They were still born: From the cot to a casket

 As my baby slips silently from my own womb, the only sound in the delivery room is my own sobs.

Still birth, defined as the death of an infant between 20 weeks' gestation and birth is a tragedy played out each day in our hospitals.

The expectation of a new life, a new cot prepared for her arrival. But this is the happiest story with the saddest ending. It begins with a cot in mind and ends in a mini-casket. 

It is a most devastating and unspeakable of losses where every hope and dream is snuffed out. Contraction of expectations turns into a lifelong grief. From joy to sorrow, in an instance. 

With her features fully formed, she looks just like any other baby. Her eyes just look like mine, and her lips just like those of my husband. Cuddled and wrapped, she looks so serene and at peace. I was the instrument from which life was bestowed, but, alas, she was not breathing. 

She will always be my child, my first child. Whenever I am asked how many children I have, I will reply, “three”. Two by my sides, and one is looking down at me from the highest of heavens. For this most special and unique child, I will miss her first gurgle, her first teeth, her first tentative step, her first smile and her first graduation. Words cannot describe my loss. I call her mine, my baby. 

With a last look from my bed, I sent her on the way home, to the mortuary. I bade my daughter farewell. My husband looks unfazed, but I know deep down, he is tearing inside. 

From the maternity ward to the morgue, the walk that my husband had to undertake felt like ages. In a maternity cart that’s not out of place in a ward of crying babies, my daughter was not crying. The wheels of the cart brought it inevitably to the mortuary. With a forlorn look on his exhausted frame, my husband walks steadily behind, a death certificate clutched in his hands. 

A birth and a death certificate look almost exactly the same, with the same name inscribed on them. She was my daughter, my late daughter. 

Till this very day, I can feel my body heat emanating from my baby, the warmth that has yet to dissipate. That’s how I want to remember my daughter. 

We must do more to help grieving parents of pre-natal losses in Singapore, regardless of whether the loss was a result of a miscarriage, a mishap during labour, stillbirth or prematurity. 

Grieving parents must know they are not alone on this painful path, from the validation of their babies' lives to guidance and a comforting hand from those who have suffered this similar tragedy. 

Children are special. They are an act of love. We grow old as our children grow up. The loss of a child is an invisible pain that lingers, a silence that many do not speak about. The regrets, the hurt and the omnipresent burdens saturate a mother’s tears that are long dry. Yet every gland continues to feel moist. 

An unspeakable consciousness, a wrenching pain. No amount of ransom can bring my child back from the grim reaper.

It is our hope that as a community, we can increase and enhance our support of young grieving mothers [parents] and that one day, Singapore will be an ecology of hope and comfort to all who have had experienced a similar loss.New Paragraph