Reply To: Pregnancy Loss

[Shar]

Been wanting to share in this space for so long & finally got the courage with support & permission from my sister ofcourse. Today is 2 days from what would have been Shaydon’s 2nd birthday 26.08.20, which I was handling well until seeing someone post about their baby’s milestones that i will admit did trigger me & brought on emotions & I ran straight to my notes.

 

I want to start by clarifying I’m not a Mom, but an Aunty to Shaydon Jayce Legacy Campbell.

 

Back in 2020 I use to joke & say that me & my sister was in her pregnancy journey together because we’ve always had a super close bond & during her pregnancy I even asked her to rearrange her bedroom so that she could put Shaydon’s baby crib closer to the door so I’d get to him before I got to her lol.  I couldn’t wait to meet my baby nephew, we were all so excited for his arrival however we weren’t prepared for his untimely death 💔 after 9 months of pregnancy without any issues we lost him due to negligence which I wouldn’t go into detail about.

 

Hopefully this isn’t too all over the place… I often try to hide my emotions & grief from my sister especially because the guilt of knowing I couldn’t do anything about this or I wasn’t allowed to be inside the room to comfort her through this traumatic experience along with not wanting to trigger her or contribute to her pain because of my own grief pains me. ☹️

I often say I am so grateful that I atleast got to hold him, even tho lifeless everything around me stopped & it felt so peaceful & angelic.. but yet so heartbreaking.. like I can’t explain it.

 

Throughout my life I experienced lost & grief before but this one was super different. He was just a precious baby, I could never recover from this, now I can’t even fathom the thought of bringing my own child into this world without worrying about what if the same thing happens to me?  How will I be happy for myself & not feel guilt about how my sister would feel because of her traumatic experience?

When I say it’s so hard to see others even that you are close to with babies, people downplay it, but it is hard, as soon as I see a baby especially newborn I go tru a spiral of different emotions from baby fever & happiness to guilt & sadness altho I am happy for others I always genuinely end up thinking shaydon would of looked so cute in that outfit or I wonder if shaydon would be calm or a cryer…  Now I refuse to hold newborns so that shaydon could always be the last newborn I held..

 

I still get sick to my stomach thinking about how my sister was forced to be alone for most of this experience due to covid restrictions, from contractions to having to go back to the ward & see all those mothers with their healthy, alive babies, imagine her not even being able to hear her baby cry for the first time, not knowing his eye colour, not being able to clean his first pamper, not getting to see if he had any birthmarks ugh… imagine how she feels that she got to see his angelic face but he didn’t get to see his mommy’s beautiful face cause I know how I feel is VERY pale in comparison to my sister.. “you never get over it, you only learn to live with it”

Shaniqua, I’m so sorry that you also had to experience loss, I appreciate your selflessness & empathy & thank you for creating this safe space for us to be vulnerable, because there really is strength in being vulnerable.

 

An update: We also kinda started a garden for shaydon at his gravesite but we want to start over as something (because hopefully not someone) broke Shaydon’s cross but we found some more stuff we can add once we receive the new cross so that we can cut the weeds and refresh it! But I will admit I have been putting off going to his gravesite for so long unfortunately, sometimes I just don’t want to relive those emotions.   But Thank you so much for the idea again & we will continue to keep you & your family in our prayers.  I don’t like the words “stay strong” because grief is exhausting so, stay soft.. ❤️