Chapter 24: "A Cry In The Dark"
Abby Lockhart, R.N
Abby's apartment, 16/9/02, 11:50pm
For the first few weeks after it happened, I used to do this. Wander around my apartment, as best I could with the leg in plaster, trying to come to terms with the turn of events. I spent my restless, tortured nights crying for them, raw angry tears that seared pain further into my soul. I could barely bear the grief in this stage, it was all I could do to take every breath.
I would lie in bed at night, eyes wide open unable to sleep, with a hand on my stomach. I wondered what he'd have said, given different circumstances, about this pregnancy. This awful, unplanned accident.
I couldn't feel anything for my baby, all I could feel was my own loss. All I could do was wish that things had turned out differently and cry bitter tears because they hadn't and here I was alone in the world. I wasn't good at being alone, it was self-destructive.
And now she's just an abnormality, a swelling, and waiting to burst. She's about to make herself real, I can feel it, and I'm still not ready. I shuffle awkwardly, trying to sleep, acutely aware that today was my due date.
I'm alone in the darkness when I'm woken from a light doze by the band of pain round my stomach. I can't move. Instead I find myself crying in the dark again, screaming this time, for my best friend. For anyone, but I knew it was him I wanted to come. I knew it would have been him who would have answered. I had been dreaming of him, as was normal, and I expected the dream to segue into reality and for him to be here to hold my hand through this ordeal.
But the silence didn't answer and the pain got worse. I'd been an OB nurse for years, seen hundreds of babies delivered but it was never real. It was never real as this was real. I was losing control over my own body and it was truly terrifying. I struggled out of bed, crawled to the phone and dialed 911. I couldn't think of what else to do.
The paramedics found me, breathless and already exhausted, about 10 minutes later. My super had let them in, no doubt woken by my crying. The female medic stayed with me all the way to Northwestern. I have no doubt I must have looked a horrific mess. She had kind eyes and a gentle tone, speaking to me in soft sentences, telling me we'd be there soon, offering generic reassurance. They both handled me as if I was breakable, some fragile object that mustn't be harmed.
I was admitted to OB pretty much instantly. It was an efficient nurse in her mid-thirties who dealt with me, a face I vaguely recognized from some of my previous visits. A person not entirely dissimilar from who I had been in a former life. She had the same generic reassurance to offer. I knew no one could offer me anything else. Everyone was going out of their way to be nice, but I wanted someone there I knew, someone who cared about me. I needed a friendly hand to hold.
His words of encouragement were ringing in my head, as clear as if he was actually saying them. I knew exactly what he'd have said and how he'd have said it. It was all that kept me going as labor twisted through my body. All I wanted was this to be over.
She was a determined young lady, much like both her mother and her father, God rest him. Her cries rended the air in the delivery room mercifully quickly, and the resident looked thankful for an easy, uncomplicated birth, probably because they were having a bad shift. I was thankful too, because I was free of the parasite.
Exhaustion took hold then. I watched from a safe distance as they cleaned her up and wrapped her in a huge hospital shawl. She was an angry pink colour, her tiny face screwed up against this big old world I'd forced her into. The friendly nurse turned to me, smiling that false smile we all learned so quickly in life, holding my little girl in her arms.
"Do you want to hold her?"
With those simple words I felt the reality of my situation crash headlong into me. This baby wasn't mine, I'd decided that long ago.
I had to give her up.
Abby Lockhart, R.N
Abby's apartment, 16/9/02, 11:50pm
For the first few weeks after it happened, I used to do this. Wander around my apartment, as best I could with the leg in plaster, trying to come to terms with the turn of events. I spent my restless, tortured nights crying for them, raw angry tears that seared pain further into my soul. I could barely bear the grief in this stage, it was all I could do to take every breath.
I would lie in bed at night, eyes wide open unable to sleep, with a hand on my stomach. I wondered what he'd have said, given different circumstances, about this pregnancy. This awful, unplanned accident.
I couldn't feel anything for my baby, all I could feel was my own loss. All I could do was wish that things had turned out differently and cry bitter tears because they hadn't and here I was alone in the world. I wasn't good at being alone, it was self-destructive.
And now she's just an abnormality, a swelling, and waiting to burst. She's about to make herself real, I can feel it, and I'm still not ready. I shuffle awkwardly, trying to sleep, acutely aware that today was my due date.
I'm alone in the darkness when I'm woken from a light doze by the band of pain round my stomach. I can't move. Instead I find myself crying in the dark again, screaming this time, for my best friend. For anyone, but I knew it was him I wanted to come. I knew it would have been him who would have answered. I had been dreaming of him, as was normal, and I expected the dream to segue into reality and for him to be here to hold my hand through this ordeal.
But the silence didn't answer and the pain got worse. I'd been an OB nurse for years, seen hundreds of babies delivered but it was never real. It was never real as this was real. I was losing control over my own body and it was truly terrifying. I struggled out of bed, crawled to the phone and dialed 911. I couldn't think of what else to do.
The paramedics found me, breathless and already exhausted, about 10 minutes later. My super had let them in, no doubt woken by my crying. The female medic stayed with me all the way to Northwestern. I have no doubt I must have looked a horrific mess. She had kind eyes and a gentle tone, speaking to me in soft sentences, telling me we'd be there soon, offering generic reassurance. They both handled me as if I was breakable, some fragile object that mustn't be harmed.
I was admitted to OB pretty much instantly. It was an efficient nurse in her mid-thirties who dealt with me, a face I vaguely recognized from some of my previous visits. A person not entirely dissimilar from who I had been in a former life. She had the same generic reassurance to offer. I knew no one could offer me anything else. Everyone was going out of their way to be nice, but I wanted someone there I knew, someone who cared about me. I needed a friendly hand to hold.
His words of encouragement were ringing in my head, as clear as if he was actually saying them. I knew exactly what he'd have said and how he'd have said it. It was all that kept me going as labor twisted through my body. All I wanted was this to be over.
She was a determined young lady, much like both her mother and her father, God rest him. Her cries rended the air in the delivery room mercifully quickly, and the resident looked thankful for an easy, uncomplicated birth, probably because they were having a bad shift. I was thankful too, because I was free of the parasite.
Exhaustion took hold then. I watched from a safe distance as they cleaned her up and wrapped her in a huge hospital shawl. She was an angry pink colour, her tiny face screwed up against this big old world I'd forced her into. The friendly nurse turned to me, smiling that false smile we all learned so quickly in life, holding my little girl in her arms.
"Do you want to hold her?"
With those simple words I felt the reality of my situation crash headlong into me. This baby wasn't mine, I'd decided that long ago.
I had to give her up.