The drive down to Melbourne was long, I had anticipated I would sleep but no such luck, I was awake the entire trip and my mind was racing. We still hadn’t confirmed the pregnancy and I couldn’t get the thought out of my head that we were attending an appointment to be told one of two things – there’s no baby or worse, there’s no heartbeat.
Once in the waiting room I started to become very impatient, I just couldn’t wait any longer, I needed to see my baby and be told they were ok, everything was ok – my eyes started to well. Finally, our names were called and we made our way into the small, dark cubical. The ultrasound technician made small talk and joked about us travelling all the way from the Sydney Opera House. What I wasn’t prepared for was when the gel connected with my belly and the devise revealing nothing. ‘Ok, I’m going to get you to go the bathroom and empty your bladder,’ He said ‘But we’ll check your ovaries before anything else,’ he concluded and I burst into tears, ‘OK’ I sobbed.
While in the toilet I focused on my breathing before returning to the room. Dave had filled the technician in about Louis and why I had been so anxious, so he was prepared for my return into the room. He took his time explaining the process and why they check our ovaries first to rule out any concerns before checking bubby. Therefore, if there is bad news (and he wasn’t saying there was!) it meant that all the checks had been done and we could focus on what’s next.
I laid back down on the bed and covered my eyes until he said it was time to look at our little ones very healthy heartbeat – and there it was, almost bouncing off the screen into our own hearts. There they were, our baby, our rainbow after the storm.
On a side note, there was also no blood clot at present, which meant both the original one during my pregnancy with Louis had actually gone and more importantly, there were no new ones forming.
We seemed to breeze through the following appointment, with Dr Kent being as beautiful as we remembered. She was genuinely so excited and happy for us, but more importantly she concluded with ‘you’ll get to take your baby home this time.’ We discussed having my following ultrasound in Shepparton through a private clinic and we would be referred to the pregnancy management clinic who specialise in placental complications. Everything was all set, just more waiting, but for now we had been reassured and sent on our way.
The drive home was just as long with no shut eye again, but the biggest surprise was waiting for us at home – a new baby lamb! Charlie was so excited to share the news as he had been home with Nannie and Papa, ready for bed once we arrived. The lamb belonged to one of our younger ewes, Sweety, who was a first-time mum and I was so proud that she had done it all on her own. We were home, our baby was progressing and the new baby lamb was in safe hands with Johnny on duty – or else!
We were over the moon, and even more so when our older girl Cookie who had been pregnant several times before but had unfortunately been unsuccessful, went into labour the following Sunday – another successful baby lamb born. One with a white and black spotted tail, the other a full black tail. Both boys, Freddy and Frank – and they were staying! We had previously discussed moving any boy lambs on, but with everything that’s happened, I just couldn’t do it. Dave helped me put a ring on the both of them and we would keep them on as wethers – welcome to the funny-farm little ones!
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The pregnancy announcements kept coming and I was so thankful we too had our own news because I don’t know that I would have handled it otherwise. Don’t get me wrong, I was happy for every single one of them! But it was a struggle, one more so than the rest. Two were close friends who I had been a part of their fertility journeys, one was a group announcement which was harder. I wasn’t angry, I just felt it was a little incentive, but it was their news and it was their right to announce it as they had always intended – didn’t mean it didn’t hurt.
No one could be expected to understand how we felt, except those who had walked with us. No one in our friendship group had lost a baby – but we had.
I could only hope that we were done with baby announcements for now, at least until after Louis’ birthday.
We had decided to host a small get together on the Sunday before Louis’ birthday. Nothing too big, just the same close family we had at the funeral, with the addition of the children this time. We tossed around a few different ideas but eventually decided to keep it simple and have it at the cemetery, with our baby boy. The children could ask questions, we’d make sure the water was running, there was shelter and we would organise a cake to share.
A blue butterfly cake with the addition of a rainbow seemed perfect.
Ironically, timing wise, Louis’ birthday fell the week after our 12-week mark, and exactly to the day of our nuchal translucency (NT) scan – we opted for the following day.
Louis’ birthday would always be sacred to us and that’s how we wanted it to stay – our forever baby boy’s sleeping birthday.
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Somehow, I had finally found the words to send through our complaint to the hospital and following this Dave and I had a meeting with the Safety, Quality and Experience Manager and the Associate Director of Midwifery.
The meeting was to be held at the Community Health offices, rather than the hospital, to which we were thankful – but it didn’t entirely ease the pain. We didn’t know what to expect but the relief we felt afterwards was definitely unexpected! Immediately we were met with ‘I’m so sorry for your loss of Louis, and the pain that followed.’ Before things turned to ‘How can we support you moving forward?’
We discussed that for us it wasn’t about being supported now – but for the families who follow in our footsteps and to eliminate some of that confusion, frustration and pain.
We started from the beginning where there had been mixed messages between leaving the maternity ward and what followed for the post-mortem. Calling the pregnancy clinic to confirm and starting what felt like weeks of phone tag and feelings of being unheard, having to repeat myself and still getting no answers.
Their solution for this was to allocate ‘one point of call’ who could check in, update, someone who knew your story and could do all the chasing for you – someone to give you peace of mind.
Secondly, we discussed the option of hosting the post-mortem appointments anywhere other than the pregnancy clinic – either a bereavement room away from the waiting room or an entirely different part of the hospital.
They went on to explain that things had not been followed by standard protocol regarding our appointment and that the information that was relied to us wasn’t adequate. They acknowledged they had let us down and understood that we only expressed our concerns so that others didn’t have to endure the same – no one was to blame, but we were hurt and needed to be heard.
What came next was unexpected; the option to birth again in the ward where Louis had been born. The ward where we met, laughed and cried with the midwifery team, the ward where we said good-bye to our beautiful little boy. We were offered the same midwifery care through Robyn in Numurkah, who would co-care with the Royal Women’s Hospital for my prenatal care, rather than having to go through the same pregnancy clinic again.
I wasn’t prepared for this and I still don’t know how I feel about it, however what I kept coming back to was this; I would love to welcome Louis’ sibling into the world where we once grieved for him. To visit the memorial wall of babies passed, to do all those things we weren’t able to do with Louis – to leave the Hospital with our baby.
We were promised one-on-one care and a personal point of contact moving forward.
This defiantly gave us something to think about and emotions were high when we left the meeting.
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Following our appointment, I had my follow up with the Naturopath. They were aware we were pregnant and we made a plan to continue working on both Emotional Release Technique (ERT) and general naturopathy to see where my body was at. My skin had finally healed so we were able to eliminate my need for extra Zink, which was replaced with a pregnancy supplement called Metagenics, containing Meta Choline.
Once we had that sorted, we jumped into working on some of the emotions that had been triggered by being pregnant after losing Louis – but I knew there was more to disclose – I needed to unpack the loss of another little boy.
The naturopath was so empathetic while I shared the horrific story that had unfolded only a week prior to losing our baby boy. How Harry and his mum had been killed so innocently on their way home that day. How myself and the staff at Nathalia had gathered that night once the news broke and how we all returned to work the following morning – the toddler room staff into the room where Harry had been enrolled for that same day and myself for my final day before maternity leave.
The fear I felt when I realised I would need to take Charlie into the toddler room and realising I just couldn’t do it and bursting into tears.
We discussed how for me, the two boys were connected and how it was during our group grief counselling session that I first realised that our little boy hadn’t moved. I expressed that I felt helpless in both situations, Harry was gone, yet Charlie was at home safe in his bed – but my baby wasn’t moving – I was in denial. Harry and Louis were already together, but I wasn’t ready, I kept thinking ‘it’s fine, he’s fine, he’ll move, he will,’ but he didn’t and suddenly I had lost two boys, who would forever impact the rest of my life.
We worked through these emotions and I felt relieved by the realisation that while I grieved for Harry, I hadn’t neglected my concerns for Louis – I just didn’t want it to be true that he too had gone. I was able to release responsibility for what happened with Louis and level with myself that, I wasn’t to know our little boy wasn’t destined for this world. I hadn’t done anything wrong, I was 36 weeks pregnant and my baby had died. I didn’t have any control over that or what had happened with Harry – they were both two very tragic events that happened very close together and everyone was overwhelmed by grief.
What I chose to focus on was the same as always, Harry and Louis were destined for bigger things – for that we would never understand but at least they had each other.
'Our Little Louis' 