Tiny Hands

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I wish I could have held those two tiny baby hands forever.  I have been dreading writing this post and looking through pictures because I knew it would be painful, but even though it’s only been two days since I last saw those darling babies I am so happy to have pictures to look back on how beautiful they were.  

On Sunday Morning in the hospital I woke up and just felt melancholy.  I had done a pretty good job of keeping myself in good spirits, but when I awoke that morning something just felt different.  I still wasn’t in any pain, but it’s like I could tell that something was coming. In the early afternoon I started feeling contractions pretty consistently.  They still weren’t very painful, but I could tell there was something different about them.  The nurses kept asking how much pain I was in and even though the contractions were getting a little bit more painful I didn’t want to admit this to the nurses because it was like admitting I was actually in labor.  Eventually the nurses were worried enough that they sent me over to Labor and Delivery.  They checked my cervix again and didn’t really see a difference. The laborist came in and said they would watch my contractions a bit more.  Again, they weren’t SUPER painful and eventually they sent me back to my room. 

By later that evening the contractions were getting really painful and were occurring fairly often.  My mom told me I should time them and I said I didn’t want to because it didn’t matter anyway, if the babies were going to come, they were going to come.  Eventually they were painful enough that we called the nurses back in.  We sat for probably an hour and the contractions were getting progressively worse. 5, 6, 7 on the pain scale.  They said I could have medicine whenever I needed it.  The contractions were getting so painful and I wanted medicine, but again I didn’t want to admit that anything was wrong so I kept trying to hold out.  Finally upon realization that I wasn’t going to get any sleep in the kind of pain I was in I consented to a small dose of morphine for the pain.  I fell almost immediately asleep and it really did help to dull the pain. 

At about 2 a.m. I awoke briefly and the contractions had gotten worse and if there were any lingering affects from the morphine I was DEFINITELY not feeling it.  I tried to sleep for awhile and ended up waking up Kyle and calling the  nurse sometime around 4 in the morning.  The nurse came in and gave me more morphine but this time I didn’t feel a thing.  If it was helping with the contractions I couldn’t tell because I was in more pain than I had ever been in in my life.  I even let out a few blood-curdling screams like in the movies. The nurses then also noticed that I was bleeding.  At this point I knew there was no stopping the babies from coming.  I became a little bit crazy/irrational.  I was in SO much pain emotionally that I couldn’t handle the physical pain anymore.  I was begging for an epidural.  The nurses wheeled me quickly over to labor and delivery and moved me to the labor bed.  I was shaking uncontrollably and don’t know how they managed to get me how they needed me.  They checked my cervix and said I was completely dilated.  The anesthesiologist came in and said that he thought it was pretty silly to give me an epidural at this point because he didn’t think it would work in time.  I was hysterical.  He gave me some other kind of medicine to dull the pain slightly but.  I continued to feel contractions and asked if it was going to help any more than that, because they were still SO PAINFUL.  

The told me to push whenever I felt ready.  I pushed so hard and man did it hurt.  They encouraged me to keep going and that I was almost there.  I pushed one more time and they told me that our son was out.  I immediately felt so much physical relief.  They took Joshua for a minute and then let me hold him.  I was holding him he gasped a little bit.  I was shocked.  I asked why he had breathed and they told me he was still alive.  This sent me into hysterics, I wish they would have warned me before they let me hold him.  I knew  he was too young to live for long but I was upset that my baby was still alive and no one was doing anything to save him.  Kyle got to hold him too and he also felt him breathe and he moved when Kyle touched his little hand.  We don’t know exactly how long he lived but it was probably only a few minutes.  

After delivering Joshua I was SO TIRED, I think all the meds had gotten to me and all I wanted to do was go to sleep.  The doctor had broken Adelaide’s water shortly after Joshua was born, but for some reason my body didn’t respond like it normally does and it’s like it had forgotten there was another baby in there.  The contractions stopped entirely and my cervix had gone back down in size to about a 5. They told me that she had to come out but they were going to wait awhile to see if contractions would start they gave me MORE medicine to make contractions start, but said it was okay to rest for awhile.  I slept for about an hour until the doctor was ready to try again.  Oh, the anesthesiologist also gave me an epidural at this time since she didn’t seem to be coming as quickly.  Man was that like heaven on earth.  I would like to think that with a regular birth I would have been strong enough to handle it without so much medication, but when I knew that I was going through all of that pain only to lose my babies it was too much.  I was grateful for the epidural.  The doctors told me to push if I felt ready, I thought I felt a contraction although it was hard to tell because I was so numb.  I pushed which was also strange because I couldn’t feel myself pushing.  It must have worked though because Adelaide came out with one push.  She was born sleeping, she had likely passed in the womb sometime after her water broke.  It broke my heart that Joshua got to live for just a few short  minutes but she never did.  

We got to spend the rest of the day loving our babies as much as we wanted.  I couldn’t believe how beautiful and perfect they were, 20 perfect fingers and toes.  Joshua had funny toes like mine (the middle toe is longer than the big toe).  My mom thought they both looked like Kyle and I can definitely see his mouth especially in Joshua.  They looked so much alike which was strange because they were a boy and a girl.  We held them and cried over them and took pictures of them.  I will cherish those few short hours that we got with them for the rest of my life. 

We love their names.  We hadn’t decided on names yet because we barely found out the genders on the day we were admitted to the hospital.  We had talked about it a little bit during our stay but it was a really hard decision since we didn’t know if they would live or not.  Kyle had always wanted to name his firstborn son Joshua Alvin after two of his heroes.  His best friend Joshua passed away at the age of 18 and Kyle looked up to him more than anyone.  Alvin is after Alvin Smith the brother of the prophet Joseph Smith who also passed away.  We hoped to tell our son how special he was because of the two amazing men he was named for, but we hope that even though he is not still with us he still knows how special his name is.  Adelaide has been my favorite name for years and years and I probably even told Kyle when we were dating in high school that I wanted to name my first daughter Adelaide.  I love how beautiful and feminine it is and I know it fit our sweet baby perfectly.  Before they were born, we weren’t sure we wanted to give up these special  names to children who wouldn’t live, but when they were born we both knew without even having to talk to each other that these were their names and even though we wouldn’t get to have them with us in this life they were special enough for our special names.  

Thanks again for the continued prayers, we appreciate them.  We are slowly trying to pick up the pieces and figure out how to live our lives again.  Everything feels the same but different and it will definitely take time, but we are truly so thankful to everyone’s prayers and even though this is a tragic time in our lives, we know they have been answered.