I want to change things

One statement that has stuck in my mind since I lost Hope is "if this happened to me, it can happen to anyone".

I know I keep banging on about my glorious, uncomplicated pregnancy, but it is true, I had not a worry in the world when I was pregnant. I did everything right, then life crapped on me.

My real worries were before I got pregnant. As I had some sort of irrational fear I would not be able to get pregnant or ever have kids. I always knew I wanted kids, so not getting them seemed like the worst thing in the world to me. After our first failed month of trying, I even condemned myself to being the poor barren lady. I really should work harder on that glass half full thing.

The next month, I fell pregnant. Turns out, not so hard after all and I'd always get that family I dreamed of. I just had to get through the whole pregnancy and birth thing. Piece of cake I thought, especially for a strong and healthy girl like me.

The only time I really worried in the pregnancy was at 10 weeks when the morning sickness decided to take a break and given I hadn't had an ultrasound yet, I was pretty convinced my uterus was empty. Glass still very much half empty.

So in we went for an ultrasound, and there she was. All 4.2cm of her, heart pounding away like a crazy little thing. Head still huge and way out of proportion to the rest of her tiny little body.Hardly being the weepy, expectant mother, I simply said to the Doctor "is it alive?" And he was like "Ahh yes, it just moved." "Oh," I said, meanwhile looking over at Simon who was simply beaming as he's a nurse so he immediately knew Hope was alive and well. He could see the blood pumping around her tiny body. He could see that little heart merrily thumping along.

The 12 and the 20 week ultrasounds went by without a worry in the world, as did the rest of the pregnancy. I never took it for granted. I relished every moment of it. Took delight in every single flutter, kick and jab to my ribs.I even remember saying to myself at about 37 weeks that this was it, it was only a matter of time. She just had to be born. Nothing was going to happen to us now, we were invincible.

The midwife even said to me at 38 weeks, "no matter what happens, in four weeks time you'll definitely have your baby in your arms".

Well, turns out we were both very, very wrong.

First rule of pregnancy: assume nothing.

Far from wanting to rain on anyone's happy parade, I want to be able to teach others about what I know now. And I'd love to somehow be able to instigate change with the way hospitals treat pregnant women, especially us "low-riskers". No one is ever really a low risk.

Yes, I have a damn scary story and telling those with bumps about me and Hope would make most pregnant women want to duck for cover.

But I want to help them. I don't want to see more babies die in the senseless way Hope did. I want to scream at them "BE CAREFUL, THIS MAY NOT WORK OUT FOR YOU AS YOU PLANNED. TAKE NOTHING FOR GRANTED. SEEK HELP AS SOON AS YOU BECOME WORRIED, CONFUSED OR CONCERNED ABOUT ANYTHING!"

If someone had said that to me six months ago, there's a very good chance Hope would be here now. If doctors and midwives hadn't always glossed over the adverse outcomes, I may not be here. Instead, I'd be marvelling at the smiles of my chubby three-month old.

I got so much information on SIDS during the pregnancy, and I think that is just as scary as stillbirths. I took all the information in my stride and knew I would be able to put it to good use once the baby arrived to do my best to avoid that awful scenario.

We got a brochure on how to install the car seat correctly to make sure our little one wouldn't go flying through the windscreen if we were in an accident.

I stayed away from all the banned foods and drinks during pregnancy, even caffeine, as I figured I didn't want to take any risks at all.

Even though you see women who take awful care of themselves and abuse their bodies give birth to perfectly healthy little babies every day.

What I'm trying to say is, there is so much that is scary about pregnancy and looking after a newborn, but surely one of the most scariest things is stillbirths yet I don't think I heard it mentioned once during the pregnancy. And if it was, it was only fleeting and no one really took the time to explain the real risks to me and what the real odds were. My guess would have been one in 1000 or maybe even 10,000, not one in 100.

No one said how important it was to do kick counting. Yet we are all fed the line that babies slow down at the end of pregnancy as they run out of room.

No one told me my waters could break without my knowledge. Well, in the end they did, but that was after the fact, when it was too late - she was already gone.

No one told me that hyperactivity and frequent hiccups at the end of pregnancy can actually be a sign of distress.

No one said how quickly things could go wrong at the end of perfectly healthy pregnancies.

No one told me that a baby could still die after a healthy CTG trace (non stress test) at 40 weeks and 1 day when I was already in the early stages of labour.

Like one couple said in one of the support group meetings we went to early on (and they were an educated, intelligent couple like us) they just didn't know babies could die in the womb, before active labour had started after an uncomplicated pregnancy. Like this couple, I sort of had a rough idea that a stillbirth was something that happened in the very late stages of labour. During the pushing. Something happening with the cord, or oxygen supply. But I thought this day and age, with all the monitoring they do and all the technology they have, that it just didn't happen and if it did, it was incredibly rare. I mean it is 2008 for crying out loud! I live in Australia! WTF?

It begs the question why we all aren't monitored more closely. I know some other mothers have expressed these sentiments, but it is almost as if our first babies are disposable. They can't keep all the first babies alive, so if some unfortunately don't make it, we are reassured by being told we'll get all the extra checks next time. I hardly know what to make of this. As that extra attention most certainly could have kept Hope alive. Like she deserved to be.

I saw my GP a couple of days ago and she seems to agree with me that things need to change. That we should be speaking about these adverse outcomes during pregnancy more often and that all women should be monitored more closely. Things are sugar coated too much for us and we are just all lead to believe that nine months always ends in happily ever after. I am living proof it doesn't.

She asked me if I thought she should speak about stillbirths to her pregnant patients more. And I said "YES, PLEASE!" I mean we can be sensible about this, but we can just give women the facts and the truth, so at least they are aware and armed with what could end being life saving information.

She said a stillbirth needed to happen to a prominent person, so it could be put back on the social agenda. Like when Ky.lie Min.ogue or Chris.tina Apple.gate got breast cancer, suddenly everyone was talking about it and everyone was out getting screened. And from the research I have done, there are about as many stillborn babies each year as there are breast cancer victims. There is something so very wrong about this.

But I am neither of those women. I am not prominent. People probably aren't going to take notice of me. I'm the crazy lady with the horror story. I'm the one in 100 who people would rather not think about.

So how do I do this? My GP said she saw an "inner strength" in me. She said she thought I could one day be someone who could do something about this. She said it might take me 10 or 15 years to gather my thoughts and find my feet (and also some time to welcome some little living treasures in to the world) but that with the right help and the right knowledge, I could help bring about change. I do shudder to think about all the babies that will die in the meantime. The poor women out there who will suffer my fate. They are out there, and they don't even know it yet. Maybe the took a pregnancy test this morning. It was positive! Yay! But little do they know, they may end up getting smacked down with a stillbirth, which much like it did for me, will come straight out of left field. I feel so sorry for those women. I wish Hope was the last baby to die this way. Sadly, I know there will be many women walking this path behind me.

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In other news, I hosted the non-birthday party for my friends yesterday and their three December babes. It went well. I baked a cake and got to play favourite quasi-Aunty by handing out presents to the little treasures. They all flocked to the one present as I feared - there just wasn't three of them in the shop to get them all the same thing!

It was nice and hard all at the same time. I am proud I was able to get through it, but also gutted that my baby will never get to play with these kids. And fight over the same toy. Her absence was so apparent. Two boys, one girl. And one of the little boys and the little girl are the best of friends. I think my Hope and the other little boy would have been the best of friends, too. She was the missing little girlfriend, and the missing little girl. She was the little baby not quite yet rolling over, that the three bigger should have been beating up on but ever so inquisitive of. She was the little baby I didn't get to breastfeed while the others got to feed their kids mashed fruit and yoghurt. She just wasn't here, on another day when I wanted her here so, so much.

Just like every day.

I want her here every day. I miss you and love you forever my Hope.