A tale of two couples
dealing with a stillborn, miscarrige, infertility and the unexpected

I was at a meeting until midnight, on the evening of Friday 8th September. When I arrived home, my pregnant wife, Mary-Lou complained of pains in her tummy. We waited for one hour hoping that the condition would subside before we called the mid-wives; we were then advised that Mary-Lou should take a bath as a pain relief method. After her bath, Pam, the Community Midwife on call, arrived at our home. She felt Mary-Lou’s bump and used some equipment to try to hear our baby’s heartbeat; but there was none.

Pam was not worried because the baby’s position or faulty equipment could interfere with the heartbeat but she suggested a trip to the hospital for a proper scan.

She drove us to the hospital at around 3 a.m. on Saturday morning. On the way I remembered that I'd forgotten to bring the car seat to bring our baby home with us, but I didn’t tell Mary-Lou because I didn’t want to worry her anymore than she already was. When we arrived, I texted a couple of friends to pray for us and for our baby, and I phoned Mary-Lou’s parents and my parents with the news. It was so hard – I had never given such bad news – but I wanted them to pray for us too.

Our doctor came in with the echo machine and said that he would do some scanning for a while, and chat with us afterwards. As he was scanning in silence, I held Mary-Lou’s hand and nervousness creeped in. It began to register that there could really be a problem. It was quite eerie. Pam was with us too, but no-one was speaking and it was obvious that everyone was very tense. I was born with a congenital heart problem called Transposition of the Main Arteries, so I am used to echo cardiograms and I know what I am looking at on the screens. As the doctor scanned I wondered whether I should look at the screen, or whether that might scare me. I did glance at it a couple of times, and immediately wished I didn’t. I saw the cavity where the heart was, but I didn’t see valves flapping around, like I’ve seen in my heart.

I looked away and decided it didn’t mean anything. After all, I’m not an expert on echo cardiograms. I began watching him move the scanner around Mary-Lou’s tummy and then noticed that his hand was shaking. I squeezed Mary-Lou’s hand and looked at her. She was just staring straight ahead at the opposite wall. I didn’t know how to feel, all the signs were pointing towards the worst thing, but I was determined that this wasn’t the case.

The doctor's eyes were very sorrowful. He apologised and told us that he could not find a heartbeat. Mary-Lou started breathing heavily, repeating, “No, no, no.” I tried to hug her but it was very awkward because of how she was lying. I didn’t know what to think or say; I just focused on Mary-Lou, trying to hold her. Mary-Lou started groaning, then crying, then stopped and just stared at the ceiling. Hundreds of things were going through my head about what this meant – memories of our hopes, confusion about what needed to happen next, fears of it’s implications on Mary-Lou. I felt this was the worst thing that could have happened. The baby was nine days late by then, and was going to be induced on the following Monday. It was full term and fully developed; it had grown these nine months, and now, nothing.

The doctors recommended that Mary-Lou give birth to the baby and the horror I had felt as a child when I learnt that some ladies have to give birth to their dead babies flooded over me. I thought, “There is no way I’m going to let Mary-Lou give birth, it is the most horrific thing she could ever go through.” So I asked the doctor if she could have a Cesarean section under general anaesthetic so that she could be knocked out while they took the baby out and not have to experience giving birth to the dead baby. But a vaginal delivery was strongly recommended since a c-section is a serious operation with risks of complications in future pregnancies, whereas vaginal delivery was natural and far less risky.

When we were left alone, we cuddled. We didn’t know what to say. Mary-Lou was still in shock. I started to think about where Jesus was in all this, I really couldn’t work it out. I said to Mary- Lou that I felt I should remind us that Jesus is here somewhere in this situation, but that I couldn’t see it. Mary-Lou hugged me and I began crying. I started repeating through tears, “I don’t want this, I don’t want this.” I really felt desperate for things to be different, for there to be no problem.

Mary-Lou’s contractions were getting stronger so she accepted some Pethidine from our new midwife, Caroline. After the injection, the pain died down but she was fatigued and fell asleep almost immediately.

I'd told our parents that we didn’t want anyone to come to us, and that we wanted to be alone and go through this together; nonetheless my mom and dad arrived at about 7 or 8 am, just in case we needed them, and we decided to see them after all. When they came in, we hugged then they sat down. Mary- Lou held my mom's hand because she was crying; no one talked much. We told them in detail what happened. I mentioned that we thought we wanted a c-section and that we didn’t think we wanted to see the baby. Before they left my dad asked to chat with me outside the room.

He was troubled that we didn’t want to see our baby. Mary-Lou and I had chatted about it earlier. I’d said that I would like to see it, but Mary-Lou didn’t want to because the idea was so horrible. My dad explained that many couples who go through stillbirth and don’t see their baby regret it afterwards. He explained that in the eyes of God, our baby was a person from it’s conception, that we will meet him or her one day in heaven and that we should name it and he encouraged me to see our baby and hold it with Mary-Lou. After my parents left at around 10 a.m., I told Mary-Lou what my dad said, and as I explained, it slowly dawned on me how precious an individual our baby was. We chatted about it and both realised that we had been distancing ourselves from our baby as our baby, and that it was a human whom we should honour and respect. This helped us greatly in making decisions later on. One of the first difficult decisions was about how our baby was going to be delivered. We thought the most honourable thing was to complete the pregnancy through a vaginal delivery. To have a c-section under general anaesthetic was – in our mind – trying to shun our baby and not have anything more to do with it. We felt we would be neglecting the last nine months of discomfort and sacrifice we had gone through for our child.

The contractions continued getting stronger and Mary-Lou was dilating at about 1cm per hour; the normal rate. By 10 p.m. Mary- Lou had dilated 10cm, her legs in stirrups, and was encouraged to start pushing whenever she had a contraction. She initially had a problem in that she didn’t know how or where to push. By this time Pam was on shift again and was looking after us – we were very grateful to have her and not another new person. mary Lou's contractions were quite infrequent and irregular so our baby wasn’t really moving much. At about midnight, the doctor returned and advised putting Mary-Lou on a drip which would help regulate her contractions and hopefully speed up the delivery, so we agreed to that. After an hour, our baby’s head had crowned and Pam could see the hair – it was like Mary-Lou’s, she told us. Yet even with Mary-Lou pushing really hard and doing so well at it, our baby wasn’t moving very far.

The doctor did an episiotomy, using forceps to pull our baby out. We had chosen not to see our baby being delivered so a sheet had been hung over Mary-Lou’s tummy. Eventually, in one giant push, our baby was delivered, no sound, no noise, just Mary-Lou panting for breath and sighing with relief. Our baby was taken away by Pam and when she returned she injected Mary-Lou with something which helps the placenta be delivered quickly. Mary- Lou had suffered a third degree tear that required stitches straight away. We briefly discussed whether to have general or local anaesthetic and decided on local. Mary-Lou wanted me to be with her during the surgery and they agreed that I would be allowed.

When they had wheeled Mary-Lou on her bed into surgery, I was left on my own in the room, awaiting clothes to go into the theatre. I felt quite lost and lonely and started shaking a bit. Pam came in to help clear up and take away the stuff they had used for delivery and asked me if I wanted to know what sex our baby was. I said I didn’t and that we would rather find out together, so she had a tricky time telling me how the delivery went and how big our baby was.

When I was called into the theatre, the surgeon seemed to have already started adding the local anaesthetic. I was given a stool next to Mary-Lou’s head and I stroked her head and held her hand while I told her how much I loved her and how proud I was of her. She seemed to drift in and out of consciousness according to any pain she felt but I just kept stroking and whispering to her; there was nothing else I could do. The stitches took longer than the doctor had expected but once we were back in our room Mary-Lou, already quite dozy, fell asleep.

I asked the doctor how the surgery went. He said it went very well and that they were very happy with their work. Then he expressed how sorry he was for us and shook my hand. It was quite bizarre since I didn’t feel like I had done anything to deserve having my hand shaken.

After only five minutes, I came back to our room to find the lights off, the drip machine beeping loudly and Mary-Lou panicking and moaning for help. My heart sank immediately with guilt for not being there and I rushed over to her bed and pressed the button to call for a midwife. I kept telling her that I was there with her as she was hyperventilating and looking into my eyes as if asking why I wasn’t there when she woke up. Once Pam had come and sorted out the machine and helped to calm Mary-Lou down, she got me a camp bed to lie on, so for the first time in over two and a half days, we both got some proper sleep…for 4 hours! When we woke up Caroline told us about our baby. She told us we had had a “wee girl” who was 10lb 3oz – not so “wee” after all! When we heard we had had a girl, Mary-Lou burst into tears and I couldn’t quite take it in. We had both hoped for a girl, but as the pregnancy went on, we became more and more convinced we would have a boy.

I started wondering what we would name our daughter. We had gotten names for a boy or a girl, but I wondered if it was “worth” giving the name to our dead daughter, or saving it for a future daughter. But when Mary-Lou told Caroline we would call her Amy Isabel Gibbs, I felt that it was entirely right. Caroline asked if we wanted to see Amy, but we didn’t feel ready to. There was a sense of fear and dread for us both, to see a dead baby – our dead baby.

Later on that Sunday afternoon, after lunch and organizing for some friends and my parents to come and be with us in the evening, we decided to go and see Amy. Mary-Lou was very scared about it, but I really wanted to see Amy at this point, and Mary- Lou didn’t want it to just be me who saw Amy. Caroline took Amy to the room next door and dressed her in a body suit and hat that we'd given her from the bag of clothes and nappies we had brought with us. Then she came to get us and we helped Mary-Lou walk next door.

Caroline explained that Amy looked a bit red and that the forceps had left a scar on her right cheek and scalp, but as we went into the room and saw the Moses basket, then walked further in to see Amy in the basket, we were both quite shocked. Amy looked more purple than I thought she would, and her parted lips were very dark. She wasn’t actually purple, but was a lot darker than I expected. The initial shock was quickly washed away by amazement at how much she looked like Mary-Lou! She was definitely Filipino looking with Mary-Lou’s mouth and lips, and long black hair. I asked if her hat could be taken off so we could see all her hair. So Caroline took the covers and hat off. I remember bending over to look closer with my hands behind my back, as though I were inspecting her. I felt quite sad now and afraid to touch her, as though I wasn’t allowed to. Then I plucked up the courage to pick up her left hand from on her chest and began talking to her, saying how much we loved her, how beautiful she looked (the initial shock had completely dissolved into pride by this point) and I thanked God for giving her to us and asked Jesus to look after her and let her know how much we love her. Mary-Lou then held her hand in mine too but was too upset to say anything. So I said goodbye to Amy, rubbed her hand with my thumb and rested it back onto her chest.

When we returned to our room we chatted about what she looked like and about how glad we were to have seen her. Then we cuddled and I began crying as it all began sinking in. The tears and snosh and dribble – which I had seen so many times on Mary- Lou’s face, and wondered how annoying they must be – didn’t bother me, nor did the fact that I heard someone come in our room, and hastily leave after seeing me crying. I was overwhelmed with grief and pain like I had never felt, I just wanted to be held by Mary-Lou, nothing else seemed to matter.

I remember reading an article about fathers suffering a stillbirth and it said that fathers may start to grieve up to thirty six months after the death occurs. I found this to be somewhat true for me. I coped initially by not really dealing with Amy's death. I concentrated on Mary-Lou – trying to help her recover physically and emotionally.

As the months passed, we took each moment, hour, feeling, wave of grief as they came. We didn't try to hide our feelings, even if it was anger, which can be a scary emotion. We had "reviews" where we talked about everything from trying for another baby, moving house, moving country, our jobs, dealing with grief, money issues. It was our way of keeping the lines of communication open as well as keeping hope, encouraging each other to dream and look forward.

As Mary-Lou recovered physically, she coped emotionally by structuring her week and focusing on one thing to do each day, such as making dinner. She spent one day a week going out on her own and arranged lunch and coffee dates with friends. She faced her fears by going to places like the Christmas markets where she fertilimagined taking Amy; though Christmas, anniversaries, birthdays and other special occasions were most difficult for her.

It was more that two years later that our son Toby was born – a birth that triggered an identity crisis, in that, I still wanted to be Amy's grieving father, and celebrate this birth. Two contrary aspirations which created a lot of tension for me. I joined community groups in the hope of helping other less fortunate people, and having control over something positive, and though I feel that I’ve a lot to really learn and discover at this point, I’m sure I’ll be figuring it out the rest of my life. But for now it feels good and proper that I rest and invest in the place I have as Mary-Lou’s husband, and Amy and Toby’s dad.

Mary Jane Grenzow’s Happy Ending

You’re pregnant,” the nurse said. I was standing at a phone booth on a dreary December afternoon in 1999. I had left work and driven three blocks to get my pregnancy test results in private; the thought of another month, another disappointment, another humiliation in front of co-workers was too much to bear.

I didn’t believe her: Was she sure?

The nurse laughed. Yes, she said. Quite sure. But she worked in a clinic that helped women overcome infertility – I wasn’t the first who didn’t believe she was actually pregnant. The nurse was gentle, and very reassuring. “Come in and we’ll test again. But you are pregnant. Merry Christmas!”

Almost ten years later, it still strikes me how close I came to never hearing those words.

At age nineteen, I was diagnosed with a small tumor on my pituitary gland, the cause of years of menstrual difficulties. But more troubling was the doctor’s warning that I would likely have fertilimagined ity issues – and possibly, never be able to conceive. I wasn’t interested in having a child right away, but the knowledge weighed heavily in my heart. By the time I married when I was thirty-three, I was ready. I knew it would be a challenge, especially with my age working against me. I visited a highly-regarded reproductive endocrinologist who started me on Provera, to induce a menstrual cycle, and Clomid, a commonly prescribed drug that stimulates ovulation.

And the agonizing game began. A cycle of Provera and Clomid, no pregnancy. Another cycle, this time a higher dosage of Clomid, but no pregnancy. Another higher dose yet, and another. Circled dates on the calendar: when to take Clomid, when to have intercourse, when to take another blood test, when to return to the doctor. And after each failed cycle, more tears and a little more desperation.

Nine months later, the doctor told me it was the last cycle of the drug he would put me on. If it didn’t work, it was time to explore other options – such as in vitro fertilization.

But there would be no next step for me. We were of average means and simply didn’t have the money for expensive procedures, especially when there were no guarantees. Maybe we could adopt, but that too can be a difficult and expensive journey. It was my last chance. I lay on the living room floor one Sunday night as my husband, carefully following the doctor’s instructions, injected me with hCG to trigger the release of an egg from my ovaries. Please God, let it work, I prayed.

It did. I was pregnant.

My joy washed away one Friday two months later when I started to bleed heavily. The clinic staff said there was nothing they could do. Bed rest, they said. Whatever will happen, will happen. So I stayed in bed, bleeding and crying and praying, until Monday morning when I returned to the doctor for an ultrasound: Somehow, my baby had survived.

And she continued to grow and thrive, right up until the day before her due date when I had my first contraction. We went to the hospital, where I labored for twenty-four hours. But the baby was stuck, and the hospital staff grew concerned that she was in danger. The doctor was called for an emergency Caesarean section. I was so overwhelmed and exhausted, I barely realized when they placed my precious baby in my arms.

By the time I left the hospital four days later, the emotional rollercoaster of the previous eighteen months no longer mattered. I knew I needed another child.

We began trying again a year later. This time, I knew what to expect. The doctor knew how much Clomid to prescribe. I scribbled my notes, circled my dates, followed his instructions to the letter. It only took two cycles of Clomid to become pregnant again. Six weeks in, over a holiday weekend, I started to bleed and cramp. The doctor said there was nothing he could do. What will happen, will happen, he said. On Monday, I was back in his office for an ultrasound. There was no heartbeat. It didn’t look promising, he said. Defeated, I went home. The cramps started at 9:45 that evening. Within 10 minutes, I miscarried; my dreams shattered again.

I mourned my lost baby. But I knew we would try again. When the first round of Clomid didn’t work four months later, I began to doubt I could carry another child.

One morning a few days after Christmas, a sudden wave of nausea hit. Odd, I thought. I didn’t feel ill at all. By the middle of the day, it hit me: a home pregnancy test confirmed my suspicion. Sitting in the doctor’s office several days later, I asked how I could be pregnant, when the blood test earlier that month had shown I hadn’t even ovulated.

He shrugged. It’s the season of miracles, he said. My elation was short-lived. An early screening indicated the baby was at high risk for Downs Syndrome. We were offered amniocentesis to find out for certain. But amnio can trigger premature labor – I couldn’t risk that. And what if the baby did have Downs? Would I terminate? After all I had been through? I cried for my baby night after night, fearing the worst. I cried so much, I worried my heartache would harm her even more. Then one day, I stopped crying. I decided I would accept my baby on her terms – no matter what. She was born via C-section, this one planned, four years and one day after my first child was born. And she was perfect. Our family was complete. During a follow-up visit a short time later, my doctor discussed birth control. I laughed. “Accidents” don’t happen to infertile women.

One night eighteen months later, that familiar wave of nausea hit. I ran to the store for a pregnancy test, then called for my husband to come and verify the positive result on the test strip. Neither of us knew what to say. I was forty, he was forty-three; we thought we were done with babies. Our marriage was rocky and another baby was not what we expected. Neither of us was sure it was even what we wanted.

I didn’t have too much time to think about it. Physically, the pregnancy was exhausting – I was older, and had two small children to care for, plus a full-time job. But I wasn’t consumed with worry this time. Whatever will happen, will happen, I thought. It hit me when my third child was born how much we really did need another baby, another perfect daughter, to complete our family. Like a surprise gift from God, she wasn’t expected, but she was exactly what we wanted. She brought us full circle.

My path to motherhood was paved with tears and disappointments.

My heart goes out to women struggling with infertility. I know the pain and helplessness of infertility, and I know the despair and grief of a miscarried baby.

But I also know that miracles do happen, especially when you least expect them: They happened to me three times.