My Little Girl Angel

By now, you all know I have two sons. I might have had three. Or I might have had a precious little girl in between. A little girl who would have been about 21 years old by now.

When Josh was 1 1/2 years old, I became pregnant again. I shouldn't have. I couldn't have, but I did. I was taking an oral contraceptive. We were just getting on our feet again. Children are expensive. We couldn't afford anymore right then. I was doing my job to prevent that. As I sat in my doctor's office, discussing why I was there. What was going on with my body. Trying to figure it all out, he told me. The pills I was taking, were evidently not strong enough. They had not been effective. And now I was pregnant. Again. I cried. Uncontrollably. We couldn't afford another child. And more than that, we were already having problems. The drinking had already started. My husband's drinking. We didn't need another child. I blamed my doctor and his irresponsibility. I was angry. I blamed a lot of things.

I cried all the way home, and for hours afterward. Was depressed for weeks. Enough time passed. I had gone through the gamut of emotions. I resolved myself to accept this gift. Operating on the premise, as I always have, that everything happens for a reason.

I've told people now. My family and friends. I'm beginning to get excited. I'm talking about the baby more. Trying to decide on a name. I had a girl name picked out. No boy name at this point. Two weeks before Christmas, three and half months into my pregnancy I am in the doctors office. Regular visit. They're doing all the regular things they do. Checking for heartbeats. All the normal things. The nurse takes a little more time than usual I guess. I'm not really paying a lot of attention. I'm rattling off about one thing or another. When I'm nervous I tend to do that. A distraction for me more than anything else. It seems as if she is done. But she asks me to get dressed. And go next door to the sonogram building. Let's take a look, she says. I feel a nervous quiver in my stomach. But I get dressed and do as she asks.

We're just about ready. She's rubbing the ice cold gel over my stomach. And begins to rub the sonogram wand. Slowly, from one place to another. I'm still talking, she is not. I'm looking at the screen. Not knowing what in the world I'm looking at. I don't see anything. I'm wondering what she sees. And I ask her. I asked her what she saw. She just stopped. Cut the machine off. Placed her hand on my arm. And said, I am so sorry. There is nothing there honey. I remember feeling like the bottom had fallen out. Like my head had just exploded off of my shoulders. Like I couldn't breathe. At all. I remember all of that. And I remember nothing. I stared at her as if she was speaking a foreign language. And then I found my voice. I remember asking her to show me again. Maybe she was wrong. She was a kind soul. Because she did. She did it all over again. And I looked while she moved the wand back and forth..again. I strained to see what she couldn't see. And I cried. Silent tears streamed down my face. I asked her why? How could this have happened? I didn't feel any different. Nothing had happened. And she explained to me, that sometimes, the birth just does not take. I put my clothes on and she said to go back next door. My OBGYN would want to talk to me again. About my options.

My doctor comes into the room. My tears have dried now. But as soon as I see him, they begin again. Many days after, I remember thinking, he must have thought I was a nut case. Just three some odd months earlier, I sat in that same chair, hysterically blaming him for the ineffective dosage he had prescribed. Blaming him for strapping me down with yet, one more thing I could not afford and did not need right then. And now on this day, I am crying hysterically again, because I am not going to have my baby. The one I still could not afford.The one my marriage still didn't need the extra strain of...but the one..I had already fallen in love with. That was now, not here at all.

My options, which didn't feel much like options at all, were either to miscarry on my own. Whenever and wherever I might be. Or have a medical D&C to "clean up" the area. Both sounded awful, distasteful and cold. It was so close to Christmas. My Joshua's 2nd Christmas. And I did not want that memory for any of us to be marred more than it already would be. December 22, 1988 (my mother's birthday) they did a scheduled D&C. It was one of the most awful days of my life. Even though my little girl was never even there, I lost her again that day.

I don't know that if I had carried term, if it would have really been a little girl. I seem prone to have little boys. But since I was blessed to have two of the most wonderful boys in the world for children, I like to dream, that the one God chose to keep, was a little girl. That he needed a beautiful little girl angel, and he took mine. A little girl angel, named Savannah Le'nise.

copyright © 2011 Michelle Mount Mims