Michael Angela
I found out that
I was pregnant in December. Knowing that we were open to life, I was not shocked but, I was a little surprised.
My due date was August 27, 2005. The date wasn’t great because we planned to be
in Florida that week and the reservations were already made. I decided not to cancel the reservations until
I was 4 months pregnant just incase anything would happen.
On Christmas, I
knew I was pregnant but, I knew it would not bring joy to the extended family so I kept it a secret. On
New Years Eve my dad became very sick and I brought him to the hospital. I was there for several hours
and I hoped that I didn’t become exposed to anything dangerous to my baby. Dad was also in and out
of the hospital many times in early January and I was with Dad a lot while he was hospitalized.
I
started worrying if it was dangerous for the baby so I told Dad that I was pregnant. We went ahead and
told everyone.
I felt really exhausted and fairly nauseous during that month
of January. Suddenly, on Saturday night Jan 22nd around 11 pm, I no longer felt completely exhausted.
I wasn’t nauseous. I told my self not to worry and enjoy a few hours of feeling good.
Sunday, I felt good and still on Monday I felt good. I chose not to be anxious but, I was a little
concerned.
My husband left for Seattle on Monday afternoon. Monday night,
Jan 24th my sister brought the little kids home from religion class. While she was visiting
for a little while, I went to the bathroom. There is was pink on the toilet tissue. “I’m
spotting,” I told her. In my heart I knew the baby was gone.
I called my husband on the cell phone. His plane was on the landing strip. “I
can get back on a plane and come home,” he said. “We don’t even know for sure that the
baby is dead. Stay there for now. There is nothing you can do to stop it anyway,”
I insisted.
I told my sister that I needed to be with Jesus. She drove me up to church but the church was locked.
There were two women in the parking lot talking. I asked them if they had keys to the church and
if they could let us in. They had keys and they let us in. One of the ladies insisted on getting a priest
so I requested Fr. Don. As she called to the rectory for him, I prayed in front of the Blessed Sacrament.
I asked God for the strength to accept his will for my child whatever that might be. My heart was
tearing apart, was my child dying right now? How can I protect him or her? Was my child
dead? Is everything OK…I didn’t think so. I don’t bleed with healthy
pregnancies. God please give me strength.
Fr. Don came in and prayed with us for a few minutes.
He asked me to call him and let him know what the doctor said.
The next day, I went to see my OB doctor
for an emergency visit. Frank, my oldest, asked to go with me. If my husband was home,
I would have had him go with me to the doctors. My husband wasn’t home so I allowed Frank to go.
I figured either he was really worried about me or he wanted to be the man of the house or both. Frank
waited in the waiting room as the doctor examined me. The doctor said the bleeding stopped and I measured
correctly so he wasn’t worried but, he would send me for an ultrasound to be sure. We went straight
to the hospital and had the ultrasound. Frank waited in the waiting room again. The
ultrasound tech said she couldn’t tell me anything but it didn’t look like I was 9 ½ weeks pregnant and
I was the measurement of 6 ½ weeks. I didn’t see a heart beat; I knew the answer.
The ultrasound tech called the doctors office and they told me that they could hurry along the miscarriage with some
drugs. I said I wasn’t interested and my husband was out of town. I came back
into the waiting room I told Frank the baby was dead. He didn’t look surprised. We
walked to the car.
When we got in the car, Frank said, “I knew the baby was dead. God told me in a dream that
the baby was dead a few days earlier. I didn’t know whether to tell you. I told
God that I would ask to go to the doctors with you and if I was to tell you about the dream then you would say yes and allow
me to go to the doctors. We had been having a hard time in homeschool and praying for help.
God chose to give us this baby who was to die so that we had another intercessor in heaven.”
Wow! God sent a messenger who was my own son, Frank. What a blessing to know
our baby was in heaven praying for us. Praise be to God! Thank you Frank, for listening
and bringing me his message.
I called my husband and told him the news. I explained
that the baby was dead and I had no idea when the baby would be born. Since our first miscarried baby was
Raphael I wanted to name this one after another archangel. I asked if we could call the baby Michael Angela
and he agreed.
My friend was babysitting while I was at the doctor. I went home and told the kids that our number
one goal is to get the kids to heaven and we accomplished that goal with this child already. Our baby had
died and was living in heaven where he/ she will always be happy. He/ she has the best mother in Mary and
the best father in God the Father and they will give our baby all the love it will need and we can add even more when we get
there and hold him someday.
I noticed that on the calendar that Thursday was the feast of St. Angela
Merici. I called my husband and said wouldn’t that be just like God to have the Michael Angela born
on its feast day.
The doctor’s office called and said my hormone levels
are as if I was pregnant. That was why I was so sick. My placenta did not know that
the baby died and was still growing and making me sick. They had not yet seen the ultrasound but, it sounded
like the baby was dead. They wanted me to call them and update them on my situation.
After I left the ultrasound, I started to bleed again almost immediately. The bleeding continued
on Tuesday, Wednesday and Thursday. As larger clots would pass I would frantically search through the toilet
trying to make sure that I didn’t flush my baby. It was a great relief to find a new way to catch
the baby. I found a small 4 inch strainer to use to catch the clots. The seconds, minutes,
and hours seemed to take forever as I waited in this limbo. I kept thinking it is just a dream.
I kept picking up the phone and checking the e-mail for someone to tell me they made a mistake.
On
Thursday another doctor at the office called and told me that since my hormonal levels were up and the ultrasound wasn’t
conclusive they thought maybe I was a month less pregnant and still pregnant. They wanted to do another
ultrasound next week to be sure. I knew they were wrong. My bleeding had been increasing
and I didn’t feel pregnant anymore.
I did not feel like making a meal on Thursday, so I asked my mom
and dad to go with us to a restaurant. While we were there I began to have some strong cramps.
I tried not to show any pain so no one knew I might be starting labor. I tried to act like I was
perfectly fine emotionally and physically but, I felt torn apart emotionally and was cramping.
After we came home, around 8:30, my sister stopped by. While she was there I began to bleed heavily.
I was not cramping anymore. I asked my sister to bring me to a hospital. This
was too much blood. She went with me to the bathroom and I bleed heavily and into the strainer fell many
clots and one big clot about 1 ½ inch diameter. I asked my sister to look at that clot.
She broke it open and found our Michael Angela. Michael Angela was not well formed like my other
miscarried child, but he/ she was my baby. I continued to bleed heavily and called a nurse friend to come
down to help me to decide if I needed to call a squad. My husband called while this was happening and he
felt helpless 3000 miles away as we tried to stop the bleeding. I called the doctors office.
They said I could try to stay home if I stayed perfectly still, put ice on by belly, and nurse my babies to cramp the
uterus. About 10:30 the bleeding was under control and I sent my fried and sister
home. My sister did not go to sleep until 3 am waiting for me to call if I needed help.
My husband got home on Friday. Since he was out of town he really did not understand all I went
through and was still going through. He seemed cold and callus. I was deeply hurt.
He had been so caring with the last miscarriage, I could not understand. We buried Michael Angela
on Saturday in the plot next to my other miscarried baby. Fr. Don came to the grave to pray as we buried
a second child’s body. Only their bodies are in the ground. Their souls are in
heaven. I am glad Michael Angela and my other baby have each other. So every Jan. 27th
I will celebrate the day you were born Michael Angela. I will look forward to the day my babies can
take me by an arm and present me to the triune God. Until then as we miss you, all the angels and saints
especially my babies, pray for us.
