1. I grieve over not holding my Joey. I wish that the nurses were persistent on asking me to hold Joey but I don't know if that still would've made a difference. At the support group, we discussed what if the nurses held our babies - could that have made the difference? I think it would have...I wanted to tell the nurses that I was scared and that I needed their support just to look at my child. My arms ache for her and sometimes guilt overwhelms me.
2. I wish that we handled Joey's body rather than accepting the hospital's service. It is funny how everything was a blur for us and we feel like we were not in our "right mind." I was talking normal and emotionally I felt numb. We didn't know that funerals could be affordable and we just signed the papers that the chaplain gave us. The hospital offered to cremate her but I didn't know the right questions to ask. Would they allow us to spread the ashes? How soon would the memorial be held? Nothing afterwards went our way... I called the chaplains couple days later to retrieve Joey's ashes out of regret and it was too late.
3. Joey was stillborn not miscarried. John and I didn't even know the difference back then with these two terms. Stillborn refers to the loss of babies beginning from 20 to 21 weeks. Stillborn is significant to me not to undermine a valuable baby that is miscarried, but to give Joey the credit for her gestational "milestone" so to speak.
4. The state of Texas gives a certificate for stillborn children. I discovered this through another mom. At first I didn't know what I was going to do with it. The more I thought about it I knew that I needed Joey to be recognized as our child. I filled out the application and sent in my twenty dollars. I grieve that she wasn't acknowledged with a birth or death certificate. As depressing as a death certificate may sound, it would have still validated Joey as a person.
Wow. I'm so glad you are sharing this information, Patty. I can imagine it will be SO helpful for many folks.
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