Angelique

In Loving Memory of Angelique Tahlia Tyler
born unto Ian and Davina
October 1 1996

At the moment I am twenty weeks pregnant with our second child, a precious baby boy named Kieran Ashleigh. However, our story first began almost twelve months ago with the death of our first baby, Angelique Tahlia, just eighteen weeks into the pregnancy. Since she was born before twenty weeks the medical profession insist on calling our daughter a miscarriage - a word that my husband and I have grown to hate with a passion. She was a whole, perfect baby who was most precious to us. Her tiny body was flawless. We held her, loved her and wanted her very very much.

In the first few weeks after her death we felt shocked and even removed from the whole situation, but eventually an extreme sadness enveloped our lives. The shadow of that black cloud seemed to follow us everywhere we went. I couldn't see or speak to anybody for quite some time afterwards and even went to work with my husband for the following months so that I didn't have to be alone. My wonderful husband was strong enough to support me as well as himself because I had fallen apart. Everyday tasks became physically challenging chores that drained even more life from my already weary body. There was a great heaviness in my chest, my breathing became difficult and I suffered from recurring nightmares - signs of the immensity of the grief I was reeling over the death of our much loved daughter. It did not seem real, only a week ago her precious little life was growing inside me . What went wrong? Why did it happen? Was it my fault? Was I being punished? Did I not deserve to be a mummy? Why didn't God intervene? He could have if he'd wanted to. We had been planning our baby for an awful long time and Angelique was already a major part of our lives.

Our friends and family never did understand our love for her. They could not comprehend the terrible emptiness we felt knowing that she was gone forever. Everyone was sorry to hear about our "miscarriage", not the fact that our first born child had died. After Angelique's death we only received one card from my sister and one floral arrangement from my husband's parents. We felt that they were the only ones to truly recognise our daughter as a real person whose death we were grieving over. My father told me about six months after her death that I should stop talking about her and all my mother kept saying is how awful it must be for people whose baby dies at full term after a normal pregnancy. She also told me recently that if I had rested more when I was pregnant with Angelique like I am doing now with Kieran, then it probably would not have happened.

The nights I had to spend alone at the hospital were dark and lonesome. Each night when my husband had to leave me there while I was recovering physically, the deadly silence was broken only by my uncontrollable sobs which I tried to muffle in my pillow. I felt afraid and vulnerable without him as I had lost my naiveté and my innocence the night she died. The old lady who was sharing the room with me told she understood because her husband had died not so long ago. We cried together for a little while and I'm sure she understood the feeling of losing a loved one, but she had spent many wonderful years with her husband and had plenty of memories. All we had to remember was a tiny, lifeless body. For a long time I hoped and prayed that it was all a big mistake, they were going to phone me to tell me that she really was alive. That they had managed to bring her back to life either medically or that God had breathed life back into her perfect body. A miracle! I believed that silly fantasy until the day we collected her ashes. I knew then that the impossible was no longer possible. However I did continue to wish that one day I would wake from this nightmare and that everything had been done, or said, differently.

We were treated unfairly by the hospital staff who made my husband go home while I gave birth to our darling Angelique all by myself in the surgical ward. We also found the doctor to be cold and insensitive. He came to see me first thing in the morning and the discussion led to what we were going to do with her tiny body. As I had not yet seen my husband we had not had the chance to discuss it so I told him we'd get back to him. He then said to the nurse in front of me "I think the best thing to do right now would be to bag the babe and put it in the fridge". That comment didn't worry me at the time but now as I reflect on it, my heart is torn. I let my little girl be treated like a piece of meat, my precious baby girl.

I felt guilty enough that my body was to blame for her death, but then as time went on I came to realise that we never really treated her like our baby for a long time afterwards. There just wasn't the time to form any real memories of our daughter. We never heard that precious first cry, never experienced her dependency on us and never heard her say those beautiful words, 'I love you' We only spent half an hour with her at another hospital which welcomed us to spend some time alone with her. I regret not bathing or dressing her and I wish we'd spent a lot more time with her. At the time we found the whole situation very uncomfortable, for which I blame the hospital staff's attitudes.

I miss my baby girl to such a degree that only those who have been through the same can understand. Others try to make us feel better but generally end up upsetting us even more. Although it has now been almost twelve months since we lost Angelique I still can't put some of her things away. Just the other night I went to put her teddy bear away in her memory box but I couldn't. I cried again for the first time in quite a while. I don't want to let go, I miss her so much. I want her back, my darling daughter, I want her back.

Now that I'm pregnant again everybody thinks that we should be happy and think positive, after all we've got a second chance. What they don't realise is that it has reopened the wound. Sometimes I think why should Kieran die, there's no reason why he should? But then I think why should he live, Angelique didn't, what makes Kieran different? They both deserve to live. All I want right now is to bathe, dress, love him and hold him close if he does die. I also would like to have a real funeral service for him. This may sound morbid but I don't believe he will be coming home with us. I feel that if we were meant to keep babies then Angelique would have lived. Not only am I worried for Kieran, but my arms still ache and my heart still yearns for Angelique. I find it extremely difficult to be around baby girls who are the same age as she would be. I hurts too much.

Our friends and family now believe our grieving should he over and we should be trusting God and looking to the future. But our children are our future and part of Ian's and my own future has gone. She never even breathed a breath of air from our world. We have to live a whole lifetime before we can see our baby girl again and it hurts to live every day of your life with part of you missing. A part that will never be replaced, especially by another baby. Although we might not always be conscious of it, there will always be a gaping hole in our hearts, a lonely emptiness that will not be filled until we are reunited with our darling Angelique in God's loving arms. Until then we will continue to feel cheated, sad and even angry at the unfairness of the lousy hand we were dealt. Not only will we be suffering from losing our baby girl but also from being abandoned by our friends and family at a time when we needed them most.

By Davina Tyler