Freya’s Beginning
I didn’t have time
to be devastated. My intended home
birth turned into a ‘non-emergency’ cesarean in about 2 hours. My fluid was very low and the baby was
barely responding. So we
took some deep breaths and down to the OR we went.
She
didn’t come out crying and, through my morphine haze, I could tell there was
some concern. But then my baby,
wrapped snug in her hospital commissioned blanket, was lying on my arm next to
me. I spoke quietly to her and she
opened her eyes for the first time.
I held on to
that.
She may not have
come fluidly into the world from between my legs to rest against my naked,
intact belly. I may not have used
my hands to help her out of my body and into the world. I didn’t even get to
feel my womb tighten around her little body as she resided safely inside. But I was the first person she laid
eyes on.
And I held onto
that.
I spent most of
the next few days in the hospital just trying to feed my baby. My first had nursed so well, but this
one wouldn’t, or couldn’t nurse, and she just kept falling asleep. I tried nipple shields, special spoons,
finger feeding and syringes. My
milk came in and I thought she had finally caught on. She gained some ounces and they let us go home.
Home.
My baby was so
small…so quiet…so weak…so tired.
My oldest daughter would rub her feet while she attempted nursing to try
and keep her awake. My partner and
I tried to understand the reasons; because of the cesarean she wasn’t in her
body yet, perhaps my due date was wrong and she was younger than we had
thought, maybe she just wasn’t getting enough food to begin with. Every day she lost more weight.
I held her, naked,
to my chest, for most of the first few weeks. I slept that way.
I was trying to feed her soul with my touch, to awaken her to this
world. She slept most of this
time, as most newborns do. But
there were times that she slept so deeply it took moments of jostling to wake
her. I would wake in terror in the
middle of the night; afraid she had passed with out my knowing. The times when I was awake I could feel
a subtle shift in her being, as if she was slowly just letting go. Those were the scariest moments.
The last moment I
remember; I was home alone. Baby
was sleeping against my chest as I wandered around the house. Then I could feel it; that slow
retreat; the silent, backwards stepping out of a room so as not to disturb
those in it. I could feel her
spirit trying to quietly remove itself from that body.
But I held on.
I sang to
her. I called to her. I jostled and cajoled her. I sobbed and pleaded and frantically
paced the hall as each passing moment found her still asleep. Finally, her little body stirred
against mine and she fluttered open her eyes. The day was November 1, Dia de los Muertos, Day of the
Dead. I decided then and there
that my baby needed a name. She
needed a name to let her know that she was in this world now. That she was wanted. A name that I could call to her to
bring her back if she tried again to leave.
I would not sleep
until she had a name. I could not
sleep lest her spirit decide to take flight from her nameless body. We spent hours trying on names but
could not find one to fit. We knew
her middle name would be Jude, in honor of ‘Hey Jude’ having been played in the
OR during her birth. I fell asleep
somewhat consoled, with Baby Jude on my chest.
The next morning I
woke feeling hopeful. Baby Jude
was still with us and had even lost her umbilical cord in the night; to my
anxiety ridden consciousness it was a testament to her commitment in remaining
with us. That day she got her
name.
Freya. The Norse Goddess of love, beauty,
fertility, death and war who reigns over her own field in the afterlife,
accepting those who do not go to Valhalla.
Freya Jude…a
Viking Goddess and a song of comfort.
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