Sheer and Utter Terror

The following is a cross post with my “regular” photography website. At some point I’m going to start posting here, regularly, about our current pregnancy, and baby, nicknamed Booger for the moment.  I just haven’t been able to yet.  I haven’t been able to bring myself to that yet.

I will though.

Promise.

It’s been a year since Erin and I lost Beanie. We lost Beanie at 32-weeks of pregnancy. It was, it was nothing we could’ve changed. The problem that took Beanie from us was started before we even knew Erin was pregnant, and we knew before her period. It was ultimately just bad luck, very bad luck.

Having said that, it doesn’t change much, it doesn’t really change anything. I don’t know if I would change anything. We could’ve found out sooner, maybe it would’ve hurt less, maybe it would hurt less now, but I wouldn’t have had those blissful months. I’ve never had months that happy. I think I will in the future, but those were wonderful times, and I don’t think I’d take those away.

Time has, as time does, dulled the pain. I’m thankful for that.

Getting in the car and crying the whole time was just…it just was. The car is my thinking time, and for many months if I was alone in the car, I was crying. I think I can driver safer today, not crying.

But there is still pain. I’ve found a peace with pain. An embrace of it. Crying, today, in some ways, it doesn’t hurt. It feels honest. It hurts to talk about losing Beanie, every time it hurts, but that’s not “bad”. It just is. I enjoy talking about her actually, at least on occasion. I may cry while doing it, but it feels good to do it. It’s something I don’t think people get, but they just need to trust me here.

I do think about her. I think about her a lot. Not everyday, not for days on end on occasion, but I probably think about her more days than not. She’s my baby girl. How could I not?

I do wonder what she would’ve been like, as a child, as a teenager, as an adult, I wonder. I wonder, as is I think natural, about those lost potentials. I miss that I’ll never experience those with her. I would’ve liked too.

I’ll always wish I could’ve. And that’s good.

At the end of the day I’ve learned somethings, they may very well be of no use to anyone but me, but that never stopped me from sharing before. I’ve learned much purer versions of many emotions, namely love and fear.

I can’t say I know love like many parents know love, but I have an inkling of how little I know of love. I love many people in this world, and many experiences, and many things, and I know I know very little about that word. I just have a taste for how powerful it can be.

Maybe what I’ve learned more about, for better or worse, is fear. I think I can pretty comfortably say I understand fear. I’ve learned to understand fear in and out. With this current pregnancy, oh, for those who don’t know, Erin is 24 weeks pregnant, it’s good stuff. But with this pregnancy, Booger, I can feel the terror, shear terror. Slight pains, slight things that the perinatologist is keeping an eye, and he is very confident everything is dandy for us, but I live in fear. I’ve learned how randomly things can go wrong, horribly wrong, and I fear that moment, I fear that moment coming into existence. Logic be damned, it terrifies me.

I’ve never been a person to live in fear. I respect and listen to fear, it’s a good emotion, it’s an informative emotion, but it definitely has a much stronger pull in my life today. I’m not unusually scared of climbing a cliff, I’m not scared of a car getting to close, I’m terrified of anything that happens to Erin and Boog, a slip and fall, a strange pain, anything, anything different that isn’t easily and quickly definable as “normal”, anything that could be “a sign”. It’s an amazing, a powerful, feeling.

But for all this, let me again be very clear, I wouldn’t, even at the hardest of time, give up my time with Bean, as third hand as it may have been. (As a guy, what else can we do but feel a stomach a move? It is a wonderful feeling though.) I don’t want you to think, after the previous paragraphs that I’m worse off for the experience. I’m different for it, but I’m happy to have had it. She was my baby girl.

I just wish I could’ve had a lifetime with her. I never can, but I’d do almost anything too.

But it was what it was, and that can’t and couldn’t have been changed. That much I know. My job today, everyday, one of many actually, but the important one, is to, while honoring Beanie, to create a happy life for Boog to come into. I can’t do anything for Beanie but love and honor her memory, but for Boog, I can do a lot for Boog, and I’ll do whatever that is, whatever that must be, because I want Boog to have a great life.

And I can’t provide a lot, but damn if Boog ain’t going to at least have the love of it’s Papa. (Mama’s going to do the same I’m sure.) I’ll at least make sure of that Boog is well loved.

And I can’t think of anything I’d rather do in this life.

But I will also always miss my little Beanie. I love you girl. You did have that, you always will have that.

As I’m no longer emotionally capable of writing back to people personally with even the barest of details on what has occurred in the last week I’ve decided everyone is just getting a form letter response to minimize my pain, my crying.  I know the people who care about me deserve better, but I think they will understand, I hope so. It’s just so overwhelming.

———

Thank you for the concern you have shown my family and I.  I wish I could respond personally but I’m unable to tell this story anymore.  I’m sure you can understand.

On July 7th at 9:46am Erin and I’s little Bean passed from us.  It was sudden, unexpected and has been devastating to us.  She will always be loved by us, she will always be our sweet little baby girl.

We are working on trying to heal at this point and moving forward.  For at least a few weeks we won’t be much in contact with anybody.  We need to hold each other, help each other, and help ourselves.  As we start to heal, when we need to, we’ll reach out to you.  Over the following months feel free to contact us about the day to day and usual stuff of life as we put the pieces of our lives back together and get to our new normal, but please don’t mention our little Bean unless we choose to bring her up.  But also let me be clear here, the day to day dealing with life is wonderful and brings us both joy, so don’t be shy about talking to us once we’ve had some time.

So you know we will be or are currently seeking and getting professional help along with group therapy to help us with the grieving process.  We are working on healing, healing each other, healing ourselves, but it’s going to take some time.  We think about her a lot, we are happy to, but it is both joyful and very painful.

Should you wish to understand further what we’ve been through, what has happened and how that has effected us I have been trying to write regualarly during some of this to help me process each day and start healing.  It explains in greater detail than I’m prepared to repeat about what has occurred.  It is not a light easy read though, so be prepared if you choose to read it.  You can do so at:

http://www.sheerandutterterror.com/?p=39

The support offered by our families and friends has been immense, appreciated and so necessary for helping us get through this ordeal.  Thank you for that, never doubt your love for us means so much to us.

Bean, 7/7/09 - 9:46am

3lbs

Beanie, we love you.

We loved you from the moment we found out you were inside Erin and we will love you to the day we die.  You brought a joy and happiness to our lives that neither of us had ever experienced.  We are sorry your time with us was so short, but we are so thankful and grateful for that time we got.  You are a part of us, you are a part of our family, you always will be.  We will never forget you.  We will never stop loving you.

Thank you for sharing your life with us.

You will always be my sweet little girl.

I found after writing last night that it really helped me process what had occurred.  It helped give me way points to remembering the day without having to remember the whole day, leaving me room to focus on today, on getting through today without needing to hang onto all the details of yesterday.  This whole experience is too much for one mind, or at least my mind, to hold onto.  I just need to focus on what I need to do.  What I need to deal with now, and be prepared to deal with in the near future, what I’ve already dealt with is gone and I don’t have time to fully emotionally process it now.  Think of this as a diary, rambling an incoherent, but my experience.

This is giving me a way to get started, and leave markers for me to come back later and work through it.  I keep thinking about how what psychologist will say about it, because there will be a psychologist, psychiatrist, someone or another, in my future.  There ain’t much of choice about that.

I’ve also found that writing this gives me a way to communicate with people without talking to anyone.  I just can’t talk to anyone on the phone anymore.  It’s too much.  I talk to my mom, Erin’s mom, our midwife, maybe a few other people on occasion, but by and large I can’t explain what’s going on for the first time to someone again.  There are many people who’ve read this, many close dear friends, who deserve better, but today I’m not capable of it.  I do promise when I’m ready, want, and need help I will ask.  Right now, right now I need time with Erin for us to go through this.  I time to hold her, to be held by her.  I need time to honor the Bean, the three of us, as a family.

Today I’ve also started to realize by the time this is done, I will have lost a child.  On an intellectual level, that’s not accurate.  The Bean isn’t a person.  The Bean is obviously not properly formed, doesn’t have a functioning brain, has no chance to live outside of Erin.  I also think that perspective is total bullshit.  Beanie is my baby.  My child.  Beanie won’t live a day, probably not an hour, maybe Beanie will not even be born alive.  But Beanie is my baby.  Emotionally, Beanie is every bit my child, and I love it as such.

I was actually thinking about that a lot last night, and today as well.  Beanie will not have been in this world long, certainly not outside the womb long, and even it’s trip through this world growing in Erin has been too short, but I know that Bean has been loved in that time.  Loved deeply by the two of us.  Dootted over.  Cared for.  The happiness Beanie has brought the two of us is amazing.  I don’t know if I’d trade that happiness away to save myself the pain I’m now going through.  I don’t want that trade even today.

The time Erin has been pregnant been the most amazing point in my life to date.  It’s been just so filled with joy, with hope, with potential.  Here I am jobless, my chosen career the field in shambles with hardly a chance to ever do it again.  That which I love so dearly.  And without it, I’ve been so happy.  I’ve been aimless and wandering trying to figure out where to go in life, confused so deeply, but none of that has mattered because of Bean.  I just wanted to be a father.  And I will be, for a very short time.  And in that time, whatever that time is, a minute, an hour, I will do everything I can to show Bean a world filled with love.  World that will be so sad to see Bean go, but that is made better, better for the two of us by it’s presence.  I want Bean, in it’s own way, to know, on some sort of whacky spiritual level, I want it to know that it’s was loved in this world, and brought tremendous joy to this world, to the two of us.  I want to show Bean all that I can of why this world is amazing and thank it for being a part of my life if too short so.

We’ve asked our care providers if possible to not let us know the gender of Beanie.  We somehow think that will make it easier on us.  I think it will.  I guess I don’t want to remember Beanie as a little boy or girl, but as that overly energetic little smart-ass troublemaker that would kick and punch Erin relentlessly until I put my hand on her stomach to feel it and then it would stop.  That’s how I want to remember Bean.  I’m sure I’ll remember it’s little face with a hat, and bundled up.  I just want to remember Bean as our child.

We’ve made some preliminary plans on what to do to honor Bean, in way of memorial.  We’re going to have Bean cremated.  No one ever wants to go through birth while simultaneously planning the memorial service for that baby.  We’re going to cremate Bean, and then we need to figure out where to spread the ashes.  I’ve got a few ideas, maybe a trail we hiked that first day we found out about Bean.  That might be nice.  Maybe we’ll find some special spot that feels right.  We don’t know.  We’ll figure that out.

We’re hoping that Bean will be born tomorrow.  I don’t know if born is the term I want to use, but it’s the one that’s easiest right now, clearest.

I let this blog slip by for too long, and for that the story is now going to lack in the richness it so deserves.  I’m going to try to compress months, or parts of months, into an hour or two of writing before I pass out, after this day.  I have to write this, not for you, but I need to write this for me.

Erin and I have spent months preparing for our Beanie.  We call the baby The Bean because we don’t know it’s gender.  So we can’t use a name, and “it” gets old quickly, but sometimes you just have too.  The name Bean came from when we were looking at various bits of info and size photos on the babycenter.com website (btw, good site for a lot of info, if you haven’t figured this out already).  At one point early on we saw that the baby was the size of a bean of some sort, and the name Bean came, and stuck.

We’re on week 31, and it’s still the Bean.

We have, for the last 28 or so weeks, been preparing for the Bean.  We’ve taken classes, found an excellent midwife, developed a birth plan we’re both very happy with.  We’ve researched formula and breast-feeding, disposable and reusable diapers, strollers, car seats, cribs and co-sleepers.  We’ve seen the midwife, time and time again.  Found ourselves a doula.  Talked about what music to have during the birth, made jokes when we read it was safe to have sex while Erin was having contractions as long as the water hadn’t broke.  I know more about more things that a year ago I never cared about, or knew existed than I would’ve guessed possible.  Read, read, talk and talk.

I’ve been amazed at how much any one person, namely how much I, can talk about a baby not yet born, hell, talk about a baby at all.  Every conversation turns that way, sooner or later, but mostly sooner.  And I rarely have gotten bored of it, I’m probably the only person in the conversation who wasn’t bored.  The Bean fascinates me, the possibilities of this little life amaze me.  The frightening possibility that any universe would allow me to raise a child astounds me.

Several months back we were on a trip to northern California.  Erin had just started to feel Beanie kicking and punching a week or two earlier.  So in a hotel room in Reno Nevada I felt my baby kick my hand.  My baby, kicked, maybe punched, my hand.  We were just laying in bed spooning, and I felt my baby, my Beanie move.  As the months would go by we would get used to this.  The Bean was  very active, very active.  I could count ten movements in as many seconds regularly.  It was fun.  Less so for Erin, who’s ribs were getting sore in one spot.  Beanie was the master of En Utero Dance Dance Revolution.

For 30 weeks of pregnancy, everything had been smooth.  Erin has grown normally, her protein has been good, Bean’s heart has been strong and regular.  Any other number of tests have come back fine and well (I have no idea what all the little strips on the urine test measure among other things.)

Week 31 things got tough.  Erin started having pain in her lower abdomen, her left leg, and her side, under her rib.  Her walking was becoming labored and difficult, as was her sleeping.  Our midwife diagnosed Erin as have an irritable uterus.  Basically she was having irregular, short contractions.  Nothing that was a source of immediate concern for a pre-term birth, but it was disturbing her sleep.

Friday we went and she did a test at a local clinic for a UTI, positive.  (Really, it’s not like pregnant women are peeing constantly already, or have pressure in their abdomens, or many of the other symptoms.)  Got meds for it.  Did some research and found out a UTI will increase problems with an irritable uterus.  Thought we had any number of the recent problems on the road to reduction.

Saturday, the 4th of July, Erin sent an email to our midwife with a photo of her foot.  One swollen (left), one not (right).  She told us to go the ER immediately to get checked for a blood clot in her left leg.  On the way to the ER my mom called, she’s a nurse.  I told her what was up, and what the symptoms were, and she diagnosed Erin with a blood clot also.

On arrival at the hospital we were first taken up to labor and delivery.  Being 31 weeks pregnant they wanted to check the baby first and foremost.  Erin was put on a fetal monitor.  The Beanie’s heartbeat, was, as always, strong and regular.  Erin’s uterus was having irregular intermittent contractions.  On the advice of the doctor and in consultation with our midwife she was given some drug I don’t remember the name of that relaxes smooth muscle tissue so the contractions would stop.  After two or three hours everything was good and fine, and back to the ER.

In the ER after a doppler ultrasound of her left leg Erin was diagnosed with a blood clotting issue.  Once they diagnosed it they wouldn’t let her even go to the bathroom.  Things got serious for a bit.  After talking to this person and that person, this doc and that doc, a plan was decided on.  She was to go on something called Leverox, or something like that, I can’t remember the names of all these drugs precisely, it’s an anticoagulant.  Because of the holiday weekend getting the script for home use wasn’t a possibility and she needed to be on it so Erin was admitted for a day or two so she could get her shots and be observed.

So they admitted us to labor and delivery so Erin and the Bean could be monitored.  Fetal monitoring was minor, which we were happy about.  The Bean’s heartbeat was strong and regular when it was monitored.  The Bean just liked to move a lot so monitoring was tough and Erin needed to move regularly so monitoring was basically a real pain with limited benefit.  We were told that we were going to stay till Monday morning so Erin wouldn’t miss any shots.  They were going to transfer us to postpartum (whatever the department for the women who’ve given birth already is) for Sunday night.  They didn’t need to monitor the Bean anymore, and Erin required minimal monitoring they felt.

Before they did that though they wanted to do a quick ultrasound, just to double check that everything was good with the Bean.  Yep, no biggie.  The doc was talking us through the ultrasound.  Feet (10 toes, I looked), legs, on down.  There was more fluid than she liked.  She went into doctor talk, that clean antiseptic talking through what she was seeing and what she wasn’t.  What she didn’t see was a skull.  There was face, but no skull.  I almost fainted.  I had to leave the room twice.  I feel horrible for that.  I could leave the room, Erin couldn’t.  I was so flush.  The nurses were afraid to leave me alone because I had so little skin tone.

The doctor wanted to do a vaginal ultrasound to be sure.  We did.  She was.

I don’t remember when I asked her to stop, but somewhere I did.  We needed to stop for a minute.  I needed to breath.  Erin needed to breath.  We had spent this year, we found out Erin was pregnant on Dec 27th, this whole year looking forward to our Beanie.

The doctor told us there was no chance for our baby to survive.  The brain, as much as there might be one, was getting mushed around unprotected as the Bean moved.  Everything was fine up to the brainstem with the Bean.  The brainstem being intact meant that the heart pumped fine (I saw it pumping on the ultrasound, our Beanie’s little heart, I was happy to have seen it beating, all those conformations of good things, I loved that) and it meant that Bean would have those involuntary movements that Erin was feeling.  Erin had to lay there, knowing our baby would die as she felt it kicking inside of her.  I love her, and I feel so badly for her.  I wish I had been a better pillar for her, but all I could do was cry on her.  Since that hour I’ve been happy any point she wasn’t crying.

(She’s asleep now.  It makes me happy, as much as anything can right now.  Moments like this I love modern medications.)

The problem would with skull would’ve started at about 3 or 4 weeks.  Probably around when we were just learning she was pregnant, right when the spinal cord was first forming.  When we were so excited, and so scared, and so confused.  That’s when this started.  There was nothing we could’ve done, there is nothing wrong with either of us.  It’s bad luck, just bad luck.

Tomorrow, or the day after, depends on how the meds work, Erin needs to give birth to our Bean.  Our Bean may be alive when it’s born, but it won’t live long they tell us, if it is alive.  We had planned a home birth with no medications, now we are going with any anti-pain med we can get and any med they want to induce and rush this along.  Our midwife is trying to get us to think of this not as a birth but as a medical procedure.  She doesn’t want us to have this association if we should have future births.

With the clotting issue due to the pregnancy we don’t want to have this take any longer than necessary.  We, I very much, don’t want to endanger Erin.  Losing the Bean is a pain I don’t know how I’m going to bear (I don’t know if I’ve ever felt a love like this before), but I will, and I will do so so much better if I can do it with Erin.  To lose both would be…

Erin, and me as well, also can’t go home and spend two months feeling this baby kicking and punching while waiting to be born to die.  It’s something that would tear us each apart.  I know all I want to do is cry.

My eyes hurt from crying.

Tomorrow is going to be worse.

That was what The Oven’s grandma said when she found out that I had impregnated her granddaughter. The part you need to understand here is that The Oven and I were each the other’s first boy/girlfriend, and we dated for 2 years in our early twenties.  She also didn’t realize we were involved, again.  So apparently I finally did what I was supposed to do all along.

Good to know I got that accomplished.  Grandma was all around very happy to get the news, which felt good.

Next up, in 36 hours or so, The Oven’s father.  We expect him to be ecstatic.  He’s always wanted to be a grandpa.  He also doesn’t know we’re involved, but we think he suspects.

So I heard The Beans heartbeat.  The Oven conferenced me in with the midwife for the appointment so I could ask questions and hear the heartbeat.

It was…strange.  It may have made it all more real to me.  I’ve started having some very vivid dreams about the baby, just had my first about it being born, after a hostage situation that involved me sliding down down some high-tension steel wire which I was able to weld the broken ends of together with my bare hands via my superpowers while hanging hundreds of feet in the air.  And it ended with my just sobbing my eyes out that The Bean was safe at the end of this.  Like minutes of sobbing.  How confused is that?  Got to love them dreams.

On one hand, I’m really excited, really excited.  I love that I’ve heard my baby’s heart beat.  That’s way cool.  Really, it’s hard to overemphasize the coolness of this. Every once and a while, usually when I tell someone I heard the heart beat, then it gets a bit overwhelming.

On the other hand, it’s not like it was this overwhelming spiritual moment I thought it might be.  It was cool.  It actually seems more like a delayed effect item.  The moment was cool but it’s power takes time to effect me.

I don’t know, any which way, I’m very happy I’ve heard that.  It was a strong beat, impressively strong, and fast, but not like the hummingbird fast I thought it might be.

Told my mom that I’m dating The Oven.  She already had figured out I was seeing someone.  She was unsurprised by the whole conversation. It was actually kind of dull.  Bummer.

The real question now is how she’ll react to the next conversation, the one where I tell her I got The Oven pregnant.  I’m guessing that conversation will be more interesting.

This link is courtesy of The Oven.  I never have an idea how big The Bean is, we call it The Bean for now.  So she sent me a link to a nice, if overly fluffy and girl-y, website.  Outside of those problems, so far, from the three pages I’ve looked at, it looks useful.

Baby Center

So apparently The Bean is the size of a kumquat, and mind you I have no idea what a kumquat is other than a reason to snicker and think about how this all started, but I’m immature like that.  For comparison they also show a quarter, so think about a quarter round on all sides, then add just a bit.  About an inch long.

That’s freaky.  And way cool.  My boys can swim!

I long ago, maybe like 3 years ago, stopped playing video games on a regular basis.  Just got busy with stuff.  Whatever, no biggie they were always there when I felt like it.  And sometimes I did, and sometimes I played them again, because I wanted to.  Cool.

So I was playing Halo tonight.  I wonder if I can only do that for the next 7 months?  Am I going to lose that?  I don’t do it much, but it’s always been an option.  I don’t know.  I don’t know how I feel about that.  I don’t know if it’s depressing or I just don’t care.  Hmmm…