“Our baby was anencephaly.”- Records of 5 Days Wrapped with Conflicts and Impression -



“As I have something important to tell you,
make sure you can take a phone.”
My wife, Hana, texted me.

It was lunch time. I was about to open a wrapping of chicken crisp in the shop.
“Well then, that was true.” I deeply sighed in my heart.

 Indeed, Hana was worried before going to the hospital.
“The stomach should be a little bigger now.
I’m worried whether it has properly been raised.”
Since about 1 month ago, she told me like that several times.

 Yet, she gets anxiety easily
as she concerns about things too much.

Honestly, I didn’t care too much.
To be precise, it had been trying not to care.





Wife’s July 7
As it has no brain, it can’t liven even being born.

Pregnancy 14th week. As usually, I went to obstetrics and gynecology at 10:30.
Normal blood pressure, body weight 900g increased.
Alright. Not yet to plus 1kg.

“Bring a USB next time.
I can give you a video of the baby.”

OK. I’m sure to bring it next time.

The echo has begun.

Wow, the heart is beating!
I was relieved.

Silence.
Silence.
Silence.


What’s wrong?
At the time of Sotaro, my first son,
There was a normal conversation, such as
“These are feet and these are hands.”
“This is the face.”
“Not, it is ○○cm high.”


 “Oh, this is the heart, isn’t it?”


Ignored.


What? Ignored?
In addition, she was looking at the video while cocking her head.


Is something wrong?
Is that why she’s not talking at all?


Then,
“H,How it going? Is the morning sickness lighter now?”
She talked to me awkward.
“Not at all! I vomited also last week. That was painful.”

 “O,Oh… Didn’t you catch a cold?”
“A cold? Probably not.”


Silence
Silence.


“How’s your family? Didn’t anybody catch a cold”
“No, nobody.”


Silence.
Silence.


“Well, your elder child. Is he 5 years old now?”
“Yeah.”


“How about him? Did he catch a cold?”
“? No, he didn’t.”


Silence.
Why does she ask
if anybody catch a cold this much?
Is it important?
I was so anxious.


It’s taking too long.
The echo is too long.


“Well. Ok…Well…Well.
Later, the doctor will talk to you.
Please wait at the waiting room.”


With this serious intonation,
I wanted to ask
“What happened?”
But I couldn’t as I felt something wrong.


After all, I waited at a waiting room
without given an echo photo, which I usually get.
I waited more than 1 hour.


People who came later go home one and after.
Well,
is it in purpose to let me wait so that to be the last?


“Mrs. Handa!”


Finally, I was called and about to go to the examination room.
A nurse asked me, “Did you come here alone today?”


Definitely it’s wrong. This question is wrong.
Having my heart beating, I opened the door of the examination room.


There were many echo photos inside.
A doctor and 5 nurses were seriously discussing
in low voices.


What is going on?
Inside my head was white out.
It was more than heart beating.


Although I sit on a chair, nobody talks to me.


Finally, a nurse talked to me.
“Are you here alone today? Nobody with you?”
She asked me so again.
I could understand that the situation is very serious.


Finally, the doctor talked.
“I want to check from inside.
Please lay down on the examination table.”


“What is going on?”
Finally, I could ask with my voice trembling.


“Well. Then, well.
Let me check the position of the placenta.”


I couldn’t see the echo image, being scared somehow.
Moreover,
I was so worried about the doctors’ low tone voices.


Well, it’s sure something.
This is that.
That’s why that.
I cannot listen to the contents but sounded too serious.


Even after the examination,
I cannot put my underwear well, having my legs trembling.


I sat in front of the doctor again.


 “Well, here is an echo today.”


My heart hurts.
Just I think something is said from now,
it is likely to cause hyperventilation.


“Can you see this? The underparts are black, aren’t they?
Here is the bottom of the head, and here’s the back,
can you see the bottom of the back is also black?”


“Yeah.”


“This means the baby is swollen.”
As I have no knowledge, I cannot oversee the conversation.


“Then, here, this is the back of the head.
Compared to the size of the body,
the size of the head is a little smaller.
That means, the back of the head has not grown.”


“What?”


“I couldn’t see it
at the last echo.
Well… In short, it has no brain.”


 “What!?”


“It’s called anencephalic fetus.
This happens rarely.
Although it can alive in the mother's belly,
it cannot live even born because it has no brain.
We have no treatment to do at this stage.”


Although it can alive in the mother's belly,
it cannot live even born because it has no brain.



I can’t understand at all.
I can’t summarize at all.


 “Wh, what? What can I do then?”


“You’re in the 14th week of pregnant, are you?
Then, in the case of pregnancy 12th weeks or later,
We cannot help but give the baby
as in the same way of a normal birth.
It means, abortion.”


 “Abortion!?”


“Well… Anencephalic fetus,
only there is no brain, the body really grows up normally.
It also has perfect eyes.
The heart also beats properly.
So there is no other way to say but abortion.
Given the risk of maternal,
It is demanded to get a mid-term abortion by the Maternal Protection Law.


The doctor told me very apologetic.


In an article, which I looked up later,
“In general, it is rare that
doctors recommend abortion.
However, only in the case of anencephaly,
It is the only case that doctors encourage abortion.
Anencephaly is
that much desperate disease.” It said like that.


I can’t organize my head at all.
My mind is not caught up with the reality.
The first place, I have not been able to completely understand the current situation.


“Then, decided the day to be hospitalized at the back room."
I was taken to another room.


I think dazed alone.


But, I had no idea what to think at all.
So eventually I was sitting without thinking anything.


Although I go back to the reception, nobody was there.


I wait dazed, payed money, and went back to the car.
Then, I immediately made a phone call to my husband, Naoto.


At the moment I heard the voice, I was crying.
Even if I thought I had to speak,
for now, only tears accumulated and flew all.




Husband’s July 7
There is no reason.




“As I have something important to tell you,
make sure you can take a phone.”
My wife, Hana, texted me.


It was lunch time. I was about to open a wrapping of chicken crisp in the shop.

After a few minutes, the phone rang.
Of course, Hana was crying.
I heard the entire story.


I didn’t say anything, or I couldn’t.
"Yeah, yeah," I was just nodding.


After that, “I see. I’ll go home soon.”
I think I just said so in low tone.


I had no appetite anymore.
I went back to the company and told the situation,
and went home early.


It took about 45 minutes by a car to home.
Anyway, I thought various things.


What was wrong?
What if, what that?
I thought about meaninglessly.


Then, I remembered a story that I heard.


“This is about a Zen story at a temple.
When I was hit at the first time, I considered that the body had moved.
However, after beaten many times,
People start to think that
“Maybe this is because I did something wrong in the past.”

“This means that when human beings confront an incidence,
which they cannot understand nor convince,
they force themselves to create a reason
to protect a balance of mind.”


I thought this was exactly what I was at.


Surely, there is no reason.
Nobody’s wrong.
It’s just happened in real.


This is just like that. I received in that way.


I have to support Hana from now on.


I have no time to be depressed.


When I went home, it was a time
to pick up Sotaro at a nursery.


Hana asked me
to pick him up alone.
“I don’t know what kind of face I should make.” She said.
But I rejected it.
Sotaro will be worried about it. You cannot run away there.


She was convinced straight.
We went to pick him up together.


As it was our first time to pick him up together,
Sotaro was smiling so happily.


At the end, children’s innocent smile heals us.
We have Sotaro.


Only with the fact, I thought we are blessed.
Even if we had not him and alone,
we will sink forever.


At night, I looked up a little about anencephaly.
On the net, it said that the probability is even more than 1 in thousands,
it was 1 in a thousand.
Sincerely I thought it couldn’t be true. It was too much.


This feeling is not like “not anything unusual."
It sounded like my feeling was put away cheaply and could not been satisfied.


Hana kept looking up about anencephaly on a mobile phone
as if obsessed.


A little, even only a little bit,
she was looking for a “medicine”
to dissolve this choking feeling and anxiety.




Husband’s July 8
Sotaro shouted to the sky.




Originally we had
a so-called "pardoned marriage."
However, since before pregnancy was noticed,
we were taking a quote at a wedding hall,
although it was a “sudden” pregnancy,
it was not an "unwilling" pardoned marriage.


We started dating January 2008. Got married 10 months after that.
In May in the next year, our first boy, Sotaro, was born.
This story is about the incident after 5 years and 2 months from the first birth.


Today, at the obstetrics and gynecology,
we receive “description of medical condition to the family.”
We went to the hospital at the designated time.
Of course, Hana was depressed.


I may looked calm like almost cold-heart,
as I could organize my feeling to accept
until I came home yesterday.


At the obstetrics and gynecology, we were not called for a long time.
Finally, I was annoyed.
I thought that it will run out of business if this is a service industry.


At last after 2 hours, the explanation started.


A director, whose personality is good but clumsy,
explained in a roundabout way while using the mind.


Honestly, it doesn’t enter my head.

Gradually he could not summarize the description, so ended like that.
“Well…
Anyway, it means that it has not brain.”


An airplane keeps swirling in the sky before landing,
after all, it lands in in schuss.
It was like that.


Then a midwife, Kato, appeared.
She pushed away the director.
She is a charismatic midwife, called "God Hand."


Her words were so strong that reliance was overflowing.
"It can’t be helped this time!"
She looks at my eyes and predicated to me.


A lot of happy tears, vexation,
tears of guilt, she had touched.
That’s why her words had “thickness.”


Surely, these strong words are also Kato’s
“treatment.”




Wife’s July 8
“He went back to the sky to catch something forget.”




Further, Kato told me this.


“I think that the mother
does not need to leave it visually.


Instead,
the father must see the baby.
I think, this is the way.


The mother must keep going on!
If she leave it visually,
she will keep having it forever
and cannot move on to the next pregnancy.”


She accepted me
that was anxious and had strong fear
without any brave to meet the baby. I cried.


I asked her
how we can tell Sotaro about this.


“A world of a 5-year-old child
is like a fantasy world.
Just tell him with fantasy words!
Tell him that the baby went back to the sky.
That’s all good.”


I couldn’t think of even such a simple thing.


I was about to tell him,
“The baby is dead.”


About hospital,
Naoto considered my mental burden,
so I decided to stay at the hospital in that week.


I went to pick up Sotaro.


On the way back home from the nursery,
Sotaro asked me happily,
“You went to the hospital today, doncha?
How was the baby?”


I was almost crying only by that.
I was full of thinking, “I’m sorry, Sotaro.”
“I’ll tell you when we get home.”
I said so and tried not to cry.


When went home,
I let Sotaro sit in front of me.
I started to talking, “The baby…”
Tears came flowing after all.


“What happened?”


“The baby forgot something.
That’s why he went back to the sky
to pick up the thing.”


“What did he forget?”


“Well, we don’t know.
That’s even the doctor doesn’t know.”


“So then, the baby’s not in Hana’s belly anymore?”


“Right.”




Rattling.




Sotaro suddenly opened the window
and went out to the balcony.




“Is the baby already in this sky?”


“Yes, it is.”


Then, Sotaro, who has shy personality,
cried out to the sky.






“Baaaaabyyyyy!!




Come back sooooooooon!!”





I couldn’t stand crying
with this pureness.


I notice Sotaro came back to the room,
and hugged, saying, “Thank you.”


Sotaro
asked me curiously,
“Why are you crying?”


Because Sotaro was
so looking for the baby,
I was so sorry
for him.


Then, I was thankful for him to tell our family’s thoughts.
Sotaro has already been an elder brother.
The fact made me so happy.


It was good to have Mrs. Kato’s advice.
I was also saved by the fantasy anyhow.


I could think honestly
that the baby really just went back temporally
to pick up something forget and will come back someday.


I talked to Naoto a lot at night.
I am shamed now
but I could think of only negative thoughts.
I told him all of them.


Naoto always tell me,
“I don’t think so.”
“That’s not true.”
and change may thoughts.
This helps me a lot.


Although Mrs. Kato allowed me not to meet the baby,
is it really so?
I was still worried about it.


I looked up about it on the net so much.


I wanted read articles that says like,
“although I experienced medium-term abortion,
I didn’t meet the baby. And it was all right.”


But I couldn’t find anything like that at all.


I could find thousands of articles, saying;
I was happy to meet it.
It was really pretty.


If I meet it and think even a little
“scary” “disgusting,”
I will never get over it as a parent.
I’m scared.


Isn’t it so cruel
to force to take out the baby with a medicine
even though it is still alive?
I feel so depressed like going down to the dark.


At the examination in the last month,
It was lively moving its legs like a dog paddle.
I saw it on an echo.
It was way too cute. I laughed.


What kind of thought should I have and prepare to the birth?
I thought about it many times but could not find the answer.


I told all my thoughts to Naoto.


“Only we can do is to accept the fact and go forward.
If you keep saying “sorry, sorry,”not only you cannot be helped,
but the baby also will think “sorry.”
The baby must wat to hear “thank you”
instead of “sorry.”
I want to say it “thank you” when I meet it
and “you have done well. See you soon.”
That’s what I want to tell it.”


He told me so and the words stuck on my heart. I cried.
I was so miserable that I was thinking linger.


Thank you for coming to me to become our family.
Thank you for your try to live.
That’s all right.
My feeling was slightly raised.




Husband’s July 9
From a husband, who supports the wife, to “a man”



On the 3rd day, I went to the company.
The week was the first and the last normal attendance.


Yet, as soon as I got into a car toward the company,
An illusion, such as shift changing, occurred.


That was exactly shift changing.
I became alone after a while,
I think I returned to “a man”
from a husband, who supports the wife.


Lethargy, malaise. heavy.
I muttered several times, “painful.”


When I noticed,
I was thinking again;
"I wonder what went wrong."
"Why this happened?"


I had decided
to thank to being alive now
not to think of not being able to live.


It seems like a lie that
I told Hana yesterday.


Wife’s July 9
“I still want to meet it.”



In the evening of the day,
I searched on the net a lot,
how much mid-term abortion hurts.


I read so much that I could say,
I read through all the information!


As expected, it seemed painful, painful, and painful.
I couldn’t find any information
which gives me relief.
It was anything no.


On the day before hospitalized,
I started to think strongly
that I should meet the baby after all.


But I still had fear
so decided to image search with “anencephaly”
as a training to meet my baby.


OK. I watched.
I could watch firmly.


Why can’t I watch my baby
although I could see somebody else’s baby!


Still, what if
I couldn’t think it “pretty”
when I see it?
I get anxious.


I decide.


I get anxious.


I repeated them endlessly.


I couldn’t have confident on my thoughts and feelings when I see it.


But when I think of a baby, which cannot be seen even its face by its parents,
I am depressed how terrible the parent is.


I consulted with Naoto.


“I definitely meet it.
I’m even looking forward to meeting it.
If I were Hana, I’ll meet it.
Yet, as Mrs. Kato says,
I think it’s not wrong that you don’t meet it.
After experiencing various things,
she gave her opinion that
there is no need to remember it visually to keep going on.
I think that is also correct.
Yet, either way you choose,
do not regret.
Although you want to see it after that,
you can never see it again.”


Although I have anxiety, to be honest,
I also want to meet my own baby.


All right.
I’ve decided.


I’ll meet it.


After I tell her Mrs. Kato tomorrow,
if she still tell me not to meet it,
I will not meet it if I was convinced by her opinion.
But if I still want to see it, I’ll meet it honestly.


I’m somehow refreshed.
The only problem left is if I can accept the pain.



Husband’s July 11 AM5:30
“I’ve met a fairy.”



As I forgot to close curtains,
I was awakened at 5:30am.


One day after the first day of hospitalization, when a typhoon struck,
it's wonderfully good weather only to such a day.


Finally, Hana is to give birth.
Finally, we can meet the baby.
Finally, we say farewell to the baby.




Wife’s July 11, 8;30am
“I’ve met a fairy.”



Mrs. Kato came.
I was explained the flow of the day.

 Immediately, I told Mrs. Kato,
"After all, I want to meet the baby."
I tried to say.


 “Of course you want to meet. Because you’re a mom!”
She told me kind.


Mrs. Kato said,
"Although we are familiar with them at work,
ordinary people will see it for the first time.
So, first the father meets it,
and he determines whether to meet the mother.”
She told me so.


“I’ll meet it.”


I told Naoto so.




Husband’s July 11, 9:00am
“I’ve met a fairy.”





At 9:00am, I went to a labor room.
I felt nostalgia.


5 years ago, when Hana gave a birth of Sotaro,
I thought it was like a torture room.


Being confined to a narrow room,
I kept hearing the “death throes cry" of my wife for hours here.


When a dinner served,
I even thought “No way. No kidding.”


5 years since then.
Although I do not writhe in agony as much as that time,
it was still “torture room” in a different sense.


I can meet the baby soon.


When I thought so,
I practiced again.


In fact, I could understand
that Hana says
“I’m scared of meeting the baby.”


Yet, do not get it wrong.
It’s not a fear like seeing ghosts and monsters.


At the moment to see the baby,
only a slight moment, only a slight moment,
I may think, “gross.”
“myself,” that what I am scared of.


In the head, such as alien,
I imagined a drawing of my baby like a frog,
I got prepared in my mind again.

I’m alright.
I can accept any shape of my baby.




4 hours after entering the room. They told us “the time.”




 “We will move to the labor room.”




It is similar to the feeling before a live of a band,
going to a stage from a waiting room.


“Ready to war.”
“The only thing left is to do.”


“Fuuuu”
I breathed deeply,
and proudly, enter the delivery room.


5 years ago, I was just an "uncomfortable guest,"
but now, I’m pretty sturdy now.
I waited for that time.




Hana pushed down.


You can do it.


Almost there.


It will end soon.




We can get easier after this.




Husband’s July 11, 1:09pm




“11cm, 65g.”

On 1:09pm. “He” was born.


“Firs, father, meet him.”
I was guided to the next room divided with curtains.


The baby was covered with gauze
on a stainless tray.


A midwife turned it over slowly.


Honestly, I was surprised.




There was no thing on my head,
no alien,
no frog.







He was beautiful.






He was a tiny little boy
with a pretty face.




Surely,
de did not have a head
like cut with a sharp knife,
his nose is through,
and he really looked like me.




As I had prepared various things,
the yarn of tension was also probably expired.




Tears overflew and did not stop.




I had been thinking to tell him
“thank you” and “see you”
when I see him.




I was just moved.




Hana already was crying out.




Wife’s July 11, 1:09am
“I’ve met a fairy.”



Naoto finally met his son at the next room.


“Pretty! So pretty!”


“I’m moved!”


I heard his voice.
I also wanted to see him so much.


It seemed funny that
I had been scared to see him in these days.
I just thought,
I want to meet him anyhow!!


It is nothing different than the time of birth of Sotaro.


With totally the same feeling at Sotaro,
I wanted to meet him soon.


When Mrs. Kato asked,
“What will you do? Do you want to see him?”
I answered without hesitation.


I told her, “I want to meet him!”


Naoto came back.


He was crying.


But he told me it was a tear of impression.


“He’s so pretty.
So pretty that you’ll be moved!”
He was crying so much.


I also started to cry, even before meeting him.


I finally meet the baby.


In a small box with gauze,
he was sleeping.




I felt like that I met something so valuable.


Later, Naoto says,
“I’ve met a fairy.”
That’s exactly true.


He’s a fairy.


Although he is so small,
He looks like Naoto,
surprisingly and exactly same.


Having various feelings overflowing,
I cried the most among these few days.


He was so pretty
that I wanted to bare him normally
I thought so after all.


The baby looked so well with Naoto.
If he were born safely,
Naoto must have been happy.



Husband’s July 11, 1:09pm


I cannot stop complaining, if being greedy.

If I want luxury,
I wanted to live with him together.


But as it cannot come true,
I feel like watching something very mysterious
with my eyes.


Normally, we can never meet it.
It is a secret and limited meeting.


“I’ve met a fairy.”


I thought so.


I want to see him again.


That’s why I definitely call you back
to this world.


Although you have a different face,
or different gender at that time,




the baby is absolutely you.




Epilogue





Also 5 years ago and at the pregnancy in this year,
I told Hana.


“When you bare a child,
we have to prepare to accept any child.


Although I stopped anymore, I was playing a band in my twenties.


About 10 years ago. The meaning is a little different,
I made a song, which gives me so much impact when I read now.


Maybe then, from that time,
I may have been prepared for today.









Water Fairy




Almost there. Almost.
Until finishing winding this fate.
I’ve been waiting so long.
Finally, this is my turn.

A person, who was supposed to become a father,
he just lost words.
A person, who was supposed to become a mother,
she just kept crying.

What does this life give me
and what does it charge me?
I want be born even in unfortunate fate.


Even though I were a undesired child,
Even though I was not loved by it,
Even though I was not blessed,
I want to be born and I want to live.


A person, who was supposed to become a father,
he just sighed.
A person, who was supposed to become a mother,
she just kept crying.


What does this life give me
and what does it charge me?
I want be born even in unfortunate fate.


For example, even if the appearance is ugly.
Even if I was born with disease.
Even if I was not blessed with five-body satisfaction.

That’s right. Even if I cannot understand anymore if I live or not.
Even if I cannot even feel enough.
I want to be born and I want to live.

Please, I’ll behave myself.
I won’t be greedy.
Please, I’ll behave myself.
I want to be born and I want to live.

I hope, someday, you will say,
“I’m happy for baring you.”
With a gentle voice, I hope you will say,
“I’m happy.”

Be in love, make friends, and go on an adventure.
Get hurt, betrayed, but again believe in people.

I’ve been waiting for a long time.
So do not kill me.






As we wrote above, Hana was also helped by lots of articles and experiences on the Internet.
If we can be a little help for people who are worrying in the same circumstances or close situations, we will be happy.


0 件のコメント: