As I hold my youngest baby in my arms, watching her sleep, I feel such joy and love for this precious little person. I feel so much disbelief that she actually made it across the finish line and into my arms and I am beyond grateful that I get to be her Mummy. 

But the path to this moment wasn’t an easy one and my love for her will forever be intertwined with loss and grief. 

In fact, my journey to motherhood on the whole has not been a smooth one. My eldest daughter was born when I was 25; she was a complete surprise but a very welcome one. I had a lot of bleeding throughout the pregnancy and was even told early on that I was miscarrying. However, she fought through and made it into my arms and she is an absolute dream come true. 

The birth trauma stayed with me however, and two years after my daughter’s birth I was diagnosed with a muscle tissue disorder which meant my natural birth had caused damage and there was a question mark over whether I would be able to carry another child. I spent the next year and a half working so hard at my physical therapy and got my body to a point where it was strong enough to safely try again.

The month before my daughter turned four we decided to start trying for our second and didn’t anticipate, perhaps naively, that we would have any problems conceiving. We had fallen so quickly (accidently) with our eldest that we felt pretty confident we would fall quickly again.

Like all best laid plans it didn’t work out like that. It took us months to fall pregnant, I remember the pure exhaustion of the trying to conceive journey. The endless cycle of ovulation tests, big fat negatives, other people’s good news and the dreaded two week wait. It just wasn’t happening for us and we started to worry something was wrong. 

But thankfully, after eight months, we saw those magical two lines!  We were over the moon and couldn’t wait to start preparing for new baby. The first few weeks were an excited bubble! I was finally carrying the baby I had dreamed of for so long. A baby I worked so hard to have and had already overcome so many obstacles for. 

At around six weeks the dreaded morning sickness began to kick in. I’d been expecting this as I was sick daily with my first daughter. However, this time it was on another level and as the days went on I got progressively more sick. I was being sick between twenty and thirty times a day and had extreme nausea. I was diagnosed with Hyperemesis Gravidarum and given a number of different medications (none of which lessened my symptoms) and was admitted to hospital for fluids. I was basically bed bound for months. It was a hellish experience. I lost a lot of weight and felt the most ill I had ever felt. 

I kept focusing on that 12-week mark as the point where things would turn around but 12 weeks came and went and I was still as sick as ever. The 12-week scan was of course a relief as we saw a strong healthy baby on the screen but I was really hoping it would be a turning point for feeling better. 

A month later, the day before I was 16 weeks, alongside feeling so unwell I started to get what felt like very mild contractions. I dragged myself to the EPU where I was told it could be Braxton Hicks but it was most likely anxiety or trapped wind! They did a scan and confirmed baby was healthy and strong, then sent me back home. By this point the pain was increasing and I was feeling even more unwell. 

I didn’t sleep all night as the pains (contractions) were coming every 20 minutes or so. My husband suggested A&E but I knew the EPU opened at 6am so I just wanted to make it through until then. I rang and they told me to come in at midday, I was in complete agony and begged them to see me sooner. They agreed and we headed straight off.

When we arrived at the EPU we were guided to a small side room. I was in so much pain, I remember feeling cold all over and my whole body shaking, from what I thought at the time was fear but turned out to be a raging fever. I was seen by various doctors and nurses who all parroted the previous day’s diagnosis of braxton hicks and anxiety. A doctor completed an excruciating diagnosis and confirmed that my cervix was closed and that baby was in no danger. At this point I was begging for some pain relief and they gave me gas and air and took some blood.

When the results from the blood tests came in everything changed. It turned out I had contracted Sepsis; it was already advanced and already life threatening. I deteriorated rapidly and was suddenly fighting for my life. My body was going into septic shock and I was in premature labour. If had waited until midday to go in as suggested both me and baby would have died at home. Baby battled on, keeping his heart beating until the very end but he couldn’t survive the virus and I gave birth to him sleeping.

I was immediately rushed into emergency surgery where they worked at speed to save my life. I was told that the surgeons would take whatever they needed to rid my body of the infection, including my womb, ovaries etc, and that if they needed to take other organs then that would happen. I was wheeled into the operating theatre still in shock from losing my baby, not knowing if I would wake up or what parts of me I would still have if I did.

I remember being wheeled down and thinking “just let me die and be with my baby”, but then I thought of my eldest daughter and knew I couldn’t go into that surgery wanting to die as then I would never wake up. So I willed myself to want to live for my little girl.

I survived the surgery, and by some miracle with all my organs intact, but I was still exceptionally poorly. The next two days were a blur of doctors trying their best to beat the sepsis. After three days of losing that battle, they decided to try a final strong antibiotic but warned me that if that didn’t work it would be back into surgery to cut away any infected organs. 

The antibiotic worked and I began to recover. I was allowed to see my tiny baby twice in hospital to say goodbye. 

Losing my baby in the middle of fighting for my life was something I never could have imagined and it will stay with me forever. It’s hard to live with the knowledge that if I hadn’t contracted sepsis my baby would be in my arms now. 

My experience of loss taught me love, patience, resilience and true strength in a way I had never experienced before. It taught me a different way to be a mother. It taught me that you can love your child so deeply and so truly even if they are not with you; that sometimes your babies are with you in a different way, wrapping you in love from above. 

My baby saved me so I could carry on being a mother to their big sister and then sent me their little sister to pull my out of the darkness. Every day I try to live in a way that will makes my baby proud. 

My rainbow came very quickly after our storm. As soon as the doctors said it was safe we tried and were pregnant immediately. That pregnancy was one of the hardest experiences of my life, the anxiety and PTSD were all consuming. I could not imagine getting to bring home my baby and I was terrified for 9 months. I felt like I was existing, not living, just praying baby made it through. My anxiety was at an all time high and life was a struggle.

In keeping with my motherhood experiences my birth with baby girl was not smooth sailing. She came three weeks early and I had to have an emergency c-section due to placental abruption. It was another emergency situation for me and my baby. My husband said after that he couldn’t focus on who to worry about as the surgeons couldn’t stop my internal bleeding as the NICU team were working to get baby breathing. I remember feeling like here it is, the moment I was waiting for, here’s where I lose my baby, again. 

But the doctors did their amazing work and I have my rainbow baby in my arms and magically she was born with a “stork bite” birthmark which legend says means she was kissed by an angel before she was born. It felt like a miracle but that complicated my grief because if I hadn’t experienced that loss my baby girl wouldn’t be here but then there is still so much pain and grief for the baby boy we lost. 

Living with and healing from the trauma is an ongoing journey. It is a daily battle and I still have so many questions around how you make space for the grief and the joy. How do you align the incredible experience of safely bringing children into this world and the joy of getting to raise them with the grief of never knowing the child you lost?

I am learning every day that grief and joy can co-exist. I am learning to honour my grief and accept that holding space for the baby I lost doesn’t mean I love or appreciate my earthside children any less and that there is space for all my children, always.

Love and loss will forever define my motherhood and the grief and joy exist together in my heart.

—Rebecca Fearn