Today (16th August) marks 1 whole month since Hallie's birthday and I guess one month on is the perfect place to press pause on the blogging for now. I feel that Hallie's story has been told and her memory preserved and there's not much more to say. Michael and I will continue to grieve Hallie in private - it's a journey that we still very much feel we're only at the start of.
Both of us intend to keep our Instagram Accounts updated. While this blog is public, our Instagram's are a safe place where we can engage with people around the world who understand exactly what it is like to lose a baby. Because of this, we have decided to make our profiles private so that our Instagram content is only available to those who are on a similar path. This allows us to be as open and honest and raw as we want/need to be. The community we have discovered there has been the best source of information and advice and it's important to us that we can ask questions and share our experiences in a safe place. It's a sensitive subject and at times can be hard to share what we're really going through and because of this we won't be following each other's accounts, just to give each other that added privacy to share our thoughts and feelings without having to worry about judgement or causing upset. I've been brutally honest and open on my Instagram page and it's been the best form of therapy. It really has.
I began my Instagram blog after my miscarriage (almost a year ago) and have made so many friends with women all around the world. We discovered that the men in our lives, all the lost baby's fathers, craved the same companionship and safe place to vent, share and seek advice. We have been encouraging them to create profiles and open up dialogues between them in the hope that they'll reap the benefits of trading stories and advice that we have. Michael's slowly finding his way - he's not as social media savvy (obsessed?) as I am but I know that when he gets going he'll really benefit from chatting to other Dads and will enjoy getting to know some of the couples that I have befriended already. The ladies I have met are just wonderful - they've pulled me out of some of the darkest days and I really want Michael to have that kind of support too.
As much as Social Media has been a safe haven for us, it's also been a curse at the same time. With every scroll you're painfully reminded that life goes on, even on days where you feel like your own has come to a standstill. There have been days where I've had to log out because the pregnancy and birth announcements were too much. Is it hard to see scan photos cropping up on my Facebook timeline? Sure. Does it hurt to see people casually complain about their kids or how hard it is to be a parent? Of course. Does every happy family photo on Instagram make me feel like sobbing? Most definitely. Life both online and offline has become a bit of a minefield. Though saying that, these posts often inspire hope for us too. If it can happen for those guys, it can happen for us.
Even if I log out of social media it can still be hard to go outside and face the world in real life. Triggers are everywhere and some days they get me more than on others. There are days where I can happily write a message of congratulations under a pregnancy announcement on Facebook but there are days where I'll burst into tears at the sight of a Family Size box of Rice Krispies in Sainsburys (yep, this actually happened). I've gone into Next and bought presents for a friend's newborn baby and the very next day narrowly avoided a concussion outside of Mothercare because I was so fixated on avoiding the shop windows that I walked right into a post. The only place I'm completely comfortable is at home in our little bubble. That's not to say that I don't make the effort to go outside, to see people, to connect with life outside of the house - because I do. Most days. The thought of going back to work is lurking in my peripherals too, I have to make up my mind within the next 2 weeks if I'm ready to go back or if I need more time; an impossible decision right now because I honestly have no idea. Michael went back to work today and I know he really struggled. The very thought terrifies me.
We bought our little schnauzer puppy Maisie to help bridge the gap until we can try again. To fill our empty arms and give us something to love on and she's been the perfect little companion so far. She's hard work - puppies are a lot and some days I find myself secretly glad to have a little more time before having a baby because you can't lock a baby in a crate if it's eaten all the flowers in your garden! We're seeing Maisie as a practise run for parenting. Though people tell me puppies are harder work than babies and I'm starting to believe them! The cuddles are worth it though.
I can't believe that it's August already and Summer is almost over. Halloween will be next and with it brings the first anniversary of my miscarriage (30th October). Six days later will be Hallie's due date (5th November) and that's going to be a very hard week for us. We are also dreading Christmas this year and are thinking of spending it somewhere away from home. It's going to be a very long and very hard few months but we look forward to January, a new year, a new start. A new chance to try again. 2019 will hopefully be our year.
The purpose of this blog alongside my Instagram was to tell our story, to record our journey and to inspire other families facing similar issues. I hoped that it would open a dialogue with other parents/couples/families that have been affected by loss. To encourage them to tell their story and introduce the world to their little lost ones - every baby deserves to have their names spoken and their stories told. I wanted to acknowledge that everyone struggles with something in their lives and there's no shame in that and to let them know that no one has to suffer alone.
The feedback and messages we receive on the daily from both strangers and people we know is mind blowing, I wish I could share them here. People we haven't spoken to in years have reached out, strangers send us the most beautiful messages and introduce us to their little lost ones. People all around the world show us love every day. Hallie's name has been drawn in Canadian sands, candles have been lit in her name in New Zealand and balloons have been released for her in Dubai. There are memorial gardens with stones in England and Ireland that bear her name and Bean's name too. Our two babies are known around the world alongside countless other babies that left this earth too soon. Getting to know these couples and seeing them through their journeys has been the greatest privilege and one by one we're being gifted the families that we have been striving for.
There is always, always hope.
Our story won't end here and this blog won't either. I hope that I get to return in a few months with a happier story. 2018 has had its peaks and incredibly low troughs but as they say, the greater the storm, the brighter the rainbow.
If you've stumbled upon this blog and want to reach out, please send us an email using the contact form at the side of the blog. Thank you for following so far :)
Reunited
Well, technically it's 18 days since Hallie was born. It's funny, because it feels like an absolute lifetime ago. Every day feels like a year, seconds feel like minutes - so much has been squeezed into such a short amount of time that it's hard to fathom. Also, being off work has made the days longer. There's a lot of sitting around, watching TV, eating crisps in our pyjamas. Grief isn't a pretty sight, as numerous Derriaghy-based Postmen, delivery drivers and window cleaners can probably attest to. The first bunch of flowers was delivered by a very posh man from a very posh company and Michael opened the door to him in toothpaste-covered pyjamas and messy bed hair. The deliveries and just-passing-by-and-thought-we'd-call-in visitors always seem to come on the days you've decided that you're not getting washed or dressed. Isn't it always the way? The days I've made an effort to put on some makeup and venture out into the world are the days I don't see another soul.
When you're sitting at home, barely moving about it's easy to trick yourself into thinking that you're physically recovered. I no longer need any Heparin injections and I've been officially discharged from midwifery care but I'm still quite sore and uncomfortable. Paracetamol is still my best friend. I recently ventured into town for a bit of shopping and within minutes I felt sore and exhausted. Mentally exhausted too. Walking through town I was suddenly terrified of who I was going to bump into - would they go out of their way to avoid me or would they make a whole scene and make me cry in the middle of Bow Street? Would it be a totally awkward exchange where no one knows what to say? Will they avoid mentioning Hallie at all? Will an old acquaintance not on my social media recognise me and notice what's left of my bump and the fact that I'm still wearing my maternity jeans and congratulate me? How would I even react to that? When will my scar be healed enough to let me wear normal jeans again? Will someone from Work see me and think that if I'm able to go shopping I should be able to go to work? How many prams and pregnant people am I going to run into? Will I run into any pregnant people that I know and have to make awkward conversation? Mental torture in other words.
Michael's had some very low days too - on a few occasions I've thought I've totally lost him to it all. But that's his story to tell if he ever wants to, not mine. However, the overwhelming feeling for the both of us has been complete numbness. It's the strangest thing. We both have days where we feel completely numb, like it was all a bad dream and didn't really happen. Sometimes we struggle to feel anything at all - we don't feel sad, we don't feel happy, we don't really feel anything - and those are the scariest days. We are forever doubting ourselves; why aren't we feeling sad? All the books tell us that we should be feeling tremendous grief, that we should have completely shut down by now, so how come we haven't felt that yet? Some days it's easy to just soldier on and act like we usually would. We are still able to laugh at a comedy show on Netflix, we still sing along to songs on Absolute Radio in the car, we still joke with friends - and then we're left wondering why on earth everything feels normal when we lost Hallie just 2 weeks ago. Then comes the guilt, followed by the fear that this all hasn't hit us yet and the worst is still to come. There's no way of knowing what's ahead and that's a scary thing. Grief really does come in waves. It's an endless back and forth. You never know when it's going to strike next, you never know what's going to trigger it.
We had to make an unexpected trip back to the Ulster Hospital to leave a form off at the Mortuary to authorise Hallie's cremation. We absolutely did not want to go back there. Just driving back to the building where our baby was being kept and knowing we couldn't see her was horrible and thankfully our Midwife Roz offered to collect the letter from us personally and leave it to the Mortuary on our behalf. How on earth did we get launched into a life that involved Mortuaries and Cremations? It seems so surreal. We were told that it could take up to a month to receive Hallie's ashes back so we hadn't put too much thought into that day so I was surprised, relieved and devastated all at once to get the phone call from Roselawn that her ashes were ready for collection less than 2 weeks after her death. Straight away, I felt the grief. We had no idea this could happen so quickly. What were we doing while our baby was being cremated? It felt wrong that we didn't know where and when it was happening. I'm sure we could have found out, but it didn't occur to us to ask and that made me feel incredibly sad.
Michael and I drove to Roselawn on Monday morning (30th July - exactly 2 weeks since her birth) to collect our baby girls ashes. I'd never been to a crematorium before so it was all very unknown and I wasn't sure what to expect. Of course, we landed in at the same time as a funeral procession so we awkwardly had to manoeuvre around a coffin and mourners in our jeans and trainers - it hadn't really dawned on us to dress smartly to pick up ashes. In hindsight we probably could have tidied ourselves up a little! Once we were in the building we were terrified of what we were going to see, we weren't sure where to go so were tentatively pushing open doors fearing what was going to be on the other side. We found the Public Office eventually and all it took was one ID check and signature from me and a tiny white box containing Hallie's ashes was handed over. I cradled the little box as we walked back to the car - it felt so surreal that she was in there. How can our beautiful baby girl be reduced to a pile of dust inside a box that fits in the palm of my hand? I'm still trying to wrap my head around it all. I sat in the car with the little box on my lap, resting against what is left of my bump and the tears started when it dawned on me that the contents of the box used to live and breathe inside of me. Michael stopped at a shop to pick up lunch and I just sobbed and sobbed behind my sunglasses until he returned.
At the same time, in the strangest way it felt right to have her back with us. I instantly felt an unexpected sense of peace at having her with me again. We have set up a place on our bookshelf at home where we would keep her next to a framed photograph, a candle and a glass vase with a pink rose that we clipped from Hallie's rose bush that was gifted to us by my Aunt Heather. We have been lighting the candle every evening and blowing it out every night when we're going to bed by way of saying goodnight to Hallie. I didn't expect to feel so at ease with having her ashes at home, but I do. I thought it would be weird and I'm sure some of you reading this might still find it a bit odd, but we weren't able to think of anything else that felt right. Knowing she is home and will always be around us at Christmas, birthdays, anniversaries and just every single day is soothing our grief just a little bit. She belongs here with us so it feels right. Not that she ever would, but she can never be forgotten as she's part of our family and therefore our home and always will be.
On her first night at home Michael opened the fancy bottle of red wine that I bought him from Hallie on Father's Day. It was a little thank you for all of his love and support throughout our journey with Hallie so it was a fitting time to open it. Having her home felt like the conclusion of Hallie's journey. All her fighting is over & she's resting peacefully at home with us at last. We sat with her little white box, lit her candle and toasted her life at 11.25pm, exactly two weeks from the moment she was born. What a crazy two weeks it has been. We miss her every single moment of every single day.
We have received some amazing gifts to help us remember Hallie and carry her with us everywhere we go. I have a beautiful necklace that bears both my name and Hallie's name together. I was gifted a bracelet with Hallie's birthstone and initial on it. I had a silver ring made with her name and birth date inscribed on it which I wear next to my wedding ring. Michael's sister bought us a beautiful poster of the night sky as it was the moment Hallie was born and we have it framed in our bedroom. We love the memorial Rose Bush from my Aunt, its pink roses are just perfect to represent Hallie and my cousin had a beautiful poem printed and framed and we have it displayed in our kitchen. We also had a photo book made with all our favourite photos and memories of Hallie and keep it on our coffee table. Hallie is everywhere, little subtle memories of her existence are with us always and they mean the world to us. She's never far away. The memories aren't just in our home either - Hallie's Great Aunt Sonya has arranged a memorial plaque on the beautiful old Clevedon Pier in Somerset where we spent the evening together when visiting Michael's family in England. We can't wait to visit again to see Hallie's plaque and it gives all her English family somewhere to visit to remember her. We love that.
Friends, family and people I haven't spoken to in years reach out every day to tell us how Hallie's story has touched them. That makes us proud of her, to know that she touched so many hearts in the few hours she was alive. I know that it's not just us that think about her all the time, she is missed by people who didn't even get to meet her and that's an amazing thing.
When you're sitting at home, barely moving about it's easy to trick yourself into thinking that you're physically recovered. I no longer need any Heparin injections and I've been officially discharged from midwifery care but I'm still quite sore and uncomfortable. Paracetamol is still my best friend. I recently ventured into town for a bit of shopping and within minutes I felt sore and exhausted. Mentally exhausted too. Walking through town I was suddenly terrified of who I was going to bump into - would they go out of their way to avoid me or would they make a whole scene and make me cry in the middle of Bow Street? Would it be a totally awkward exchange where no one knows what to say? Will they avoid mentioning Hallie at all? Will an old acquaintance not on my social media recognise me and notice what's left of my bump and the fact that I'm still wearing my maternity jeans and congratulate me? How would I even react to that? When will my scar be healed enough to let me wear normal jeans again? Will someone from Work see me and think that if I'm able to go shopping I should be able to go to work? How many prams and pregnant people am I going to run into? Will I run into any pregnant people that I know and have to make awkward conversation? Mental torture in other words.
Michael's had some very low days too - on a few occasions I've thought I've totally lost him to it all. But that's his story to tell if he ever wants to, not mine. However, the overwhelming feeling for the both of us has been complete numbness. It's the strangest thing. We both have days where we feel completely numb, like it was all a bad dream and didn't really happen. Sometimes we struggle to feel anything at all - we don't feel sad, we don't feel happy, we don't really feel anything - and those are the scariest days. We are forever doubting ourselves; why aren't we feeling sad? All the books tell us that we should be feeling tremendous grief, that we should have completely shut down by now, so how come we haven't felt that yet? Some days it's easy to just soldier on and act like we usually would. We are still able to laugh at a comedy show on Netflix, we still sing along to songs on Absolute Radio in the car, we still joke with friends - and then we're left wondering why on earth everything feels normal when we lost Hallie just 2 weeks ago. Then comes the guilt, followed by the fear that this all hasn't hit us yet and the worst is still to come. There's no way of knowing what's ahead and that's a scary thing. Grief really does come in waves. It's an endless back and forth. You never know when it's going to strike next, you never know what's going to trigger it.
We had to make an unexpected trip back to the Ulster Hospital to leave a form off at the Mortuary to authorise Hallie's cremation. We absolutely did not want to go back there. Just driving back to the building where our baby was being kept and knowing we couldn't see her was horrible and thankfully our Midwife Roz offered to collect the letter from us personally and leave it to the Mortuary on our behalf. How on earth did we get launched into a life that involved Mortuaries and Cremations? It seems so surreal. We were told that it could take up to a month to receive Hallie's ashes back so we hadn't put too much thought into that day so I was surprised, relieved and devastated all at once to get the phone call from Roselawn that her ashes were ready for collection less than 2 weeks after her death. Straight away, I felt the grief. We had no idea this could happen so quickly. What were we doing while our baby was being cremated? It felt wrong that we didn't know where and when it was happening. I'm sure we could have found out, but it didn't occur to us to ask and that made me feel incredibly sad.
Michael and I drove to Roselawn on Monday morning (30th July - exactly 2 weeks since her birth) to collect our baby girls ashes. I'd never been to a crematorium before so it was all very unknown and I wasn't sure what to expect. Of course, we landed in at the same time as a funeral procession so we awkwardly had to manoeuvre around a coffin and mourners in our jeans and trainers - it hadn't really dawned on us to dress smartly to pick up ashes. In hindsight we probably could have tidied ourselves up a little! Once we were in the building we were terrified of what we were going to see, we weren't sure where to go so were tentatively pushing open doors fearing what was going to be on the other side. We found the Public Office eventually and all it took was one ID check and signature from me and a tiny white box containing Hallie's ashes was handed over. I cradled the little box as we walked back to the car - it felt so surreal that she was in there. How can our beautiful baby girl be reduced to a pile of dust inside a box that fits in the palm of my hand? I'm still trying to wrap my head around it all. I sat in the car with the little box on my lap, resting against what is left of my bump and the tears started when it dawned on me that the contents of the box used to live and breathe inside of me. Michael stopped at a shop to pick up lunch and I just sobbed and sobbed behind my sunglasses until he returned.
At the same time, in the strangest way it felt right to have her back with us. I instantly felt an unexpected sense of peace at having her with me again. We have set up a place on our bookshelf at home where we would keep her next to a framed photograph, a candle and a glass vase with a pink rose that we clipped from Hallie's rose bush that was gifted to us by my Aunt Heather. We have been lighting the candle every evening and blowing it out every night when we're going to bed by way of saying goodnight to Hallie. I didn't expect to feel so at ease with having her ashes at home, but I do. I thought it would be weird and I'm sure some of you reading this might still find it a bit odd, but we weren't able to think of anything else that felt right. Knowing she is home and will always be around us at Christmas, birthdays, anniversaries and just every single day is soothing our grief just a little bit. She belongs here with us so it feels right. Not that she ever would, but she can never be forgotten as she's part of our family and therefore our home and always will be.
On her first night at home Michael opened the fancy bottle of red wine that I bought him from Hallie on Father's Day. It was a little thank you for all of his love and support throughout our journey with Hallie so it was a fitting time to open it. Having her home felt like the conclusion of Hallie's journey. All her fighting is over & she's resting peacefully at home with us at last. We sat with her little white box, lit her candle and toasted her life at 11.25pm, exactly two weeks from the moment she was born. What a crazy two weeks it has been. We miss her every single moment of every single day.
We have received some amazing gifts to help us remember Hallie and carry her with us everywhere we go. I have a beautiful necklace that bears both my name and Hallie's name together. I was gifted a bracelet with Hallie's birthstone and initial on it. I had a silver ring made with her name and birth date inscribed on it which I wear next to my wedding ring. Michael's sister bought us a beautiful poster of the night sky as it was the moment Hallie was born and we have it framed in our bedroom. We love the memorial Rose Bush from my Aunt, its pink roses are just perfect to represent Hallie and my cousin had a beautiful poem printed and framed and we have it displayed in our kitchen. We also had a photo book made with all our favourite photos and memories of Hallie and keep it on our coffee table. Hallie is everywhere, little subtle memories of her existence are with us always and they mean the world to us. She's never far away. The memories aren't just in our home either - Hallie's Great Aunt Sonya has arranged a memorial plaque on the beautiful old Clevedon Pier in Somerset where we spent the evening together when visiting Michael's family in England. We can't wait to visit again to see Hallie's plaque and it gives all her English family somewhere to visit to remember her. We love that.
Friends, family and people I haven't spoken to in years reach out every day to tell us how Hallie's story has touched them. That makes us proud of her, to know that she touched so many hearts in the few hours she was alive. I know that it's not just us that think about her all the time, she is missed by people who didn't even get to meet her and that's an amazing thing.
Recovery
This time last week I was watching the World Cup Final with Michael while getting increasingly worried about the pesky contractions I was having. We had no idea how our night was about to escalate and certainly no idea that we were about to meet Hallie.
It's been the craziest week of our lives in many ways; most of it seems so surreal. Tonight, at 11.25pm it will be exactly one week since we became parents. And that's exactly how we see ourselves. Our baby may have passed away but we are still very much Mum & Dad to little Hallie and we are as proud of her as any new parent is of their new baby. We spent this morning at the Civic Centre in Lisburn registering Hallie's birth & her death. It was difficult, of course, but being able to register her birth and receive a certificate was a good feeling. It's nice to have a document acknowledging her little life. We paid for the full version so that we can keep it in her memory box. We see her death certificate as just an unfortunate formality.
Our recovery began the second the Doctor told us Hallie's heart had stopped. For whatever reason, for our entire stay in hospital, I took on the role of Mrs Brave Face. I don't think I cried or had a wobble at all while I was there (apart from saying goodbye of course) and I think it was because Hallie never left my side the whole time. As long as she was there, I felt like everything was manageable. She stayed in a little Moses basket next to my bed and it was honestly just like she was sleeping. I fell asleep most nights clutching her little hand and it was incredibly comforting. Michael struggled a little more than I did at the hospital. We've noticed this pattern we've fallen into - when I am upset, Michael is strong. And when Michael is upset, I am strong. We seem to take it in turns to look after one another.
Life at home has been quiet. Too quiet. From the moment we arrived home, we disappeared up into our bedroom and set up camp there. I must mention here that my Sister had washed & dried our bed sheets for us and made our bed up just like a hotel bed - ironed sheets and everything! It was the perfect thing to come home to - we climbed straight in and didn't leave for a couple of days. We surrounded ourselves with all of Hallie's things; her blankets, her little teddies...and just spent a few days coming to terms with missing her. We had a few deliveries - flowers from work and a giant care package from an amazing friend - but apart from that our little bubble wasn't burst those first few days and I think that was important. We needed our family time.
As well as mental recovery, I've had a lot to deal with physically too. I've been in a lot of pain. Recovery from a Cesarean Section is notoriously difficult - my respect and admiration goes to all the new Mums who have to deal with section recovery and a new born baby too! I'm on a diet of various painkillers and anti-blood clotting injections at the moment - Dr Michael Archer has taken on the injecting duties as I haven't been able to do it myself. I'm having a bit of a love/hate relationship with my scar right now. It's very painful and it affects my ability to freely move around or wear anything that isn't pyjamas. I'm not allowed to drive or return to work for 6 weeks and I also have to sleep on my back like Dracula, however, it's a welcomed physical reminder of my baby. Well, it's usually a welcomed reminder but occasionally it can upset me. Sometimes, in my darkest moments, it makes me feel like Hallie was just ripped from me. It all happened so fast with so little time to consider what was happening and now I'm left with this permanent, painful reminder that she is no longer part of me. Dealing with this pain and having nothing to show for it is hard.
The hardest part of recovery is getting used to the fact that I am not pregnant anymore. My bump is disappearing day by day and that's been hard to deal with - I loved my bump and everything about carrying Hallie. I miss talking to her and I miss that feeling of never being alone. The very first moment that it hit me was when I took my first shower at home. Shower time was when I had my daily bonding time with Hallie; it was when I really got to know my bump. I had a shower just before we made the decision to go to the hospital last Monday in a last ditch attempt to calm my contractions. I stood with my back under the running hot water and begged Hallie not to leave me. I don't know why I ever thought I could tell her what to do - her fierce, independent little spirit was ever going to listen! That first shower when we got home was incredibly sad & the first time that I felt horribly alone and without my girl. I miss feeling her little kicks. Hallie used to wake me up every morning dancing on my bladder and making me rush to the bathroom at 5am without fail. The first morning I slept through without having woken at 5am was emotional.
Having empty arms is the hardest part of all. We miss Hallie so, so much and it's just so unfair that we didn't get to take her home and do all the new parent stuff that everyone else gets to do. We are surrounded by friends who have new babies or are pregnant and it's hard to save face around them but we know that we'll get there eventually; this just wasn't our time. When the Doctor told us that we have to wait 6 months before trying again it was like a punch in the stomach, but maybe it's the time we need to grieve Hallie properly before attempting to move on. There's a lot of complicated emotions involved when dealing with the loss of a baby; we have been robbed of all of the plans we made as a family. We were so close to getting everything that we ever wanted and it was ripped out from underneath us and it's been a bitter pill to swallow.
As well as dealing with our own emotions, we have to deal with the emotions of others too. Our own parents and siblings are devastated. Completely devastated. And that's been hard to cope with - we feel tremendous guilt every day. As well as guilt, there's a certain amount of embarrassment too. When I think back to us happily announcing our pregnancy without a care in the world and then having to retract those announcements when we found out about her illness then having to announce her birth and death...it's hard not to feel, well... stupid. Knowing people are pitying you isn't a nice feeling. Knowing that people don't know what to say to you isn't fun either. It makes the whole thing much easier to manage if people are just normal with us, or throw us a text to see how we are instead of keeping their distance because they think it's too awkward to talk to us. I know it isn't easy and these are just normal feelings in situations like these so I try not to dwell on them too much.
I am now on Maternity Leave from work - thanks to Hallie for holding on and being born alive so I qualify. Michael's work just happens to be on Factory Shutdown for 3 weeks, plus his Paternity Leave so he'll be off for a few weeks too, perfect timing really. Sometimes I think that Hallie knew exactly what she was doing - the little rascal. We plan to make use of the time off; make some plans to work on the house, get a holiday or a few weekends away fitted in or even get a puppy towards the end. We have been discussing getting a puppy to fill the gap so now is as good a time as any to introduce a new pet while we have so much time on our hands. We crave a bit of chaos in our house as it's too quiet right now. We'd love a little buddy to look after who will give us a bit of love in return and give us a reason to smile and laugh again. Puppies are healing, or so I'm told.
There will be good days and bad days. Every day this week has been different. Some days we just want to hide away and cry. Other days we have ventured out or had visitors round. It's been a rollercoaster but I do think we are handling it quite well. Everyone keeps describing us as "brave" - we are battling with this brave word in all honestly. What does it mean to be brave when you've lost your baby? Does it mean that people think we are acting differently to how they expect us to? That because we aren't breaking down in tears in front of everyone that we aren't dealing with it as we should? I think for Michael and I it's been a case of waiting until we're in our own safe space at home to really open ourselves up to our grief.
But on the other hand, we are still beyond grateful for those 2+ hours we had with Hallie. We have an overwhelming sense of peace around her birth and her death in that we got time with her that we never thought we would have. That in itself keeps us going. We have hundreds of beautiful photographs and videos of our time spent with Hallie - we are obsessed with her - she was absolutely beautiful and our overriding emotion towards her is pride. We are so, so proud of our girl and we were blessed to have met her and can't believe our luck in all honesty. That seems like a strange thing to say, but we lost a baby before that we never got to know anything about. We never learnt whether they were a boy or a girl. We never got to name them. So if we had to lose Hallie too, it meant everything that we got to name her and meet her alive. To have a legal document that says Hallie Was Here. She lived. In this situation, we couldn't have asked for anything more.
There is no wrong or right way to recover from a loss like this. We are just taking it one day at a time and seeing what each day brings. We welcome both sadness and happiness at this stage, just riding the emotions until we get to a point where it doesn't hurt so much. If such a point exists. I hope it does. But for now, we're going to have a quiet night in, hold each other close and light a candle at 11.25pm tonight to mark a week since our baby girl was put into our arms. A week since our lives changed irrevocably. One week survived without her and the rest of our lives to follow.
It's been the craziest week of our lives in many ways; most of it seems so surreal. Tonight, at 11.25pm it will be exactly one week since we became parents. And that's exactly how we see ourselves. Our baby may have passed away but we are still very much Mum & Dad to little Hallie and we are as proud of her as any new parent is of their new baby. We spent this morning at the Civic Centre in Lisburn registering Hallie's birth & her death. It was difficult, of course, but being able to register her birth and receive a certificate was a good feeling. It's nice to have a document acknowledging her little life. We paid for the full version so that we can keep it in her memory box. We see her death certificate as just an unfortunate formality.
Our recovery began the second the Doctor told us Hallie's heart had stopped. For whatever reason, for our entire stay in hospital, I took on the role of Mrs Brave Face. I don't think I cried or had a wobble at all while I was there (apart from saying goodbye of course) and I think it was because Hallie never left my side the whole time. As long as she was there, I felt like everything was manageable. She stayed in a little Moses basket next to my bed and it was honestly just like she was sleeping. I fell asleep most nights clutching her little hand and it was incredibly comforting. Michael struggled a little more than I did at the hospital. We've noticed this pattern we've fallen into - when I am upset, Michael is strong. And when Michael is upset, I am strong. We seem to take it in turns to look after one another.
Life at home has been quiet. Too quiet. From the moment we arrived home, we disappeared up into our bedroom and set up camp there. I must mention here that my Sister had washed & dried our bed sheets for us and made our bed up just like a hotel bed - ironed sheets and everything! It was the perfect thing to come home to - we climbed straight in and didn't leave for a couple of days. We surrounded ourselves with all of Hallie's things; her blankets, her little teddies...and just spent a few days coming to terms with missing her. We had a few deliveries - flowers from work and a giant care package from an amazing friend - but apart from that our little bubble wasn't burst those first few days and I think that was important. We needed our family time.
As well as mental recovery, I've had a lot to deal with physically too. I've been in a lot of pain. Recovery from a Cesarean Section is notoriously difficult - my respect and admiration goes to all the new Mums who have to deal with section recovery and a new born baby too! I'm on a diet of various painkillers and anti-blood clotting injections at the moment - Dr Michael Archer has taken on the injecting duties as I haven't been able to do it myself. I'm having a bit of a love/hate relationship with my scar right now. It's very painful and it affects my ability to freely move around or wear anything that isn't pyjamas. I'm not allowed to drive or return to work for 6 weeks and I also have to sleep on my back like Dracula, however, it's a welcomed physical reminder of my baby. Well, it's usually a welcomed reminder but occasionally it can upset me. Sometimes, in my darkest moments, it makes me feel like Hallie was just ripped from me. It all happened so fast with so little time to consider what was happening and now I'm left with this permanent, painful reminder that she is no longer part of me. Dealing with this pain and having nothing to show for it is hard.
The hardest part of recovery is getting used to the fact that I am not pregnant anymore. My bump is disappearing day by day and that's been hard to deal with - I loved my bump and everything about carrying Hallie. I miss talking to her and I miss that feeling of never being alone. The very first moment that it hit me was when I took my first shower at home. Shower time was when I had my daily bonding time with Hallie; it was when I really got to know my bump. I had a shower just before we made the decision to go to the hospital last Monday in a last ditch attempt to calm my contractions. I stood with my back under the running hot water and begged Hallie not to leave me. I don't know why I ever thought I could tell her what to do - her fierce, independent little spirit was ever going to listen! That first shower when we got home was incredibly sad & the first time that I felt horribly alone and without my girl. I miss feeling her little kicks. Hallie used to wake me up every morning dancing on my bladder and making me rush to the bathroom at 5am without fail. The first morning I slept through without having woken at 5am was emotional.
Having empty arms is the hardest part of all. We miss Hallie so, so much and it's just so unfair that we didn't get to take her home and do all the new parent stuff that everyone else gets to do. We are surrounded by friends who have new babies or are pregnant and it's hard to save face around them but we know that we'll get there eventually; this just wasn't our time. When the Doctor told us that we have to wait 6 months before trying again it was like a punch in the stomach, but maybe it's the time we need to grieve Hallie properly before attempting to move on. There's a lot of complicated emotions involved when dealing with the loss of a baby; we have been robbed of all of the plans we made as a family. We were so close to getting everything that we ever wanted and it was ripped out from underneath us and it's been a bitter pill to swallow.
As well as dealing with our own emotions, we have to deal with the emotions of others too. Our own parents and siblings are devastated. Completely devastated. And that's been hard to cope with - we feel tremendous guilt every day. As well as guilt, there's a certain amount of embarrassment too. When I think back to us happily announcing our pregnancy without a care in the world and then having to retract those announcements when we found out about her illness then having to announce her birth and death...it's hard not to feel, well... stupid. Knowing people are pitying you isn't a nice feeling. Knowing that people don't know what to say to you isn't fun either. It makes the whole thing much easier to manage if people are just normal with us, or throw us a text to see how we are instead of keeping their distance because they think it's too awkward to talk to us. I know it isn't easy and these are just normal feelings in situations like these so I try not to dwell on them too much.
I am now on Maternity Leave from work - thanks to Hallie for holding on and being born alive so I qualify. Michael's work just happens to be on Factory Shutdown for 3 weeks, plus his Paternity Leave so he'll be off for a few weeks too, perfect timing really. Sometimes I think that Hallie knew exactly what she was doing - the little rascal. We plan to make use of the time off; make some plans to work on the house, get a holiday or a few weekends away fitted in or even get a puppy towards the end. We have been discussing getting a puppy to fill the gap so now is as good a time as any to introduce a new pet while we have so much time on our hands. We crave a bit of chaos in our house as it's too quiet right now. We'd love a little buddy to look after who will give us a bit of love in return and give us a reason to smile and laugh again. Puppies are healing, or so I'm told.
There will be good days and bad days. Every day this week has been different. Some days we just want to hide away and cry. Other days we have ventured out or had visitors round. It's been a rollercoaster but I do think we are handling it quite well. Everyone keeps describing us as "brave" - we are battling with this brave word in all honestly. What does it mean to be brave when you've lost your baby? Does it mean that people think we are acting differently to how they expect us to? That because we aren't breaking down in tears in front of everyone that we aren't dealing with it as we should? I think for Michael and I it's been a case of waiting until we're in our own safe space at home to really open ourselves up to our grief.
But on the other hand, we are still beyond grateful for those 2+ hours we had with Hallie. We have an overwhelming sense of peace around her birth and her death in that we got time with her that we never thought we would have. That in itself keeps us going. We have hundreds of beautiful photographs and videos of our time spent with Hallie - we are obsessed with her - she was absolutely beautiful and our overriding emotion towards her is pride. We are so, so proud of our girl and we were blessed to have met her and can't believe our luck in all honesty. That seems like a strange thing to say, but we lost a baby before that we never got to know anything about. We never learnt whether they were a boy or a girl. We never got to name them. So if we had to lose Hallie too, it meant everything that we got to name her and meet her alive. To have a legal document that says Hallie Was Here. She lived. In this situation, we couldn't have asked for anything more.
There is no wrong or right way to recover from a loss like this. We are just taking it one day at a time and seeing what each day brings. We welcome both sadness and happiness at this stage, just riding the emotions until we get to a point where it doesn't hurt so much. If such a point exists. I hope it does. But for now, we're going to have a quiet night in, hold each other close and light a candle at 11.25pm tonight to mark a week since our baby girl was put into our arms. A week since our lives changed irrevocably. One week survived without her and the rest of our lives to follow.
God Bless the NHS
Before our pregnancy journey, I was a complete NHS newbie. The only contact I've had with a Doctor in the years leading up to pregnancy is one ear syringing and the dreaded (but very important!!) smear tests. I'd never been to A&E before and I've never had any issues that couldn't be medically solved with a packet of Tesco Cold and Flu tablets and a small tub of Vicks.
My first contact with A&E was at the Royal Victoria Hospital, the day that I had my miscarriage. It was awful, they didn't have the equipment there to scan me so basically sent me away without any help or diagnosis for the bleeding I was having. Thankfully, that was my only bad experience. I went to the Lagan Valley Hospital shortly afterwards where the midwives there took me in, carefully scanned my tummy and broke the sad news to Michael and I that our baby didn't have a heartbeat. They supported me through the loss and those very same ladies where my first port of call when I found out that I was pregnant again. They took me under their wing again immediately.
I was a ball of nerves my entire pregnancy but the ladies in the Early Pregnancy Unit at Lagan Valley supported me the entire way through. They were on the end of the phone 24 hours a day to calm me down when I was in a panic and they let me go for reassurance scans as often as I wanted or needed. They never rolled their eyes at me or made me feel like I was being a nuisance (I definitely was) and they went out of their way to make me feel better, never shy about dishing out the hugs either.
When Hallie was diagnosed, our care was transferred to the Ulster Hospital. Our Consultant was very honest and forthcoming with the facts and his opinions which we really appreciated. Roz, our Midwife gave me her mobile number on the day she delivered the results of my Amniocentesis and told me to text or call her anytime with any questions and really was a caring source of information for both of us after Hallie's diagnosis. We were in and out of the hospital at least once a week between 18 and 24 weeks, all our tests and scans were no hassle and free of charge. When I think about all the medical care, tests, medication, operations, interactions with staff etc that I've had through the NHS over the past few weeks and just casually walked away without a bill, it blows my mind. In a world where nothing is free it feels completely surreal to use a service such as the NHS and just walk away without being asked for payment. I actually felt quite awkward about it!
From the second I walked into the Emergency Obstetrics Unit in the Ulster on Monday night I was treated with care. Ushered in, given a comfortable bed to rest in and a fistful of painkillers to get me through the contractions while I waited to see the Doctor. As soon as they discovered I was in labour it was all hands on deck - I must have met around 20-30 different medical professionals through the course of Monday night between Midwives, Doctors, Consultants, Anaesthetists..the list goes on. I was pretty mortified when our Paediatrician rocked up in his jeans and t-shirt, Hallie had disturbed his quiet Monday night with his own family and he had rushed to the Hospital to help deliver her (at 10pm...poor guy was probably in his bed). The entire team that helped deliver Hallie was assembled in an impressively short space of time and each and every one of them rallied around Michael and I and made us feel at ease considering everything had happened so quickly and I was facing very last minute major surgery and we were about to meet our baby 16 weeks too early.
Everyone who spoke to us was calm, informative and super caring. They took their time to listen to us, understand our needs and wants and really let us have the final say on what happened with Hallie when she was born, regardless of the urgency of the situation. The midwives never let go of my hand, they held eye contact with me when I was getting the spinal block, they reassured us both that everything was going to be okay. The Doctors kept us updated with how everything was going, the Anaesthetist kept telling me that I was doing great and kept peaking over the screen to give me little updates on Hallie's progress and I never felt for one second that I wasn't safe or under the highest level of care. The Doctor taking time to snap photos of us meeting Hallie on Michael's phone will always be a favourite moment. We love those photographs. Once in a lifetime opportunity and he kindly made it possible for us and we didn't even think to ask!
Before the surgery they told us that there was a chance, as Hallie was only 24 weeks, that they would have to make the incision higher than they usually would and there was a chance that this meant I could never deliver any future pregnancies naturally. We were heartbroken when we heard this. However, they told us straight afterwards that they were able to make the incision very low down and it was such a success that we should have no problems having a normal delivery next time if we wanted. Amazing work. Every NHS Staff member we met that day made everything easy for us. Every person involved in bringing Hallie into the world stopped by our room to see how she was getting on and made a bit of a fuss of her, and us too. That meant the world to us.
I was under round the clock care with Midwives taking my obs every couple of hours through the day and night. They always stopped by Hallie and commented on how beautiful she was, even after she had passed away. They made us feel comfortable, welcomed and above all proud to be parents even considering the circumstances. They kept us well topped up with cups of tea and endless rounds of toast (is there anything better than hospital toast?) and went out of their way to help us with anything we needed. Even my humiliating post-birth sponge bath was actually completely fine and not as awkward as I thought it would be. You have to be a very special kind of person to be an NHS Nurse/Midwife - I certainly wouldn't be cut out for sponge bathing anyone, let alone doing it with a smile on my face.
We were in our own private suite which we soon learned was actually a specially created Bereavement Suite for parents who have lost babies. You wouldn't immediately know this without being told - it's beautifully decorated and really modern and consists of a main room with a sofa and sofa bed for husband/partner/guests to stay, an en suite bath/shower room and a separate sitting area with a kitchen attached. All for our own private use to share with as many guests as we wanted. Thankfully, the suite is situated away from the rest of the Labour ward so we didn't have to encounter any screaming newborn babies or new parents while we were there. Hospital visiting rules didn't apply to us, we could have visitors at whatever time we wanted but we did choose to spend the majority of our time with Hallie on our own.
When Hallie was born the hospital gave us a beautiful Memory Box (donated by charity 4Louis) filled with all sorts of little goodies for making memories with her before and after she passed. There was a little ink and clay set for making prints of her little hands and feet and the Midwives carefully sorted those out for us and we have the most perfect little set of Hallie's prints in a frame that we'll cherish forever. The Midwives always asked did we want photos taken with her too - they seemed really committed to helping us make memories and I know this wasn't part of their job description. It seemed like someone was always sticking their head in to check on us, to say hello or to give us hugs (or bring us toast...) and it was really appreciated. The Bereavement Midwife, Niamh, visited a couple times and managed to have my Mum in tears with her kind words. It wasn't just about Hallie's parents suffering from her loss, she spent some time chatting with her Nanny Wendy too. And I know she appreciated that.
24 hours after my surgery I had my catheter removed (don't even start me on the catheter...) and I made the mistake of being too excited to be able to finally get out of bed to test that my legs were still working (no joke) and ended up blacking out in the bathroom. I literally hit the deck and they found me collapsed in a heap next to the toilet and I had to be carried back to bed - I was mortified and kept apologising but they really made me feel at ease with the incident and kept making me laugh about it throughout the rest of my stay. I'm still cringing about it though! They took care of Michael too, bringing him coffee and toast, making up his bed for him, making sure he was okay too.
Any paperwork was dealt with in the kindest and easiest way - the staff did everything for us. On our final night with Hallie they left us in peace, understanding that we wanted a night alone as a family. The three of us settled into bed for the night and watched TV together, we changed Hallie's outfit (after Michael spilt Ribena all over her!) and Michael read her a bedtime story. All completely undisturbed. We really needed that night together and the Midwives knew that without us even having to ask. When it was time to say our goodbyes to Hallie, the hardest thing we've ever done, they gave us space to say goodbye. Two Midwives helped us when we were leaving, one told us she would stay with Hallie when we left and the other showed us to the front door. They both gave us hugs goodbye and I know that they really cared about us and hoped to see us there again in happier circumstances. We felt assured that Hallie was in good hands, which made leaving her a tiny bit easier but still the worst thing we've ever had to do.
We've been home for two days now and already a Community Midwife has visited us. She insisted that I stayed in my pyjamas and didn't get out of bed, she took my blood pressure and took off my bandage for me. Held a little mirror up so I could see my scar for the first time, an emotional experience, and told me it was more than okay to cry around her if I needed to. She spotted some scan photos we have framed in our bedroom and made a fuss of them, making cute comments about our tiny little Hallie Bean. Throughout her visit she showed kindness, thoughtfulness and compassion to both of us, so fresh and raw in the loss of our baby.
In all, our experience under NHS healthcare was incredible. Losing Hallie is and always will be the worst days of our lives but we were so well looked after that we made it through it as peacefully as possible. Hallie was delivered safely and professionally and thanks to the quick work of the Doctors there we were given over 2 precious hours with our girl that we never thought we would have. Hallie died peacefully in our arms, with the dignity she deserved and her time with us afterwards was made to be easier to handle than we ever thought possible. All this was thanks to the staff in the Ulster Hospital Maternity Ward - we are forever in their debt. Walking away from the building was hard; it had become our safe place for the 3 days we were there. On the car journey home we talked about how great everyone was and how appreciative we are of all the work they did, all the time they spent and care and love they showed the three of us - total strangers to them and only three people on their long, long list of patients they were taking care of in that time. How do you ever repay that level of kindness? I'm not sure, but I hope in time we find a way.
My first contact with A&E was at the Royal Victoria Hospital, the day that I had my miscarriage. It was awful, they didn't have the equipment there to scan me so basically sent me away without any help or diagnosis for the bleeding I was having. Thankfully, that was my only bad experience. I went to the Lagan Valley Hospital shortly afterwards where the midwives there took me in, carefully scanned my tummy and broke the sad news to Michael and I that our baby didn't have a heartbeat. They supported me through the loss and those very same ladies where my first port of call when I found out that I was pregnant again. They took me under their wing again immediately.
I was a ball of nerves my entire pregnancy but the ladies in the Early Pregnancy Unit at Lagan Valley supported me the entire way through. They were on the end of the phone 24 hours a day to calm me down when I was in a panic and they let me go for reassurance scans as often as I wanted or needed. They never rolled their eyes at me or made me feel like I was being a nuisance (I definitely was) and they went out of their way to make me feel better, never shy about dishing out the hugs either.
When Hallie was diagnosed, our care was transferred to the Ulster Hospital. Our Consultant was very honest and forthcoming with the facts and his opinions which we really appreciated. Roz, our Midwife gave me her mobile number on the day she delivered the results of my Amniocentesis and told me to text or call her anytime with any questions and really was a caring source of information for both of us after Hallie's diagnosis. We were in and out of the hospital at least once a week between 18 and 24 weeks, all our tests and scans were no hassle and free of charge. When I think about all the medical care, tests, medication, operations, interactions with staff etc that I've had through the NHS over the past few weeks and just casually walked away without a bill, it blows my mind. In a world where nothing is free it feels completely surreal to use a service such as the NHS and just walk away without being asked for payment. I actually felt quite awkward about it!
From the second I walked into the Emergency Obstetrics Unit in the Ulster on Monday night I was treated with care. Ushered in, given a comfortable bed to rest in and a fistful of painkillers to get me through the contractions while I waited to see the Doctor. As soon as they discovered I was in labour it was all hands on deck - I must have met around 20-30 different medical professionals through the course of Monday night between Midwives, Doctors, Consultants, Anaesthetists..the list goes on. I was pretty mortified when our Paediatrician rocked up in his jeans and t-shirt, Hallie had disturbed his quiet Monday night with his own family and he had rushed to the Hospital to help deliver her (at 10pm...poor guy was probably in his bed). The entire team that helped deliver Hallie was assembled in an impressively short space of time and each and every one of them rallied around Michael and I and made us feel at ease considering everything had happened so quickly and I was facing very last minute major surgery and we were about to meet our baby 16 weeks too early.
Everyone who spoke to us was calm, informative and super caring. They took their time to listen to us, understand our needs and wants and really let us have the final say on what happened with Hallie when she was born, regardless of the urgency of the situation. The midwives never let go of my hand, they held eye contact with me when I was getting the spinal block, they reassured us both that everything was going to be okay. The Doctors kept us updated with how everything was going, the Anaesthetist kept telling me that I was doing great and kept peaking over the screen to give me little updates on Hallie's progress and I never felt for one second that I wasn't safe or under the highest level of care. The Doctor taking time to snap photos of us meeting Hallie on Michael's phone will always be a favourite moment. We love those photographs. Once in a lifetime opportunity and he kindly made it possible for us and we didn't even think to ask!
Before the surgery they told us that there was a chance, as Hallie was only 24 weeks, that they would have to make the incision higher than they usually would and there was a chance that this meant I could never deliver any future pregnancies naturally. We were heartbroken when we heard this. However, they told us straight afterwards that they were able to make the incision very low down and it was such a success that we should have no problems having a normal delivery next time if we wanted. Amazing work. Every NHS Staff member we met that day made everything easy for us. Every person involved in bringing Hallie into the world stopped by our room to see how she was getting on and made a bit of a fuss of her, and us too. That meant the world to us.
I was under round the clock care with Midwives taking my obs every couple of hours through the day and night. They always stopped by Hallie and commented on how beautiful she was, even after she had passed away. They made us feel comfortable, welcomed and above all proud to be parents even considering the circumstances. They kept us well topped up with cups of tea and endless rounds of toast (is there anything better than hospital toast?) and went out of their way to help us with anything we needed. Even my humiliating post-birth sponge bath was actually completely fine and not as awkward as I thought it would be. You have to be a very special kind of person to be an NHS Nurse/Midwife - I certainly wouldn't be cut out for sponge bathing anyone, let alone doing it with a smile on my face.
We were in our own private suite which we soon learned was actually a specially created Bereavement Suite for parents who have lost babies. You wouldn't immediately know this without being told - it's beautifully decorated and really modern and consists of a main room with a sofa and sofa bed for husband/partner/guests to stay, an en suite bath/shower room and a separate sitting area with a kitchen attached. All for our own private use to share with as many guests as we wanted. Thankfully, the suite is situated away from the rest of the Labour ward so we didn't have to encounter any screaming newborn babies or new parents while we were there. Hospital visiting rules didn't apply to us, we could have visitors at whatever time we wanted but we did choose to spend the majority of our time with Hallie on our own.
When Hallie was born the hospital gave us a beautiful Memory Box (donated by charity 4Louis) filled with all sorts of little goodies for making memories with her before and after she passed. There was a little ink and clay set for making prints of her little hands and feet and the Midwives carefully sorted those out for us and we have the most perfect little set of Hallie's prints in a frame that we'll cherish forever. The Midwives always asked did we want photos taken with her too - they seemed really committed to helping us make memories and I know this wasn't part of their job description. It seemed like someone was always sticking their head in to check on us, to say hello or to give us hugs (or bring us toast...) and it was really appreciated. The Bereavement Midwife, Niamh, visited a couple times and managed to have my Mum in tears with her kind words. It wasn't just about Hallie's parents suffering from her loss, she spent some time chatting with her Nanny Wendy too. And I know she appreciated that.
24 hours after my surgery I had my catheter removed (don't even start me on the catheter...) and I made the mistake of being too excited to be able to finally get out of bed to test that my legs were still working (no joke) and ended up blacking out in the bathroom. I literally hit the deck and they found me collapsed in a heap next to the toilet and I had to be carried back to bed - I was mortified and kept apologising but they really made me feel at ease with the incident and kept making me laugh about it throughout the rest of my stay. I'm still cringing about it though! They took care of Michael too, bringing him coffee and toast, making up his bed for him, making sure he was okay too.
Any paperwork was dealt with in the kindest and easiest way - the staff did everything for us. On our final night with Hallie they left us in peace, understanding that we wanted a night alone as a family. The three of us settled into bed for the night and watched TV together, we changed Hallie's outfit (after Michael spilt Ribena all over her!) and Michael read her a bedtime story. All completely undisturbed. We really needed that night together and the Midwives knew that without us even having to ask. When it was time to say our goodbyes to Hallie, the hardest thing we've ever done, they gave us space to say goodbye. Two Midwives helped us when we were leaving, one told us she would stay with Hallie when we left and the other showed us to the front door. They both gave us hugs goodbye and I know that they really cared about us and hoped to see us there again in happier circumstances. We felt assured that Hallie was in good hands, which made leaving her a tiny bit easier but still the worst thing we've ever had to do.
We've been home for two days now and already a Community Midwife has visited us. She insisted that I stayed in my pyjamas and didn't get out of bed, she took my blood pressure and took off my bandage for me. Held a little mirror up so I could see my scar for the first time, an emotional experience, and told me it was more than okay to cry around her if I needed to. She spotted some scan photos we have framed in our bedroom and made a fuss of them, making cute comments about our tiny little Hallie Bean. Throughout her visit she showed kindness, thoughtfulness and compassion to both of us, so fresh and raw in the loss of our baby.
In all, our experience under NHS healthcare was incredible. Losing Hallie is and always will be the worst days of our lives but we were so well looked after that we made it through it as peacefully as possible. Hallie was delivered safely and professionally and thanks to the quick work of the Doctors there we were given over 2 precious hours with our girl that we never thought we would have. Hallie died peacefully in our arms, with the dignity she deserved and her time with us afterwards was made to be easier to handle than we ever thought possible. All this was thanks to the staff in the Ulster Hospital Maternity Ward - we are forever in their debt. Walking away from the building was hard; it had become our safe place for the 3 days we were there. On the car journey home we talked about how great everyone was and how appreciative we are of all the work they did, all the time they spent and care and love they showed the three of us - total strangers to them and only three people on their long, long list of patients they were taking care of in that time. How do you ever repay that level of kindness? I'm not sure, but I hope in time we find a way.
Our Perfect Little Hallie
Hallie Archer
Just minutes after being born on 16th July 2018.
We will forever be obsessed with you.
Meeting Hallie 16th July 2018
It's been 3 days since Hallie surprised us with an early visit and it's been a complete rollercoaster of a journey. We just got home from the hospital. Saying goodbye to our girl and leaving her behind was the hardest thing we've ever had to do. There's been so many emotions over the past few days and we've been through so much that I'm keen to get it all down into words while it's still fresh. I don't want to forget a moment of it.
On Sunday 15th July I started to have some cramps that were coming in waves. I'd done my research and at 23 weeks these cramps are usually harmless contractions called Braxton Hicks. These are like rehearsal contractions for labour later on and are incredibly normal. With this in mind, I started to feel a little antsy that I was really unprepared just in case Hallie was on her way. Mum and I went shopping to get some bits for my hospital bag and some preemie outfits and blankets for Hallie. I felt better knowing I had a packed bag on standby with everything she and I would need. Michael took me down to the Ulster Emergency Obstetrics Unit at around 7pm that night just to make sure it was Braxton Hicks. They did some tests and confirmed that it was nothing and they sent me home again at around Midnight.
The contractions continued through the night and by the next morning they were notably stronger. I rang the EOU again and spoke to a midwife who told me to take some paracetamol and have a bath. By that evening I was absolutely crippled - the contractions were coming every 5 minutes and were so painful that I struggled to stand up straight. I knew something wasn't right so Michael and I packed the car, hospital bag and all, and we drove back down to the Ulster. It was much the same experience as the night before - lots of waiting around but this time I was making some pretty intense animalistic noises with every contraction! They started to take me seriously and the Doctor examined me between contractions and announced "you're about 3cm dilated." He did a quick scan to check baby's position and announced that she was breech and he had to go and speak with my consultant.
After a few phone calls the decision was made to bring me up to the Labour Ward immediately and prep me for an Emergency Cesarean Section. It all happened so quickly - one minute I was having contractions in the hallway, the next I had a midwife putting a line in my hand and within minutes I was in the bathroom of a labour suite putting on a gown and stockings. I had no time to get scared or anxious; Michael looked more worried than I felt! I fired off a few quick text messages to my Mum, Sister, Dad and Claire from work to let them know what was happening and before I knew it I was walking down to theatre with my bum hanging out the back of my hospital gown. It was the most surreal experience but I was completely calm. I was cracking jokes with all the midwives, having banter with the Anaesthetist and even told one Doctor that he looked like Vince Vaughan. I think there was less than an hour between me being told I was in Pre-term Labour to me lying in theatre completely numb below the neck - it was all incredibly intense and I wasn't really given the time to wrap my head around it.
I just soldiered on and got it done. There was no time to be anxious and the Midwives Emma and Sandra had me feeling completely at ease. Once I was given the spinal block and felt completely numb, Michael arrived in (gown on, hat on, the works) and he sat behind the screen with me and held my hand and kissed my forehead while the surgery started. Before they made the incision, everyone in the room introduced themselves to us one by one, telling us their name and their job title. All 12 of them. If I had time to be embarrassed about being in the centre of it all I would have been mortified! The mood in the room was light despite the fact that everyone knew of Hallie's condition. Everyone made us feel at ease and treated it just like any other birth, I would imagine.
The whole C-Section experience is strange from start to finish - completely painless but you do feel your whole body being pulled and pushed about from the inside. The description of it being like someone rummaging through your tummy like they would a handbag is completely correct. It was all very weird. I kept thinking about the times I had seen this happen on TV and they're always waiting on tenterhooks for the birth to be announced by the baby crying. We knew this wasn't going to be the case.
We had already discussed with the Paediatrician what we wanted to do when Hallie was born. He made it clear that the chances of her being alive were very slim and if she was born alive it wouldn't be for very long. They made the suggestion that they would put her onto my chest straight away so we would have those few precious seconds with her but we were very concerned about how she would look. We had seen photographs of babies with Hydrops and Cystic Hygromas and knew it could be quite shocking so we asked that she be wrapped up immediately and requested that someone would advise on how she looked before handing her to us.
When Hallie was born ("butt first" as the Anaesthetist told me when I asked him to peak over the screen and tell me what was happening) she was rushed over to a resuscitation unit in the corner of the room and they gave her a couple blasts of oxygen and wrapped her up in the blanket Mum had bought her when we went shopping and a little woollen hat. The time on the clock was 11.25pm.
Michael and I were terrified to see her - we didn't know where to look - but the Paediatrician popped over and told us that while the Hygroma on her neck was very visible she was absolutely gorgeous and perfectly formed everywhere else and we immediately agreed to see her. When they brought her over to us it was honestly love at first sight. She had us hook, line and sinker right then and there. We were obsessed. They placed her in Michael's arms and the two of us were sobbing loudly with happy tears. Everyone in the room was fussing over the three of us and congratulating us, it was the perfect moment. One of the Doctors asked Michael for his phone so he could snap some pictures of us meeting our daughter - he must have taken about 30 pictures of us! We appreciate that little act of kindness so, so much. Hallie was alive and breathing and taking little gasps of air in and she looked absolutely adorable. They laid her on my chest while they delivered the placenta, stitched me up and wheeled me back out to our private room. I never took my eyes off her once.
Hallie lived for 3 hours. This is unbelievable. A complete miracle. We had been preparing ourselves for a stillbirth - everything we had been told was based on Hallie passing away while in the womb. There never was a scenario where she would be born alive, let alone stay alive for more than a few minutes. I don't know how she managed it but it was the greatest gift. We held onto her, took turns cuddling her, took a million photographs of the three of us together and even snapped a video to our Mum's and my Sister who were outside in the car park waiting for news! I wasn't aware of this until afterwards but all of our parents rushed to the hospital when we told them I had been admitted. We appreciate that so much and apologise that they didn't get to come up to meet Hallie that night but we wanted/needed those precious hours with our baby girl as a family of three. Our time with her was completely ours and it was perfect.
The nurse checked her pulse a few times and confirmed each time that she still had a heartbeat. At around 2.30am she finally confirmed that Hallie's heart had stopped beating and strangely and unbelievably enough, we weren't at all phased. There was no tears or sadness - we had just had 3 hours of Hallie alive that we never, ever thought we would get and that pushed us through. The rest of the night was spent cuddling her in our little bubble of love. Michael eventually went over to the sofa bed beside me to get some sleep and I lay in bed drifting in and out of consciousness with our little girl curled up on my chest. I just lay there and stared at her perfect little nose and pouty lips all night, completely in love.
We are absolutely delighted that our birth experience with Hallie was a positive one. We really feel like we had the same experience as anyone else would have with their first born and we cannot stress how lucky we feel to have had this experience with her. Even though Hallie never cried, the whole scenario still felt like a happy and positive one from start to finish. Michael and I just fell in love with her and couldn't believe our luck that we got to be her parents.
She's the bravest, most impressive little girl with the strongest heart and we are thankful for every second we had in her company. The 3 days we had with her were unforgettable. We lived in our little private suite as a 3-person family. We watched TV together, ate meals together and cuddled her at every opportunity. I changed her outfit every day and Michael read bedtime stories to her every night. For the time that Hallie was alive and for the time after that, all she knew was the purest form of love. (Even when Michael spilled Ribena all over her...!!) We gave her everything we had to give and she was 100% worth every scary second of our journey to meet each other.
On Sunday 15th July I started to have some cramps that were coming in waves. I'd done my research and at 23 weeks these cramps are usually harmless contractions called Braxton Hicks. These are like rehearsal contractions for labour later on and are incredibly normal. With this in mind, I started to feel a little antsy that I was really unprepared just in case Hallie was on her way. Mum and I went shopping to get some bits for my hospital bag and some preemie outfits and blankets for Hallie. I felt better knowing I had a packed bag on standby with everything she and I would need. Michael took me down to the Ulster Emergency Obstetrics Unit at around 7pm that night just to make sure it was Braxton Hicks. They did some tests and confirmed that it was nothing and they sent me home again at around Midnight.
The contractions continued through the night and by the next morning they were notably stronger. I rang the EOU again and spoke to a midwife who told me to take some paracetamol and have a bath. By that evening I was absolutely crippled - the contractions were coming every 5 minutes and were so painful that I struggled to stand up straight. I knew something wasn't right so Michael and I packed the car, hospital bag and all, and we drove back down to the Ulster. It was much the same experience as the night before - lots of waiting around but this time I was making some pretty intense animalistic noises with every contraction! They started to take me seriously and the Doctor examined me between contractions and announced "you're about 3cm dilated." He did a quick scan to check baby's position and announced that she was breech and he had to go and speak with my consultant.
After a few phone calls the decision was made to bring me up to the Labour Ward immediately and prep me for an Emergency Cesarean Section. It all happened so quickly - one minute I was having contractions in the hallway, the next I had a midwife putting a line in my hand and within minutes I was in the bathroom of a labour suite putting on a gown and stockings. I had no time to get scared or anxious; Michael looked more worried than I felt! I fired off a few quick text messages to my Mum, Sister, Dad and Claire from work to let them know what was happening and before I knew it I was walking down to theatre with my bum hanging out the back of my hospital gown. It was the most surreal experience but I was completely calm. I was cracking jokes with all the midwives, having banter with the Anaesthetist and even told one Doctor that he looked like Vince Vaughan. I think there was less than an hour between me being told I was in Pre-term Labour to me lying in theatre completely numb below the neck - it was all incredibly intense and I wasn't really given the time to wrap my head around it.
I just soldiered on and got it done. There was no time to be anxious and the Midwives Emma and Sandra had me feeling completely at ease. Once I was given the spinal block and felt completely numb, Michael arrived in (gown on, hat on, the works) and he sat behind the screen with me and held my hand and kissed my forehead while the surgery started. Before they made the incision, everyone in the room introduced themselves to us one by one, telling us their name and their job title. All 12 of them. If I had time to be embarrassed about being in the centre of it all I would have been mortified! The mood in the room was light despite the fact that everyone knew of Hallie's condition. Everyone made us feel at ease and treated it just like any other birth, I would imagine.
The whole C-Section experience is strange from start to finish - completely painless but you do feel your whole body being pulled and pushed about from the inside. The description of it being like someone rummaging through your tummy like they would a handbag is completely correct. It was all very weird. I kept thinking about the times I had seen this happen on TV and they're always waiting on tenterhooks for the birth to be announced by the baby crying. We knew this wasn't going to be the case.
We had already discussed with the Paediatrician what we wanted to do when Hallie was born. He made it clear that the chances of her being alive were very slim and if she was born alive it wouldn't be for very long. They made the suggestion that they would put her onto my chest straight away so we would have those few precious seconds with her but we were very concerned about how she would look. We had seen photographs of babies with Hydrops and Cystic Hygromas and knew it could be quite shocking so we asked that she be wrapped up immediately and requested that someone would advise on how she looked before handing her to us.
When Hallie was born ("butt first" as the Anaesthetist told me when I asked him to peak over the screen and tell me what was happening) she was rushed over to a resuscitation unit in the corner of the room and they gave her a couple blasts of oxygen and wrapped her up in the blanket Mum had bought her when we went shopping and a little woollen hat. The time on the clock was 11.25pm.
Michael and I were terrified to see her - we didn't know where to look - but the Paediatrician popped over and told us that while the Hygroma on her neck was very visible she was absolutely gorgeous and perfectly formed everywhere else and we immediately agreed to see her. When they brought her over to us it was honestly love at first sight. She had us hook, line and sinker right then and there. We were obsessed. They placed her in Michael's arms and the two of us were sobbing loudly with happy tears. Everyone in the room was fussing over the three of us and congratulating us, it was the perfect moment. One of the Doctors asked Michael for his phone so he could snap some pictures of us meeting our daughter - he must have taken about 30 pictures of us! We appreciate that little act of kindness so, so much. Hallie was alive and breathing and taking little gasps of air in and she looked absolutely adorable. They laid her on my chest while they delivered the placenta, stitched me up and wheeled me back out to our private room. I never took my eyes off her once.
Hallie lived for 3 hours. This is unbelievable. A complete miracle. We had been preparing ourselves for a stillbirth - everything we had been told was based on Hallie passing away while in the womb. There never was a scenario where she would be born alive, let alone stay alive for more than a few minutes. I don't know how she managed it but it was the greatest gift. We held onto her, took turns cuddling her, took a million photographs of the three of us together and even snapped a video to our Mum's and my Sister who were outside in the car park waiting for news! I wasn't aware of this until afterwards but all of our parents rushed to the hospital when we told them I had been admitted. We appreciate that so much and apologise that they didn't get to come up to meet Hallie that night but we wanted/needed those precious hours with our baby girl as a family of three. Our time with her was completely ours and it was perfect.
The nurse checked her pulse a few times and confirmed each time that she still had a heartbeat. At around 2.30am she finally confirmed that Hallie's heart had stopped beating and strangely and unbelievably enough, we weren't at all phased. There was no tears or sadness - we had just had 3 hours of Hallie alive that we never, ever thought we would get and that pushed us through. The rest of the night was spent cuddling her in our little bubble of love. Michael eventually went over to the sofa bed beside me to get some sleep and I lay in bed drifting in and out of consciousness with our little girl curled up on my chest. I just lay there and stared at her perfect little nose and pouty lips all night, completely in love.
We are absolutely delighted that our birth experience with Hallie was a positive one. We really feel like we had the same experience as anyone else would have with their first born and we cannot stress how lucky we feel to have had this experience with her. Even though Hallie never cried, the whole scenario still felt like a happy and positive one from start to finish. Michael and I just fell in love with her and couldn't believe our luck that we got to be her parents.
She's the bravest, most impressive little girl with the strongest heart and we are thankful for every second we had in her company. The 3 days we had with her were unforgettable. We lived in our little private suite as a 3-person family. We watched TV together, ate meals together and cuddled her at every opportunity. I changed her outfit every day and Michael read bedtime stories to her every night. For the time that Hallie was alive and for the time after that, all she knew was the purest form of love. (Even when Michael spilled Ribena all over her...!!) We gave her everything we had to give and she was 100% worth every scary second of our journey to meet each other.
Appointment 13th July 2018
We didn't have very high hopes for our Friday 13th scan today but our Midwife Roz very kindly offered to meet us at the Lagan Valley instead of the Ulster this week. I automatically feel more comfortable in Lagan Valley - the Ulster can be very overwhelming - Lagan Valley is so familiar and I suppose it's where I have my happier memories of this pregnancy. All the bad news happened at the Ulster so it can be quite hard to go back there every week.
Roz was there already so we didn't have any time to wait - the Ulster always leave us hanging around for a while before our appointments. Unfortunately, there was no improvement on the fluid surrounding Hallie's organs and the Hygroma is still very large, but Roz did say that she didn't think the fluid had gotten any worse. She just looked the same as the week before.
All of the scans we've had recently have been solely focused on Hallie's organs, just brief glimpses of her little heart ticking away and the fluid in her abdomen, but today, Roz took the time to show us a bigger picture of our girl and it was absolutely lovely to see her. She was lying on her back, opening and closing her little lips as if she was blowing bubbles or chatting away to herself! We could see her swallowing. We watched as she brought her little hands up to her face and even put her chubby little fist into her mouth. Proper baby stuff. It was mind blowing and I was crying my eyes out - mostly because she looked so happy and adorable, but also because it was incredibly sad to see her look so perfectly normal when we know that she isn't. For a minute, it was almost like having a normal, happy scan. Roz let us watch her for a good while and she babbled at her on the screen just as I imagine she would do with any other happy baby scan and it was the most wonderful thing. Of course, the one day that I leave my phone in the car is the day that I'm told that we're free to take videos and photos of her if we like! Hopefully we'll get the chance to again.
We listened to her heart which is still beating at a perfectly strong and normal rate. She's doing really well in there considering the high levels of fluid but as we know, the fluid is stopping her lungs from developing properly. Hallie is doing well because I am breathing for her - the problem is that if her lungs aren't developed, she won't be able to breathe on her own when she's born. If Hallie carries on as she is, she could survive to term but when she is delivered, she won't survive. The miracle would be that the fluid in her abdomen would resolve and her organs would have a chance to grow, but as she is, they're far too underdeveloped for her to breathe on her own.
If Hallie holds on for a few more weeks, at around 28 weeks we will be referred to the Neo Natal unit in the Ulster to discuss and make decisions on post-birth management. The options will basically be, for me to deliver and have her placed on my chest and us to be left alone with her, allowing her to pass away peacefully with us. They would supply her with any pain relief or oxygen she requires, but it's inevitable that she won't live outside of my body for very long. The other option is for us to give birth in the Royal where they will whisk her away from us as soon as she's born and they'll put her on a ventilator. This would be to prolong her life long enough for us to see her and spend some time with her but we would eventually have to make the decision to turn the machine off and it would be unlikely that we'll get to hold her while she's still alive. Prolonging the inevitable, in other words.
The fact that Hallie has Mosaic Turner Syndrome is not even a worry any more - had the Hydrops not existed, she would be absolutely fine. That's the cruel truth. Unless the fluid resolves, Hallie won't stand a chance and it's highly unlikely that it will resolve. Roz has never seen it resolve before. We still believe that we're doing the right thing in giving Hallie the best chance though, we have no regrets about our decision and no matter what happens to her, we will always know we did our best for her. She's a little warrior and we are so, so proud.
We have a meeting with our Consultant back at the Ulster next week, so will get a more detailed analysis of her situation but for today we're clinging to the happy image of our beautiful baby girl we saw on the screen today. Our little ray of sunshine amongst the dark clouds.
All of the scans we've had recently have been solely focused on Hallie's organs, just brief glimpses of her little heart ticking away and the fluid in her abdomen, but today, Roz took the time to show us a bigger picture of our girl and it was absolutely lovely to see her. She was lying on her back, opening and closing her little lips as if she was blowing bubbles or chatting away to herself! We could see her swallowing. We watched as she brought her little hands up to her face and even put her chubby little fist into her mouth. Proper baby stuff. It was mind blowing and I was crying my eyes out - mostly because she looked so happy and adorable, but also because it was incredibly sad to see her look so perfectly normal when we know that she isn't. For a minute, it was almost like having a normal, happy scan. Roz let us watch her for a good while and she babbled at her on the screen just as I imagine she would do with any other happy baby scan and it was the most wonderful thing. Of course, the one day that I leave my phone in the car is the day that I'm told that we're free to take videos and photos of her if we like! Hopefully we'll get the chance to again.
We listened to her heart which is still beating at a perfectly strong and normal rate. She's doing really well in there considering the high levels of fluid but as we know, the fluid is stopping her lungs from developing properly. Hallie is doing well because I am breathing for her - the problem is that if her lungs aren't developed, she won't be able to breathe on her own when she's born. If Hallie carries on as she is, she could survive to term but when she is delivered, she won't survive. The miracle would be that the fluid in her abdomen would resolve and her organs would have a chance to grow, but as she is, they're far too underdeveloped for her to breathe on her own.
If Hallie holds on for a few more weeks, at around 28 weeks we will be referred to the Neo Natal unit in the Ulster to discuss and make decisions on post-birth management. The options will basically be, for me to deliver and have her placed on my chest and us to be left alone with her, allowing her to pass away peacefully with us. They would supply her with any pain relief or oxygen she requires, but it's inevitable that she won't live outside of my body for very long. The other option is for us to give birth in the Royal where they will whisk her away from us as soon as she's born and they'll put her on a ventilator. This would be to prolong her life long enough for us to see her and spend some time with her but we would eventually have to make the decision to turn the machine off and it would be unlikely that we'll get to hold her while she's still alive. Prolonging the inevitable, in other words.
The fact that Hallie has Mosaic Turner Syndrome is not even a worry any more - had the Hydrops not existed, she would be absolutely fine. That's the cruel truth. Unless the fluid resolves, Hallie won't stand a chance and it's highly unlikely that it will resolve. Roz has never seen it resolve before. We still believe that we're doing the right thing in giving Hallie the best chance though, we have no regrets about our decision and no matter what happens to her, we will always know we did our best for her. She's a little warrior and we are so, so proud.
We have a meeting with our Consultant back at the Ulster next week, so will get a more detailed analysis of her situation but for today we're clinging to the happy image of our beautiful baby girl we saw on the screen today. Our little ray of sunshine amongst the dark clouds.
Coping.
On numerous occasions I’ve typed variations of the words “how to cope with bad pregnancy news” into Google and it’s surprised me that most of the results were about coping with receiving bad news while you’re pregnant, rather than the bad news being related to your pregnancy itself. There’s plenty of articles on how to cope after the loss of your baby, but not too many about the period of limbo between the diagnosis and the loss itself. Of course, the truth is, there isn’t a handbook with all the answers – in fact, there is no answer – everyone going through this will deal with it differently.
The question I’m asked the most (almost daily) is “how on earth are you coping?”
Well, the truth is, I often impress myself with my ability to carry on. It’s been over a month now since our lives were flipped upside down with Hallie’s diagnosis but we are battling through, relatively unscathed so far (I know that won't always be the case!). Already, I have had emails from women that have found this blog or my Instagram page; some offering their stories of hope, some just letting us know that they’re thinking about us and some just reaching out from one suffering family to another. I honestly believe that the key to making it through a dark period like this is communication, communication and more communication. And this applies to a whole spectrum of diagnoses and illnesses, not just instances like ours. I know it sounds like a cliché but it’s honestly true, being open and willing to talk and not keeping your thoughts and feelings to yourself is the best thing you can do. It’s all too easy to just curl up in bed and ignore the world and there are days where that’s exactly what you want to do, but you have to force yourself to get out there – don’t hide away. Let people in. I believe that the more you hide, the more people are scared to approach you; and you need your support system. You really do. There were long periods after my miscarriage where I felt horribly alone and wasn't coping and pushed people away and I am careful not to make the same mistake again.
Michael and I are pretty good at checking in with one another too. Don’t be fooled, there are moments where we’ve just clung to each other and cried our eyes out. There’s been days where he’s been stronger than I have and vice versa. Shadow has had his fair share of tears cried on his furry little back! I’ve burst into tears in the middle of dinner and sobbed my heart out while driving home from work when the distraction of the office is over; it’s not all been silly Instagram stories and fun days out. But there have been a lot of those too. Distraction during this time is important and enjoying our pregnancy and making happy memories has become our priority. It’s been 23 weeks of our lives and regardless, we refuse to look back at our time with Hallie and have it be the bleak, horribly dark time that it could so easily be.
Reaching out to couples who have had the same experiences has been incredibly helpful too – seeing that they’ve coped with and survived the same things is uplifting and inspiring. There are so many bloggers out there who openly share their experiences online, not necessarily of the same issues as Hallie but they’ve dealt with losing a baby and it’s these blogs that I have started drifting towards. I want to be prepared and being able to ask frank questions has really helped me wrap my head around what is coming and how others have dealt with it. Social media has made it so easy to reach out, ask questions and educate yourself through other people’s experiences and I know that I wouldn’t be half as positive as I am without their influence. We know that we can get through this and be okay on the other side. It’s a process, but we have the means and the want to survive it and if we can help others along the way, even better.
Keeping to a routine has been invaluable to us too. We both go to work every day, the only time we take off at the moment is for appointments. Being in work, surrounded by my colleagues has been really good for me; they treat me absolutely like normal and I never feel awkward or upset in work. Our HR Department and my Line Manager have been checking in on me often and letting me know that I am allowed as much time off as I need – again, it would be tempting to take them up on their offer to get paid to sit at home and wallow but that wouldn’t do me any good at all. If Hallie passes after 24 weeks I am entitled to full Maternity leave and benefits and they have encouraged me to take that, but I can’t imagine sitting at home for a year with empty arms would do anyone any good so my plan would be to take some time and get back to work sooner rather than later. And I know that they’ll support me on whatever decision I make – and that is amazing. After Hallie, it will be hard to come back to work and face everyone. I think about that a lot. But I know that I’ll be accepted back into the fold (after perhaps, an awkward start) but I do know that it will be fine in the end and the distraction will do me good. It’s the same for Michael’s work too – they’ve been a wonderful support too which is great for such a male-orientated workplace as men definitely struggle a bit more with our situation than women as we’re finding out!
We are no experts in this. Every day is a new day with new feelings and thoughts and discoveries about Hallie’s illness and it can be a bit of a minefield. There are triggers everywhere but I also see these triggers as tests of strength. Other babies are unavoidable – they are literally everywhere. You know when you buy a new car and suddenly the roads seem to be filled with the same car as yours? When you decide to start a family, suddenly everyone is pushing a pram! The best thing to do is to face it head on. It would have been easy for us to walk past a café filled with Mums and their babies in Hillsborough at the weekend but we went and had lunch in amongst them all. When my friend brought her beautiful new baby to work, I made sure that I was the very first one holding my arms out for a cuddle (and another…and another after that one…!) We went to the Aquarium yesterday and we were faced with two new Mums openly breastfeeding by the Seal enclosure – I forced myself to make eye contact and smile when they smiled at me and nodded at my bump and later on I cooed over one of their babies and asked what her name is. These interactions were in no way easy for me/us, but I see them as necessary steps to keeping us open and in touch with the baby world. Like falling off a horse, you’re advised to get right back on it again before the fear sets in. I don’t want to ever fear having a baby, even after everything with Hallie. Because there are many women that do.
I’ve found that being open with what we’re going through has helped most people around us feel more comfortable too. I know it’s difficult to know what to say to someone going through something like this but the best advice I would give is - don’t treat them any differently as you would before the diagnosis. You can be gentler with them, sure, but they’re still the same people after all. Our fear has always been that people will avoid us and treat us like lepers – particularly if and when Hallie does eventually pass away. I can’t tell you how good it feels to be treated like normal – when friends still happily introduce you to their new baby (baby cuddles are healing and can never be a bad thing, I promise you!) or share in their pregnancy news – just because this has happened to us, it doesn’t mean we are incapable of being happy for our friends and family! Something I’ve also struggled with is when people completely ignore the fact that I’m pregnant – I’ve met people in the shops and had dinners with friends where they’ve ignored my pregnancy entirely, but on the other hand I have had others come up to me, congratulate me and rub my bump, fully knowing the situation and wishing us the best. Those are the best interactions. Don’t shy away from using our baby’s name either – we absolutely love when people ask how Hallie is! We love when she’s acknowledged and hearing her name only ever makes us proud.
I know that many are scared of causing upset – we’re not going to burst into tears in front of you, I promise! I know that others are scared of reminding us of our pain – it’s not something that we’ll ever forget about and not mentioning it doesn’t magically heal everything, but knowing that you acknowledge it and care about us and our girl means the world, it really does. Every little show of love helps keep our heads above water, whether it’s been flowers, little cards in the post, Pavlovas (important one), brunches, cups of tea (always bring buns!) or just funny daily text exchanges with your best friends. Just being present makes all the difference. And that goes for now, and for afterwards too.
It is also our commitment to Hallie as a real life existing human being that pulls us through too. She's here and she's real and we will always honour her time on this earth. She won't be the only baby to only know life inside their Mum's tummy. If all Hallie ever knows is the cosy, warm, safe environment I've made for her and all she ever hears is the sounds of her Mum and Dad singing along (badly) to Absolute Radio in the car, then that's okay. If our girl passes away silently, listening to nothing but the sound of my heartbeat then that's the best end to her little life that I can imagine. She's never going to feel pain, or be sad, or be scared and that's a comfort to us. We will never give up on her, or on having our family one day. We won't let this beat us - it might, for a while - but we're committed to making this happen for us and I know that we'll get there in the end. And that, is how we cope.
The question I’m asked the most (almost daily) is “how on earth are you coping?”
Well, the truth is, I often impress myself with my ability to carry on. It’s been over a month now since our lives were flipped upside down with Hallie’s diagnosis but we are battling through, relatively unscathed so far (I know that won't always be the case!). Already, I have had emails from women that have found this blog or my Instagram page; some offering their stories of hope, some just letting us know that they’re thinking about us and some just reaching out from one suffering family to another. I honestly believe that the key to making it through a dark period like this is communication, communication and more communication. And this applies to a whole spectrum of diagnoses and illnesses, not just instances like ours. I know it sounds like a cliché but it’s honestly true, being open and willing to talk and not keeping your thoughts and feelings to yourself is the best thing you can do. It’s all too easy to just curl up in bed and ignore the world and there are days where that’s exactly what you want to do, but you have to force yourself to get out there – don’t hide away. Let people in. I believe that the more you hide, the more people are scared to approach you; and you need your support system. You really do. There were long periods after my miscarriage where I felt horribly alone and wasn't coping and pushed people away and I am careful not to make the same mistake again.
Michael and I are pretty good at checking in with one another too. Don’t be fooled, there are moments where we’ve just clung to each other and cried our eyes out. There’s been days where he’s been stronger than I have and vice versa. Shadow has had his fair share of tears cried on his furry little back! I’ve burst into tears in the middle of dinner and sobbed my heart out while driving home from work when the distraction of the office is over; it’s not all been silly Instagram stories and fun days out. But there have been a lot of those too. Distraction during this time is important and enjoying our pregnancy and making happy memories has become our priority. It’s been 23 weeks of our lives and regardless, we refuse to look back at our time with Hallie and have it be the bleak, horribly dark time that it could so easily be.
Reaching out to couples who have had the same experiences has been incredibly helpful too – seeing that they’ve coped with and survived the same things is uplifting and inspiring. There are so many bloggers out there who openly share their experiences online, not necessarily of the same issues as Hallie but they’ve dealt with losing a baby and it’s these blogs that I have started drifting towards. I want to be prepared and being able to ask frank questions has really helped me wrap my head around what is coming and how others have dealt with it. Social media has made it so easy to reach out, ask questions and educate yourself through other people’s experiences and I know that I wouldn’t be half as positive as I am without their influence. We know that we can get through this and be okay on the other side. It’s a process, but we have the means and the want to survive it and if we can help others along the way, even better.
Keeping to a routine has been invaluable to us too. We both go to work every day, the only time we take off at the moment is for appointments. Being in work, surrounded by my colleagues has been really good for me; they treat me absolutely like normal and I never feel awkward or upset in work. Our HR Department and my Line Manager have been checking in on me often and letting me know that I am allowed as much time off as I need – again, it would be tempting to take them up on their offer to get paid to sit at home and wallow but that wouldn’t do me any good at all. If Hallie passes after 24 weeks I am entitled to full Maternity leave and benefits and they have encouraged me to take that, but I can’t imagine sitting at home for a year with empty arms would do anyone any good so my plan would be to take some time and get back to work sooner rather than later. And I know that they’ll support me on whatever decision I make – and that is amazing. After Hallie, it will be hard to come back to work and face everyone. I think about that a lot. But I know that I’ll be accepted back into the fold (after perhaps, an awkward start) but I do know that it will be fine in the end and the distraction will do me good. It’s the same for Michael’s work too – they’ve been a wonderful support too which is great for such a male-orientated workplace as men definitely struggle a bit more with our situation than women as we’re finding out!
We are no experts in this. Every day is a new day with new feelings and thoughts and discoveries about Hallie’s illness and it can be a bit of a minefield. There are triggers everywhere but I also see these triggers as tests of strength. Other babies are unavoidable – they are literally everywhere. You know when you buy a new car and suddenly the roads seem to be filled with the same car as yours? When you decide to start a family, suddenly everyone is pushing a pram! The best thing to do is to face it head on. It would have been easy for us to walk past a café filled with Mums and their babies in Hillsborough at the weekend but we went and had lunch in amongst them all. When my friend brought her beautiful new baby to work, I made sure that I was the very first one holding my arms out for a cuddle (and another…and another after that one…!) We went to the Aquarium yesterday and we were faced with two new Mums openly breastfeeding by the Seal enclosure – I forced myself to make eye contact and smile when they smiled at me and nodded at my bump and later on I cooed over one of their babies and asked what her name is. These interactions were in no way easy for me/us, but I see them as necessary steps to keeping us open and in touch with the baby world. Like falling off a horse, you’re advised to get right back on it again before the fear sets in. I don’t want to ever fear having a baby, even after everything with Hallie. Because there are many women that do.
I’ve found that being open with what we’re going through has helped most people around us feel more comfortable too. I know it’s difficult to know what to say to someone going through something like this but the best advice I would give is - don’t treat them any differently as you would before the diagnosis. You can be gentler with them, sure, but they’re still the same people after all. Our fear has always been that people will avoid us and treat us like lepers – particularly if and when Hallie does eventually pass away. I can’t tell you how good it feels to be treated like normal – when friends still happily introduce you to their new baby (baby cuddles are healing and can never be a bad thing, I promise you!) or share in their pregnancy news – just because this has happened to us, it doesn’t mean we are incapable of being happy for our friends and family! Something I’ve also struggled with is when people completely ignore the fact that I’m pregnant – I’ve met people in the shops and had dinners with friends where they’ve ignored my pregnancy entirely, but on the other hand I have had others come up to me, congratulate me and rub my bump, fully knowing the situation and wishing us the best. Those are the best interactions. Don’t shy away from using our baby’s name either – we absolutely love when people ask how Hallie is! We love when she’s acknowledged and hearing her name only ever makes us proud.
I know that many are scared of causing upset – we’re not going to burst into tears in front of you, I promise! I know that others are scared of reminding us of our pain – it’s not something that we’ll ever forget about and not mentioning it doesn’t magically heal everything, but knowing that you acknowledge it and care about us and our girl means the world, it really does. Every little show of love helps keep our heads above water, whether it’s been flowers, little cards in the post, Pavlovas (important one), brunches, cups of tea (always bring buns!) or just funny daily text exchanges with your best friends. Just being present makes all the difference. And that goes for now, and for afterwards too.
It is also our commitment to Hallie as a real life existing human being that pulls us through too. She's here and she's real and we will always honour her time on this earth. She won't be the only baby to only know life inside their Mum's tummy. If all Hallie ever knows is the cosy, warm, safe environment I've made for her and all she ever hears is the sounds of her Mum and Dad singing along (badly) to Absolute Radio in the car, then that's okay. If our girl passes away silently, listening to nothing but the sound of my heartbeat then that's the best end to her little life that I can imagine. She's never going to feel pain, or be sad, or be scared and that's a comfort to us. We will never give up on her, or on having our family one day. We won't let this beat us - it might, for a while - but we're committed to making this happen for us and I know that we'll get there in the end. And that, is how we cope.
Telling Hallie's Story
The decision to tell Hallie’s story was an easy one. I’m a natural sharer (over sharer, probably!) and have always been of the opinion that a problem shared is a problem halved. Of course, with such a sensitive subject I’ve run everything past my Husband just to make sure that he’s happy with the level of information shared, and thankfully, he’s been really supportive (as usual). I haven’t shared this blog with too many people but so far the feedback has been great. Thank you for that.
From the very second I got into the car after the disastrous gender scan, I started Googling. There is no website or article about Cystic Hygroma’s, Hydrops and Turner Syndrome that I have not read! The most valued information, however, has come from personal blogs; people who have lived this situation before and have chosen to tell their story whether it be to provide encouragement to others with their positive outcomes or to retain the memory of their little ones who didn’t make it. Granted, there aren’t too many of these kinds of blogs around due to the rarity of these cases but I have valued the honesty of the couples who have chosen to share their story with the world and I wanted to add to the existing blogs and share our story with honesty too.
It’s quite normal for me to keep track of any challenges I’m facing through writing. Of course, choosing to be so open about subjects like this is a little scary – you leave yourself open to judgement. Some might question my intent. Am I sharing Hallie’s story for sympathy? Absolutely not. Sympathy and pity are the two overriding emotions that we simply cannot deal with at all – any pitying look, or message, or hug is 100% guaranteed to start the waterworks and send us into a spiral. Positive support and understanding of our situation is much easier to handle, which thankfully, everyone has aced so far!
Some might not understand our willingness to be so open with such a sensitive subject but we have never been the type to hide away and wallow in self-pity. We are proud of our daughter, and yes, her story can be seen as incredibly upsetting and difficult to talk about but these things are all part of nature. They happen to couples around the world every single day. This is not just our pain, we share it with so many others, and we’re so aware of that and want to honour it.
Since my miscarriage in October I found myself launched head-first into the underground world of pregnancy struggles and baby loss – somewhere I never imagined I would end up. I’ve met women from all around the world that I speak to every day who have suffered the same issues; couples who are as frustrated as we are that starting a family isn’t as easy as everyone else seems to make it look. I have learnt the stories of close friends and family members who have suffered losses too. I talk with women daily who, like me, are navigating pregnancy after loss. I have had friends open up to me about their fertility struggles, wonderful couples who have been trying for many years and getting no closer to the family they crave, and quite frankly, 100% deserve. I've even heard from couples who have successfully started their families but are struggling to cope, women for who being a Mum isn't coming naturally or they're finding it harder than they ever imagined. These are subjects that no one openly talks about. Each person's story is valid. I am not ashamed of our story. At all. Because here's the thing. Everybody struggles with something in their lives. Everyone’s journey is different and individual to them – this just happens to be ours.
When it comes to sad or dark or depressing issues whether its loss, illness, addiction, financial worries, whatever - no one is untouchable. As much as we love to portray a happy, perfect image of ourselves on social media or in social circles, it's rarely the reality. I believe that it's okay to let your guard down and be vulnerable and be human sometimes. There's a world of support out there, communities full of people following similar paths to you, if only you'd let them in. More often than not you find stories that bring you hope. Stories that spur you on and give you reasons to keep going. And knowing that you aren't facing your battles alone is everything.
With this in mind, we made the joint decision to announce our pregnancy on social media this weekend. So now our wider circle knows about Hallie, not just our closest friends and family. The messages of support ever since have blown us away! We’re so thankful to each and every person who took the time to acknowledge Hallie and offer to add her to their thoughts and prayers. It’s been a confirmation that we aren’t facing this alone, not that we ever thought that we were, but it’s been so great to have everyone rallying around us and our girl. Thank you, from the bottom of our super-full hearts.
From the very second I got into the car after the disastrous gender scan, I started Googling. There is no website or article about Cystic Hygroma’s, Hydrops and Turner Syndrome that I have not read! The most valued information, however, has come from personal blogs; people who have lived this situation before and have chosen to tell their story whether it be to provide encouragement to others with their positive outcomes or to retain the memory of their little ones who didn’t make it. Granted, there aren’t too many of these kinds of blogs around due to the rarity of these cases but I have valued the honesty of the couples who have chosen to share their story with the world and I wanted to add to the existing blogs and share our story with honesty too.
It’s quite normal for me to keep track of any challenges I’m facing through writing. Of course, choosing to be so open about subjects like this is a little scary – you leave yourself open to judgement. Some might question my intent. Am I sharing Hallie’s story for sympathy? Absolutely not. Sympathy and pity are the two overriding emotions that we simply cannot deal with at all – any pitying look, or message, or hug is 100% guaranteed to start the waterworks and send us into a spiral. Positive support and understanding of our situation is much easier to handle, which thankfully, everyone has aced so far!
Some might not understand our willingness to be so open with such a sensitive subject but we have never been the type to hide away and wallow in self-pity. We are proud of our daughter, and yes, her story can be seen as incredibly upsetting and difficult to talk about but these things are all part of nature. They happen to couples around the world every single day. This is not just our pain, we share it with so many others, and we’re so aware of that and want to honour it.
Since my miscarriage in October I found myself launched head-first into the underground world of pregnancy struggles and baby loss – somewhere I never imagined I would end up. I’ve met women from all around the world that I speak to every day who have suffered the same issues; couples who are as frustrated as we are that starting a family isn’t as easy as everyone else seems to make it look. I have learnt the stories of close friends and family members who have suffered losses too. I talk with women daily who, like me, are navigating pregnancy after loss. I have had friends open up to me about their fertility struggles, wonderful couples who have been trying for many years and getting no closer to the family they crave, and quite frankly, 100% deserve. I've even heard from couples who have successfully started their families but are struggling to cope, women for who being a Mum isn't coming naturally or they're finding it harder than they ever imagined. These are subjects that no one openly talks about. Each person's story is valid. I am not ashamed of our story. At all. Because here's the thing. Everybody struggles with something in their lives. Everyone’s journey is different and individual to them – this just happens to be ours.
When it comes to sad or dark or depressing issues whether its loss, illness, addiction, financial worries, whatever - no one is untouchable. As much as we love to portray a happy, perfect image of ourselves on social media or in social circles, it's rarely the reality. I believe that it's okay to let your guard down and be vulnerable and be human sometimes. There's a world of support out there, communities full of people following similar paths to you, if only you'd let them in. More often than not you find stories that bring you hope. Stories that spur you on and give you reasons to keep going. And knowing that you aren't facing your battles alone is everything.
With this in mind, we made the joint decision to announce our pregnancy on social media this weekend. So now our wider circle knows about Hallie, not just our closest friends and family. The messages of support ever since have blown us away! We’re so thankful to each and every person who took the time to acknowledge Hallie and offer to add her to their thoughts and prayers. It’s been a confirmation that we aren’t facing this alone, not that we ever thought that we were, but it’s been so great to have everyone rallying around us and our girl. Thank you, from the bottom of our super-full hearts.
Appointment 5th July 2018
Today the weather was a bit overcast for the first time in a couple of weeks & I knew it was a sign of things to come. You know that feeling in your stomach when you know something isn't right? I had that from the second I woke up. Hallie was moving about, kicking me all morning so I knew we were going to see a heartbeat, but I just had a bad feeling about this appointment anyway.
We got to the Ulster for 8.45am & met with Roz, the lovely midwife who had called me to tell me about the Amnio results. Basically, she confirmed that the Hydrops/fluid in Hallie's abdomen has increased in the week since our last scan. Being able to chat with Roz is good, because she is completely honest, if not a little more doom & gloom than other people we have spoken to - but honesty is valuable in times like these, even if it isn't what you want to hear. And today's news really wasn't what we wanted to hear! I think, with every scan, we get obsessed with hoping that the fluid has somehow started to go away. In the week between scans you start to believe that will be the case until you're almost convinced that everything will be okay - and when you get bad news it knocks the wind completely out of your sails.
As it was just Roz this time, we felt like we could have a bit more of an open chat about what the reality of the situation is - and it wasn't nice. I broke my resolve for the first time and sat there sobbing while she explained to me what the process would/will be if/when we discover that Hallie's heart has stopped beating. Of course, I already knew the jist of it but actually having that conversation made it seem even more scary and real than any previous appointments where no details were given. While we've been very careful not to get carried away with any hope that Hallie will survive this, I think there was a small part of us maybe thought that in some way she would and it felt like someone had just come along and shot that little ray of hope right out of the sky. We asked Roz if she had ever seen Hydrops resolve and her answer was a firm "never". She confirmed that Hallie's case is really severe and the likelihood of this having any kind of happy ending is incredibly small. Close to no chance at all.
We spoke about the timing of discovering that Hallie was ill and whether or not her symptoms were missed during the early scans at Lagan Valley. We learnt that due to the current Northern Irish abortion laws, our Midwives here are not trained or instructed to look for signs of any chromosomal issues in any of the early scanning procedures (unless they're incredibly obvious), whereas in England nuchal measurements are taken and issues like extra fluid is looked for and determined at the 12 week scan. The reason for this is simple - in England they are allowed to advise terminations in cases of fetal anomalies where in Northern Ireland, they aren't - so there's "no point" in them looking for issues early on because it doesn't make a difference to the outcome, the opinion being that babies with chromosome issues will usually pass away/miscarry before the 20 week scan, the very first point at which NI babies are investigated in depth. This means that post-20 week parents who are told that their baby has a chromosome disorder or disability are given less than 4 weeks to make the decision to terminate and travel to England for the procedure. These parents are having to make this heart-breaking and difficult decision after 20 weeks of bonding with their pregnancy and announcing it to friends and family. This law needs to change.
It's easy to get bogged down with thinking "why us?" and when we're at our worst the overriding feeling is that it's completely unfair that this would happen to a happy couple like us, surely deserving of a family like everyone else? But Roz has told us that issues like Hallie's are incredibly common, more common than you would think and we are not the only couple in Northern Ireland struggling with news like this & making decisions like we are. Its a sobering realisation that you don't always get what you want, when you want it. It's a lesson in patience. We thought we were doing it all the right way - enjoying our twenties like everyone told us to, getting married, buying a beautiful big house & making sure we're financially ready before starting our family. It's a pattern followed by a lot of couples in our social circle and many of us are learning the hard way that things just don't always work out that way just because that's how you planned it. When you make plans, God laughs, right? The feeling of letting everyone down is something I'm struggling with most. Because these things don't just affect Michael and I - we have 4 sets of family that are suffering and the guilt is sometimes more than we can handle.
The wait to see what's going to happen is nothing short of torture for us, and everyone else really. It's hard especially, because Hallie is such a little wriggler - I can feel her dancing around in there most of the day so it's easy to convince yourself that everything's okay in there. It's not until we see her on the screen that we're brought back down to earth with the reality of the situation. Saying that though, our decision to remain focused on enjoying our pregnancy and looking after her while she's here hasn't changed. There are options we have to discuss and decisions we'll have to make on what we want to happen if/when we lose Hallie and we want to make sure we're both on the same page and have some sort of plan of how we want things to go. We're not going to feel brave and positive every single day, and today is just one of the days where we feel down and almost completely hopeless - but still, the two of us have soldiered on and have gone to work and carried on as usual. I'm proud of us for being able to do that. I think the support we are giving each other is carrying us through and keeping us going.
If the worst happens, and yes, it's likely that it will, we are still so proud of our girl. She's been such a little warrior in there and we'll make sure that she's always remembered as a very important part of our family. Because she is. We will learn from her and always hold this entire experience as part of our journey to being parents, which will happen for us. Babies born after tragedy's like this one can only be even more special and loved than normal, right? And to think that one day we'll have little ones that have that much love surrounding them is pretty amazing and we can't wait for that day.
We got to the Ulster for 8.45am & met with Roz, the lovely midwife who had called me to tell me about the Amnio results. Basically, she confirmed that the Hydrops/fluid in Hallie's abdomen has increased in the week since our last scan. Being able to chat with Roz is good, because she is completely honest, if not a little more doom & gloom than other people we have spoken to - but honesty is valuable in times like these, even if it isn't what you want to hear. And today's news really wasn't what we wanted to hear! I think, with every scan, we get obsessed with hoping that the fluid has somehow started to go away. In the week between scans you start to believe that will be the case until you're almost convinced that everything will be okay - and when you get bad news it knocks the wind completely out of your sails.
As it was just Roz this time, we felt like we could have a bit more of an open chat about what the reality of the situation is - and it wasn't nice. I broke my resolve for the first time and sat there sobbing while she explained to me what the process would/will be if/when we discover that Hallie's heart has stopped beating. Of course, I already knew the jist of it but actually having that conversation made it seem even more scary and real than any previous appointments where no details were given. While we've been very careful not to get carried away with any hope that Hallie will survive this, I think there was a small part of us maybe thought that in some way she would and it felt like someone had just come along and shot that little ray of hope right out of the sky. We asked Roz if she had ever seen Hydrops resolve and her answer was a firm "never". She confirmed that Hallie's case is really severe and the likelihood of this having any kind of happy ending is incredibly small. Close to no chance at all.
We spoke about the timing of discovering that Hallie was ill and whether or not her symptoms were missed during the early scans at Lagan Valley. We learnt that due to the current Northern Irish abortion laws, our Midwives here are not trained or instructed to look for signs of any chromosomal issues in any of the early scanning procedures (unless they're incredibly obvious), whereas in England nuchal measurements are taken and issues like extra fluid is looked for and determined at the 12 week scan. The reason for this is simple - in England they are allowed to advise terminations in cases of fetal anomalies where in Northern Ireland, they aren't - so there's "no point" in them looking for issues early on because it doesn't make a difference to the outcome, the opinion being that babies with chromosome issues will usually pass away/miscarry before the 20 week scan, the very first point at which NI babies are investigated in depth. This means that post-20 week parents who are told that their baby has a chromosome disorder or disability are given less than 4 weeks to make the decision to terminate and travel to England for the procedure. These parents are having to make this heart-breaking and difficult decision after 20 weeks of bonding with their pregnancy and announcing it to friends and family. This law needs to change.
It's easy to get bogged down with thinking "why us?" and when we're at our worst the overriding feeling is that it's completely unfair that this would happen to a happy couple like us, surely deserving of a family like everyone else? But Roz has told us that issues like Hallie's are incredibly common, more common than you would think and we are not the only couple in Northern Ireland struggling with news like this & making decisions like we are. Its a sobering realisation that you don't always get what you want, when you want it. It's a lesson in patience. We thought we were doing it all the right way - enjoying our twenties like everyone told us to, getting married, buying a beautiful big house & making sure we're financially ready before starting our family. It's a pattern followed by a lot of couples in our social circle and many of us are learning the hard way that things just don't always work out that way just because that's how you planned it. When you make plans, God laughs, right? The feeling of letting everyone down is something I'm struggling with most. Because these things don't just affect Michael and I - we have 4 sets of family that are suffering and the guilt is sometimes more than we can handle.
The wait to see what's going to happen is nothing short of torture for us, and everyone else really. It's hard especially, because Hallie is such a little wriggler - I can feel her dancing around in there most of the day so it's easy to convince yourself that everything's okay in there. It's not until we see her on the screen that we're brought back down to earth with the reality of the situation. Saying that though, our decision to remain focused on enjoying our pregnancy and looking after her while she's here hasn't changed. There are options we have to discuss and decisions we'll have to make on what we want to happen if/when we lose Hallie and we want to make sure we're both on the same page and have some sort of plan of how we want things to go. We're not going to feel brave and positive every single day, and today is just one of the days where we feel down and almost completely hopeless - but still, the two of us have soldiered on and have gone to work and carried on as usual. I'm proud of us for being able to do that. I think the support we are giving each other is carrying us through and keeping us going.
If the worst happens, and yes, it's likely that it will, we are still so proud of our girl. She's been such a little warrior in there and we'll make sure that she's always remembered as a very important part of our family. Because she is. We will learn from her and always hold this entire experience as part of our journey to being parents, which will happen for us. Babies born after tragedy's like this one can only be even more special and loved than normal, right? And to think that one day we'll have little ones that have that much love surrounding them is pretty amazing and we can't wait for that day.
Appointment 28th June 2018
On 28th June we had an 11am meeting with Fetal Medicine and our Consultant at the Ulster Hospital. It was a beautiful, sunny day and we were secretly delighted to have a reason to not be at work that day! This appointment was to go over the results of our Amniocentesis test (the big needle), so far all we knew was Hallie has a large Cystic Hygroma, Fetal Hydrops and Turner Syndrome (TS). To our Doctor's surprise and our delight, we learned that Hallie has Mosaic Turner Syndrome, which means that not all of her cells are affected. In Hallie's case, 70% of her cells have Turners but 30% are completely normal. This equates to a much milder form of the Syndrome where her symptoms would be very manageable and her chances of having a normal life are favourable. I couldn't believe it, we were told on the phone that her condition pointed to Classic Turner's and her chances of having the Mosaic version were incredibly thin. The first time Hallie has proved Doctor opinion to be wrong.
I hopped up on the table for an ultrasound. It's always a pleasure to see our girl; Michael and I still swell with pride when we see her. It's built into us already. Unfortunately, she's still incredibly Hydropic. The fluid around her organs and below her skin is very obvious and the Hygroma on her neck still looks to be very large. The good news, however, is that her condition hasn't worsened but of course, it hasn't really improved either. The best news though, is that her heart is still beating at a strong and healthy rate and doesn't seem to be showing any signs of struggling as yet. I asked the Doctor if he was surprised that her heart was doing so well considering and he said that he was. Hallie is a little fighter, showing herself to be strong in adversity already. She is measuring as normal too - her little legs are only measuring a few days behind which is normal for TS babies. Their growth is usually stunted, however our Doctor thinks that as Michael and I are very tall that she might inherit our height and that will make up for any height issues that her TS might cause.
The Hydrops/fluid in her body still poses the most danger to her - babies with these symptoms very rarely make it to term. This is something we know and have had to come to terms with, but at the same time Doctor still talks about what would happen if she makes it to term and is born. Miracles do and have happened in these cases so all we can do is hold out hope that Hallie makes it, while still remembering that she is very ill and could succumb to her symptoms at any time. At the moment, I will be having weekly scans to check her heartbeat and her fluid levels. There's nothing else that we can do but wait.
As I've mentioned before, had we been living anywhere but Northern Ireland we would have been offered a termination. It's still illegal here, so we would have to travel to England to have the surgery completed. I have always been very Pro-Choice in these cases and if I'm very honest, had we found out about this at the very start of our pregnancy it's something we might have considered. However, we have bonded with Hallie. I will be 22 weeks pregnant tomorrow and she is a fully formed little human being about the size of a Papaya. I can feel her moving around inside of me and she's very much part of our family already. There is no way we could take her life from her. We have made the firm decision to carry on with our pregnancy and let Hallie's fate be decided by her. If Hallie is meant for this world, she will be. And if not, then we will always know that we gave her the best possible chance at life.
Of course, I am terrified of losing her. I have a very rational mind and I know that sometimes I can come across a little too logical. And that's okay. I know, intellectually that I am facing something pretty damn awful but I'm coping, WE are coping, and if it takes a little while for me to emotionally catch up then that's okay too. Losing Hallie would leave us distraught, but we will have learnt so much from her. We'll always love her and would never forget her, but we won't let it beat us. My Husband is an amazing support - I sometimes forget that this is happening to ME, to my body, because he has me so well supported that I naturally think of it as happening to US. We are a team & I can't thank him enough for everything he does and is doing for me and Hallie. He's going to make an amazing Dad one day.
We made the decision that we wouldn't ever mourn Hallie while she is still here. It would be all too easy to admit defeat and stay at home, hiding from the world, but we refuse to do that. It's going to be incredibly hard for me to continue to get more and more pregnant, I'm already pretty big and sometimes I do shy away from going to the local shops just to avoid being seen but it's part and parcel of our decision. As Hallie grows, I will grow too and I will have to explain to people about her condition, but I already know that I would literally undergo any awkwardness and pain for her. There's no doubt about that. We are enjoying this pregnancy - we take her to the Zoo, to the beach, to play Mini Golf...all the fun things. If this turns out to be the only time we have with Hallie, then we're going to make the most of it. So that's exactly what we did after our last appointment - we spent the day in Bangor loading her up with Slushies and paddling in the sea with her. This is our unique version of parenting already, just in case it's the only chance we get.
I hopped up on the table for an ultrasound. It's always a pleasure to see our girl; Michael and I still swell with pride when we see her. It's built into us already. Unfortunately, she's still incredibly Hydropic. The fluid around her organs and below her skin is very obvious and the Hygroma on her neck still looks to be very large. The good news, however, is that her condition hasn't worsened but of course, it hasn't really improved either. The best news though, is that her heart is still beating at a strong and healthy rate and doesn't seem to be showing any signs of struggling as yet. I asked the Doctor if he was surprised that her heart was doing so well considering and he said that he was. Hallie is a little fighter, showing herself to be strong in adversity already. She is measuring as normal too - her little legs are only measuring a few days behind which is normal for TS babies. Their growth is usually stunted, however our Doctor thinks that as Michael and I are very tall that she might inherit our height and that will make up for any height issues that her TS might cause.
The Hydrops/fluid in her body still poses the most danger to her - babies with these symptoms very rarely make it to term. This is something we know and have had to come to terms with, but at the same time Doctor still talks about what would happen if she makes it to term and is born. Miracles do and have happened in these cases so all we can do is hold out hope that Hallie makes it, while still remembering that she is very ill and could succumb to her symptoms at any time. At the moment, I will be having weekly scans to check her heartbeat and her fluid levels. There's nothing else that we can do but wait.
As I've mentioned before, had we been living anywhere but Northern Ireland we would have been offered a termination. It's still illegal here, so we would have to travel to England to have the surgery completed. I have always been very Pro-Choice in these cases and if I'm very honest, had we found out about this at the very start of our pregnancy it's something we might have considered. However, we have bonded with Hallie. I will be 22 weeks pregnant tomorrow and she is a fully formed little human being about the size of a Papaya. I can feel her moving around inside of me and she's very much part of our family already. There is no way we could take her life from her. We have made the firm decision to carry on with our pregnancy and let Hallie's fate be decided by her. If Hallie is meant for this world, she will be. And if not, then we will always know that we gave her the best possible chance at life.
Of course, I am terrified of losing her. I have a very rational mind and I know that sometimes I can come across a little too logical. And that's okay. I know, intellectually that I am facing something pretty damn awful but I'm coping, WE are coping, and if it takes a little while for me to emotionally catch up then that's okay too. Losing Hallie would leave us distraught, but we will have learnt so much from her. We'll always love her and would never forget her, but we won't let it beat us. My Husband is an amazing support - I sometimes forget that this is happening to ME, to my body, because he has me so well supported that I naturally think of it as happening to US. We are a team & I can't thank him enough for everything he does and is doing for me and Hallie. He's going to make an amazing Dad one day.
We made the decision that we wouldn't ever mourn Hallie while she is still here. It would be all too easy to admit defeat and stay at home, hiding from the world, but we refuse to do that. It's going to be incredibly hard for me to continue to get more and more pregnant, I'm already pretty big and sometimes I do shy away from going to the local shops just to avoid being seen but it's part and parcel of our decision. As Hallie grows, I will grow too and I will have to explain to people about her condition, but I already know that I would literally undergo any awkwardness and pain for her. There's no doubt about that. We are enjoying this pregnancy - we take her to the Zoo, to the beach, to play Mini Golf...all the fun things. If this turns out to be the only time we have with Hallie, then we're going to make the most of it. So that's exactly what we did after our last appointment - we spent the day in Bangor loading her up with Slushies and paddling in the sea with her. This is our unique version of parenting already, just in case it's the only chance we get.
Hallie's Story So Far
I took the first pregnancy test on 22nd February 2018. The line was incredibly faint, but I just knew this was happening again. I tested every day (Thank you Cheapie Tests!) for about 2 weeks. On 22nd February, I had some bleeding and convinced myself that it was all over. A close friend had recently had a Chemical Pregnancy so I assumed that I was suffering the same fate. But the tests continued to get darker and I made the phone call to the Early Pregnancy Unit in Lagan Valley Hospital to arrange my first scan at 6 weeks.
At 6 weeks, there wasn’t much to see of course but the heartbeat was visible. I remember crying when I saw it – not howling dramatically, but a few tears definitely escaped! I proudly sent photographs of my basically invisible little Bean to my Mum and my Sister, bless them for pretending to get excited about a little blob of nothing at that point!
Throughout my whole 1st Trimester I spotted on and off. Each time, I would rush to the EPU for an “anxiety scan” as I’d come to call them. In all, I had about 8 scans before my 12 week booking appointment, each time leaving the hospital flapping a scan photo of my ever-growing little Bean. Surpassing the point at which our last baby passed was hard, the entire first 12 weeks were filled with worry and anxiety and tears and tantrums but I really made the effort to look after myself. I took days off work when I was feeling sick and I rested as often as possible. I felt like the world’s most important incubator, I wasn’t going to risk harming my little one for anything.
Our 12 week booking appointment was magical. Michael got to see the baby for the first time and we all laughed at how much she looked like him. She had that classic Archer profile. We left the appointment on a high and rushed to break the news to Michael’s parents. I had 2 more “anxiety scans” after that due to some more spotting, which eventually tailed off the further I got into the 2nd trimester and my confidence was growing. 12 weeks is the magical point, right? When everything is confirmed as fine at 12 weeks you’re basically home free. This is when couples usually announce their pregnancy and start to get excited. And we were no different.
We booked a gender scan for 18 weeks in a private clinic in our home town. It always (and will always) bothered us that we never knew the gender of our first little one before the miscarriage, so we really wanted to learn more about our second pregnancy. We were excited to start bonding! On 5th July we met our Mum’s and my Sister at the Window to the Womb clinic, a bit of a strange place that I wouldn’t necessarily recommend, and had the scan that marked the beginning of disaster. The sonographer was able to confirm that our baby was a little girl, but also discovered that she had extra fluid on her neck that she wasn’t happy with and referred us to the Ulster Hospital for further investigation. In the end, all 5 of us left the clinic in tears – it was awful. It was only 2 weeks since my last scan and there had been no signs of any extra fluid whatsoever and now we were being told that there was a chance that this would end our baby’s life? It was entirely unexpected. I had, and still have, a hard time wrapping my head around it.
We had to wait for an entire week before we could be seen in the Ulster Hospital. Every night that week Michael and I lay in bed and listened to her heartbeat consistently beating at a healthy 160bpm on our Doppler. We were referred to Fetal Medicine and on 12th June our daughter was diagnosed with a large Cystic Hygroma as well as Hydrops, dangerous levels of fluid surrounding her organs. This means that her tiny heart is under immense pressure and is liable to stop at any time.
The Doctor recommended that I have an Amniocentesis Test, a large needle inserted through my tummy and into my uterus to draw out some of the amniotic fluid surrounding Hallie for testing. Two days later I returned for the test, which was pretty grim in all honestly. I’m not the best person for dealing with needles, having only ever having my very first blood test at the age of 29, but what I believe to be Motherly instinct took over – they could have stuck 1000 needles in me and I wouldn’t have flinched because I was doing it for my baby. Michael held my hand throughout, and I squeezed my eyes shut and thought of Hallie.
A week later we got the results – Hallie has a chromosome disorder called Turner Syndrome. We had never heard of Turner’s until this happened to us, of course by now we had Googled every possible outcome for this and had read a little about it in passing. Turner’s is exclusive to females and is caused by an error in the sex chromosomes at conception and affects about 1 in every 2,000 baby girls. A girl with Turner syndrome only has one normal X sex chromosome, rather than the usual two. This chromosome variation happens randomly when the baby is conceived in the womb. It isn't linked to the mother or father’s health or genetics which was a huge relief for us – we didn’t cause this and there’s nothing we could have done to prevent this happening.
Creating a life is no mean feat. Unfortunately, things like this happen a lot; most chromosome issues cause miscarriages long before any testing can be done to confirm the reason. Our Doctor reassures us that this was a fluke and while he can’t confirm that our miscarriage was caused by a similar issue, he says it’s more than likely just two unrelated cases of horrendous bad luck.
The survival figures of Turner’s Syndrome diagnosed in the womb are pretty low and our Doctor's are not overly optimistic about her chances. These survival numbers are mostly due to most couples choosing/being advised to terminate rather than wait around to see if the baby will pass away on its own or survive to term. Turner Syndrome has varying levels of severity that might not be known until after the baby has been born, so every baby that survives to term will have their own unique symptoms. As we live in Northern Ireland, termination is still illegal here, even in the case of fetal abnormalities like Turner’s. We would have to travel to England, undergo surgery, and never get to see or hold our baby – not really something we want to consider. Our options are limited, but tomorrow we have an appointment to discuss next steps. Hopefully Hallie takes any decisions out of our hands, but for now we want to trust that she knows what she’s doing. She’s a fighter and we believe that she is stubborn (like her Mum!) and incredibly strong willed.
Turner’s in itself can be a very liveable condition – there are many women who have normal lives with just aspects of the syndrome affecting them. They are usually slightly smaller in height, they sometimes have slight differences in their appearance and they will occasionally have issues with their heart and other organs. Women with Turner’s will have reproductive issues and may not be able to have children of their own, however, depending on the case, this can be treated and I’ve been contacted by many Turner’s ladies who have had their own babies following hormone treatment. These, are of course, best case scenarios. But in the end, it is the fluid in Hallie’s body that poses the biggest danger to her. For now all we can do is wait and see what happens.
If she has to go, we will understand. We know that there might be a day in the near future where her little heart will stop and I will have to give birth to her. That day will be the hardest day of our lives but we would endure any heartache and pain if it means that Hallie is at peace and that she had the best chance of survival. We have been enjoying her while she is here – taking her to the Zoo, singing her songs (mostly in the shower, Delicate by Taylor Swift is her Jam) and talking to her all the time. Our baby may thankfully never know pain, or sadness, or fear, but she will know love. Our support network has been amazing – we receive texts every day asking how Hallie is doing, we’ve had flowers sent, desserts baked and care packages given. We love when people call down just to hang out – it means everything that Hallie gets to hear all the voices of our loved ones. She is literally surrounded by love, family and friendship all day every day. She’s a lucky girl, despite being so damn unlucky!
At 6 weeks, there wasn’t much to see of course but the heartbeat was visible. I remember crying when I saw it – not howling dramatically, but a few tears definitely escaped! I proudly sent photographs of my basically invisible little Bean to my Mum and my Sister, bless them for pretending to get excited about a little blob of nothing at that point!
Throughout my whole 1st Trimester I spotted on and off. Each time, I would rush to the EPU for an “anxiety scan” as I’d come to call them. In all, I had about 8 scans before my 12 week booking appointment, each time leaving the hospital flapping a scan photo of my ever-growing little Bean. Surpassing the point at which our last baby passed was hard, the entire first 12 weeks were filled with worry and anxiety and tears and tantrums but I really made the effort to look after myself. I took days off work when I was feeling sick and I rested as often as possible. I felt like the world’s most important incubator, I wasn’t going to risk harming my little one for anything.
Our 12 week booking appointment was magical. Michael got to see the baby for the first time and we all laughed at how much she looked like him. She had that classic Archer profile. We left the appointment on a high and rushed to break the news to Michael’s parents. I had 2 more “anxiety scans” after that due to some more spotting, which eventually tailed off the further I got into the 2nd trimester and my confidence was growing. 12 weeks is the magical point, right? When everything is confirmed as fine at 12 weeks you’re basically home free. This is when couples usually announce their pregnancy and start to get excited. And we were no different.
We booked a gender scan for 18 weeks in a private clinic in our home town. It always (and will always) bothered us that we never knew the gender of our first little one before the miscarriage, so we really wanted to learn more about our second pregnancy. We were excited to start bonding! On 5th July we met our Mum’s and my Sister at the Window to the Womb clinic, a bit of a strange place that I wouldn’t necessarily recommend, and had the scan that marked the beginning of disaster. The sonographer was able to confirm that our baby was a little girl, but also discovered that she had extra fluid on her neck that she wasn’t happy with and referred us to the Ulster Hospital for further investigation. In the end, all 5 of us left the clinic in tears – it was awful. It was only 2 weeks since my last scan and there had been no signs of any extra fluid whatsoever and now we were being told that there was a chance that this would end our baby’s life? It was entirely unexpected. I had, and still have, a hard time wrapping my head around it.
We had to wait for an entire week before we could be seen in the Ulster Hospital. Every night that week Michael and I lay in bed and listened to her heartbeat consistently beating at a healthy 160bpm on our Doppler. We were referred to Fetal Medicine and on 12th June our daughter was diagnosed with a large Cystic Hygroma as well as Hydrops, dangerous levels of fluid surrounding her organs. This means that her tiny heart is under immense pressure and is liable to stop at any time.
The Doctor recommended that I have an Amniocentesis Test, a large needle inserted through my tummy and into my uterus to draw out some of the amniotic fluid surrounding Hallie for testing. Two days later I returned for the test, which was pretty grim in all honestly. I’m not the best person for dealing with needles, having only ever having my very first blood test at the age of 29, but what I believe to be Motherly instinct took over – they could have stuck 1000 needles in me and I wouldn’t have flinched because I was doing it for my baby. Michael held my hand throughout, and I squeezed my eyes shut and thought of Hallie.
A week later we got the results – Hallie has a chromosome disorder called Turner Syndrome. We had never heard of Turner’s until this happened to us, of course by now we had Googled every possible outcome for this and had read a little about it in passing. Turner’s is exclusive to females and is caused by an error in the sex chromosomes at conception and affects about 1 in every 2,000 baby girls. A girl with Turner syndrome only has one normal X sex chromosome, rather than the usual two. This chromosome variation happens randomly when the baby is conceived in the womb. It isn't linked to the mother or father’s health or genetics which was a huge relief for us – we didn’t cause this and there’s nothing we could have done to prevent this happening.
Creating a life is no mean feat. Unfortunately, things like this happen a lot; most chromosome issues cause miscarriages long before any testing can be done to confirm the reason. Our Doctor reassures us that this was a fluke and while he can’t confirm that our miscarriage was caused by a similar issue, he says it’s more than likely just two unrelated cases of horrendous bad luck.
The survival figures of Turner’s Syndrome diagnosed in the womb are pretty low and our Doctor's are not overly optimistic about her chances. These survival numbers are mostly due to most couples choosing/being advised to terminate rather than wait around to see if the baby will pass away on its own or survive to term. Turner Syndrome has varying levels of severity that might not be known until after the baby has been born, so every baby that survives to term will have their own unique symptoms. As we live in Northern Ireland, termination is still illegal here, even in the case of fetal abnormalities like Turner’s. We would have to travel to England, undergo surgery, and never get to see or hold our baby – not really something we want to consider. Our options are limited, but tomorrow we have an appointment to discuss next steps. Hopefully Hallie takes any decisions out of our hands, but for now we want to trust that she knows what she’s doing. She’s a fighter and we believe that she is stubborn (like her Mum!) and incredibly strong willed.
Turner’s in itself can be a very liveable condition – there are many women who have normal lives with just aspects of the syndrome affecting them. They are usually slightly smaller in height, they sometimes have slight differences in their appearance and they will occasionally have issues with their heart and other organs. Women with Turner’s will have reproductive issues and may not be able to have children of their own, however, depending on the case, this can be treated and I’ve been contacted by many Turner’s ladies who have had their own babies following hormone treatment. These, are of course, best case scenarios. But in the end, it is the fluid in Hallie’s body that poses the biggest danger to her. For now all we can do is wait and see what happens.
If she has to go, we will understand. We know that there might be a day in the near future where her little heart will stop and I will have to give birth to her. That day will be the hardest day of our lives but we would endure any heartache and pain if it means that Hallie is at peace and that she had the best chance of survival. We have been enjoying her while she is here – taking her to the Zoo, singing her songs (mostly in the shower, Delicate by Taylor Swift is her Jam) and talking to her all the time. Our baby may thankfully never know pain, or sadness, or fear, but she will know love. Our support network has been amazing – we receive texts every day asking how Hallie is doing, we’ve had flowers sent, desserts baked and care packages given. We love when people call down just to hang out – it means everything that Hallie gets to hear all the voices of our loved ones. She is literally surrounded by love, family and friendship all day every day. She’s a lucky girl, despite being so damn unlucky!
The Lowdown
If you're here, you probably already know our story. But for anyone who might stumble upon this, here's the low down.
My name is Rachel. I've just turned 30 and I live in Northern Ireland with my Husband (Michael), our Cat (Shadow), our Rabbit (Sheldon) and our puppy (Maisie). Michael and I met in 2010, I took off travelling for 6 months and he waited patiently for me to return. We picked up right where we left off and have been inseparable ever since. We were married in New York on Christmas Eve 2015 and decided to start a family in the summer of 2017.
We were delighted to fall pregnant very quickly and got our two pink lines in August 2017. We affectionately referred to our little baby as Bean and excitedly tracked his/her growth on every website and app we could get our hands on. However, the day before my 12 week scan I suffered a miscarriage. Baby only measured between 8 & 9 weeks - our baby's heart had stopped weeks before there were any signs. A Missed, or Silent Miscarriage.
We decided to try again after New Year's and again, fell pregnant the first month of trying. We were super cautious, keeping the secret close to our chest for the first while. But everything was great, we passed all our scans and appointments with flying colours and began to relax and tell people about our Baby.
On 5th June we had a private Gender Scan that revealed extra fluid on our baby girl's neck and we were referred to the Ulster Hospital for further investigations. On 12th June our baby was diagnosed with a large Cystic Hygroma on her neck and Fetal Hydrops, dangerous levels of fluid around her tiny organs. I underwent an Amniocentesis on 14th June and one week later the results revealed that our girl had Turner Syndrome. The expectation was that her heart would stop at any moment and she would be delivered after she had passed away. I began this blog at 21 weeks pregnant, just 3 weeks before we eventually lost our daughter.
Hallie Archer was born at 11.25pm on the 16th of July 2018 by Emergency C-section after I went into preterm labour. Hallie was born alive and she stayed with us for 3 miraculous hours before passing away in our arms at 2.30am on 17th July 2018. We miss her every single second of every day.
I decided to track our journey for personal reasons, yes, but also in the hope that someone else facing a similar diagnosis will stumble upon this blog while Googling (The Google addiction is real) and will find me, and know that they are not alone.
With love,
Rachel
My name is Rachel. I've just turned 30 and I live in Northern Ireland with my Husband (Michael), our Cat (Shadow), our Rabbit (Sheldon) and our puppy (Maisie). Michael and I met in 2010, I took off travelling for 6 months and he waited patiently for me to return. We picked up right where we left off and have been inseparable ever since. We were married in New York on Christmas Eve 2015 and decided to start a family in the summer of 2017.
We were delighted to fall pregnant very quickly and got our two pink lines in August 2017. We affectionately referred to our little baby as Bean and excitedly tracked his/her growth on every website and app we could get our hands on. However, the day before my 12 week scan I suffered a miscarriage. Baby only measured between 8 & 9 weeks - our baby's heart had stopped weeks before there were any signs. A Missed, or Silent Miscarriage.
We decided to try again after New Year's and again, fell pregnant the first month of trying. We were super cautious, keeping the secret close to our chest for the first while. But everything was great, we passed all our scans and appointments with flying colours and began to relax and tell people about our Baby.
On 5th June we had a private Gender Scan that revealed extra fluid on our baby girl's neck and we were referred to the Ulster Hospital for further investigations. On 12th June our baby was diagnosed with a large Cystic Hygroma on her neck and Fetal Hydrops, dangerous levels of fluid around her tiny organs. I underwent an Amniocentesis on 14th June and one week later the results revealed that our girl had Turner Syndrome. The expectation was that her heart would stop at any moment and she would be delivered after she had passed away. I began this blog at 21 weeks pregnant, just 3 weeks before we eventually lost our daughter.
Hallie Archer was born at 11.25pm on the 16th of July 2018 by Emergency C-section after I went into preterm labour. Hallie was born alive and she stayed with us for 3 miraculous hours before passing away in our arms at 2.30am on 17th July 2018. We miss her every single second of every day.
I decided to track our journey for personal reasons, yes, but also in the hope that someone else facing a similar diagnosis will stumble upon this blog while Googling (The Google addiction is real) and will find me, and know that they are not alone.
With love,
Rachel
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