Part III- The Beginning of just Me

I stayed a week in the hospital. It was a full blown kidney infection. We decided to do the amniocentesis. I mostly wanted to know she  was really a she. Selfish 13 year old that I was. The ultrasound techs could not find my kidney. Still. The contractions stopped. I was sent home and expected back in school the next day. I showed up, but I did not feel good. I went to the asst. principle's office and he thought I was faking. He sent me to detention. It was in the basement of the school. There were NO windows. Detention was referred to as "prison" and we all knew that our underfunded school was a fire hazard.

I sat through detention, wondering why being sick from pregnancy was worthy of detention. It felt like she was shamed no matter what I did. I went home that night. My boyfriend was his usual stoned, literally overworked self. I started having regular "cramps." I looked to my book first. I now trusted it more. It said what I was experiencing was an emergency. I called my teen parenting teacher. She immediately began yelling at me, telling me I was going to fail out of school and be nothing for my baby. She told me I was melodramatic. I didn't know what that meant. She said to go to bed and come see her in the morning. I listened to her.

I wish I listened to my book. The pain woke me at 2am. I got up and went to go pee, thinking that was the problem. Immediately I felt the thick and slow decent of the warmth spreading down my thighs. Not pee. I said a short prayer as I walked for the light. I had been having periods for over a year before I got pregnant. I knew the hesitant downfall of blood down my leg by now. I also knew it was not compatible with pregnancy. My book told me that.

I woke my boyfriend because I was screaming. My grandparents came rushing down the stairs. I was already dialing the nurse line. They would give me permission to go to the hospital and take care of myself and her.

On the way the contractions were intolerable. I got there and emergency quickly took me to L&D. I was put on a chair resembling a dentist's chair. I remember thinking, a dentist's chair means minor business, an office visit, she  is going to be ok.


Within seconds there was an official looking person telling me that I needed a room, but it was in fact a state hospital, and there were no rooms. I was checked and was dilated to 4. no turning back, too late. A portable NICU bassinet was brought in and I was told to brace myself. Any minute.  I wish that was true. 16 long and agonizing hours of minute apart contractions and I was not even a 7. An epidural wasn't an option, so they physically and mentally numbed me with stadol. She was breech, but even though they gave me false hope, they didn't acknowledge the fact that a 22 weeker, with next to no chance, could not endure a breech delivery. I was given false hope that every minute inside meant she had a better chance.

Nature didn't help me keep her inside. They broke my water, saying there was no going back and they walked out. She was being born, bottom first, the next contraction. Thankfully there was an awesome orderly there to come catch her. 
Bet she thought she was only going to empty trash that day, not empty a 13 year old girl...

Here she was.

Here she was, yet no one came. Maybe if there were a Dr. in the room they would be working miracles, with this little angel fighting, beyond my sight. Yet she was in my arms and I was helpless. I watched her tiny chest raise and fall, with what seemed like the work of a million miracles each time. I could actually see her heart beneath her fragile and thin skin. It was working hard. Still no one came. I saw tears in the lying cheater's eyes. Even he loved her.

Someone finally came, but they knew, and the let us know. THERE WAS NO MORE HOPE. They didn't take her away. There was no oxygen, there was no NICU, there was no airlifting her to Children's Hospital. After all, her mother was only 13. No hope. A lost soul... two lost souls.

I held her from the moment she took that painful first breath to that moment I saw that last fragile beat, and then, nothing. No one was there to tell me she was gone. They were off tending to live births. I spent a magical, painful, intense, love filled, 84 minutes with her, while her strong little heart beat, but they didn't come. Even when she became still, even then I couldn't let her go. I held her 'til she turned blue and unrecognizable.

The hospital was nice enough to give me a grieving room where I could go see her until I could let go. Even though they didn't try to save her, they didn't disgrace her or downplay my loss like our families were doing. "It is better off this way," is not something you say to someone who just lost a baby. She had a preemie diaper and a little hand-made dress, and she was wrapped snuggly in a receiving blanket that my dear sweet friend had brought for her. They made her a tiny hat. They didn't take her to the morgue 'til I could say okay. They took her hand and footprints for me.... they let us name her.

...to be continued...