I was wrong

What I'm about to post about might be graphic and disturbing to some. Just a warning.

I posted last night in anger and frustration, before considering that there might be other reasons for someone leaving a baby in a makeshift grave, as was reported on the local news here last night. Soper made a suggestion in the comments section of yesterday's post that I hadn't considered. That "maybe a woman simply found a quiet place in the woods where she could walk by and visit her child whenever she needed to, without having to pay $10k for a cemetary plot".

Turns out that is highly likely exactly what has taken place.

I heard an updated news report today which said that the baby was stillborn at about 20 weeks. That the baby was definitely in a makeshift grave, and had been wrapped fairly well in a white cloth. The police are suggesting that the parent(s) very likely created a place for the child - given that it was in a secluded, serene spot on the ocean.

Now, instead of feeling anger, I'm feeling a profound sadness that yet another family has experienced this loss. We lost our baby boy at around 21 weeks, and were given the choice of labour and delivery or surgery, only because he had lost size in the 18 - 20th weeks. But technically, he was considered a stillbirth.

There were a few considerations when we had to make the choice between these two methods of bringing the body of our baby into the world. One for us was the desire to have some sort of ceremony associated with his presence in our lives. The second was the doctor's suggestion that l&d might result in a more preserved body upon which to conduct pathology and autopsy, which might give us some answers regarding his death. But the same doctor also said it was entirely possible to conduct those same tests should we choose the d&c.

In the end, we chose the d&c, and decided to ask for a baptism to occur in the operating room. We also decided that we would work with our parish priest to facilitate a ceremony that would be meaningful to us. Who knew that the Catholic Church actually has a ceremony for parents of babies that don't make it into the world? I sure didn't. Our parish priest conducted a very touching, personal service for HB and I on Thanksgiving Sunday of all days. It was just the three of us in the church, gathered at the altar, and was very healing for both of us....particularly for my husband. It was particularly touching for us that this priest had been off, dealing with cancer, but he specifically came in to conduct this service for and with us. He has since died of that cancer.

I digressed for a moment there. The day that we had to go to the hospital for the d&c came, and we called ahead to speak to the pastoral team and make arrangements for the baptism to occur. We were not able to contact anyone, and because this felt like the one thing that HB and I could control, we fixated on it. By the time they were prepping me for the OR, we still had not heard back from the pastoral team of the hospital, and in I was wheeled with no promise of a baptism. I, of course, was just a mess going into that OR for all the reasons you can imagine, and this was not helping.

Until a nurse whose name I never even caught spoke to me. She leaned down and said "I understand you wanted a pastoral team member and we weren't able to contact one. Can I help?"

I told her that we desperately wanted our baby baptized before his remains were taken for the autopsy. She told me that she would be honoured to perform that baptism, and asked me what name we had chosen for him. And she held my hand while I counted backward, to drop into the sleep within which they would empty my womb.

And when I awoke, she was the first one there. Again she leaned down and said "I baptised Brodie William". That was it. No embellishment or sweet words. Just the admission of having carried out what was so important to us. And I wept in gratitude for a moment, before the pain that was tearing my heart out resurfaced.

As it turns out, I found out later that what was supposed to have been a simple 20 minute surgery had stretched to 90 minutes for me because my cervix hadn't softened sufficiently. The description I was given later leaves me to believe that there was no "preserved body" upon which to cleanly conduct pathology that survived this surgery. They did carry out the tests, but to no solid avail.

So today I grieve with the mother of this 20 week old baby. And I apologize to her for my angry response yesterday. There is no justice in her world either, and I am ashamed that I never even stopped to consider this possibility.

And I wish now that this baby's grave had not been found, and that the story had never made the news. This poor woman's heart must be breaking all over again today ... as it will for months and years ahead. So I will pray for her, and her baby, and her family.