An Open Letter to Our Angel Baby
To our perfect Angel Baby that never made it into this world, I loved you the day that God began to weave you inside my womb. I fell to my knees, thankful that God blessed me with a baby, answering my prayers and my dreams of finally becoming a mother came true. I wept with joy and sheer excitement to be expecting a baby, already calculating your expected birth date and planning on how to announce it to your Daddy and to our families. I made a card for your Daddy that read: “Faith as small as a mustard seed can move mountains. That is the size of our baby! You are going to be a Daddy!” We were able to watch you grow from a tiny mustard seed on the ultrasound to the size of a mango. We heard your heart beating like the sound of the most beautiful music, I felt you move, I felt you kick, I felt you grow. It wasn’t until the day of your 20-week anatomy scan that I learned about the many risks mothers take when they decide they want to become a mother.
I am your mother, I carried you in my womb for five months before I learned of the very rare complex you had as a very small fetus: OEIS complex or syndrome, a very rare and life threatening complex of multiple birth defects. Our doctor told us that your case was very severe; omphalocele, exstrophy of the bladder, imperforate anus and spinal defects, amongst other things. A mother to be is not prepared to face such decisions during a fragile time in their pregnancy, halfway there. We were told that if the baby were to come to term, we run the risk of having you go through multiple surgeries beginning immediately at birth as well as long term effects associated with considerable morbidity and psychosocial consequences. Just as I thought, the worst was yet to come during labor and delivery, little did I know what can be identified or diagnosed at this 20 week anatomy scan.
That whole week I had been really nervous and anxious for our upcoming appointment. We thought everything in our pregnancy was fairly normal and it was meant to take this long to measure everything. As I lay there with your Daddy sitting by my side for almost 2 hours having them take pictures of everything, every angle and every acronym typed out onto the photos, I didn’t think to ask anything but just to confirm your gender. That day as I lay there, having the technician scan me, the first time I really felt you kick, we were able to see it on the ultrasound, I say it aloud “I felt that!” and I smile at your Daddy in amazement.
The technician says she’s going to “have the doctor come back and take a look at the images,” there was just enough time for me and your Daddy to say a prayer for you, praying for a healthy and whole baby as we did everyday since we have known I was pregnant. Just as sudden as your first kick was, I had to snap back to reality the moment the doctor mentioned the severity of the birth defects and complications that were to come if we brought you to term. 1 out of 400,000 pregnancies, this happens unexplainably as there are no known causes, a “fluke of nature” they called it. You kick and I feel the jolt of movement in my belly, we were stunned and shocked at the outcomes. It was weeks or months in and out of surgeries or we can terminate this wanted pregnancy soon after getting MRI confirmations and a chromosomal and genetic test done. We had to make decisions, and we had to make them soon because you were growing bigger and things may get more complicated the further along I am in the pregnancy.
That night as your Daddy held me in his arms as I wailed and cried out, we made the hardest decision any couple has to make when they want to grow their family in the most comfortable, joyful and loving environment. I remember your repeated kicks inside me that night, refusing me to sleep and allowing me to feel you, really feel you kick me. Every moment I stopped to feel you, took my time to tell you I love you and that I was so thankful for you. For five months, as your mother with you in my womb; I was your protector, I was your strength, I was your home, I was your guardian. That night I realized that I couldn’t bring you upon this Earth with so many complications to bear, with multiple risks of death and even consequences that are unpredictable, surgeries that could possibly not mend. I could not have you or your Daddy and I live a life with suffering, uncertainty, risk of loss or just major life threatening challenges for days to come.
Our Angel Baby, you were destined for heaven because the Lord needs your perfect soul to be our guardian angel. You were not meant to live in this world, but eternally with our God forever.
PSALM 139:13-16 “For you created my inmost being; you knit me together in my mother’s womb. I praise you because I am fearfully and wonderfully made; your works are wonderful, I know that full well. My frame was not hidden from you when I was made in the secret place, when I was woven together in the depths of the earth. Your eyes saw my unformed body; all the days ordained for me were written in your book before one of them came to be.”
It will take time for me to understand why this is our plan, why we were chosen with such a difficult choice and if I would want to ever try again after such grief and sadness, may God now carry you.
PROVERBS 16:9 “We can make our plans, but the Lord determines our steps.”