I couldn’t hold my second son, but my obstetrician did

Warning: the following article explores subjects that may be triggering for some readers.

In life, I have two sons: four-year-old Bastian and two-year-old Jasper. I word it so carefully because it neither feels right to call Jasper my second or third son.

After Jasper was born, I struggled to think of the right gift for my obstetrician. We had scrubbed into my maternal assisted caesarean together with round after round of Betadine until I was sterile enough to lift my baby from my womb with gloved hands.

Postpartum, I kept thinking about her hands. I wanted to do something to care for them. Eventually, I settled on gifting her the most beautiful rose hand cream I knew of, which seemed a paltry offering.

We had met a year earlier under both auspicious and horrible circumstances. I was 12 weeks pregnant with my son before Jasper and after Bastian. Days earlier, I had received a call from the genetic counsellor to say they’d received “complicated results”. I immediately knew there was nothing complicated about them. It was bad news. Our baby had one, just one, extra chromosome rendering him “incompatible with life”.

A specialised scan the next day confirmed to the trained eyes of the technician the extent of our beautiful boy’s condition, although my own eyes only registered his heart beating and his body wiggling.

I’d experienced pregnancy loss before. My first pregnancy abruptly and shockingly ended in a miscarriage at nine weeks. There was nothing I could have done to prevent it and nothing I did to cause it. This time, my partner and I had a part to play.

We were faced with the heartbreaking “decision” to let nature take its course or undergo a termination for medical reasons (TFMR). It didn’t feel like a choice at all. The decision was made as soon as this extra chromosome was produced. He would not live. But still, I had to sign the piece of paper allowing the doctor to take him from us.

Through the public health system, I was randomly assigned an obstetrician to perform the TFMR. The morning of the procedure I walked into the operating room (the same one in which I had delivered Bastian 14 months earlier), devastated and heartbroken, whispering, “I love you, I love you, I love you” over and over as I cradled my tummy protectively in my last few moments with him.

Later, when I walked out of the hospital I said to my partner through tears and my haze of general anaesthesia, “If we ever get the chance again, I want her to deliver my baby.” I don’t know why I said it. At the time I was 44 and didn’t think we would have another chance. I can only describe it as feeling destined.

In the weeks following, I remember the panicked, desperate ache of grief. I felt devoid of life, both his and mine. One minute the energy of people was too much, the next I didn’t want to be alone, scared the aloneness would give my thoughts free rein to terrorise me even more. Some days I felt sheer dread for the seconds and minutes and hours ahead, believing I had nothing to look forward to, even while holding my toddler in my arms and loving him fiercely. I was grieving my son, Basti’s brother, and the possibility that I might never have another baby.

Three weeks later, entirely by surprise, without actively trying, and still in the depths of grief, I was pregnant. I was terrified. When I went to my four week post-TFMR check-up with the obstetrician, I could barely believe the words coming out of my mouth. She looked as stunned as I felt.

Nine months later, she delivered Jasper. With the same hands that had lifted Jasper’s brother out of me that awful morning. She had held him while I never got the chance.

There is a Bill Withers song I love called Grandma’s Hands. It chronicles Withers’ love for his grandmother by detailing all the things he used to watch her hands do. Clapped in church on Sunday morning … Played a tambourine so well … Picked me up each time I fell.

The last line, If I get to heaven I’ll look for Grandma’s hands, now makes me think of my obstetrician. Her hands are the only link between me and my son before Jasper, and they also link Jasper and him to each other. She is, and will always be, the only person who has held both.

Three years on, I’ve not had a chance to properly grieve, but little spaces open up now and again, whether I want them or not. I spend time thinking about how random it is, the children you get. If my first pregnancy had been “viable”, we wouldn’t have Basti. If we had not lost Jasper’s brother, we wouldn’t have Jasper. It’s a bittersweet thought that chills and overwhelms me, but ultimately leaves me immensely grateful for the chance I had to try again.

The Pink Elephants Support Network: pinkelephants.org.au/tfmr

Red Nose: rednose.org.au

Read more about pregnancy loss:

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