April 12,2012
With Mimie being gone all these emotions and heartache grows inside me. It's like her passing has made these private matters between her and I worth all the more. People should know what she went through and the heartache we've shared together. These are private moments that only she and I shared. Now, with her passing I do not want these moments to fade with time until the day, I 'm gone myself.
Our primary doctors came to see us in the hospital the next day after they had just delivered our twin girls. They were very sad and apologetic. Our main doctor said to us, “in all my years of delivering babies I have never seen this. I never lost both twins.”
As I sat there trying to make sense of what he was saying I had mentally checked out. I realized at this moment I didn’t give a shit. I just knew we had just lost our baby girls. Thankfully Mimie’s sister Kim was there and she was so unforgiving and she laid into the doctors. I don’t remember exactly how it went but I can remember the quotes.
“What do you mean their young?" She said angrily.
"They can try again? Their young", that should make them feel better?
“How do you let something like this happen? You just saw them the day before and the babies were fine.”
She was fiery and I was grateful she was there. I was grateful all her sisters were there because at this moment in time I needed someone to speak for us. I was so vulnerable. You could flick me and I would fall to the ground and curl up crying like a baby. Kind of like now at this moment of y life reliving an entire new nightmare.
Her prenatal specialist was known as a “cocky asshole” and he never had the balls to come and see us in the hospital or ever contact us for that matter. Until this day I don’t think he cares. For him, he probably sees it as part of the job.
Since Mimie had a c-section to deliver our girls we could not leave the hospital until she was walking and passed gas. Yep, she had to fart. Probably the first time in my life I would have heard her. So normally a c-section takes 4 to 5 days of hospital recuperation she did it in three.
Before her scheduled release I had to leave the hospital and prepare our home for her arrival. Like I said earlier the hospital could only shield us long enough until we would have to face the sad fact of reality of leaving the hospital and our girls behind. We had already given the twins up once but to have to leave and think they were in the hospital morgue was grueling. I would reflect on the night we gave them back to the hospital for years. No parent should have to give back their children. No parent should have to lose their children at birth, especially in America where for some reason we have the highest still born birth rate in the world.
Mimie and I were in our hospital room. The twin girls were there with us. It was a nightmare wrapped in a fantasy that those girls were alive. Hell, you couldn’t tell otherwise. In the beginning we did not want to see the girls. As she gave birth to them I buried my head in Mimie's shoulder. I felt the hospital gown and her skin against my lips. I cried uncontrollably. My wails echoing off the white sterile walls. As I cried and moan like a new born baby Mimie's streams of tears intertwined with mine. Even under her heavily sedated state she knew it was happening. The birth of our girls into heaven.
I saw them in the little incubator. The hospital staff still prepared them as if they were living breathing babies. They cleaned them off. Wrapped them in blankets. Placed booties on their feet and knit caps on their head. My God they were beautiful. Their little ears peaking through the knit caps the nurses put on their tiny black hair heads. I decided right then we'd see them. We couldn’t have truly lost them, could we?
We held them from the moment they were born until we got into our private room. The shock was still in Mimie’s face and her motherly instincts were there nurturing their lifeless bodies. I remember when I would go back and forth from the post operating room to coordinating family at the hospital as they arrived to this tragic occurrence and thinking , "How do we move past this?"
When I was by Mimie’s bed side in post op she was throwing up. She couldn’t handle the pain medicine being pumped in her body. I helped her and cleaned her up. Both girls snug on either side of her arms. The look of pain in her face made me think she didn’t even want the pain medicine. She wanted to feel all of it. But the biggest pain for us both was yet to come.
After having the girls with us for 6 or so hours I could see that being outside the womb wasn’t being kind to our girls. I knew we would have to give them back to the hospital. The room was quite, family had left and it was just her and I.
I looked at Mimie and I said, “You know, we have to give them back.”
They girls were so beautiful. We would take their little booties off and kiss their feet. Take off their knit caps and kiss their face. We knew time was running out. The nurse came to check on us.
I said to the nurse, “I know we have to give them up, but we don’t know how to do it."
Mimie and I would cry uncontrollably. The young nurse said to me, “How about I give you a time frame. I’ll be back at 8:45pm and take them.” We both agreed and we rushed to take in the last moments of our children.
We kissed them again. Undressed and dressed them. I decided I would take pictures of us holding them. I noticed our time was winding down. The anxiety over coming us like a death row inmate. It the last second and I had decided to cut locks of their hair so we would have something physical of them. First Sophia then Gabriella.
The nurse walked in I noticed the time. I could have told her to leave we are not ready but time was not being kind to the girls and we had to do what was right by them. We held them close. We lied in each other’s arms and cried holding our children knowing that once we handed them over we would never see them again in this lifetime. Our tears flowed soaking Sophia and Gabriella’s face (the girls). Our sobbing could not be controlled and the noises we made from our grief could not be helped.
“This isn’t right.” “We shouldn’t be giving them to anyone.” I looked at the nurse. She was so strong.
Mimie reluctantly handed me the girls. And one by one I placed them in the nurse’s arms. Our crying drowning everything else out.
I said to the nurse, “please take care of our girls. I know where they’re going to be is very cold. Can you please keep them dressed and wrapped in their blankets? Please we don’t want them to be cold.”
The heartbreak and anguish was brutal. And with that the nurse turned around and left with our girls, leaving us empty handed for eternity.
https://twitter.com/FusaCmee
Christopher Fusaro. The author of Captain Imperfecto.
© copyright 2012. All rights reserved.
Hi. I just came across your blog. I am so very sorry to hear about your tremendous losses.
ReplyDeleteI understand you have not revealed the death of your wife but I wondered if you have shared how your precious twins passed? From reading, I am assuming they were born at 38 weeks - that seems "late" enough in a pregnancy to be able to survive. Have you shared what happened? Was this unexpected?
Many Blessings!