More awkward than when people don’t know your baby died and ask you about it is when your GP doesn’t know and asks at your 6week check ..are you breastfeeding??? ERRRRMMMM Is this some kind of sick joke? First she asked why I was there, something I asked myself – the obvious answer: “My 6 week check” and now this???
I went to this appointment reluctantly, to me I feel its another cruelty of loosing your baby; going through all of the motions and appointments of a new mother without your baby. Its like a big slap in the face and pretty naff; answering questions about the birth, about if we are wanting to try again? Its all just another reminder of what you don’t have. Why when your heart is so broken do they then drag you through all of that? in answer to her question I just responded (surprisingly calm) “no my baby was still born” – of course she was horrified, more so because she too had experienced such loss and knew straight away how I felt and that that was probs the last place I wanted to be on a wednesday morning…anyway after much apologizing and talking normally about the situation..one mother to another the awkwardness left.
I answered all of the usual questions and as I thought I’m fit and well and recovered from the birth..HA if only it took 6 weeks to recover from such a birth…so YES physically I am well recovered, mentally and emotionally this birth will always affect me and I doubt I will ever be fully healed from it.
I learnt during the appointment that because Poppy had Edwards apparently the hospital feel “no further appointments are necessary” – Oh right were here again are we? discriminating in life AND death – PFFFFTTTT! No follow up because she had Trisomy 18? No opportunity for us to talk about what happened? ask unanswered questions? I cannot believe after all we have been through we still have to fight for a certain level of care. Every parent I met at SANDS said they had had a follow up consultation to discuss it , yet apparently thats not necessary in this case?!Thankfully my GP was on it and said she will help me with this one as every parent that has had infant loss should be entitled to meet with Drs and talk about it all…Edwards or not! What a difference a DR with similar experiences makes.
After such a rubbish start to the day all I wanted to do was hide away again and have a good cry, but as in life it must go on and we had a couple of other things to do. We were however able to enjoy a lovely afternoon at Farmer Copley’s in Ponte! Im glad we made the effort to go and make the most of the the Autumn season, the kids enjoyed being with one of their cousins and had fun scrambling over hey bails, seeing all of the pumpkins, animals and a little tractor ride. But throughout it all my heart ached for my own little Pumpkin that isn’t here to do these things. How different this is from what 6 weeks postnatal was meant to be…
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