Saturday, May 2, 2009

Wishes

With every fallen eyelash, shooting star, four-leafed clover, truckload of hay, my wish (I feel I can share this now) was "Please let my baby be born healthy."

I realize now it should have been, "Please let my baby be born alive and healthy." Does that violate the rules of wishing--two adjectives? Because ostensibly, according to all the pathology and autopsy reports, she was perfectly healthy. She was dead, but healthy. I need to be more clever in my wishes and outsmart the universe. I thought alive was a given with healthy, but apparently not.

At times I am at peace with there being no reason for Lucy's death, and other times, it feels like I am still waiting for a reason. I used to imagine at death's door, all our questions got answered. Eventually, I came to this place where I realized that there was no question that would be important to know after I died. I wouldn't really care who shot JFK, or who stole my sticker book in the third grade. But, now, I have one. I want to know why Lucy died. I don't want to know on a metaphysical level (well, yeah, I do), but I mean, I want to know on a physical level. What was the mechanism that killed my daughter? Why did her heart stop? Why didn't she live longer than 38 weeks in my belly? What is the medical reason?

Without a definitive answer, I feel like Lucy has been kidnapped, rather than that Lucy is dead. I'm just waiting for her to come home, for the police to call and tell me they have a lead. I am in this endless anticipation of finding information out, because I cannot believe or accept that this is it. This is life now. I went to the hospital one day in December, and came home a day later without my baby and that's it. Her life erased. Her face gone. Her body ash in my secretary.

I wish...

14 comments:

  1. Your words are so poignant....thank you for sharing your heart.

    We have so many wishes.

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  2. Oh Angie, how I wish Lucy was in your arms.

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  3. Oh, I am with you completely and utterly on this one. When I allow myself to think about her birth, my overriding emotion is disbelief - how could a perfectly healthy baby not survive a straightforward labour?

    Such beautiful words - I wish, I wish, I wish with all my heart it could have been different for you Angie and for me and for all of us.

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  4. As Lea says, we have so many wishes here.
    I wish that Lucy was here with you now. It must be so hard to understand why, she was so healthy.
    I wish I had kept my daughter safe too.
    I wish that I could stop yearning for things that will never come to pass.
    xo

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  5. I get it Angie. I too have blogged about the wishing for the wrong thing. Wishing for a healthy baby - silly me! I needed to wish for an ALIVE one. Who knew!
    That's the thing with a stillbirth. Its all too sudden. Life and death colliding so catastrophically like that. How is anyone supposed to survive that. Not for one second in my pregnancy did I think my perfectly healthy 8 pound baby girl would die in my belly four days past my due date. I worried in the pregnancy, but I did not worry about that. I'm not even sure I really understood that could happen. Again, who knew!
    I'm so sorry Angie. So sorry for all of your anguish, sorrow, heartbreak and frustration. I wish she was here too.

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  6. I wish too. I wish for Lucy and I wish for my E. E too was healthy. I have no idea why she died. I've tried and tried to no avail. I've found no answer. I don't think I'll ever give up searching for the answer. There has to be one.

    I also thought for the longest time after E died that one day I'd wake up and she'd be with me. How could she be gone? I thought (and, really I still do) that the only solution to this problem was for E to be here. It's the only thing that made sense.

    I'm thinking of you, Angie. I wish Lucy was here.

    Peace, my friend.

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  7. i too wished for the wrong thing angie. so many times a day i lay my hands on my belly and prayed and wished for a healthy baby. i knew some babies were born with problems but i never knew that some were born dead.

    not having a reason is hard for me too. as i've mentioned, there's no real reason, a few speculations but no hard core evidence. i jump to all sort of reasons.

    it's all just too messed up. lucy and lev and all our babies should be here with us in our arms. i wish the police would fine them and bring them home, safe, healthy and ALIVE.

    sending you love

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  8. i meant FIND them, not fine them :)

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  9. I wish your wish too. I wish Lucy was with you and I wish we new the anwers to the most sad/painful/fucked questions we have ever had to ask.
    xxx

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  10. It's so crazymaking, not having an answer. Our doctor gave us lines about how buses can hit any of us anytime we cross the street, any of us can just die in a second.

    Right, but if it's a bus, than I know what did it. And I can be damn careful crossing the street next time, every time. Not like a perfectly healthy baby just dying, for no reason. Not like that at all.

    It's just so hard.

    Wishing with you.

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  11. I'm sorry that you don't have any answers. How frustrating and heartbreaking.

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  12. The wanting is too much sometimes. I struggle with the why often. I wish she was here too. Much love.

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