The Delivery of Baby Beckett

At three in the morning, I woke up and started worrying that we had forgotten to pack something for our hospital stay. I had notebooks, pens, puzzle books, a travel-sized set of 'mancala', two pairs of clothes, my wallet, Beckett's clothes, the duck blankie and enough fuzzy socks to get me through the cold nights. I stuffed my bathroom supplies in an empty pocket in the suitcase and put it out of my mind. It was two hours until we were finally at the hospital and my best friend, Lila, was there to greet us. She brought along some chocolate milk because she figured I hadn't eaten breakfast - she knows me better than I know myself.

The first nurse we spoke with took her time with getting us registered. She asked if we had picked a pediatrician yet for the postpartum care. I snickered and kind of stared at her in awe, then chided myself and told her, "no." The second nurse was much more understanding and escorted us into the birthing room. She sat and talked with us for over an hour, testing the waters and asking if we had any special wants or needs as far as each step of the process was concerned. We told her that we wanted to monitor the progress of the labor so we could be certain of the exact moment when Beckett was no longer with us. We said we wanted an epidural right away because my last experience with it was less than perfect and I didn't want pain if there didn't absolutely have to be any. It took another full hour to even find Beckett's heartbeat - there was so much fluid to listen through and she was moving just too frequently to catch a steady sound. The rhythm was intermittent, but it was enough to show that she was alive. Next came the IV setup, the small battery of tests and then the introduction of the many nurses and doctors that would be involved. There was Dawn, Christie, Holly, Betty, Bridget, Adonna, Rebecca, Tameika, Natalie, Cathy and Dr Breland himself. A few nameless others were there just to make sure things were done by the book. They each had to ask me their own questions to ascertain the order of each step - and then they had to ask again, just to be sure there were no misunderstandings. I was tired by the time they were ready to administer the epidural.

Lila stayed with me for the procedure, holding onto me tightly as I shivered and whined my way through the next half hour. We giggled over forced jokes while Christie talked me through what she was doing to my spine. First the cleaning, then the numbing stick before the big shot to the spine and lastly the catheter. My body was reacting to the position of the wire involuntarily, and for a while it was a bit of a concern to everyone involved. They upped the normal dosage, let Phillip and my mother back into the room and things quickly progressed from there. A pitocin drip was started and thankfully, I felt none of the contractions for a few hours. To further the labor, the amniotic sac was manually broken and in that moment I lost 3 liters of fluid. The bedding was changed three times in the next hour and the floor was flooded, prompting blue coverings for shoes and nervous laughter from all that gathered at my side. 2 more liters would be lost before it was even time to push. At about 9 in the morning, the contractions became so strong that Christie had to up the dosage twice on the epidural. At 10:30, my two main nurses (Dawn and Bridget) were quietly reapplying the monitor on my belly. They were shifting it, silently watching the yellow dashes on the screen that should have been recording Beckett's heartbeat. I asked, half in jest, if Beckett was being difficult and the look Bridget gave me stopped me in mid-breath. I knew then that I had been taking it all for granted. When Dawn said, "Oh, honey," I hurriedly proclaimed that I had been feeling Beckett move and she couldn't be gone already. The movements, I learned, were simply the wake of the fluid that was being sloshed during each contraction. My baby's heart had been silent since just after 9, crushed from the force of her contracting tomb. I gasped, I squealed and I clung to Phillip so hard that everything in my sight went white. Nothing else existed in that moment. Beckett was gone, encased in my belly but no longer waiting to be born. The nurses left and I suddenly wondered what we were supposed to do. I knew, in theory, she still needed to come out, but I couldn't imagine trying to give birth to a corpse.  Through tears, Phillip assured me that it still had to happen and that it was all very possible. We clung to each other until the staff began to filter back in. Lila came to the bed and fed me ice chips, leaving my hands free to squeeze at Phillip and the bed rails when particularly strong contractions hit. Mom joined us at the bed when I started calling for Dawn, yelling that I was sure it was time.  After being checked, Dawn agreed and I begged her not to leave the room. She used the bedside phone to assemble the team and it took less than a minute to prepare the equipment.

With Lila and my mother on my right and Phillip on my left, my hands and face were covered with loving strokes and firm grips. It was then that the fear set in. At any moment, I would be faced with my child's lifeless body, but only after enduring the intense pain of the birthing process. Between breaths, Lila would kiss my hand and face, repeating that I was doing great and everything was going to be fine. My mother was petting my cheek, caressing my jaw and whispering that I was such a great pusher. Phillip held steadily onto my hand, pinning my shoulder when he needed to and reminding me to breathe, which was more difficult than I can explain. Christie, the anesthetist, somehow managed to squeeze behind Phillip and position herself above my head. She talked me through how to breathe, making sure I understood each foreign step. Dr Breland's voice was the softest of all and I struggled to follow his orders. He instructed me not to force the motions because Beckett's body would be particularly susceptible to manipulation and would not return to a normal shape once my muscles had contorted her. I cried, grunting and squealing in both pain and fear. The voices came from everywhere - seven medical staff members, Dr Breland and my three beloved supporters all urging me onward with separate sing-song chants. The sound grew to a fever pitch and with a final, agonizing rip, my mind went blank. At 12:08, I heard someone say, "She's perfect," and I forgot (for the third time that day) how to breathe.

She was placed on my stomach and the four of us holding hands all cried at the same time. We all slowly started to wipe her down. She was covered in a thick coating of something that reminded me of down feathers. Several hands came together to help me scrape her clean. Her head was soft, devoid of bone or brain matter and filled with enough water to give her the consistency of a weak water balloon. Black hair, styled just like Mina's, was prominent from forehead to neck. She was an awful purplish-gray color and splotches of white skin showed where my bones had been particularly crushing on her tiny form. Her bottom lip was two-toned, purple and pink. Her nose was half sunken, having only one nostril and a second opening that gave way to where her top lip should have been. I have no idea what color her eyes were because she never had the chance to open them. The rest of her bones were just fine. There were no other deformations and everything was in it's own perfect place. She wasn't a monster.

She was 16 inches long and 3 lbs, 14 ozs. She had died comfortably in the womb, not knowing what it was like to have to struggle to breathe or be forced through a birth canal. She was frozen in a fetal position and I knew that I couldn't have asked for a more peaceful passing for her. She was comfortable, and that made it all bearable.

She was abnormally tall and thin, and just like our other children, she had long feet and fingers. She was soft and fit snugly in my hands. For a while, we all passed her back and forth. She was weighed, had her hands and feet printed and we were given an honorary birth certificate. The state wont actually issue us one because she was stillborn, but in two weeks we can pick up a death certificate which is the best we can do. Cathy, the 'keepsake' nurse, helped us wash her in a tiny basin. We scrubbed the ink from her skin and washed the grease out of her hair. We shied away a few times as Cathy was forced to pry open her hands or straighten out her legs so that we could properly clean her. It was just too much to watch her lifeless form creak apart like that. A few pictures were taken, she was put into a diaper and shirt just like the live babies in the ward and was eventually wrapped in the blanket that Auntie Cindy made for her. For a long time, we all just sat and held her. A few of the nurses involved stayed and cried right alongside us. Two asked to hold her. A few other visitors came by, some not knowing that Beckett had already passed and the confusion and tears made for a terrifying few hours.

For the longest time, I sat staring at her, willing her to open her eyes. She didn't look sick at all and I kept futilely hoping that her chest would suddenly rise and fall with a stolen breath. I waited for hours but she never moved. I pulled at her hands, rocked her, cradled her, hummed and kissed her... we had to shift her from side to side in the macabre understanding that leaving her laying on one side would cause her blood to pool and further deform her. I wanted to feed her. I wanted to hear her cry. I watched Phillip hold her for a while and I kept comparing the image to the memory I have of him holding Mina the day she was born. Beckett looked no different.

Johnny Brock and Felicia finally came from the funeral home. They brought a blanket of their own to carry her in because it was a devastatingly cold night. We bundled Beckett in clothes, a hat and two blankets. The pair stayed and talked with us for a while, though none of us said anything of importance. Phillip had already said his goodbyes, so I took a moment to kiss her again and finally handed her over to Felicia. They hesitated only a minute before leaving, not giving me time to panic or demand her back. When the door closed, I collapsed onto Phillip and we leaned on each other, crying. It went on for hours that way. We would crumble, sob, mutter incoherent phrases at one another and repeatedly proclaim that Beckett hadn't actually looked dead. We struggled with the idea for a long while. Later in the evening, emotional pain was overshadowed by physical pain when my body continued to progress with the afterbirth process. A new nurse joined the team, introduced herself as Ashlee and was very sweet through the next few hours. Slightly loopy from the Percocet, I babbled on and on about Beckett and offered to show Ashlee the photos we had of her. She was hesitant, but humored me. She suddenly opened up about her own life, how just a few days ago she had lost her sister to cancer and had only that night returned to work. She was devastated and we bonded for a long while over lost loves and the silly things people tend to say when they don't know what to say to each other. We found each other for a reason, I'm sure.

We fought our way through the night and in the morning I was wheeled into surgery. An accidental overdose of anesthesia caused some unfortunate reactions and it took a whole separate team to restrain me and repair me. I had some minuscule damage from the breathing tube and was given multiple doses of Valium when my own fears caused me to become a danger to myself. I was freshly wounded and stitched in more than one place, but I had reacted violently when waking up from surgery. The team was amazing though and as soon as the trouble began, it was quickly smothered and I was returned to my room relatively unharmed. Phillip was waiting for me when I woke up, as were yellow flowers that Lila had sent. Mom arrived shortly after.

Just a few moments after waking up, the pain was more than I could take. With safety being the main concern of my chosen nursing staff, they administered an intravenous source of Morphine. They felt it was safer than Percocet at the time, though they were immediately proven wrong. With Phillip and my mother at my side, my arm swelled, turned red and began to sting. Suddenly, my chest burned, my throat tightened and my brain shut down. I had forgotten how to speak. I realized I had also forgotten how to breathe. In panic, I stared at Phillip, screaming internally. I heard him say, "No, something's wrong," and Dawn (my main nurse) pounded on the emergency button on the wall. The room was filled before I could blink and people were barking orders across me. I kept hearing, "Tina, breathe!" but I couldn't make myself do it. After nearly two minutes, I hyperventilated, lurching into a hurried pattern of breathing. When they told me to take slower, deeper breathes, I tried and my lungs were suddenly frozen again. I could not, by any means, slow the rate of my breath. I found my voice, tried to convey that I was passing out and told Phillip I was sure I was going to die, just like Beckett had. The staff, including an anesthetist, smartly filled me full of other prescriptions and managed to stop the anaphalactic shock. I am, apparently, allergic to Morphine. After a long while, my body returned to normal, though my arm is still damaged from the initial burn.

After three great mishaps in two days, I was ready for pain relief and sleep. Visitors came and went, calls were made, I drifted in and out of consciousness.. After my final dosing of the night, Phillip returned home to give my parents a well-deserved break and take care of the children. I suppose I was still in a state of shock because the cocktail of medications given to me caused me to hallucinate. For several hours, I wandered my room, hiding behind the infant warming table and avoiding the 'zombie' i was sure was climbing into my bed. I cried and tore at my own stomach, doing slight damage to my surgical wound. A nurse, Amy, found me and was content to spend the rest of the night sitting in my room, making sure I stayed safely in bed. After some new medication, she spent hours talking to me about politics, different countries, the military and poverty. We ended the conversation with thoughts of Beckett. We were both crying by 5 AM and she insisted I try to sleep. I managed to stay out for a total of 45 minutes, then the day began. There was paperwork to sign, people to call... a midwife came in to tell me about the prescriptions I'd be going home with. Many nurses came in to visit, checking on me after the great Morphine scare that the whole hospital seemed to know about. Christie returned to check on me, thanking me for allowing her to hold Beckett... then Mandi, one of the great nurses that had helped me right out of surgery, came up to talk for an hour or so. She told me about her own daughter, how she was going to need a pacemaker when she turned 15 and how a genetic defect had caused her so much strife. We talked a long while about stem-cell research and support groups. She invited me to the surgical ward whenever I felt like coming, assuring me that she'd always be around to talk.

When breakfast was delivered from the cafeteria, the woman carrying the tray simply smiled and nodded. She obviously didn't speak any English, so I nodded back, thanked her and picked at the muffin on the tray. When she returned to gather up the mess, she seemed to be staring at me. I watched curiously as she started to walk away with the tray, then dropped it to the floor and hurried to my bed. She bent over me, hugging me, then leaned back, held my face and nodded. She picked up the tray again and left. It was then that I remembered the sign they had placed on my door. A picture of a leaf filled with tears, floating in a pond. It's, apparently, the universal symbol for bereavement. I was shocked, but thankful, that the stranger had reached out and tried to comfort me.

It took me a long time to prepare to leave the hospital. I had a long bath, cleaned the room as best I could and let Phillip pack all of our things. We stopped by the nurses station on the way out and I handed Dawn one of the Beckett Bears my mom had picked up from Borders. I showed her the name on the tag and thanked her repeatedly for all of her help. We hugged, all of us crying, and we said our goodbyes to the rest of the staff.

I'm now at home, comfortably sedated. My body is unfortunately still acting as if I gave birth to a healthy baby. I'm wearing cold compresses to help stop milk production and I'm having to check both stitched wounds on a frequent basis. I have two days to rest before the funeral. I'll post again when Beckett is buried. Thank you... all of you.... for reading.