One Morning, Ten Minutes

TW/CW: Mental Health, Child Loss, Transgender Issues

This last month and 3 days has been all over the place, but I have a really good feeling about things. We just have to go upstairs and fill out the paperwork for Casey’s surgery and then we can head on to school before it gets too late. 

We cross the parking lot towards this massive hospital building. It is so beautiful and simultaneously intimidating. I am so genuinely excited about taking our baby home soon and finally getting to start our lives, I never expected to have a baby born prematurely, especially not one as small and underdeveloped as Casey, but the doctors and nurses and our families and friends have been channeling so much goodness and hope into us, which is great because I’ve really needed some help with how anxious I’ve been since they were born. 

We walk past the same absolutely breathtaking aquarium that we’ve seen every time we’ve come to visit them in the NICU, but we sadly don’t have time to stop and talk to them today, we just started massage school again after missing practically the entire last month and I’m more ready and motivated than ever to make my dreams come true. Everything is coming together just how it’s supposed to, I’m so glad that the universe has my back. 

As we get to the elevator and push the button, I look over at my beautiful partner to check in on them. They seem really tired, intense anxiety has not made sleeping any easier for either of us. They try to muster up the energy to smile through the tiredness and I smile back lovingly. I hold their hand as we ride the elevator up to go give Casey our love and positive energy really quickly before we head out, I know they are a super tiny baby but there is just something inside of me that feels like telling them that we’ll see them tonight will help them hold on and keep fighting. 

It feels weird not getting to stay for the surgery, but the nurse on the phone this morning made it seem like it was nothing to worry about, so I am going to believe them for the sake of my own heart and maintaining my ability to focus on driving, the morning traffic in Houston can be anxiety inducing as it is. 

We decide to stop at the coffee machine and chug our coffees before we go see Casey, hopefully it can really kick in before we get on the road, I am not trying to go and get in an accident and leave them parentless, I know this is totally on me but it’s okay because luckily I’m actually a very cautious driver. We laugh and clean up our faces because neither of us are remotely good at chugging drinks. It takes no more than 3 minutes to get from the parking lot up to the NICU and I’m so glad because even one more minute of walking around would probably have me hyperventilating every time we walk up to their incubator. 

We get to the special sink we have to use to thoroughly sanitize ourselves before we are allowed to be buzzed in. It only takes an extra moment but that moment always feels like an eternity when I know my baby’s cute face is waiting for me on the other side of the door. 

We get buzzed back and head down the little hallway that leads to the room with all the incubators. The walls on both sides are entirely lined with pictures of past success stories, getting to see the healthy smiling babies and adults who were also born prematurely is so deeply comforting. I’m so glad that we have such an amazing support team here, they have really helped take away a lot of my pain and worry. Casey is months younger than all the other babies in their wing, I didn’t know that babies could be born so small. Casey’s entire arm is the size of my index finger, they seem so surreal in comparison to every other baby I’ve ever seen. It’s going to be a long journey, but I am so excited about watching them grow. I have so much love for them inside of my heart.

We get to the end of the hallway and realize how much more intimidating the NICU is early in the morning before they’ve turned the lights on. The only lights are the glowing of the incubators and the numbers on their vital screens. It is so quiet, there’s usually a lot more crying and movement. It takes a moment for our eyes to adjust and realize that everything seems as dark as it is because there is a giant group of nurses and doctors standing around Casey’s incubator, blocking out the light. My social anxiety mixed with struggling to make out anyone’s faces in the darkness makes me very unsure of who we are supposed to talk to so we can sign the consent papers and get on the road. Luckily for me, one of the people realizes we’re standing there and comes over to us, I feel so relieved that it’s not on me to find them. I wish it wasn’t such a long drive to the school, even being thrown off just a few minutes in the morning can entirely change the amount of cars on the road.

It doesn’t seem like they have the consent form in their hands so we might actually have to go to another room to sign them, I hope that doesn’t take too long. I don’t mean to seem heartless, I wish in the deepest depths of my soul that we could just stay by Casey’s side every second of every day, but we trust that they are in good hands and know that the sooner we can finish this massage program, the sooner we can actually start our careers and make sure that Casey’s life doesn’t have to be as hard as what we went through. We just want to be the best parents we can possibly be.

The person reaches us and we can make out their face just enough to know that they are someone we haven’t met before. As a trans woman, I very much struggle meeting new people because the majority of Texans either think that I should not exist or that I should at very least be arrested for existing. I just want Casey to grow up in a world where I can actually be respected as their mom, I’ve wanted to be a mom my whole life and the time is finally here, I just need to get them home so we can start our lives together, living in an incubator seems like a scary way to begin life. I push through my anxiety because I know that time is really tight right now, if we can’t get back down to the car in the next 5 minutes we will end up being 30 minutes late for school and I really don’t want to deal with that after we’ve already missed so much of the semester. 

As soon as the person begins talking, the crowd begins whispering and realizing that we are there and starts parting the darkness, revealing the overexposed light of the incubator that is now illuminating the 10 feet of path between us. I look over to Casey to smile at them but the light is so blinding that I can’t even see them, they just seem like a bright glowing orb of cuteness. I didn’t know that they had an even bigger team in the morning crew, I’m not sure if that’s normal, I know surgeries of all kinds can have risks involved but this seems like an abnormally large surgery team. The mixture of the intense darkness and simultaneous intense brightness has me feeling a little disoriented, I’m so ready to be outside and experience the beautiful sunrise-lit drive we’ve become so accustomed to. Seeing all the different colors and watching the starting of another new day helps us feel so connected with Casey, it’s hard to be so far away from them.

My brain is struggling to comprehend the words that were just said to us. The person stops talking and it probably seems quite obvious that we don’t really understand medical terminology, so I respond quickly without really understanding what I’m even saying and the person agrees and walks away to relay my message to the others. I feel very confused and hope that once that message gets to the team that whoever has the consent forms for us to sign will walk over soon. The main nurse who we see every time we come in starts walking over to us and begins apologizing and the overexposed light bounces off of their face to reveal that they are actively crying. They turn to ask if the team can hold on a moment so we can see them before they take them out of the room and the team agrees. I really do want to see them before their surgery but we still haven’t signed the consent form and I can feel myself stressing about the drive.

We start walking through the crowd towards Casey and as we get closer to the light their body finally comes into focus. I agreed that it was okay for them to remove the tubes and wires from Casey to do the surgery, but it was because they let us see them before they started the removal process that I realized their monitor showed that they had no heartbeat. I immediately am blindsided by the realization of what was just being asked of us. Almost a whole 30 seconds after agreeing to the removal, the phrase “for the autopsy?” that they ended their question with registers in my brain. I look down at Casey and they are already gone. My partner and I burst out in tears and are lead out of the room to go to a special grieving room where we are told to wait for them to bring Casey in so we can hold them one last time before they are taken away. 

My baby was actually gone. 

My newly acquired motherhood ripped away. 

We sit on the mattress crying and holding each other. Forced to realize that all of our plans, their life, was canceled. I feel simultaneously more hurt and numb than at any other moment in my life. I can’t imagine what this means for us, our future, our relationship. It hurts so badly. 

Everything hurts so badly.

They open the door and ever-so-carefully hand us the fragile lifeless shell of the baby we love more than the world itself. It is immediately so much more real. We are holding their body, but Casey is gone and accepting that feels like the most ridiculous and impossible thing anyone has ever asked of us. I realize as I’m looking down at them that this is only the second time I’ve ever held them and I break down so hard. When we got out of the car 10 minutes ago, there was nothing in our minds that thought this was what our morning was going to consist of. We just needed to sign the paper and go on with our day. We were going to come back as soon as school got out that afternoon and their surgery was going to be successful and we were going to be one day closer to bringing them home and starting our family. Now we are being told that we can keep their ashes if we want. 

I ask the universe what I could have possibly done to deserve this kind of pain and loss. My heart surges in pain at the realization that there are so many people in the world and Texas itself who will say that I deserved this because of who I am. I am seen as mentally and physically unfit to be a parent. I loathe and fear the inevitable moment that my pain and grieving is met with such heartlessness. My partner begs me to use energy work to bring Casey back to life. 

My soul shatters as I try to convince them that I can’t. 

I look down at Casey, bathing them in my tears. 

Nothing about life feels clear anymore, but I know that the only thing more eternal than my tears are the love that I feel for them.

That love will be what keeps me moving forward.