Warning: the following article explores subjects that may be triggering for some readers.
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that → follow → readers
In life, I have two sons: four-year-old Bastian and two-year-old Jasper.
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I → have → sons
I word it so carefully because it neither feels right to call Jasper my second or third son.
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it → word → Jasper
After Jasper was born, I struggled to think of the right gift for my obstetrician.
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I → bear → obstetrician
We had scrubbed into my maternal assisted caesarean together with round after round of Betadine until I was sterile enough to lift my baby from my womb with gloved hands.
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I → scrub → hands
Postpartum, I kept thinking about her hands.
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I → think → hands
I wanted to do something to care for them.
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I → want → them
Eventually, I settled on gifting her the most beautiful rose hand cream I knew of, which seemed a paltry offering.
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which → settle → cream
We had met a year earlier under both auspicious and horrible circumstances.
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We → meet → circumstances
Days earlier, I had received a call from the genetic counsellor to say they’d received “complicated results”.
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they → receive → results
I immediately knew there was nothing complicated about them.
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I → know → them
Our baby had one, just one, extra chromosome rendering him “incompatible with life”.
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him → have → life
A specialised scan the next day confirmed to the trained eyes of the technician the extent of our beautiful boy’s condition, although my own eyes only registered his heart beating and his body wiggling.
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body → confirm → condition
I’d experienced pregnancy loss before.
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I → experience → loss
My first pregnancy abruptly and shockingly ended in a miscarriage at nine weeks.
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pregnancy → end → weeks
There was nothing I could have done to prevent it and nothing I did to cause it.
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I → be → it
This time, my partner and I had a part to play.
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partner → have → part
We were faced with the heartbreaking “decision” to let nature take its course or undergo a termination for medical reasons (TFMR).
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nature → face → TFMR
It didn’t feel like a choice at all.
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It → feel → choice
The decision was made as soon as this extra chromosome was produced.
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chromosome → make → ?
He would not live.
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He → live → ?
But still, I had to sign the piece of paper allowing the doctor to take him from us.
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doctor → have → us
Through the public health system, I was randomly assigned an obstetrician to perform the TFMR.
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I → assign → TFMR
The morning of the procedure I walked into the operating room (the same one in which I had delivered Bastian 14 months earlier), devastated and heartbroken, whispering, “I love you, I love you, I love you” over and over as I cradled my tummy protectively in my last few moments with him.
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I → walk → him
Later, when I walked out of the hospital I said to my partner through tears and my haze of general anaesthesia, “If we ever get the chance again, I want her to deliver my baby.”
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her → walk → baby
I don’t know why I said it.
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I → know → it
At the time I was 44 and didn’t think we would have another chance.
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we → think → chance
I can only describe it as feeling destined.
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I → describe → it
In the weeks following, I remember the panicked, desperate ache of grief.
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I → follow → grief
I felt devoid of life, both his and mine.
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I → feel → life
One minute the energy of people was too much, the next I didn’t want to be alone, scared the aloneness would give my thoughts free rein to terrorise me even more.
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aloneness → want → me
Some days I felt sheer dread for the seconds and minutes and hours ahead, believing I had nothing to look forward to, even while holding my toddler in my arms and loving him fiercely.
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I → feel → him
I was grieving my son, Basti’s brother, and the possibility that I might never have another baby.
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I → grieve → baby
Three weeks later, entirely by surprise, without actively trying, and still in the depths of grief, I was pregnant.
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I → try → grief
I was terrified.
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I → terrify → ?
When I went to my four week post-TFMR check-up with the obstetrician, I could barely believe the words coming out of my mouth.
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I → go → mouth
She looked as stunned as I felt.
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I → look → ?
Nine months later, she delivered Jasper.
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she → deliver → Jasper
With the same hands that had lifted Jasper’s brother out of me that awful morning.
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that → lift → me
She had held him while I never got the chance.
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I → hold → chance
…and 16 more, not listed.
The Aporia
