Safety Manual and Guarantee

I don’t mind admitting that I have been having a few little breakdowns to close friends and a professional midwife. I am sure on the whole some of my anxiety is normal at this stage in pregnancy and with the realities of bringing them home being so close.

However I know for a fact that lots of my anxiety is increased due to the loss of all our babies but in particular Kora and Ava as we reached second trimester and its all we have for reference further along in a pregnancy.

Neil and I undertook an online antenatal course. We have done a few with the same midwife and her company and have found them to be very useful especially in the pandemic. This course was in relation to practical parenting and included safe sleeping, cord clamping, delivery of placenta, jaundice, poo and more.

I guess I had already been feeling anxious in many ways in relation to our twins and have been very self aware of this. Some of my fears are very rational in relation to our experiences and circumstances. I know that twin movements reduce the further you progress in the pregnancy as they basically run out of room.

Although I am aware of this fact it has become difficult to trust my instincts that the movement is reduced due to lack of room rather than a sign that something isn’t right. It doesn’t help that recently there has been an advert on the TV and radio that highlights the babies movements and expresses how important it is to seek advice if the movements change.

I have also mentioned previously that it is significantly more difficult being parents that have cremated their babies as we are around groups and people who have experienced similar. Recently every post on the support group has been a loss over 30 weeks of pregnancy.

As much as people have wonderful intentions when they express to us that the statistics are low or the chances of this happening to us is slim, it is not advice or useful for me to hear. We have lived in every pregnancy in the very low or rare statistics. Our babies are healthy and have had no reason for their hearts to stop but it happened.

One of my closet friends delivered her baby at 39 weeks pregnant. She had felt her baby move but noticed the movement had decreased or changed. She went to the hospital and they checked her babies heartbeat and she was sent home. The next day her instincts still said that something wasn’t right and movement was reduced. By the time she was seen at hospital the next day her babies heart had stopped.

1 in 250 babies are born sleeping (still birth). It’s a fact and it happens. It happens at different stages of pregnancy. It doesn’t mean that it will happen to you or me but it can happen. Maybe if Neil and I hadn’t been through all we have it would be a fact I could just be aware of and not one that haunts me but unfortunately this is not the case.

It’s similar to sleeping on your back. I have raised this previously and mentioned that research shows that you are more likely to have a sleeping baby (still birth) if you sleep on your back so NHS advice is to encourage pregnant woman to sleep ideally on their left side.

I have done this from the first trimester even though guidance states it is more important from the late second to third trimester. However when I wake up and I have somehow managed to turn on my back, I am instantly swarmed with anxiety.

How long have i been on my back? When was the last time I felt them move? I then can’t sleep (no matter what time it is) until I feel both babies move. I lie there in bed holding my belly hoping and wishing that they will move even if it is the smallest of movements. I need to know they are safe and well.

The course on practical parenting discussed the guidance on babies sleeping positions and what is best to avoid sudden infant death syndrome (cot death). The guidance has obviously changed over the years as research has developed.

Neil and the midwife had conversations in relation to their children and how they would allow the babies to sleep almost anywhere and they are now adults. Yet evidence indicates now that the babies should not sleep on their stomachs, be scrunched up in a bouncy chair or car seat. Travelling with the babies when they fall asleep in the car seat the recommendation is to take breaks and wake the babies.

The midwife was very good about relating the risks to practical parenting and weighing up those risks with the guidance and your home life. However she was also speaking with experience as her nephew died from sudden infant death syndrome.

I guess from my perspective it was the first time I had considered keeping them alive outside of my womb. I have been so anxious about bringing them home that I had not thought much about safety after the birth. I had obviously thought about it as I had booked the course but maybe I had not given enough attention.

As my anxiety was already very heightened this made me reach out and ask to speak to the midwife after the course. She (although very busy) is always happy to support and give her time.

When talking to her about my anxieties and fears she stated something that really resonated. She said that we have been through so much and we are almost at the finish line. She stated that we know that we survived after losing Kora and Ava in the second trimester but we have not made it to this point before. We are in touching distance of bringing them home and the thought of that being taken from us now is unbearable.

I have to agree with her. I wasn’t sure how Neil and I would ever deal with the grief of losing Kora and Ava but we have and do daily. I am still at times overwhelmed with grief and unsure how I will face the routine of the day but I somehow manage it.

I am almost sure that Neil and I would be able to face our biggest fear if it was to happen and somehow we would find a way to cope yet that thought is too unbearable when it enters my head. It crushes my chest and reduces me to floods of tears. I don’t know who I am begging to when I hope and wish to bring them home safe but begging I am.

I am fearful that I don’t have the expertise to keep them alive when I do bring them home and my anxiety is starting to manifest in fear of this. My friends that i talk to who are parents and also Neil himself always tell me it is maternal and instincts. They tell me I will find my way and I will keep them safe.

Maybe as a mother to teenagers and older and in particular with personal experience of seeing how many parents have not been able for whatever reason, I worry its not as instinctive as people state.

I have sat beside a teenager(s) who has continuously self harmed and tried to take their own life due to their past and background. I have been that motherly figure during those harrowing times. I have listened, held and wiped away the tears of the child in my arms when they are heartbroken over their mother or fathers parenting.

I know that I am human and I know that I will not be perfect and I will make mistakes. I already have made mistakes in relation to all the children I have parented. I know that they are all still alive and that ultimately on the whole I have done most things right and to the best of my ability.

Yet the babies I have carried in my womb I have nurtured and loved from the moment I have seen those two lines. I have done everything that is recommended in relation to eating healthy, not drinking or smoking, taking the correct vitamins etc. However we have lost them all at varying stages and in different ways.

I know that there is no safety manual and that all of our loses were out of our control and for no medical reason. This is what has made my anxiety so heightened in this pregnancy as I know that just because I feel them move now or saw them on an ultrasound two days ago or heard their beautiful heartbeats, there is no guarantee.

Unfortunately you do not get a safety manual or guarantee/warranty. Parenting and pregnancy is by far the hardest thing I have undertaken. I have cursed myself when I have reacted or responded in a way that has escalated a situation or hurt someone I love.

We have stood shoulder to shoulder looking at the little white coffin instead of bringing our babies home. We have seen the heartbeats only to have another scan and be looking at the screen where the fluttering has stopped.

I just hope that somehow we find the strength to make it through these final weeks with our anxieties at a more rational level and that ultimately I will (as said before) get that photo of Neil with the two car seats leaving the hospital with our beautiful twins.

I hope then that the people around me will support me and that I am blessed with natural motherly instincts and able to meet the needs of my twins, Alissa (foster daughter) and Amy (step daughter). I don’t want to win any awards I just want to do the best I possibly can and hope that the love I have for all of them is blessed with the knowledge and skills to fulfil my motherly role.