Hi Bellah,
I don’t know what heaven is like, but I hope you are resting
with the angels, picking flowers often, and I hope each time you see me longing
for you, you say a prayer for us. I try not to think about what led to your
beautiful self leaving, but…..If tears and heartaches would bring you back,
that would be a Lazarus-kind of miracle in the 21st century.
I look back and wonder. I wish I could have held your hand more.
I wanted to take photos from day one of your being born, but I was not sure if
phones were allowed in the small incubator area that they had put you in. You
lay there, peacefully breathing each day and making small sounds each time we came to see you. I wish I had come more often than twice a day. I wish I knew
that the incubator that they had put you in did not have ventilation. I would
have transferred you to a hospital with a proper NICU. I was just a naive new
mother suffering from high blood pressure with a painful scar, with the hope
that after about 8 weeks, I would have my baby with me. The doctors said you
were fine, and the surgeon of the day said I was lucky to have given birth to a
healthy baby, albeit prematurely.
I still swear that if I had all the resources and was living in the first
world, I would have sued the pediatrician and her team in that hospital. I
still believe she would have advised me sooner rather than later about the
transfer. She had the power, instead of taking you as just another statistic.
I have since forgiven them (but will not forget that they would
have done the right thing from the start). It still hurts and aches beyond
measurable doubt.
I have learned so much from the Women of preeclampsia Kenya, but
those are lessons for another day. Today I celebrate you. We would have been a
few weeks closer to holding you in my arms had preeclampsia not knocked at my door. But, it’s
been one month since you rested.
Love Mom.
