Eden Grace
After a trying, 6 weeks admittance to hospital, with every drug trial and error pumped through my veins to keep both myself, and our baby alive, we at 37 weeks, welcomed our beautiful, feisty, little girl into the world via caesarean.
I worried deeply about the connection or bond, if you will, that I would have with her for the entire 37 weeks due to the Hyperemesis.
Spending six of the last weeks of what would be my last pregnancy, on my own wasn’t what I had planned, but the silver lining to which I worked hard on learning to find and accept, was that I was able to in the moment, feel her every kick, every hiccup, and every contraction which would confirm she was ready to meet me as much as I, her.
I knew that I was never truly alone in that small, confined room, isolated from the rest of the world. Isolated from my husband, and our beautiful, Peyton.
After my body started to decline all medication from what my obstetrician could only gather and assume was overuse of the drugs to try and keep us both going, he made the decision to stop everything and let nature take its course. Meaning, rather than suppress my pre-term labour any longer, let Eden make her entry into the world in her own time. However unfortunately, we were not able to allow her to do so, as at 36 weeks, my body started deteriorating.
My bones- weak, my muscles- deflated, my throat and stomach- shredded. So at 36 weeks to the day, Bevan made the call. The following Monday, much to everything he felt strongly against, he would deliver our little girl to in his words, “save you both”.
Healthy as anything, I heard her cry and I felt a love so instant, it bought me straight back to her sisters entry into the world.
After 37 weeks, I held the baby I grew and made a home for, on my chest. That connection and bond I was so afraid I would not feel, well, that was just fear of the unknown.
Because never in my life, aside from 3 years prior on the
14th February 2019, have I felt the love I felt,
on the 31st January 2022.
I am forever grateful that I was able to carry my two daughters and bring them into this world as safe as I could, though, before anyone dare asks the million dollar question, no, I personally will not carry another child again.
I don’t know what our future holds, but with my husbands optimistic heart and his dream of three children,
with science on our side, I dare say, anything is possible.
Though for now, in this moment and moments in time, my girls are my world, my husband, the root of it.
There is nothing quite like the bliss and overwhelment I felt when I walked out of that hospital after 6 weeks knowing I was going home, to my bed, to my shower, to my husband, to my daughter,
to my life, before HG.
And whilst selfish to some as it may sound, I will never risk having to experience what I did for 37 weeks, ever again.
This, is the conclusion (or is it?), to what I started writing in 2017.
Five and a half years later, I am as proud of a mother as I could possibly be. I am content, I am strong, and I am in absolute awe of the strength I have and will continue to grow whilst passing that on to my beautiful children.
Something I truly believe every mother reading this, has and does within herself, to the very best of her ability.
The last five and a half years have torn us apart,
both individually, and together.
We saw darkness no flashlight could brighten or shine the way for. We tried, we lost, we separated, we held on, we fought.
And despite the heartache from loss, the piercing sound of words unable to retract, we believe we are, right where we should be in this crazy thing called life, because someone believed, we were strong enough to endure and overcome.
Pregnancy is hard, parenthood is harder.
And whilst we may have our hands full, even if only for a short while in time, our hearts, despite our struggles along the way,
will always, be fuller.
