Become a Creator today!Start creating today - Share your story with the world!
Start for free
00:00:00
00:00:01
Lucas James Fundraiser Event
49 Plays1 year ago
On April 28th, we attended the fundraising event at Spartan Gym to honor Lucas James Swartz. We were lucky enough to speak with his mom Amber, twice on our podcast! During the event, we we are able to conduct mini-interviews and heard some beautiful stories of love and loss from other loss parents.
The event raised over $13,000, which was then donated to the following local non-profits: Aubrey's Advocate, Noelle's Light and The Adalyn Rose Foundation.
Thank you to everyone who came out to support this event and the amazing organizations the funds will support! We loved hearing your stories and connecting with you all!!!!
Links mentioned:
- Unite Grief Support Groups - Couples/Mom Support
- Unite Dad's Only Group - Contact Matt Sklar - matt.sklar@gmail.com
- Mindful Birthing and Planning
- Light After Loss Support Group
- Sad Dad's Club
- Postpartum Stress Center - Counseling
Recommended
Transcript
Introduction and Purpose
00:00:00
Speaker
Hi, I'm Nicole and I'm Desiree. We are both mothers who run a support group for perinatal loss. Through our group, we have met many wonderful families and have had the honor of hearing about and sometimes meeting their beautiful babies. We noticed that families feel relief when they can share openly and feel seen when they meet others who are telling similar stories. So we created this podcast as a space for families to share the stories of their babies.
00:00:23
Speaker
We want to honor and remember these children. We want to help you navigate your life after loss. And most importantly, we want each story to give you hope. So please join us as we share these stories of grief and love. Welcome to the Blindsided Podcast.
00:00:39
Speaker
Hi, my name is Dominique. I am Lucas's cousin. And the way that I help my family get through it is I send Amber text messages of signs I get from Lucas. One example was I was on my walk from lunch, on my lunch break, and a bumblebee was following me. And I was like, hi, Lucas James, and it flew away. So I texted Amber right away to let her know that I got a sign from Lucas.
Pregnancy and Delivery Challenges
00:01:02
Speaker
My husband and I, we weren't trying, but we did get pregnant about three months after we got married. We were trying, not trying, right? That kind of race. And fast forward through, most of it was like you're no hiccups whatsoever. If anything, it was a little bit humorous because it was my first pregnancy, his first pregnancy. And I didn't go, I didn't know that I was supposed to have OB appointments like regularly throughout
00:01:31
Speaker
a pregnancy. So as I went to my ultrasounds, but nobody at my ultrasounds until closer, maybe in like the end of May, June, asked me how my OB appointments were going. And I was just like, this is the appointment, right? Like I've been coming to these.
00:01:51
Speaker
And they were like, no, you should be seeing an OB too. And I was like, oh, okay, well. And that like, as I made those appointments, you know, the receptionist and other providers and employees of the hospital that I was planning to deliver at, they had a chuckle about it, right? Like, I was like, oh.
00:02:10
Speaker
and then this is like one of the parts that's kind of seared in my memory was one of the receptionists said, watch you have the easiest pregnancy with a delivery with no hiccups whatsoever and you just you know at the time hahaha and then now you can't help but look back at that like how did you get the appointments for ultrasounds without i mean they just
00:02:31
Speaker
Was it like a third party? No, this is in person. The ultrasound appointments and the OB appointments were in different locations, but still apart of the same network. I feel like, I couldn't say for certain, but other people also were like, how did this happen? And the tie-in with that is that everything was going so normally that it didn't. Even my mom and my sister are both nurses. And when I told them, I said that after I made my OB appointments, I was like,
00:02:58
Speaker
hey I was supposed to be seeing an OB like during this time and they were like they felt bad right they were just like oh how did we not ask you about how those appointments were going because that's how seamless it all felt and it really was up until up until it wasn't so started to go to the OB appointments got to a point where it was our decision about when to induce
00:03:21
Speaker
All the different options that are available to a couple or a person person that's pregnant decided on. We wanted to try to let her come on her own. They would allow that to happen up until 41 weeks. So at 41 weeks that was our induction appointment in the afternoon and she started coming on her own in the morning of 41 weeks.
00:03:44
Speaker
okay so head to the hospital and the night before i had called to check in to make sure i could still come in for the induction appointment you know should i come later should i come earlier i asked like hey could i come in even earlier if you know if nobody else and the provider on
00:04:02
Speaker
that was in charge at the time. I was like, yeah, come earlier. We had breakfast, went shopping, all this kind of thing. And I was like, I think it's happening. So we didn't come earlier. We came right at the time we were scheduled to be there. And I was like, but I think I'm contracting. I don't think we need to do any of the things that you need to do to induce.
00:04:22
Speaker
So that was the point where it felt like we felt grateful to be at the hospital and she was coming on her own but it felt like the day of when the people that you don't want to be at the hospital are the people that are working in the hospital. Oh no. So we were like put into a waiting room for like 20 to 25 minutes and like finally one person that you would want to be there was like, what are you doing here? And I was like, they told me to wait in here and she said, but I'm like this and I'm like breathing.
00:04:48
Speaker
And she said, huh. And then this person was like, we're going to get you into a room immediately. The nurse that was only my nurse for a couple of hours, like had trouble putting the IVs in, but got them in. But as she's doing it, I'm like, I really wish somebody just did this really efficiently right now. But after that, had a few nurses that felt comfortable with slow dilation happening, had to wait. I had our plan was to always get the epidural, had to wait until I was five centimeters, got to five centimeters.
00:05:18
Speaker
had the epidural, went
Post-Delivery Grief and Advocacy
00:05:20
Speaker
throughout the whole night. But you were on the monitor the whole time. The whole time. And the baby was great, okay. The baby's completely fine, whole entire time, takes the entire night. So I get into, I get all geared up maybe around 1, 2 p.m. on, you know, the day before that she was delivered. And I did not start going into pushing like active labor until the following morning around 6 a.m.
00:05:43
Speaker
So it took that long to get to 10 centimeters. It took a few hours to get to five. They break my water around 10 p.m. because it didn't happen naturally. We're waiting for 10 centimeters we start to push and my baby's birth time is 7.33 a.m.
00:06:00
Speaker
So almost immediately around 6 a.m. we see concerns about the heartbeat. This at the time it was like the tending was seen me and then the doctor in charge then therefore when they're a little hiccups you know were happening doctor in charge came in and started doing some more pushing.
00:06:20
Speaker
Heartbeats dropping, coming back up, dropping, coming back up. Doctors suggest a vacuum to get her out faster. It seems like she's not responding to my pushing. Use the vacuum once or twice, lose the heartbeat, and everything's back. But immediate C-section, as soon as they lose the heartbeat, then they lose it completely. Then they say, okay, we need to immediately take her emergency C-section.
00:06:43
Speaker
However, nobody was informed that during that time that should have been informed in order to take my baby out as soon as possible. And the epidor, I had to wait for the anesthesiologist to come because I had to go under.
00:06:57
Speaker
Oh my god. Because the epidural wasn't... I could feel slightly... It wasn't working, yeah. It was working, but not at the point that they were comfortable. I'm surprised it didn't, like, intubate. Well, they did, but they wanted, because it was an emergency, they wanted to see if they could not put me on. If the epidural was strong enough to keep me awake and just get her out sooner. Yeah. Right. Okay. Yeah. So I went under, and then when I woke up, my husband had to call me. God.
00:07:25
Speaker
I'm so sorry. She's beautiful and a head of dark hair. Yeah, she is beautiful. Does your husband have dark hair? Yeah, he as a baby.
00:07:41
Speaker
was also had lots of dark hair. I was born, I was three weeks. I was born in the 80s when I guess, you know, there were less protocols as far as like how long they would let you go. So I was 22 days late on my due date. So I had like a lot of dark hair so that she reminds me of me. So did you spend time with her? Like, what was it like after you delivered her?
00:08:06
Speaker
Yeah, I mean to jump ahead of that question that's part of the drive I have now of figuring out like something to do to honor her and to help the community because there were a few like special people there that helped us figure out some things to do but not enough, not enough information, not enough about like
00:08:29
Speaker
what do we do now, you know, and like certainly look back on it and think I wish I would have done this. I wish I would have done. Yeah. Um, we definitely had a cuddle caught. She did stay with us overnight one night and it was maybe you got, I feel like I'm saying a phrase, like I'm sure you've heard this, but then it was like, we gotta go, you know, like, but in hindsight, I feel like had somebody been there that said, this is the feeling you're having. Like if I, somebody said to me, like the next morning, like you need to go. I just want to let you know, like,
00:09:00
Speaker
There are some things you could do now if you were up for it that you might really cherish once you're gone. Even if you think you're not going to want it later, like the works that can happen is this is you can go home and say, man, I wish it was offered to me. It wasn't even offered to you. So you did the best. We say you did the best that you could do with the knowledge that you had at the time, which was really
00:09:21
Speaker
Nothing. You just went with your heart and your heart said... Exactly. Yeah. Yeah, we had photos taken. Oh, good. Yeah. We had a few things done. So that's why I mean to say there were a few people there to advocate and to give advice and help us through that very brief time.
Mindfulness and Healing
00:09:37
Speaker
But yeah, of course, you know, although I wish I could have regrets. So what do you think, like, what would you recommend if a hospital is listening or a healthcare provider, what would you recommend?
00:09:49
Speaker
be done that you didn't get. Like, would you want someone that lost a baby at your gestation come in and talk to you and say, like, I went through this. You should do. Yeah. Okay. I mean, yeah, you definitely. I feel like that's powerful. Yeah. Yeah. You know, it's, it's Twilight's, you know, it's completely undescribable. So.
00:10:06
Speaker
Yeah, I think that it would be helpful to if someone's willing to, you know, like, and I think I definitely would have been a person that would be like, we were listening to any providers that came in to talk to us. Yeah, like we were willing to listen as much as we could and take advice and process it as quickly as possible.
00:10:25
Speaker
So yeah, if somebody that had gone through it was present, like I said, to suggest all the things that they had been through themselves and what they wish they would have done or what was, you know, all the things that were possible, that I think that could be really helpful for other people that go through a similar situation, for sure.
00:10:44
Speaker
Do you have any words of encouragement for someone who just lost their baby? So my words of encouragement, I'll reference like what I know has helped me get through each day. A very specific thing that we did while we were pregnant was take a mindful birth and parenting course with other families who were expecting.
00:11:05
Speaker
And that ran the gamut of what it's like to be pregnant, how you and your partner can help each other through your pregnancy, through the labor and post labor, all the things and be present and grounded. And I mean, every, every time I get
00:11:20
Speaker
caught up in the past or the future, it's a skill to like bring myself back to today. That helped beforehand and if that's something that a couple hasn't done beforehand, it's still like that group helped us get connected with a couple's grief counselor right away, like within days.
00:11:39
Speaker
We were speaking to an expert on infant loss, like somebody who, when I was done that first initial conversation of sharing my story with this person, I just exhaled since my baby left. It felt like I could get a little bit of oxygen because I know somebody is out there to help me get through it.
00:12:00
Speaker
including as a couple. Yeah, I mean that you know and then you get the ball rolling and you realize
00:12:14
Speaker
It's so many people. What we're doing here as far as bringing awareness, right? I have mixed feelings about that. It's good to live in bliss and ignorance is bliss and all this kind of thing. But now that I'm here, trying to keep it real and as, I guess, helpful and bring awareness to it as possible. But yeah, it did feel incredibly isolating.
00:12:40
Speaker
Initially, yeah, and it you know that feeling of isolation. I don't think we'll ever completely go away. No, right, but events like this
00:12:51
Speaker
Like I said, you've got to live for today. I'm in the Light After Loss group, which I got connected with through somebody on social media. I coached at a gym previously, and this person works in fetal medicine research, as it were. And they're just incredible, another person that you want in your team, in your world, when something like this happens.
00:13:17
Speaker
Yeah, you got to surround yourself with your team and like the world sucks. I said in the great group the other night, like it just, you know, everything going on right now, this world sucks. So just like, we just talked about hope as much hope as you can have for today. We started a garden for our daughter in front of our home. Someone gave me this ornament decoration for the garden that says like to plant a garden is to believe in tomorrow. I love that.
00:13:43
Speaker
I have hope for the future, but I'm here right now talking to you and I'm going to do as much as I can today in order to hope for the best for tomorrow.
Therapeutic Support and Community Impact
00:13:53
Speaker
And you're going to share with us the links to that mindfulness group that you were talking about, and maybe the grief counselor that you're talking about, just so that we can share it in this podcast. Absolutely. If anyone else would really be interested. That's really something I've never heard of. No. Yeah. Yeah. It was incredible. I just learned from a past co-worker of mine when they were pregnant and had a baby around the time that I was this. And so I was like, what's the one thing that you think that we should do?
00:14:18
Speaker
And they were just like, take this course, you know, like do this. And at the time, especially for my husband, he was like, how much money did we send on this? Oh, well, we're going. And actually, funny enough, he was the one that we got home from the hospital. He's like, I emailed them. Like he was the one who thought like to reach it, like it didn't seem like it was maybe working or might have been like, you know, not worth your time, but totally worth our time. So happy to share. Yeah, it sounds like a
00:14:47
Speaker
almost like a marriage counseling for pregnancy to me in a way. That's what it sounds like. Just like prepare you for like free marital counseling. I mean talking, right? Just talking, being proactive and present and you know like about everything that's about to go on. But as real and humble as about it as possible, like if you're not going to take the course and then everything in your life's going to go, it's easy peasy obviously. Like my situation, all these situations but even with that, yeah.
00:15:15
Speaker
trying to be prepared and prepared with groundness as possible. How can you even prepare for that? You can't. Well, you can sure be aware. It's so cliche. People don't want to hear anything bad, negative thoughts about this, but it's just like, it's real. And the more that you... I'm not saying that everybody should
00:15:40
Speaker
You know, be engrossed in it all day, every day, but you know, information is power. But just tell us about SIDS. Like, we're all aware of SIDS, but this happens more. And the purple crying thing, like, you know, the purple crying thing, like, when you bring your baby home, you get lots of education on that, like, Shake Your Baby, but not about silver, so, yeah.
00:16:01
Speaker
But no, the mindfulness is great because it's really a life skill. You need it for multiple things. Yeah, life is, you know, phoning, news, whatever, all the things that take us away from exactly what we're doing right now. So it's great to just stay. I'm not saying I'm perfect at it by any means, but it's definitely helping me through this journey right now. And any way that parents who have a loss can
00:16:29
Speaker
you know, start that process of maybe thinking and it might not happen for them for a long time, but if you give it a little bit of effort to communicate and be in community of people that like a mindful, you know, practicing group, a light after a lot of grief group, be in community and talk and process, that's going to get you to a place, a better place. It might not be where you want it to be, but you know, it's, it's where you got to be to make it through every day. Yeah. We recently did an episode with, um,
00:17:00
Speaker
a nurse researcher and she does research on grief and trauma. And she said like the one difference she noticed with participants was that the ones that had those kinds of resources did well, whereas those who did not, you know, they stored this trauma. So yeah. Yeah. You gotta let it out. Yeah. The cliche or like
00:17:17
Speaker
the hullabaloo, the fear of not talking about your feelings, you know, especially, you know, it seems like we're just starting. It seems to me anyway. I know I'm only a few months into this, but there's so much more awareness to be had and so much more work to do. And then I think about it.
00:17:36
Speaker
and maybe you guys have done an episode on this, but for the men in the world, the father's like... It's coming, father's coming. Oh yeah, good, because yeah, for my husband, we do, he does, we both do individual therapy, we do couples therapy. That's awesome. I go to the grief group. I'm trying to encourage him to also find a group as well. My sister actually has a great metaphor for it, the day you do therapy, sometimes it feels like the day that you're taking your yucky medicine.
00:18:04
Speaker
Like, oh no, later I'm going to have to take yucky medicine. And you're like, I don't want to do it. I don't want to talk about my feelings because it feels weird and yucky. But then you get like, you end the zoom session, you hang up the phone and you're like, you exhale and you're like, oh, the yucky medicine makes me feel better. I need to get that out. Get them out. They need, they're in there and they need their medicine. And the way you do that is by talking
00:18:27
Speaker
That's a great metaphor, I love that, yeah. I already forget the tattoo of the one, the garden one, amazing. Yeah, oh my gosh. I just love it. Well, thank you so much. Yeah, it's been great talking with you. I appreciate the space to share. Yeah. Hi, I'm Bianca. My name is Tommy. We're Dante's parents.
Bianca and Tommy's Journey
00:18:45
Speaker
I like to call him DJ. His name was Dante Jose, and the joke was he was gonna call him DJ, and I was gonna call him Dante, and I was gonna fight about it not being DJ.
00:18:56
Speaker
Dante was just a random name we came up with. She just said it. I fell in love with it. Jose comes from my older brother. So that's where I got it from. We found out we were 20 weeks pregnant and we went for ultrasound and they found no heartbeat. So then we kind of had to go through the process of going to the hospital and getting induced. And that was really hard.
00:19:18
Speaker
It really wasn't easy. I would say I felt more emotional, but it was more difficult for me for certain things like just seeing her, just lying down. I just had to sit there and I would say people told me I answered a lot of good questions. It was just... He was very supportive and was attentive to me and knew all the answers to the doctor's questions, so they were very impressed with him. I don't think any man would want to see his woman just laying down and you were just feeling helpless.
00:19:47
Speaker
And she's just there, and I know she's doing a lot of it for me, and I didn't want her to. But because I feel bad, but to me, it was like I'm carrying this dead person inside of me, and that was really hard. And then I'm delivering a dead baby. And so at the beginning, we talked about it. She felt like I was going to hate her. And I told her, at the time, I understand what happened.
00:20:12
Speaker
she means the world to me. So I just wanted her to be comfortable and safe. And then she showed me, she made her decision. We did get to see him.
00:20:19
Speaker
Um, we held him for a little bit. We didn't do a lot of things. We wish we could have, but we did have our little moments with him. Like, yeah, like they didn't show us like his feet or his hands. Like there's had them wrapped up. But when I talked to my doctor, like when I went back for a follow up, they said that they should have showed me like his whole body. And I didn't get to see that. And then, and I don't know if it's cause they just thought I was sad. I'm like, I was really scared to see him. Yeah. I'm sorry. Yeah. So I didn't get to like really see his body and that what makes me sad. Um.
00:20:49
Speaker
And it was just a lot. What happened with certain things, too, is Bianca did suffer from a fibroid. The best way to describe a fibroid, if you ever walked into a Target or a game or whatever, I saw one of those little kid balls. I can show you what my favorite looks like. But it was basically that big inside of her.
00:21:09
Speaker
So we did lose Aunty at 20 weeks, but when we were 20 weeks, Bianca didn't look like she was 40. Like I looked like I was like double the amount of pregnant. Did you have the fibroid removed since then or no? Yeah, so I have had surgery to have the fibroid removed. How did you dig to remove it? We saw, the doctor actually showed us a picture of it, which is kind of funny. They, I guess they weren't allowed to take the picture, but they told us about it after.
00:21:33
Speaker
We laughed, we wanted to see it, but it was literally that big. Trying to find my fiber to show you guys just how big it was. I don't know what it would mean to gross you guys out. She's a miracle. Yeah, so basically, with the whole pregnancy, she was never comfortable. So I didn't know until I got pregnant, and it grew with pregnancy, because it grows with your hormones.
00:21:54
Speaker
My whole pregnancy, I couldn't keep food down. I was constantly throwing up. I couldn't eat. And I was in constant pain. I'm a teacher, and it was really hard to go to work every day and teach. And as soon as I'm after the fibroid and stuff and having a donkey, I could eat again. I could do all these things again. And I feel really guilty that when I had a baby, when I had it in my stomach, I couldn't eat or drink.
00:22:21
Speaker
do what he needed and that sometimes I feel like it's my fault and I hated being pregnant because it was such an uncomfortable experience and now I wish like I'll go through it again all over again just to like have him here and it's just hard because a lot of like family like they try to understand but they don't and they feel like so with a lot of our family members they don't really understand us um I would say like my dad is a one of the for me at least uh he's one of my biggest offenses
00:22:51
Speaker
We did have a talk about it, but he thinks that we should be over it by now. He likes to say, we're young. We know we're young. We're both 27. I got a new job. We're both having a pretty good life right now, but he keeps telling us that we can have more kids. That's not really the point to both of us. We wanted our son, and then that's what we need. We wanted him.
00:23:13
Speaker
So that's what a lot of people don't understand, like, throughout this whole process. We see a lot of people get support. I lost a lot of good friends on the way. In the beginning, I did feel a little bad about it. Sometimes I do. I don't really care a lot of times. It does hurt every now and then because I did grow up with a lot of these people. But I've learned to grow right now. I did cut a couple of family members out as well.
00:23:34
Speaker
It impacted us a lot. One of his friends' wives posted on social media, we posted a video of a mom sharing her experience with delivering her baby, like stillborn, and showed the baby and all this stuff. And she basically was like, why would someone want to post this pain? How could someone post something like this? All this stuff. And we just went through it. It was just brand new. We just went through it.
00:23:57
Speaker
Why are you being judgmental of someone wanting to share their story? You don't have to look. You don't have to think it's pretty. You could just keep it moving. Like, why does that matter? And it's just like, and then you're going and talking about this, and then we're seeing this, and how do you think that's making us feel? It was just a lot because we were trying to have an adult conversation with her and like explain like what happened, and she didn't want to have a conversation with us.
00:24:22
Speaker
and basically was said, like, she's sorry we saw it, but she's not sorry for her actions. She's not sorry for being insensitive. I just go bad for him because he lost a lot of friends over it, and he was his best friend's, like, baby's godfather, and they took that title away from him.
00:24:41
Speaker
It comes in waves. You're good right now, but holidays, stuff like that, when you would normally see these people, and then you don't because you have to separate yourself so you can be happy. I just keep moving forward. I'd rather not get involved just because I'm...
00:24:58
Speaker
I know how personally I am when I get to a level of anger. I can't control it. And there's a lot of things I know I want to say, but I know if I say it, I never want her to see me like that personally. And I'd rather just keep it to myself and just stay away. I don't think you can reach out to me and not pretend you said what you didn't say.
00:25:19
Speaker
I'm a cry baby. I'm a very big cry. I'm crying now but normally it's him. I'm a very big cry baby. I had a very bad fake demeanor. So after everything happened I kind of just wanted to surprise I suppressed my emotions and I let him kind of breathe and so he dealt with a lot of it and I just was there for him and then it kind of flipped so we kind of like let each other like okay you're having a moment like we're there for you and
00:25:44
Speaker
So you see me like this because she's a little bit more emotional right now. So I'm like, okay, cool. She's given me plenty of time to like, read. So I see her. I just, I know how to turn it off. Yeah. I think we both know how to. Yeah. Yeah. It's going to be a year. So that was another thing is like, I would have loved to do something like this event or something. I just don't feel like we have that much support. And I just feel like a lot of people think like, oh, we should be over this or, oh, whatever. So.
00:26:09
Speaker
It's just hard to like, I don't know, want to do something and me being worried about everyone being such so judgmental about it. And I always wanted to post a picture of our son, but because of the experience we had with people and being judgmental, it was like, and I feel so bad that I was like ashamed to post my son. And it's just like, you don't have to follow, you can like not look or whatever, but I should be able to post what I want and no one should.
00:26:31
Speaker
My advice to anybody who does this to this, who have never gone through but has a friend, if you don't understand it, that's probably fine. I would just say to understand their emotions and just not speak your honest opinions all the time. If you honestly really, really want to know, if you're feeling you're close to them, don't be afraid to ask. I told some of my friends that you can genuinely ask me, hey, what can I not say? What really offends you? I told them the truth.
00:27:05
Speaker
parents, I just want you to say their son's name, like acknowledge him like, like one of my our co-workers like just like would say like Dante and like no one really said that. So just to hear, be like, oh, you're Dante's mom or oh, how like, how's Dante or like just to ask about him and just bring him up but is makes a lot for parents to make us feel like parents and sometimes to make us feel like, oh, we're not crazy. Like this didn't happen. Like he wasn't an imaginary friend. Yeah.
00:27:27
Speaker
Don't ever say this.
00:27:34
Speaker
So it's like a lot of people like our family are like, oh, we got we rely on each other a lot and maybe too much. But it's also like no one else has been there to support us as much as each other. So that's where it's hard. So yeah, like, yeah, I want to see my six in the morning because she decided we don't think apart a lot. And I said to my mom and he maybe struggled a little bit more than me because I went to sleep.
00:27:54
Speaker
Can I say goodnight as you pass out? I was late till six in the morning. Are you so tired right now? I am 100% super tired. I got stuck taking care of our dog. Yeah, so we got a dog to kind of like, and now we got a cake for him. It's his birthday on Sunday. So I think it's a little bit helpful that we are on his birthday. And then also been looking for houses for a long time. And finally someone accepted our offer this month.
00:28:23
Speaker
Thank you. I'm like, okay, Dante brought this for us, but it's very stressful. Buying a house is very stressful, so it's about this extra stressful. And on top of that, we also are trying to get pregnant again, and it's just not working out. And it's hard because his dad's like, just get pregnant again. And I'm just like, do you think we're not trying? But I think we have to stop trying because we didn't try for Dante.
00:28:46
Speaker
I'm kind of excited about this house even more. I'm happy to be alone with her because right now we live in my bedroom in my mom's house with all her stuff and her dog. So we're moving into a very much not needed large space. Yeah, we have like five bedrooms. Three floors. So I hope we have a lot of kids. My dog is everywhere to run now.
00:29:10
Speaker
My sister said to me last night, take the time to basically just enjoy our love, follow love harder, and to not worry about having a baby
Ben and Brittany's Loss Story
00:29:18
Speaker
as much. It's easier said than done. I know, I just got my period today, and it was late, and I'm like, okay, but the test negative, but maybe I'm pregnant. I wasn't going to tell you, but I was counting to see what your period was, and when you said you were on your period today, I didn't know about that. I was like, damn, you messed my life up.
00:29:35
Speaker
I know it took a test yesterday. Yeah, I think it's like when we have less stress. Thank you so much. You guys have been so fine. My name's Ben. I got Brittany here with me. Hi, I'm Brittany. We had Maxwell back in February, February 13th of 2021, day before Brittany's birthday. The actual one day she actually didn't want to have them. I think she was okay with having them on her birthday, but she didn't want to have them on her 13th. It was a typical
00:30:05
Speaker
I'm sure a lot of people are going to have the same feelings. It's a typical pregnancy. Everything was going great. She was doing all of her appointments with the doctors and everything. She was going in for a normal stress test. Unfortunately, in the middle of COVID, so she was by herself, she was getting her ultrasound done. And it's actually getting me now. They had to get a doctor to come in and talk to her. She tried calling me because I was trying to finish up work so I could actually be off for the next couple of weeks.
00:30:34
Speaker
I get the phone call. She's bawling her eyes out. She couldn't even speak to me. She had to give the phone to the doctor. The doctor's actually the one who told me the news. Half hour later, I'm doing 90 on a highway to get to her at the hospital. Probably not the best thing to do, especially in Jersey. But I got to her as pickled as I could. And that's when we started our journey on being lost parents. We lost them at 38 and a half weeks.
00:31:04
Speaker
We were literally three days away from an induction. I was being in two-step Monday, and I found out that Friday before that there was no party. But it's some of the toughest times we've ever had to go through. So my question is, so you delivered your baby, and then did you get to spend time with him? Or did you? It felt right for you guys. I want to say we spent, what, two or three days? Kind of wish we had more time. We hear all these stories about the cold beds that people get. We never got that option, unfortunately.
00:31:34
Speaker
I honestly don't really remember all of it. She doesn't remember a lot of it because of the medicine. She was on auto medication. Medicated up. So all I have is pictures. And we tried to take as many pictures as we could. But we did spend time with them. Another one of the hardest decisions was letting them take them away for the last time. That's probably the most difficult thing you're going to have to do as a parent. So it's definitely not.
00:32:03
Speaker
easy at all. I would say that like you just don't, I don't know how you, I don't know how you decide when it's time to say goodbye. You just don't know in your heart it's time. For us, I think it was more, we didn't want anything else to go wrong with him while we still had him. Yeah, exactly. Because we didn't have the cold thoughts. He was unfortunately starting to turn colors and didn't want to leave my last images of him. Yeah. No, I wanted to remember him in a better state. Yeah.
00:32:32
Speaker
I mean, we do have a lot of pictures that we look back on. She actually has one of the pictures on the back of her phone. And then both of us carry a spare card in our phone cases with us at all times. Maxwell Carter Holt. How have you guys together gotten through it and through today? The only thing I could say is keep communication open. You guys gotta talk. Whoever is going through it, you guys have to communicate with each other. That is the biggest key to get through anything like this.
00:32:58
Speaker
and understanding that moms and dads grieve differently. So what may not be looked at as grieving is when we first got home. When we first got home, she was flabbergasted that I was still functioning when all she wanted to do was cry. It was hard and funny story. When we first got home,
00:33:23
Speaker
One of the things I want to do is make sure she kept her energy up and tried to eat. This is one of the things that will stick in my mind forever. She wanted some toast. And then when I made it, she didn't even want it. And I kind of like, as a honey, you got to eat, you got to keep your energy up.
Conclusion and Community Engagement
00:33:37
Speaker
So she bit the piece of toast like she was a stubborn child being forced to do something.
00:33:43
Speaker
I just took a bite and I was like, I'm done. It's something we can look back on now and laugh at it, but in the moment I was very frustrated with how I was trying not to get made.
00:33:56
Speaker
Communication is the biggest thing, and remember, everybody agrees differently. And using like the, we go through Unite, so like those support groups, we go to two among, well he goes to three, he has a dad's own group. Yes, I have a dad's own group. Just using the community. I can see him running. I don't run it, I was just gonna. You're right there, you're right there. I'm one of the ones who were there from the start, and I'm almost at every single meeting, so yeah. There's a group online. It's through Unite, and it's all Zoom. Okay.
00:34:33
Speaker
Thank you so much for sharing Maxwell's story with us today, guys.
00:34:38
Speaker
Thank you so much for tuning into the latest episode of the blindsided podcast. We truly appreciate your support and time you spent with us. If you have a personal story you'd like to share on the show, don't hesitate to reach out to us. You can send us an email at Nicole with the blindsided.com or Desiree at the blindsided.com.
00:34:57
Speaker
For more episodes, make sure to follow on your favorite podcast app. Just search the blindsided podcast and hit that follow button. You can also connect with us on social media too. You can find us on Facebook and Instagram at the blindsided podcast. We love engaging with our listeners and hearing your thoughts on each episode.
00:35:15
Speaker
And before you go, consider leaving a rating and review for our show. Your feedback helps us reach more listeners who might find value in the stories and discussions we share. Once again, thank you for listening and being a part of the Blindsided community.