Over the past week depression has started attempting to creep back into my life. The challenge of being a single father with a work from home job has started to once again feel overwhelming. As I work to break out of what could be a very dangerous cycle two thoughts keep popping up that I have read over the last little while in this magazine. The first is that 90% of marriages end in divorce after a stillbirth. The second is the importance of acceptance as an important part of the grieving process. While the accuracy and meaning of the statistics are open for debate, they were very real for me.
From the moment my wife Rachel called me to come home because the pregnancy test was positive until the doctors confirmed our daughter Gabi had no heart beat at 32 weeks, I didn’t have the slightest fear that the pregnancy could go wrong. Rachel had devoted her life to maintaining the natural pregnancy that we thought could never happen. The shattering of her hopes and dreams were devastating. The cause of death being a true knot in the umbilical cord didn’t bring any comfort when it came to the emotions of guilt and blame. The nightmare had begun.
That night, I went home while a family member stayed with Rachel. In the middle of that night, that family member stopped a nurse from giving Rachel morphine which she had previously had an allergic reaction. Shortly before Rachel’s death she told me that she had known she was getting morphine and had chosen to be silent.
Our other daughter Channah had spent the night with friends. I went home for the night so I could take care of important tasks in the morning. I went to Channah’s school to tell the councillor what had happened and to make sure Channah would be taken care of. I rented a car, for the many trips back and forth to the hospital over the couple of days before Rachel could come home. Rachel was upset that she would not be able to attend one of the two major milestones of the Grade 1 year. I attended on my own and had a friend arrange for a professional photographer, so Rachel could watch it afterwards.
That night I was home all by myself. I cried. I screamed. How could this happen? Then I made a decision that would change my life forever. I realized that my family needed me. I needed to be strong and carry the weight of what I knew were going to be very dark days. I knew the emotional roller coaster of accepting that our family would remain the 3 of us followed by a surprise pregnancy with such a tragic ending would be more than Rachel could handle on her own.
Depression is an emotional roller coaster. The downward spirals feel like they are never going to end. On the ups you either forget things are going to crash again making them harder or you can’t enjoy them knowing the crash was coming. In order to keep Rachel company, I switched from working in my dining room to working in bed most days. There were tons of medical visits between our attempts to battle infertility and the migraines that started during the pregnancy.
The biggest challenge was trying to figure out how seriously to take the downward spirals and sometimes suicide threats. I knew if I called for emergency psychiatric intervention my marriage would be over and I wouldn’t be able to help Rachel. If I didn’t make the call her life could be in danger. I remember vividly one day where I thought she was on an upswing and I had a meeting to attend. She told me if I went to the meeting she might not be alive when I got back. I stayed home. There were many nights I just stayed up until I knew she was safely asleep and not in harm’s way.
There were people who were amazing support networks. There were people who went on with their own lives. Some of those people felt the only solution was to tell Rachel to get better. If only she cleansed herself of the medication she was taking everything would be OK. Those people didn’t understand what Rachel was going through at all. She felt like they had abandoned her, which just added to the cycle of depression.
Infertility is a common biblical theme. Rachel turned to her husband Jacob “Give me children, if not I am dead.” (Genesis 30:1). My Rachel couldn’t live with the loss of Gabi. For two weeks she was on an up swing while she put her life in order. Then one night she went to sleep and didn’t wake up. I know deep down that if she accepted the Gabi’s death she would have lived. She couldn’t and the only thing she could do was return to the world where she could look after Gabi. Some people have questioned why I didn’t do more. The simple answer is there wasn’t anything more I could have done. Her life ended peacefully in her bed with the knowledge her family would be taken care of and the words “Thank You Jason” as her last words. I believe this was the only way she could accept Gabi’s death.
Sarah K Reece says
My heart breaks for you. Our little one was due today. Thankyou for sharing your story with us.