. Her name was Amy, she was the nurse that would deliver Logan. Amy got both Johnny and I settled in the room, helped hook me up to monitors and left for the day. My parents arrived after taking Lexi to daycare and my dear friend Jen dropped everything to be at our side during this difficult day, we really are blessed to have so many people that love us. My doctor came in around 8:30 and explained that they would be inducing me with a pill that would be inserted vaginally, in very small doses and this would help put my body in delivery mode. It was at that point that I wasn’t so sure that I was ready to go through with this, I was so scared and no one had answers to the questions that I didn’t even know how to form into words. Dr. Langaker was so sweet and caring and really tried to explain everything she could in the most gentle terms but at the same time being very honest, it helped me along in ways that I wouldn’t understand until later. I asked her how long I could be waiting for Logan to be delivered and she said that it could take a really long time, it just depends on how my body reacted to the pills, but at 24 hours we could reevaluate other options,Thankfully we didn’t have to go down that road.

The day pretty much progressed with no progress. We were introduced to Coco McAtee, one of the social workers at Overland Park Regional, she helped guide us through some of the most difficult decisions we would have to make thus far. She was sweet, but you could tell that she was at a loss for words, I guess even when you deal with families who lose children everyday it doesn’t make it easier to know what to say. There were some insensitive people who were careless and didn’t pay attention to the sign the hospital had put on my door letting them know that there was a child who had died. The guy who came and took my blood for instance asked me if this was my first child and what our son’s name was, he said that Logan was a strong name and as he left he said good luck… as soon as he left the room I broke down in tears, he didn’t know, he couldn’t have known. Later that night the anesthesiologist did the same thing, he said that all the pain was worth it,  and in the end I’d get to take a beautiful baby home… again, he didn’t know. This time our nurse Heather was there, she came over and held my hand while the anesthesiologist talked about how wonderful babies were, she really helped me through that… it was hard to not say something, but it was even harder to say something.

I got to take a break from the pills and I got to eat dinner and visit with friends and Lexi was brought to the hospital for us to see. That really helped to raise my spirits in an otherwise heart wrenching day, to see my beautiful baby girl smile and laugh and ‘help’ me eat my vegetable soup, it was the only time that day I genuinely smiled.

Nurses changed shifts again and Amy came back into the room, the other nurse that was helping her was Heather, these two nurses were so great, in such a horrible circumstance they held my hand, they gave me hugs, they loved on me like they had known me for years.. they allowed me to grieve the way that I needed to, I only wish that more nurses could be that way.

We started back with the pills and doubled my dose at 8, I hadn’t really dilated and I wasn’t moving very fast, which I was thankful for… that meant that Logan was still with me for a little while longer. Finally the contractions started, I was asked so many times if I wanted to get an epidural… I refused for so long, finally I said the words that had been in my head and my heart the entire day… “why should I have relief from pain if it hurt Logan when he died?” Still, today I only hope that it didn’t hurt when he died, I only hope that something I did didn’t cause him to die (remember, at this point the reason for his death is unknown) I’m finally talked into getting an epidural and that is when I met the inconsiderate anesthesiologist.

Finally I drift off to sleep with tears in my eyes for what I know is going to come, my baby is going to be born, but he’s not going to cry, he’s not going to move, he has died.