Traumaversaries Suck
Trigger Warning: death, childhood death, pregnancy loss, suicidal thoughts
It’s weird how your body will subconsciously tell you that something is off. The past two months have been weird — sleeping longer, angry, crying, and not caring about pretty much anything. I was doing the bare minimum without even realizing it. Normally I’m on top of traumaversaries, but this year, I slipped.
August 5th, 2004, I delivered my stillborn son, Isaiah. On July 30th, I was rushed to the emergency room after being paralyzed. I took a nap in the afternoon and my youngest daughter woke me up, as I went to move and get up, I could no longer feel my legs. I remember screaming for my husband and told him that I couldn’t move. I was paralyzed from the neck down. When the EMT’s came, they immediately put a collar on my neck, put me in a chair and carried me down the steps.
When I got to the hospital, they listened for my son’s heartbeat and they “heard it”, they told me everything was fine with my little guy and would figure out why was I feeling paralyzed. They brought me to the Labor and Delivery department, put me on the monitor and started searching for his heartbeat. When the nurse couldn’t find it, she brought in the ultrasound machine to search for the heartbeat. I remember looking at the machine and seeing there was nothing there. The nurse looked at me with the saddest eyes ever and told me that my doctor will be on his way to figure out what’s going on with me and the baby. When I asked if the baby was okay, she told me, “the doctor will be in shortly.”
I turned to my then husband and said that the baby is dead. He told me I was being a drama queen, but I knew it. I just knew it. I started to recall the last time that he moved and I couldn’t. An hour or so later a doctor came in, put the ultrasound on my belly to confirm what the nurse revealed and he told me, “I’m sorry. The baby is not viable.”
Those two words, “not viable” haunts me to this day. When he said that statement to me, I remember my soul…my essence left my body. I watched everything from above, I mentally checked out. I was barely there physically. Doctors, nurses, my mom, husband, in-laws, were talking to me, but I just wasn’t there.
The reason that I was paralyzed was because the baby was dead inside of me for a week. He was poisoning my body. There was a 8cm blood clot that had ripped the placenta. It took over a week for me to deliver my son, Isaiah. Isaiah was born still on my mom’s birthday, August 5th.
Labor was one of the hardest things to go through. Why would I even want to deliver a child that was dead? I didn’t care enough to push. I wanted to die right along with him. I knew that I’d never see him smile, he’d never open his eyes, his cries would never ring in my ears, I wouldn’t hear his first words, watch him take his first step, hear about his day at school, help him tie his shoes, teach him how to count.
The realization that I’d never heard him say, “I love you, mommy.”, and that I’d never get kisses and hugs from him hit me so hard. I remember praying to God to kill me. I just wanted to be with my son. I’d do anything to be able to bring my son back to life.
When it was time for me to push, I was so delusional. When he finally emerged into this world, I snapped. I remember screaming to the nurses that he wasn’t crying and that they needed to save my baby. My mother had to get me together because I finally snapped. When they brought Isaiah back to me he was cleaned and dressed in the hospital garb that all newborns wear. When Isaiah was placed in my arms he had the cutest smile on his face.
He was perfect.
But he was dead.
My son that I was baking in my womb for twenty-six weeks was dead and there was nothing that I could do to bring him back to life.
Next week marks fourteen years that my son has been gone. Traumaversaries suck ass. I hate not being able to control these emotions. Even when I know that these traumaversaries are coming, I try to prepare myself for them, but my body, mind, and soul could care less…it doesn’t even matter to them. They plan on making me feel things that I rather bury.
It’s hard when you’re working and then a wave of anger and disgust covers you like a blanket. You start thinking of ways to kill yourself, just so that you can be a mother to your child. Or in my case…children. I’ve buried two children…two sons. August 5th, 2004 and February 2nd, 2006, I gave birth to two dead sons — Isaiah and Joshua — they’re buried together in the Garden of Angels cemetery section.
In my warped mind, if I kill myself, I’ll be able to be a parent to my dead children. I know it sounds weird, it reads strangely, and yet…it’s all I want to do. These past two months, I’ve been thinking of ways to end my life. It’s been one helluva struggle to get out of bed and live and not just take my medication and fall asleep peacefully…dreaming about my dead children.
The only thing that’s stopping me is my three living children. If it wasn’t for them, I would’ve left this world a long ass time ago. I’m trying to take it one minute at a time, so far so good, but I can say for certain, the closer I get to the 5th of August, the harder it gets for me to fight.
These next seven days are going to be the absolute worst, especially since tomorrow starts the 14th year of me waking up paralyzed and finding out my son is dead. Fourteen years. He’d probably have some peach fuzz on his chin, dirt on his lip, voice cracking, maybe in the midst of a growth spurt. I envision what he looks like and what he’d be doing often, but I know it’s just a stupid dream.
This year has been tough. Every year is tough. They say it gets easier, but that’s a damn lie. Nothing about mourning the death of your children gets easier. My therapist told me to write these feelings out a while ago, she claimed it would help. I honestly don’t know if this helps or if it’s going to cause more harm than good opening up these old wounds. All I know is that right at this moment, I’m so sad.
PTSD, PPD, depression, and anxiety all rolled up into one giant sack of SUCK is on my back and I just want to take this bag off. My shoulders hurt. My soul hurts. My heart hurts.
Traumaversaries suck.