I've always loved writing - poetry and prose. Never really taken it very far but its always been some way of writing down the thoughts and feelings in my head when they got too strong to stay inside. On paper they are tamed. For a long time I didn't write and didn't ever really realise how profound an effect that had on me. Following the birth of my little girl I developed Post Natal Depression. I spent the best part of a year on anti depressants with a lot of anger, fear and sadness I didn't know how to handle. Finally after someone with the same condition who has been a great support to me mentioned writing something clicked and i realised how much i missed channelling my thoughts. I started to write again and it was like a switch went on. By writing things down I could clarify them. I started by writing my daughter a letter which is now becoming such an event I plan to continue until she is much older then have them bound into a book for her. The letters are wide ranging and cover things like my dreams for her to a candid explanation of PND. From there I began a blog of some of my other writing and have included a few bits below. Hope you either enjoy or at least are not too bored by it all as its been my route back to feeling like my old self again. Being pregnant again I am hoping that by rediscovering my writing I don't go back down the same path this time as I have found a way to control it.
Heres some of my writing from my online blog
Tuesday, 6 July 2010
The change motherhood effects. Two cases ten years apart
We all make choices day to day and the smallest and meanest of these affect the course of our next few moments, days, weeks and onwards. Maybe its a choice to put on trainers not heels and not trip on that drain at the end of the road, injuring our ankle and laying us up. If so small a choice could potentially make such a large impact on our ongoing existence what happens when we make the most monumental choice of all. To become a parent.
Ten years ago I had started my nurse training. It was a time in my life when I could be considered relatively free. No husband,no children, no rent, not many ongoing bills. Not so much as a credit card to my name even. I lived at home and pretty much came and went as I pleased. Looking back I was so young.
During my training I worked weekends on the bank to earn extra money and that weekend I was working on the Gynae ward. I walked into the sluice to throw something away and there was a cardboard bowl on the side with a wadded up pad in it. As the ward was not busy and I was on auto tidy I put the bowl on top of the bin to be sorted and emptied later. However, as I went outside I heard a mention an inviable foetus had been delivered and placed in the sluice until the mother was seen to by the nurses. I ran back to the sluice and retrieved the bowl from on top of the bin.
I opened the pad and my fear had been right, I had come so close to discarding this most important of things. He was a little boy. His skin was pale and waxy and a darkening translucent hue. His eyes were shut and his tiny hands were held in the prayer position,clasped together against his left cheek. He was so peaceful and so utterly still. He was beautifully formed from his tiny knees to his fine small features. I closed the pad back up and pushed the bowl to a safe place at the side of the sluice for the nurse to collect when she had finished with the mother. I went home that day and sought out the person I knew I could rely on utterly for comfort, my mum. I told her about that tiny person who would never be and I cried. My mum put her arms around me and, at the age of 20, I curled up on the sofa and cried in my mum's arms like a small child.
Ten years on and my life is unrecognisable. I live with my husband of nearly 3 years in a nice house, on a nice street with a car outside on the drive. I have a career and debt romping along hand in hand. The biggest change in my life though is my 1 year old daughter who brings a daily dose of light and laughter to my life. I'm a parent these days. I qualified as a nurse 7 years ago and 6 years ago I went to A and E. I see a fair share of death for any person. When a person dies in your care you can often identify with them and their family. A man in his 30's could be my husband , a girl in her teens my sister. A man in his 50's could be my Dad and an older woman my Nan. I never know how healthy it is but it helps me empathise with them and their family.
I went back to work 8 months ago when my daughter was 7 months old. I miss my daughter every day but never more so than the day I confronted my worst fear. On a night shift we had a call for a paediatric cardiac arrest. A small boy found, not breathing, in his bed by his parents. I didn't attend the arrest, I was working elsewhere anyway but I didn't want to or think I could cope with it. I didn't know how I would manage especially knowing as I did how slim that poor boys chances were. The team worked for over an hour. They always do with kids. Nobody wants to be the person that suggests maybe enough is enough. On this occasion nobody had to. His mum asked them to stop.
After he was moved to the relatives room so his family could spend time with him and say goodbye. I offered to prepare him to go downstairs after they went. I'm not sure even now I can explain that. I had a need to face my fears for sure. Knowing my idea of my worst nightmare is the thought of my daughter dying and its a crippling type of fear sometimes I hadn't been sure I could have managed the arrest. But I felt I needed to face up to my fear to move forward at work or be forever restricted by that unknown quantity. But somehow it was more than that. I felt a protectiveness somehow towards that little boy. I wanted to help him make that final journey out the department because if it was my daughter I would want a mother with my child when I finally had to leave. I would want someone to prepare her who would understand my pain and treat her as tenderly as I would. I wanted to treat that little boy as a mother as much as a nurse and give him the dignity he deserved as someone else's child.
I went with the other nurse to see his parents. His mum...
She seemed so utterly bereft and my heart went out to her. I can recall putting my hand on her arm while I was talking to her. I needed to touch her and try to convey how I felt to her. She took the longest time saying goodbye and none of us blamed her. If it was me I think I would still be there now. As she left I told her I would look after him and make sure he was safe, warm and comfortable. To this day I can't figure out why I said that. It seemed so trite,stupid and inadequate. But it was all I could offer her. I couldn't take her pain away and make her son alive for her again so all I could promise was that I would care for him as gently as I would my own.
After she left we went to the room next door to see to him. He was so small. He looked so angelic with cherubic blond curls but that vital spark that makes a person just wasn't there. He wasn't there any more. It seemed so cruel. As I cleaned him up I was aware I could hardly see him anymore I was crying so hard. I was with a male nurse and I'm not known for being especially girly at work but I didn't care at that point and I cried the whole time I attended to him. Every time I looked down I saw my little girl. I could see her face pale and cold without that spark that makes her the special person she is. I talked to him the whole time I cleaned him. When I put the sheet over his face it seemed almost unbearable. Sometimes empathy is a terrible thing. I felt like I was pulling that sheet over my daughters face and saying goodbye.
When I went home that day I didn't want my mother. I was a mother now. I wanted my child. The whole way home I kept glancing at her photo on my dashboard. I had spent the rest of the shift aching to see her, a real honest to goodness physical ache, and when I got home I don't think I acknowledged another soul. I went straight to her and scooped her up and held her close. I felt like if I could smell her and feel the heat from her and hear and feel her breath I could take away that horrible feeling. I went home and thanked god she was safe and healthy.
That horrible feeling persisted for the longest time. For days I would lie awake seeing that little boys face. Remember putting that sheet over his face. Even now six months on I can see him so clearly in my mind as I can with that little boy ten years ago.
But I think the differences in the two cases were profound. Not in the cases themselves. Regardless of gestation both times a mother had lost her child. The difference is not one anyone else in the world would probably know because the difference was in me.
Ten years ago when I saw that little boy I thought only about myself. I thought how it had affected me. I thought about my sadness at seeing that child. I went home and sought comfort for myself from my own mother. I was obviously aware his mother would be grieving but I didn't see her and I didn't understand fully. Maybe I was selfish but I think rather that I was young. If I could go back ten years I would take that small bundle out the pad he was in and put him in something soft to lie and sleep. I know he would have had to face that final indignity of a battery of tests and post mortem to find out why but I'd have given him that dignity beforehand. I'd have treated him as someone's child and given him that care. Its a regret that I didn't understand that at the time and act upon it. He would have at least slept peacefully for a while.
This time I thought about my child. I thought about his mother. I knew how much of a fear losing a child was for me and though I don't think I could possibly comprehend the depths of her pain I could empathise with it. It made me want not to run away like last time and wallow in poor me. It made me want to protect, it made me want to care. I got to give that little boy the respect, dignity and love I didn't last time. Then I went home and felt so blessed to be able to hold my own child and enjoy her.
I think the two experiences have profoundly altered my world anyway but a choice I made within that ten years altered me more. By choosing to be a mother I chose to try and be a better person, to be less selfish. I chose to put someone else's needs ahead of my own. That choice rocked my world. I read a card once that said to be a parent is to choose to have your heart walking around outside your body. Its trite but true. I have no doubt both those mothers left a part of their hearts behind on those days in those rooms. I didn't understand that until I gave birth to Caelyn and realised in that moment I would die to protect her. It's the best choice I ever made and I think she teaches me every day to be a better person and to be the person I want to be. I don't think I will ever forget either of those two little boys but I'm so glad I got a second chance to understand and to maybe offer the smallest measure of comfort to a grieving parent and dignity to a tiny soul. Two cases ten years apart show me so much I never could have imagined.
