Three Minus One: Stories of Parents' Love and Loss by Jessica Watson Page B

as loudly as my now squished lungs could manage. My two-year-old daughter, Molly, giggled as I grabbed her hands and twirled her around our living room. My nine-months-pregnant belly prevented me from attempting anything too acrobatic, so we contented ourselves with mini rotations and elaborate flounces. My husband Joseph and I were just a week away from meeting our own “Maggie May,” and I happily indulged my need for sentimentality. In my giddy excitement,
Rod Stewart’s Greatest Hits
had been a permanent fixture in the CD player. I imagined myself singing this tune to my baby girl every night as I rocked her to sleep. It would be her special song, I decided.
    Instead, Maggie died, unnoticed, on a Thursday. Or at least, that’s when she died to us. It seems likely that she passed away early sometime the previous morning. That Thursday we arrived at our obstetrician’s office buzzing with nervous excitement for our final routine checkup before the due date. When our doctor struggled to find Maggie’s heartbeat, despite her calm reassurances that the baby was probably just “hiding,” my own heart leapt into my throat. But it was not until the nurse wheeled in the rickety old ultrasound machine, kept for emergencies, and we all saw Maggie’s completely still and lifeless body, that I felt the sensation of a cliff crumbling beneath my feet. The doctor took my hand, and I reluctantly met her gaze, the weight of inevitability unbearable: “I’m sorry…I’m just notseeing what I need to see.” The words were unreal, unleashing a wave of sickening shock. I barely noticed anything else going on in that little room, except Molly leaning over the bed and stroking my hair: “Mumma…Mumma,” she murmured.
    It wasn’t possible in that moment to make sense of what had happened, from a medical or emotional standpoint, so we carried on with the new plan of action. Did we want to deliver her today, or wait a while? Is there anything we want to do first? It always seems easier to assume a role or task, rather than delve into the bottomless pit of pain and grief in situations like this, so we agreed to make arrangements for Molly, grab our hospital bag, and proceed with the delivery. I felt utter dread at the thought of birthing my dead baby—how could I possibly find the strength to do it? I loved her terribly, but things had gone so completely wrong. It just wasn’t supposed to be like this.
    Still reeling from shock and the sucker punch of emotions, we somehow made it home. Staggering into the bedroom, I grabbed the neatly packed hospital bag and emptied out its contents, strewing nursing bras and baby blankets across the room. I was possessed with grief, determined to weed out every last piece of baby paraphernalia. The drive to the hospital was sobering, allowing us a moment to brace ourselves before facing the next stage of the ordeal. “I can feel her moving now!” I wailed as we turned into the parking lot. My body had deceived me; with each waddling, reluctant step, I could feel Maggie’s body swishing and floating, graceful limbs and hands moving in rhythm. These sensations had become familiar to me over the past week, yet it was only then as we passed through the sleek sliding hospital doors that I realized how mistaken my perceptions of my own body had been. In that moment, I was convinced that the innate, primal mother-child connection that every pregnant woman is supposed to possess had malfunctioned. Even in my belly I had failed my child, and there was no one to hold accountable but myself.
    Walking into Labor and Delivery less than two years ago to deliverour first baby, everything seemed happy: the pleasant receptionist and the jolly maternity care coordinator who waved and remembered us from the preadmission appointment. We were greeted like old friends. Even the walls seemed welcoming in their soothing tones of peach and eggshell. Now, everything about the place seemed cruel: the obnoxious front desk