The last nail in the coffin

This is the last nail in the coffin and the last part of my Miscarriage story.

For many years I sulked over my miscarriage at 22 weeks. It was a perfect pregnancy that received a ghastly blow and ended in a unpredictable way. Was I careless? Did I ignore the signs? Why did I not know? What could I have done better? How could I have prevented it? Many years passed by and I had nearly come to terms with it after I had another healthy baby.

But there was still one thought that always haunted me. It appeared in flashes and distanced itself in an instant. Was I too selfish to even think about it?

With all that had happened, I had never asked my husband how he felt about it? How did he bear the loss of his child or how he coped with it? I never saw him cry. I always saw him by my side consoling me and pulling out his handkerchief when I needed it. He stood there like a deep rooted tree with his arms resembling those sturdy branches.

On some occasions I had flashes of him carrying a small white bundle from the NICU. With his father by his side, together they must have made the most difficult path to the Hindu burial grounds. He had seen the face. Did it resemble me or him? How small was it to hold in his arms, I wondered? What did all those eyes in the busy waiting area of the hospital see when he passed by?

At the crematorium, our baby was buried as per the Hindu rituals. How deep could the pit have been? Was it painful to lay it there? Was it possible to sprinkle mounds of mud on it? Was it humanly possible to leave the site, thinking about the little one lying there? His father by his side, they must have recited a prayer for it to have another life.

We were in it together. I had carried it and lost. He had lost and carried it.

When he came back, I couldn’t look into his eyes for they had all the sight.

I never asked him and he never told. I know he worried I could get cold.

I pulled many years with these thoughts but now we know the soul has not left our sides. “It” came back to us as a boy to stay with us for this life.