Four months will soon pass since the birth and death of our precious Ian “Pough-chan,” After the overwhelming support from this board, I can only beg forgiveness for not reporting back sooner. Posts were half-written only to deleted, abandoned or neglected. I had to put some distance before I could write about Pough-chan again.
From a post written much earlier, but never finished:
The blade does not cut and should be replaced, but I’ll just finish this piece so I don’t have to go replace it. I’ll pick that up on the next trip after I hang this sheet of dry wall, and avoid an extra trip in this arid heat of the Utah summer.
I slide the blade along the well-worn straightedge, holding the ruler with my left hand; index finger up, thumb down. The thick outer paper slices easily but the inner gypsum rapidly dulls blades, requiring frequent replacements.
This time the paper is barely dented. This blade won’t cut anymore. Blue word fly and I try again, bearing down a little harder. It cuts, and I smile as I saved myself a few minutes. Yup, I’ll get that blade the next trip.
Like a plane taxiing through a muddy field, the razor shakes and weaves as it protests the forced movement. Freed by a jag in the ruler, it soars over the easier path above the ruler; not even pausing as it separates flesh on my finger.
A flash – a thought – a wonder that there was no pain or blood is erased by an abundance of both. Any concerns for completing the wall or replacing the blade are now in the past tense as this nick will require some six or seven stitches, pain and tetanus shots and an unwanted but well-deserved lecture in work safety before I can retreat to lick my wounded pride.
Some 17 years have passed, the pain is a distant memory, but the scar still remains. “You were lucky,” people told me, “another 1/8” and you would have lost the side of your finger.” “Yes, I guess I’m lucky, but had I been really lucky it wouldn’t have happened.”
Another slash and the cut is all too deep. There is no blood, but the pain won’t sleep. No lectures now, but no shots or stitches can repair this damage for which the scar will not be visible.
“It’s better this way,” was heard more than one. The burning tears, the enduring pain disprove that lie. This was not the better way. There was no better way. Babies are to be born. The young are to bury the old, not the old to bury the young. Babies are to become children, not to fade into fleeting memories of a too short time of life. Children are to grow strong not to remain frozen in time, captured only on film and one all too short video.
And from another post, also never completed.
“I can’t trust you” she sobs, the words pierce the blackness and cut deep. Words need no lights to find their target. Many are the nights that her tears have stirred me from my sleep, but tonight is different. Other nights were about our son, forever sleeping. Tonight is about me, but not about me. Those protecting hormones which grew the life within her now protest the sudden loss of a body within a body. I breathe deeply. It’s not about me, I remind myself, it’s not about me. The tremendous stress and shock of the loss of our eagerly awaited baby hurts more so than what a person can bare. Tonight is her turn for the sorrow to overwhelm rational thought. My long forgotten, inconsequential words churn and ferment, replayed late at night until they are solidified into a forgone conclusion of infidelity.
“Fight or flight,” the subconscious screams, “run away or attack her back,” the instinct is strong. Righteous indignation screams at my soul to not tolerate false accusations. Fortunately, cooler thoughts prevailed. “Breath deep”, to myself I plead. This is not about me. I hold her and we cry. We talk and cry and talk again. Then we laugh.
This one got started, only to die quickly.
I get drunk, wanting to take my my frustrations on the asshat on the train, it’s my wife’s fingernails cutting into my arm which remind me that there is more to life than who bumped who first.
You may say a few words in remembrance, but you never bury a child. They may die, but they will never leave.
Some days are better, some days are worse. I pull over on the express road because the tears won’t stop, and there were many nights when the sole reason she didn’t reach for the knife because her faith says she won’t see her child again if she does.
It gets better. There is no darkness so dark that one can’t see the light. I can no more imagine life before my child than I can imagine life without my wife. We laugh. We cry. We have our silly games. She’s got worse eyes and terrible night visions, so when the lights are turned out, I hide. It’s hysterically funny, but only for us. The rest of the world would know we’re nuts.
And yet another post started but not finished. Good thing I kept them.
I sell. I don’t see myself as a salesman, but that’s what my name card reads. Selling is not persuading, it’s looking at someone and understanding what they would want to say if they could. When the neurologist talked, it was not to the worlds that I listened. The words formed by his mouth said that modern medicine could not foretell the fate or our beloved son, but his eyes betrayed him. No, Ian would not be long for this world.
I knew, with as much conviction I have that the sun will rise again tomorrow but a parent’s love with never set, that this man knew that when we took our son from that institution, a baby seat would not be necessary. TW took the best from his words and hoped that we would be given more time to look after our precious little one. Months, if not years. Carrying our child for eight months, and with the love that only a mother can have, TW never gave up hope.
Back to the present.
It’s been almost four months, an eternity since what seems like yesterday. We’re doing much better now. We took a trip to Korea in November and then Taiwan and Vietnam over New Years. I’m really grateful that we decided to devote ourselves to supporting each other through this trial, even at the sacrifice of my beloved golf game. A lifetime of opportunities await me to enrich manufacturers of little white balls for dropping into little round holes, if one is lucky, or as likely, in my case drowned or lost. Golf will wait, but there is only now to hold my wife.
TW and I are trying again for children. As a dedicated “un-gambler”, the phrase always seemed funny to me, as if there were just something that people could do right to ensure success. (OK, even with my weak grasp of the basics, we did it before, so you don’t need to send diagrams, although DVDs are accepted.) She has a hard time, sometimes, hearing about other’s pregnancies.
The hospital was surprised by our contribution. If our gift will provide the necessary comfort for other couples in similar distress, through purchasing amenities which the hospital bureaucracy downgrades, then so it will be. They kept trying to talk us out of giving back, but this stubborn “gaijin” foreigner won’t take no for an answer.
I again would like to thank the wonderful support from everyone during our darkest hour. Though we are no more mystical beasts than saints, we will rise again. I’ve learned more than a lifetime of lessons in love and sadness; of both unbridled joy and despair. And while I wouldn’t wish this experience on any, I would not have traded it for the world. The rivers of tears; the ripped, shredded soul. No, nothing can take away from the reward of holding a child – our son – for even just a few precious hours and knowing love as love was never known before. The bond we forged through this loss will not break. To lose a child but not each other is a gift too easily overlooked but oh so special.
Recently, on a beautiful day I found myself singing the Bryan Adams song of the Summer of ’69, but with the words in the present tense. These are the best days of my life.