What Actually Happened

When I was 32 weeks and 3 days pregnant, my sister in law went into labor with her twins. She was only 21 weeks pregnant. The twins were born in a hurry and she nearly hemmoraged. We rearranged our lives and rushed down to Fort Worth to be with them. We met the twins, Luke and Levi. We hung out, tried to practice the ministry of presence, and help our family process what was going on. We couldn’t stay long - they were born on Wednesday, we came down Thursday and went home on Friday. I was in charge of a swing dance event that started Friday night and so was out, distracted, at that all weekend. On Friday we learned they had pretty bad brain bleeds. By Monday, they were both gone.

I was devastated, and I was scared, and I was sad. I was also full of awkward questions and awkward feelings. My baby shower was planned in Norman for the next Saturday. What were their plans for a funeral? How do you ask those questions? What’s selfish? Why did there have to be this cloud over my happy day?

We ended up having the shower on the scheduled day, May 5. The memorial service was the following Saturday, May 11. We travelled to Fort Worth for the service and I hated being there. I was 35 weeks pregnant at this point and its really awkward to be pregnant at a memorial service for babies who were not supposed to be born yet. I didn’t want to sing any of the songs. I didn’t want to get sad. I couldn’t put my brain in what it felt like to be James and Carley. I desperately wanted nothing like this to happen to me.

So, we went home. On Thursday afternoon I remember working on my computer and feeling Frankie move in my belly. Then later we had dinner, and she didn’t move during dinner, which was odd. I told my husband and laid down after dinner to see if she’d move, but she didn’t. I was scheduled to babysit not one but two different sets of kids first thing in the morning, so I thought I would wake up early and see if I could get her to move. If not, I’d call the doctor and have to cancel on my friends. I went to bed mildly concerned, but was able to fall asleep. Then I got up to pee at one in the morning and she didn’t move then, either. I started googling and that’s when I got really freaked out. I don’t remember what I read! But I knew it was serious and potentially involved going to the ER.

I had set an alarm for 6:30 but I shot out of bed at 5:30 am. I grabbed a bowl of cereal, sat down to take a bite, and almost immediately Frankie moved a handful of times. (I think I wrote originally it felt like 30 times.) There was a flurry of movement, and I burst into tears. Elliott was up getting ready for work so he had a limited capacity to talk with me, but I cried and he held me while I explained that I was really afraid and didn’t know how afraid I’d really been.

I switched, then, to relieved and went about my day. I told my friends what had happened and we talked about how scary that must have been. I wanted a Sonic drink between babysitting gigs, and called my sister to tell her what had happened. Right before we got off the phone I remember she said, “Yeah I know stories of people who waited like three days without movement and their babies died.” Well that was HARSH and SCARY and I wished she hadn’t told me that! But it planted the thought in my brain that something could be wrong because, if I stopped to think about it…I hadn’t really felt much movement all day since then.

Here’s what I knew about baby movement: I remember the rule that baby should move 10 times in 2 hours, and “a moving baby is a healthy baby.” I know my nurse practitioner asked every appointment if baby was moving, and the answer was yes. I also knew that my daughter generally didn’t move 10 times in 2 hours. I also knew that I was working VERY part time, and I didn’t have two hours to lay down and count kicks. It felt like a ridiculous expectation that moms should be counting kicks like that, and so careful and unrealistic that I filed it under “scare tactics and fear mongering.”

The other thing was: I had no idea what I was supposed to do if I noticed she wasn’t moving, and when. A plan was not ever communicated to me. I didn’t even know that there was such a thing as an on-call nurse that you could call at any time of day. I thought that if my doctor’s office was closed, my only other option was to go straight to the emergency room. I’d also heard stories of first time moms who showed up at the ER thinking they were in labor, when actually they were just having gas pains. There seemed to be a general sense of stupidity floating around the stereotypical first-time mom, and I did not want to be that girl.

I don’t like telling the next part of the story, and I’m not sure why.

I was talking over the whole thing with Alex when she got home from babysitting, and we brought up my at-home doppler. I had a doppler that I never used, because I didn’t have any petroleum jelly. We decided I’d feel better if I could hear her heartbeat, and so I almost bought some at Walmart, realized they didn’t have any, and ordered some on Amazon instead that was to be delivered the next day. I felt better after that - I could just hear her heartbeat on Saturday, and if anything was still weird I’d call the doctor on Monday.

The other thing on my agenda was to cook dinner for friends who’d just come home from the NICU with their baby. So I went home and got to work on that. While the food was cooking, I called Erin and told her what was going on. She’s the first person I remember telling that my daughter hadn’t really moved all afternoon, or at all that I could remember since that morning. We talked in circles about what could be wrong and what steps I should take. I was toying with the idea that I should go to the ER - but Elliott was at work, and he wasn’t responding to my text messages, and I was afraid he would think I was irresponsible or overreacting if I went without talking to him first.

I actually don’t remember what happened first - I think that, after my food was in the oven, I sat down and got back to googling “office closed baby not moving” or something. I found a PDF that said to call the office or go to the ER and do NOT use an at-home doppler, because it can give a false-positive impression. There can still be a heartbeat but the baby can be in distress.

So I called Erin and basically it came down to money and looking stupid. She said “Elle you will meet your deductible this year, so it’s really okay if you go to the ER. If something is wrong, you want to go. I don’t think anything is wrong, but even if there isn’t anything wrong you’d get peace of mind!” That convinced me to go - after delivering food to my friends.

On the way to deliver food I called my Bradley instructor, and she said that she can’t give medical advice but yes generally baby should have moved by now, so going in was a good idea. I delivered food to my friends and they were the ones who told me that the nurse line existed. She said, “She’ll tell you to go straight in, but go ahead and give them a call.” So I left and went on my way to the hospital. Elliott was at work upstairs, and he hadn’t seen my text message, so I went upstairs. When I got to his unit, the nurse called me back and explained that their measure for an ER visit is ten movements in ten hours, which I hadn’t had at all. She said yes I should go in. Armed with that, I went and saw Elliott and explained I was going downstairs to check in.

To back up: I had the eeriest feeling walking into the hospital, and I’ll never forget it. I looked cute and had my little black purse. I felt fine, aside from the low anxiety in the bottom of my stomach. It was sunny and around 6:15 pm. Everything looked normal and I felt totally normal but I thought as I walked in that maybe everything was about to change…and I was right.

The eerie feeling came back after I left Elliott’s floor. I walked out of the elevator and, instead of turning left to go to my car, I turned right and approached the ER from inside the hospital. I walked up to the desk, totally fine, and said, “I need to check in, I have decreased fetal movement.” They brought me a wheelchair and pushed me to the other side of the hospital. Red-headed Riley met us halfway, the OB ED nurse, and took me to her unit. She had her hair braided cute and I mentioned it during our small talk. She said, “Yeah, I shouldn’t have done it this way, usually when I do things don’t go well.” We both laughed.

We arrived at the room and I felt like a phony. I felt so normal that I expected them to start laughing at me at any moment. I just knew that she was fine and I was overreacting. They had me get into a hospital gown first thing, and I needed to go pee. They did a quick check to hear her heartbeat and they found it. Then the doctor came back and said she wanted to start an IV (and admitted that this might sound a little over-kill) to get me some electrolytes. They kept asking if I had eaten recently (I hadn’t, and I was starving!) Riley had a really hard time getting my IV set up. They were concerned that I was by myself. I kept explaining that my husband was upstairs and he’d be down just as soon as his shift was over.

The doctor ordered a Bio-Physical Profile (BPP) and I was elated. I got to see my daughter for the first time since 20 weeks! I oohed and aahed and made small talk with the ultrasound tech. I asked about my placenta. I learned that she was breech - folded up like a lawn chair. Her head, hands and feet were all right next to each other, and in some ways that made it even more strange that she wasn’t moving. We watched as she just continued to not move for thirty minutes. After twenty minutes, the tech pulled out the duck call. She put it right at the top of my tummy and that crazy loud sound did nothing - still no movement.

With three minutes left on the 30 minute clock, Elliott finally arrived. I think I gushed to him about how beautiful Frankie was. He jumped straight in after meeting the tech and asked if anything looked abnormal (oh, why hadn’t I thought to ask that?) She said something about the amniotic fluid, I think that there was slightly less than you’d expect for this stage of pregnancy. The test ended and the tech went to report that she hadn’t moved. I heard them talking in the hallway with resigned, urgent tones of voice.

They turned the lights on. I was freezing and shaking from the electrolytes. The doctor came in and two nurses and they gave me a mask. The doctor said, “I know this isn’t what you want to hear, but we need to have a baby right now. We don’t know what’s wrong, but she is giving us every indication in her ability to tell us that she is not well and her environment is not good and she needs to come out.” Elliott asked if we could induce but I knew from her facial expression and tone of voice that that wasn’t going to happen. It had not occurred to me until this very moment that a c-section was a possibility. Never crossed my mind. And suddenly I realized how grave the situation was, and the reality that I was about to have surgery. We fumbled through a couple of words - I think I said, “Oh shit” - and then I said, “You’re waiting for me to say okay, right?” And the doctor said yes.

I did not want to say yes. I did not want to choose to have surgery. I was terrified. It was one thing for a scary thing to happen to me, but it’s another to have chosen it. And yet, I knew it was the only choice. How could I choose anything else?

So I said “yes” and started signing a bunch of forms. I asked what the mask on my face was and learned it was oxygen (my first thought was that it was laughing gas, but I really wasn’t sure.)

Planning for Frankie's Birth

I didn’t ever dream of being a mom. I thought I’d probably get married, but even that I wasn’t really sure about. Not because I didn’t want to, but I just didn’t imagine a future that held those things for me.

When my husband and I had been dating for weeks, maybe months, he asked me how many kids I wanted to have, and I told him honestly that I had no idea. Later, as an early married couple, we talked about kids and somehow we got into a conversation about epidurals and natural childbirth. He is generally someone who knows what he wants and thinks is best - and I remember him making clear that he thought a natural birth was the best way to do it. I got my panties in a twist and said, “Well that’s cute but I’m the one who’s going to have to give birth, so I’m going to decide how to do it, thank you.” It felt like so much pressure, for something I didn’t know a lot about.

After we’d been married three years, we decided to wait to have kids for a little while longer. I was transitioning out of a job and looking for a new one, and my husband had just graduated with his nursing degree and was stressed out as a brand new nurse. We wanted to get settled in this new phase of life and then consider having a kid a little later. Well - joke’s on us. We made that decision in July and then in October my period was five days late. It took me a whole day to even consider that I might be pregnant. I ran through every other possibility in my head, and asked my sister, who suggested I go get myself a pregnancy test. I didn’t even know where to buy one! Sure enough - a few seconds after peeing on that stick, I learned I was pregnant with our first.

After I got over the initial shock, or maybe to help with the shock, I started researching. I think I was on Pinterest reading about being four or five weeks pregnant. It was helpful to wrap my mind around all the things that my body had already done all on its own to get this baby started. It was news to me, but not news to my body, and somehow that felt better.

My husband was working at our local hospital, and our insurance was structured so that it was cheapest to deliver there. My doctor delivered at that hospital and I didn’t want to really shop around, so we just decided to go with that option. I’d heard good things from other local moms about their experience and figured it should be fine. It never occurred to me to give birth outside a hospital. I did know people who had given birth at home (quite a few, actually, if I think about the statistical probabilities!) but it didn’t seem like an option for me.

Right after we were married, we joined a Sunday school class full of married couples who were already on their first or second kid. Over the years, I got to know them and their birth stories. It seemed to me that the more someone knew about birth, the more they wanted to do it naturally. I thought that was really interesting! I generally want to know as much about a thing as I can. As a part of wrapping my head around this new pregnant status, I dove in to learning about birth. We decided to do a Bradley Method class (after talking at length about it with a friend who’d seemed knowledgeable and had two successful natural births.)

There was one hang-up that I had with planning for a natural birth. A few years earlier, I’d read a friend’s birth story. She’d planned and hoped and dreamed for her natural birth, and then ended up needing to be induced. Basically, everything had gone “wrong” (although her baby was born healthy and vaginally) and she was wrecked because of it. She had to go to counseling and was traumatized. I took this seriously and learned that setting an expectation of a successful birth could lead to significant disappointment. So I tried not to get my hopes up too much.

So with that, I dove in head first! I started listening to birth podcasts and reading lots of books. I asked all my friends who had given birth naturally to share their birth stories with me. I learned about midwives and doulas and the stages of labor and what to eat or not eat. I really didn’t like my experience with my doctor. I would wait for thirty minutes (or an hour) and see her for five minutes. She was curt and I could just tell that I wasn’t interesting to her. I liked the nurse practitioner better - she was spunky and friendly and warm. When I asked about natural birth, I think I got the “well there’s not a trophy for doing it naturally” comment.

The things that became important to me as time went on were: do NOT get induced and do NOT have a c-section. Induction would lead to a c-section. So we hoped and prayed that the baby would come as late as she wanted but before my doc’s clock ran out. In our Bradley class, we learned that we needed to try and stay home as long as possible and then show up at the hospital very well established in labor. We lived three minutes from the hospital, so that seemed totally doable. My expectation was that I’d go to 41 weeks and go into labor naturally.

When I Found Out Dad and Mom Were Separating

Dad had a lawn business, and so he spent most of every Saturday out working on lawns. I don’t know why we went with him, but we did, on many occasions. He was responsible for maintaining DNA’s lawns, and so one Saturday we spent the day at the office off Harry Hines, by the Bank One building. We usually busied ourselves by drawing or playing inside the supply closet. I remember there was a laminator…I think we might have done a lot of laminating.

At the end of one day, Dad had been on the computer at the front desk but was packing up. I actually can’t remember if he was still there, or if he had left the area and I got on the computer after him. He had been on the phone at some point, talking to Abuela, too. I sat down at the computer and saw that his email was up, and it was an email to Abuela. I have no idea what exactly the email said, but I remember it seemed to be in the middle of a conversation, and it mentioned that Mom and Dad were going to separate. I think it said that Mom specifically wanted to separate from Dad.

As I was reading, I remember my pulse quickening. It was exciting, because I knew I was doing something wrong. But then it was scary. Was it true? I don’t remember actually questioning whether or not it was true. It seemed totally obvious to me. But Dad hadn’t told me yet, and now I knew this secret. I was sad, and wasn’t sure how to bring it up. It felt heavy, trying to decide if I should wait until he told me or if I should own up to having read the email.

I think that I closed down the computer, but that Dad came back in and somehow saw that the email was up and that I might have read it. I think, because I don’t remember a direct confrontation, that he realized what had happened but didn’t say anything to me at the office.

I don’t remember getting in the car.
I don’t remember the drive home.
I don’t remember walking into the house.

My next memory is Mom and Dad with Reba and I, in our bedroom. We were all sitting on the floor. I have no idea where Harrison was, except that he was definitely not there. They told us they were going to separate. (I don’t remember how they said it. Did they tell us it was for a few months, and they would reevaluate, at that point?) What I remember is after they had delivered their news, neither Reba nor I cried. We were calm. Mom or Dad commented on this - that they’d expected us to have a bigger reaction. It felt like an affirmation of my maturity.

I don’t remember how the separation started. I think Dad moved into the apartments and we started seeing him every other day? There is no difference between the separation and the divorce in my mind, except: I remember the day they told us they were actually going to get a divorce. Despite how obvious it had seemed that they needed to separate, I was holding out hope that they would somehow stay together. We all got together at Chili’s in Casa Linda (whose house had we been at? Who did we go home with?) and they told us while we ate our kids meals. Their marriage was over.

The Blue Goose

One day we went out for lunch on a weekend with Mom. We went to The Blue Goose on Lower Greenville. I can’t remember where she lived at this point - it must have been the apartment on Cedar Springs, although it maybe could have been when she still lived in the house on Westglen. It was in the era of tight money…but not so tight that we couldn’t eat out. It felt normal to eat out, but in my memory there was an aura of tension at the possibility something could go wrong. Or maybe I’m just adding that in.

We sat on the patio and it was nice out. I looked over the menu to decide what to eat, and saw something that looked good. Now - Mom was generally of the “whatever you want” mindset. “Whatever makes you happy” and “Sure, sweetheart!” I don’t know how to reconcile that with the tight money. If I had to specify, I’d say that she got to pick when we did extravagant things, not us.

So I picked something and ordered. We ate chips and queso while we waited for our food. And then the waitress brought out our meal. There was something in a sizzling pan…a giant heap of meat. That was what I had ordered. I think it was like…fajitas for two or something.

I can’t remember what exactly was said. I think Mom said, “What is THAT?! Did you order that?” What I do remember is shame. I was so embarrassed. I didn’t realize until typing this that I don’t actually remember Mom’s reaction, and yet this was one of the most embarrassing and shameful memories of my childhood.

At some point, we looked at the menu again. It said that there was more than one pound of meat, and it cost twenty-six dollars. I remember feeling foolish for not noticing that, and taking on a duty to bring home all leftovers. (Is this the beginning of my weight of guilt around leftovers?)

My stomach is in knots just thinking about it. I can feel the warmth of a flush on my cheeks, even though I’m not blushing. Whatever Mom said or did, what I heard was “You have put our family in danger by your choice and by your negligence. I expected you to make a wise decision. You knew the rules, and you broke them.” To be clear: there were no spoken rules! It was an accident. I went through most of childhood and early teen years very aware of how much things cost on the menu, or so I thought. Maybe it started this day.

It was with shame that I packed up my food and shame that I carried it home. I feel like I can remember the weight of the leftovers in my lap in the car. The smell of it reheating later. I don’t even remember what it tasted like, although I can tell you that I remember some talk about me needing to like it, like it better be good.

Why did the waitress not say anything? How could she not have noticed I wasn’t going to share it with anyone, since everyone else ordered? And what were the rules that were unspoken? What was the difference in cost, really? Like, fifteen dollars? This was an accident, but it felt like I had willfully made an error. Or like…if I can’t be careful, I must be a terrible daughter. I must not have our family’s best interests in mind as well as I should.

Oh, dear baby Elle. I wish I could wrap you up and give you a hug. It’s okay. You are not responsible for the family budget. Your mistake did not put the entire family in danger. You are not a disappointing daughter because of this mistake.

The Money Rules: We don’t talk about what we want if we are pretty sure we can’t afford it. We must listen, observe, and learn all the unspoken rules about what there is or is not money for, and shape our requests appropriately. If you ask for something that is outside the budget, you bring shame on Mom and therefore on yourself. She might react badly and no one wants that, and so you should just keep your desires to yourself.

I deserve to be cancelled.

Much has been said lately about “cancel culture” and our penchant for writing people off for one mistake. Recently I found myself at risk of being cancelled by association. I read a famous book about childbirth, and shared my enthusiasm for the ideas presented in the book in a Facebook group. After a little while, the comments started. “I can’t read the book or recommend it. The author is too problematic.” “Haven’t read it, won’t read it.” “She’s a racist.”

Fear and dread immediately flooded my body. My stomach dropped. I want these women in this group to like me! I had no idea that this book’s author had said anything racist. I thought it was nearly a textbook on birth, and in my reading thus far I hadn’t come across anything problematic. Had I made a mistake? In a panic, I googled the author and “racist” and found the offense. Yes, in answering a question in a public forum, this famous woman had made a now-obviously racist comment. Did this characterize her underlying racist beliefs? Was she conscious of how this came across? Had she publicly asked for forgiveness? I wasn’t sure.

On the group thread, I amended my enthusiasm to clearly state “I saw this and find it problematic, too” - to signal, “Don’t worry, y’all, I’m not a racist” - and asked for alternative books in the same vein. The signal was received and I was not cancelled that day.

Relaying this story to a friend later, we laughed in our frustration. Does her bad comment erase everything good in the book? Is she now without value? It strikes me that our culture has suddenly made a broad change. Not too long ago, relativistic truth ruled the day. But now there is something we all think is absolutely true: a hint of racism is a virtual death sentence. Racism is always wrong, always bad, never excusable.

To be clear: I agree! One hundred percent. In snarkier moments I want to say, “Great! Glad you got with the program, world.” (But that would be prideful.) It’s just that I believe this applies to other realms as well. Lying is always bad. Stealing is always bad. Infidelity is always bad. Greed, lust, malice, slander…always bad. And with that broader list comes broader culpability. We all have erred at some point. I’ve said racist things. I’ve stolen things! I rolled out of bed and the first thing out of my mouth was a cutting remark meant to shame my husband. (Who does that?!) Any one of my mistakes is worth me being cancelled - from my marriage, from our culture, and ultimately…for all of eternity.

Do you see? This is the core of the Christian worldview. “We all have sinned and fall short…” of the standard of perfection on Twitter? No, we fall short “of the glory of God” - the only perfect One, the unchanging standard-setter who was and is and ever shall be. The One who never misspoke or acted out of any motivation other than love and justice.

When you see someone post or say something evil and think, “Wow, I can no longer associate myself with them. I can’t believe they did that,” you agree with God. He cannot associate with us in our yuckiness. And yet! This is the heart of my faith: He did not want to leave us cancelled. He did not want to be without us. And so he offers us forgiveness (and a way to be better, and a bunch of other things! But let’s focus on forgiveness first.)

I am eternally forgiven. What a gift. Because I have been forgiven, I can forgive. And on my worst days (or, really, every day) I must ask for God’s help to forgive. You don’t have to be your worst tweet. I’m so glad I’m not the nastiest thing I’ve ever said or done. It is in view of my own brokenness that I offer a shrug and pause to hear the rest of the story.