I Knew Before I Knew

My baby was so active. I remember making a comment to my husband that he was going to be handful because he was always moving about in my belly. He would wake me up in the morning around 4:00 AM with his little butterfly kicks reminding me that I needed to eat. Just before lunch, again, he would move about in my belly with excitement that food was on its way. Throughout the remainder of the day I would feel kicks reacting to the voices around me. There was no doubt that he was there – an active participant in my life and everything that was going on around us.

The day I realized I didn’t feel him moving any longer I knew. I knew it wasn’t right, but I don’t think I wanted to believe it. I remember rushing to the OB to be put on the fetal monitor and thinking “well at least I will get to hear the baby’s heart beat”. The nurses tried to find the heart beat and kept saying “babies like to hide” as if this would reassure me of my fears. My shoulders were so tense and the nurse kept saying relax, but I couldn’t. The only heartbeat they found was my own. The doctor came in and tried – she found nothing but said nothing. We went into another room to do an ultrasound. As soon as it started I knew – they baby was not moving at all. I remember when we had an ultrasound at 6 months, the technician had to race to take pictures because Danny moved so much. He was sucking his thumb and had his fingers in his mouth the whole time – it was just before lunch and I was sure he was hungry. This time there was nothing – no reassuring flashing lights that would prove to me that he was okay. The monitor was ominously dark with white outlines of a baby. When the doctor told the nurse to close the door and she looked over at me I knew. I just cried – I cried so hard and loud they closed other doors into offices where other expectant mothers lay.

It seemed like forever before my husband got to the office, but in that time I went from wanting to erase everything from my memory and skip right to not being pregnant any longer to realizing for the first time in my life that this was something I couldn’t just pretend didn’t happen – that it didn’t effect me. The nurse that sat with me while I waited for my husband said something to me that gave me the courage to deal with all of this. She said “No matter what you can not forget this baby. This is your baby and you carried it for as long as you did”. “He will always be your child and that will never change.”