Faces of Loss, Faces of Hope

Jodie

Mom to Jasper

Stillborn September 2nd, 2009 at 20 weeks

My name is Jodie and last September 2nd 2009, i had my beautiful baby son Jasper at 20 weeks, he was stillborn. It has been just over a year and i still cry for him , i still long for him and i still feel empty without him.

 

 I am an insulin diabetic so i have always known that i would most likely never have children , or if i did there could be major complications, but it was a risk i was willing to take. Before my first son Jakson was born in 2004, i felt very blessed to have a very healthy child in my arms. He was a dream come true as before he was born i had suffered up to 5 miscarriages. Even though he came a month early , he was still completely healthy.
 

We tried more times after that with 2 more miscarriages then last year we found ourselves going through a beautiful , normal pregnancy. I wasn't ill this time , except that my blood sugar levels went haywire and i could not control them. I knew this was a bad sign that i may possibly then have trouble with my baby. All my ultrasounds were good, except for when they came to my 20 week scan. On that day i felt so alone, for starters my son was home sick with gastro so for me that was a bad sign, so my husband could not come with me. I was alone. When i told the nurse that i was i diabetic she went straight to his heart, she said she would be back in a moment. I knew then and there that this was the end. Even though i knew he was alive and kicking, this was the start of my nightmare. She told me to come back with my husband to see the docter in a few hrs, the were the longest hours ever. I did nothing but cry, but we did have the joy of opening up the piece of paper that told us he was our son.
 

From there it is all a blur, the words that my beautiful boy would not survive feels like a knife cutting deep into my heart. He had 3 holes in his tiny little heart, side of his heart was not growing as it should be , and he had no arteries connected properly. If he survived inside of me, he would not survive his first breath. To think and believe that this was all my fault, nearly killed me, but the decision and the guilt afterwards destroyed me.
 

After seeing a very well known cardiologist here in Melbourne our decision was made. As I said this decision destroyed me but i know in my heart of hearts that I could just not put my little baby through so much pain and suffering with the the guarantee that he would still not survive and if he did he would most likely end up with severe brain damage and possibly only a brief time to live.
 

After planning his funeral and after countless tears and "what ifs' , that dreaded day arrived. I felt my little boys last kick aound 1pm , well that is what i remember. After nearly dying giving birth to Jasper , he was born at 1.42am on the 02/09/09. He was beautiful, i just had to get my head around the fact that he was only approx 23cms and looked very normal. At around 2.30am our lovely priest came in and baptised him before i rushed to theatre.
 

We spend several hours with him taking photos and holding him. His brother came in and met him and held him and talked to him, it was beautiful. Saying goodbye to him was the worst feeling that day, i wanted to take him home with me, like the other mothers that day, but that wasn't going to be.
 

After being numb we had his funeral two days later, letting him go was the worst thing i had to do, but we did and now i pray that he is at peace. I will never get over losing him, never, and i will never get over the way some family and friends chose to dismiss him as though he never existed. To me he was my son, he existed , he has a birth certificate, and he had a funeral, he definitely existed.
 

Slowly now we are getting better at him not being with us, his first anniversary was so hard and looking at other babies who were his age made me cry tears that i thought weren't there. I know it will never go away, nor do i want it to, he was a piece of me and that is the way it will always be. I love him and remember him each and every day and that is the way it will always be. I have found strength and support through people that i don't know more than the people around me. I have become a much wiser and stronger woman and a much better mother to Jakson and a better wife.   

I may have lost my son, but i have now found a new me, without Jaspers help I would still be where I was before him, so i thank him from the bottom of my heart for helping me become the woman that I am today.