I can't believe I am joining the ranks of my distinguished fellow bloggers but here goes nothing. This blog starts at the beginning of my journey into motherhood. Shortly after getting married in 1999 I fell pregnant, I had wanted to have a baby so much but the pregnancy that followed was marred with sickness and eventual bed rest from five months in until the day our precious daughter was delivered. Nothing about this pregnancy or birth was conventional, the day finally arrived for the birth as I was scheduled for a induction only to find I had gone into labour naturally anyway, I was hooked up to monitors for baby's heartbeat as she had gone into distress, 24 long hours later and a host of nurses and doctors burst into the room and announced that I would need a emergency c.section, the baby was fine but I wasn't doing so well, before I knew where I was I was lying on the operating table and Lauren was delivered in six minutes flat, it was the longest six minutes of my life and as I lay there listening to her cry and my husband saying its a girl I shook my head in disbelief and pure exhaustion. She was finally here and so my story begins.
Lauren was not a easy baby, in fact she had reflux and cried constantly, she was never out of my arms and had to be rocked for hours to get to sleep. My parents babysat for us one night and when we came back they shoved her into my arms and literally ran from the house as if she was a demon possessed. As time went on the reflux settled and she thrived but still she was constantly in my arms needing attention, I fell into depression and needed help and was promptly marched to the doctor when I ended up banging my head off the wall in frustration and exhaustion. Things got better for me after that but Lauren never gave me a chance, she was so active and walked at ten months, crawling just wasn't for her, she talked early too. She had daddy wrapped around her little finger.
Three years passed by and I had this clingy but beautiful little girl, I didn't want anymore children as she literally had put me off for life but my husband was a only child and he didn't want her to be on her own so I relented and agreed to have another baby, I fell pregnant quickly and allowed myself to get excited all over again, twelve weeks in and I got sick, a very sore throat and cough so I decided to go to the doctor, she confirmed my pregnancy and gave me antibiotics so I went home and went to bed, about a hour later I got up and went to the bathroom with unbearable pain and realised I was losing my precious baby, A emptyness hit me and we rushed to the hospital, as I waited to see the heartbeat on the scan I knew something wasn't right, the doctor looked at me and said 'are you sure of your dates' then I knew there was a problem, I said yes and she said well the scan is showing up at five weeks, a lot of pregnancies fail in the fifth week and there is no heartbeat. A black mist descended over me and I felt I had failed my husband, I kept apologising to him over and over again, how could this happen? We already had one healthy child, what was going on. I was sent home and had a full miscarriage and ended up back in hospital that night with my sister for company. It was her thirthieth birthday and we had lost my baby and her future niece or nephew on that day. Even now when her birthday arrives I descend into despair and wonder about what could have been.