I never would have described myself as entitled. I have always worked extremely hard for everything I have achieved. I guess I never realized just how entitled I felt. I thought because I lived my life a certain way I was ENTITLED to a healthy living baby. I thought that being an organic eating vegetarian, living in a house where no shoes are allowed and using non toxic cleaning products entitled me to a healthy living baby... I thought that being a kind compassionate chronically happy person entitled me to a healthy living baby....Now I am rethinking all of the above...maybe I should change my approach...start eating large quantities of red meat, processed food with partially hydrogenated oil, drinking alcohol profusely, smoking like a chimney and using illicit drugs. Maybe then I could have a healthy LIVING baby....
So far this experience has made me feel so much more animal. Not all animals offspring make it in the wild. It makes me realize how much we really don't have control over. Prenatal vitamins, avoiding soft cheeses, eating 70-100 grams of protein daily...do these things REALLY make a difference or just give us a sense (a false sense) of control over something we know, on a primal level, we have little to no control over. In the animal world if one of your litter doesn't survive...well at least you have like 5 more kids in the litter...but when you grow just one and you're pregnant for almost a year and you are full term and you're due in 14 days and then your baby just DIES!!! it is BEYOND devastating...you're are left with a stretched out abdomen and a empty heart...it is truly cruel.
Most of the time I am sad...but once in a while I get angry. I get angry when I see people who are obese, smoking...and they have kids, I get angry when I see people eating fast food and gulping down soda....and they have kids. I get angry when I see women who are not paying attention to their children or yelling at them and treating them like crap. I guess I just feel like why have kids if you don't care about their health, and by health I mean both physical and emotional. Since the death of my daughter I am so much more in love with my son on a primal level. I don't really love him more than I did before. I just feel more desperate about it. The - I love you so much I ache from it- kind of love. I also feel more love for all babies and children. I recognize their preciousness and how fragile they are. How quickly they can be taken from us.
I did everything "right" during my pregnancy. I was a healthy weight, I ate well, I don't smoke, I wasn't around harsh chemicals, I didn't eat fast food...I felt entitled to a healthy living baby. I guess the joke is on me. Who was I kidding? Do babies die from being smug? I guess the question after your baby dies is "If I get pregnant again, what do I do differently in order to change the outcome? With no known reason for my daughter to die full term.. I wish I could put a finger on the ONE thing that could make the next baby live. My doctor told me "If I were you, I would do nothing different, this was just really bad luck"...Well That certainly is the truth. But now I think, since my baby has died, I certainly am ENTITLED to the next one being alive....
About Me
- Renel
- My second child and our first daughter, Camille, died and was born on June, 30 2011 when I was full term at 38 weeks pregnant. I gave birth to my rainbow baby, a second daughter, on August 31, 2012. This is me trying to figure out how to be a mother to my living son and daughter and function in society after our tragic loss.
Doesn't that just feel like a punch in the face . . . you do EVERYTHING RIGHT and then your life just takes a shit.
ReplyDeleteSorry. Graphic. But really, it just isn't fair. And while no one said life is fair, it still isn't fair.
I know what you mean about that new love, too. I often wished I could just curl up next to my big boy and hold him all the time, never let him go. I still feel that way.
Sending big hugs and love to you. xo
I have written similar posts to this one and feel you hit the nail on the head here. It's beyond frustrating. And that anger is so fierce, so raw. The world suddenly makes no sense after something like this happens, especially to those of us who ate right and had great medical care, etc. Like you, I felt entitled. I felt I was a good person, and having experienced a prior loss, I was super entitled for things to go well this time. Unfortunately there are many out there who have had to endure multiple losses, which I find to be particularly cruel. But it goes to show how there is no rhyme or reason to any of it, and loss isn't parceled out equally. Some skate through several pregnancies, unwanted pregnancies, NEVER knowing this pain. *sigh* Like you, I feel like I should change my approach - maybe being a horrible person will help my next outcome??? It all comes down to lack of control, as you mentioned above. It's both terrifying and freeing at the same time to acknowledge it.
ReplyDeleteGah. Blogger ate my first comment.
ReplyDeleteWhat I tried to say was yeah, me too. I thought silly things like, because I was planning on using cloth nappies (diapers) that the happy outcome was a sure thing. I thought I had it all worked out. Like you, I worked hard, did all the right things and once I got to the "safe stage" you know, 12 weeks, I thought it was a given. I'm sure my smugness killed her, sure of it. And three years on, the anger still fucks with me. You're not alone.
xo
I have a friend who is pregnant now after 3 years of infertility and 3 previous miscarriages. She's on pins and needles and jokes with me (because dark humor is the best when you have a dead baby) about how she'll practically let her children juggle knives if they just made it out of her uterus alive. They'll obviously live through that, right? Doing everything write and just have REALLY bad luck is where I stand, too. I'm that vegetarian with an obsession with natural cleaning products, too. I don't smoke or drink-- except while ttc. Then bring on the large quantities of wine because ttc after loss is one impossible feat.
ReplyDeleteJust found your blog. Looks like you're new to this journey. You're in good company with a bunch of sad, desperate people. I'm sorry your daughter died. It's a cruel, cruel thing.
Oh LORD. I just wrote doing everything "write" when it should be RIGHT. And yes, I am so anal that I must correct myself as not to confuse you into thinking I am some grammatically incorrect fool.
ReplyDeleteAlso, I take back the comment about me not drinking. That was a lie. Just no booze while pregnant. ;)
"Do babies die from being smug?" This got me. I mean, do they? Is that why my little boy died? I agree with Hope's Mama. I'm sure of it. What else could I have possibly done wrong besides believing I was entitled. I thought, "I am so good at making babies. I should be a pro." My first two pregnancies, I sailed right through. Holden's, I sailed right through. Until 38 weeks. I am angry too. I am angry with you at the loss of your precious Camille. So very sorry.
ReplyDeleteI've asked so many of these questions myself, wondered the same things...I didn't eat CHOCOLATE in the first twenty weeks of my pregnancy with Otis for fear I'd miscarry from the caffeine in it, I was that careful...I took my Bradley classes and the "best" prenatal vitamins and went to prenatal yoga and had a thorough three page birth plan and only ate organic and researched EVERYTHING and spent way too much money on an organic mattress for the baby and and and and and and...
ReplyDeletehe still died.
Boy was I smug. Babbling on at dinner parties about why my birth and pregnancy choices were so superior, for me and for the baby...blah blah blah.
I do have to say that it's been a little bit freeing, at least for me, to realize how NOT IN CONTROL I am over so much that life throws at us. No, it hasn't made me reckless, I didn't pick up a crack habit or suddenly take up smoking (though I did actually consider it (meaning smoking, not crack!) shortly after Otis's death!) but it has freed me up from some of my "have-to's" and "shoulds," which, for a control freak like me, is kinda nice. I feel like I'm slowly coming to terms with the whole idea of "shit just happens," while not completely throwing in the towel and giving up on lifestyle choices that I know really can make a difference. But lord knows I sure as heck don't feel there are ANY guarantees...
Pffft, I get this, being entitled.
ReplyDeleteI figured also I'd paid my dues. Tried for 7 years to have our first, 5 goes of IVF, then along he came. My body just needed a kick start then it was off and running. Then a miscarriage. Then a twin pregnancy. Then another miscarriage. Then thinking there's room for one more. We really want 4. My body's champ and I've suffered enough early loss and TTC woes then along came Joseph. I thought I was entitled. What was I thinking?
I totally get your anger at others and thier kids. Don't you just want to scream at them? Tell them how goddamn lucky they are?
You did do everything right. None of it is your fault. It's such a shitty shitty thing to have happened and I wish she was here. xo
Ah the smugness... I'm ashamed to say that I had a lot of that... coupled with a lot of tut-tutting directed towards those who, in my judgmental view, were not taking their pregnancy seriously (because they were drinking a glass of wine with dinner, or consuming caffeine, or eating mayonnaise). Yet, I was the one out of everyone who lost my baby, and all those others who had a more 'relaxed' attitude, they got to take home kicking, screaming, live, healthy babies. It feels like such a slap in the face. It's left me torn now too... do I need to 'relax and go easier on myself' this time, not be so strict... Or do I go the other way and be as strict as I was before, and then some? I don't think I'm capable of going easier on myself - I'm too much of a control freak.
ReplyDeleteWhen we returned to the hospital where our baby was born six weeks after he died, for the results of all of our tests, we were confronted with the sight of numerous heavily pregnant women smoking out the front as if they didn't have a care in the world. I could have literally sunk my teeth into them like a dog and ripped them to shreds. I've no doubt they went on to have living babies, while I sit at home going over every aspect of my pregnancy to find the moment where it all went wrong, despite me doing everything 'right', getting the best medical care, by the best specialists. I can also relate to the confusion you mention of not knowing what to do differently next time (if I'm lucky enough for there to be a next time) as no one can tell me what went wrong this time. It's infuriating. Finding out we are not in control of anything has been simultaneously the most distressing and freeing experience of my life. It's such a complicated paradox, isn't it?
ReplyDelete