I have had a Csection twice before.
They told me it will hurt more this time. Because the pain is the same. But there is no baby to bring joy between bursts of pain. A Csection without a baby has to be one of life's cruelest things.
But the punches keep coming. First your milk comes in to feed that baby that's gone. Its incredibly painful as you wish away the thing that would have given your baby life.
Your body wakes up all night. Because its designed to wake up for a baby, and care for it. But you wake up to more emptiness.
These things your body does automatically. Instinctually. As a mother.
But mine is only doing the after. It didn't give me the baby I was carrying all those months. That needed these things. Now I do them alone.
I went to my OB's office yesterday. I was led in through a side door, as a kindness to avoid all the other happy mothers. Maybe for me, maybe for them. I talked to my OB who kept repeating how rare it was, that she was PERFECT. Healthy and thriving, that most babies can survive and abruption. But mine was severe, and mine was hidden, and mine left her no chance.
I think it makes it worse to know she was completely healthy. It hurts to know she could have lived if I had just shown a sign of bleeding and got her out in time. Had I not been used to being so sick, this pregnancy, and thought of how sick to my stomach I was. It hurts to have held a perfectly developed baby in your arms, but who's skin has turned blue.
So I sit in my OB's office, they prescribe me anti-depressents and sleep aids. They tell us we can try again. But they cant guarantee it wont happen again. They will do more tests. They will watch so carefully. Its incredibly rare for it to happen again. But then, it was incredibly rare what happened. That I will be the case they remember.
The story no one forgets.