"Did you push us when we fell?" -David Bazan

   I've always been told that the Bible says God will never give you more than you can handle. What it actually says is, "No temptation has overtaken you that is not common to man. God is faithful, and he will not let you be tempted beyond your ability, but with the temptation he will also provide the way of escape, that you may be able to endure it. 1 Corinthians 10:13".  This is a very hard thing for me to read these days. If we won't be tempted past our ability, then I'm as close to that as I can be.

 

10/26/12, 4:15am: I'm awoken from a dream (that to this day, I can't remember) and my wife tells me she's been awake for a little bit with contractions. We had experienced Braxton Hicks before, so we were pretty confident this was the real thing. That sometime in the day or so, we would finally get to meet our daughter, Elliston Rae Pitts. We monitored Tiffany's contractions for a few hours & around 7am called in to work & had our Doula, Amanda, come over to the house. The contractions were about 5 minutes apart & Tiffany decided she wanted to go to the hospital. Tiffany's goal was to complete the entire labor & delivery process as naturally as possible. Being that she was in a considerable amount of pain, she felt that as long as she knew Elliston & herself were okay, she could endure the pain. I loaded our bags, birthing ball, & car seat into the car and off we went. Although I felt terrible about the pain the contractions were causing Tiffany, I felt a giddyness about being a father of a daughter.

10/26/12, 9:12am: We arrived at the hospital & everything seemed pretty normal. They brought Tiffany & me back to triage and began to ask a billion questions to prepare us to be admitted. One of the nurses was pretty aggressive with Tiffany & you could hear their frustration that we weren't answering the questions as quickly as they'd have liked. I explained that her contractions were coming very close together at this point (2-3 minutes apart). She checked Tiffany's heart rate & then began to check for Elliston's. She couldn't find a heart tone for Elliston, so they brought in a different type of doppler. When that didn't work, we began to become pretty scared. We both began to pray, asking Jesus to please not let this be happening. An older nurse came in with the ultrasound machine. Time slowed down. I'll never forget the weight of seeing the image on the screen. Her perfect little body with a blank rib cage. No little light flashing. No flicker of a heartbeat. I immediately pulled Tiffany close to me and we cried together. Asking God, why? I don't know what hospital protocol is, but one of the nurses ran over, put her hand on Tiffany's stomach and began to pray. The room became dark & heavy. The nurses were crying. Amanda (our Doula) came in and cried with us. A few minutes later our OBGYN, Dr. Bullaro, came in & made the final call. She slammed the ultrasound wand down on the table &damn near crawled into the bed with Tiffany & me. She was crying too.

10/26/12, 9:38am: They moved us from triage to birth & delivery. Dr. Bullaro explained that because of future pregnancies, we should avoid doing a C-section, but encouraged Tiffany to take an epidural. I went out into an area of the hospital where no one was and made several phone calls. Mom, Dad, In-laws, & a few close friends. I wasn't sure what to say. To be honest, I can't even remember exactly what I said to them, but I did my best to explain the situation.   

   While at the hospital I wrote on Twitter, “In the darkest of times love, family, & friendship will always shine a light on you”. I really meant this. The support from everyone was incredible. From the website Ben & Holly set up to the calls, texts, dinners, donations, & comments on Facebook. It felt like people really understood the depth of the situation and kept us from feeling like we were facing it alone. So to all who called, text, wrote, donated, fed us, & prayed… Thank you.  

   Hope is a strange thing. Although everything medically said Elliston was gone, I kept hanging onto hope. Hope the doctor was wrong. That God would fix the situation. I kept trying to think of something I could do to change the outcome. That she would come out kicking & screaming & everyone would be celebrating. 

   The next several hours are a blur. I didn't know what to do or say. I tried to be strong for Tiffany. We talked a lot & tried to prepare ourselves the best we could.

10/26/12, 7:05pm: Our nurse, Beth, had been in and out throughout the day but it was time for a shift change. Our new nurse, Jenn, came in and introduced herself. She was very nice and respectful of our circumstances. She asked us if we had thought about having some photos taken once Elliston was born. This is something I had heard of and read about in some of our pregnancy books, but had never really thought much about. It seemed strange to me. Like, would we put on matching outfits and pose? We told her we would think about it. She informed us that there is an organization of volunteer photographers that will send someone out to take photos if we’d like. We were also informed that Dr. Bullaro was not on call that evening and a different doctor would be performing the delivery. While this isn’t something we were thrilled about, we knew it was always a possibility. We met the other doctor & she seemed like a nice person.  Our niece & nephew, Cara & Cullen, & our friend Suzanne had been at the hospital most of the day with us, along with Amanda. They went to the hospital cafeteria for dinner and brought back some food for me. I tried to eat, but just wasn’t hungry.    

   

   Time seemed to carry an uncomfortable cloud over the next couple of hours. Knowing that delivery was coming, but it would not bring the joy and excitement I had been anticipating for 9 months. That all it would bring would be the end of hope. Hope that the doctors were wrong. Hope that we would spend the rest of our lives with our daughter.
 

10/26/12, 9:54pm: It was time to push. A few minutes earlier we had found out that, although she wasn’t on call, Dr. Bullaro was coming to the hospital to do our delivery. This meant a lot to us. We weren’t just patients to her. We were a family about to go through the worst tragedy of our lives. She came in, went over some brief instructions for us, and the delivery process began.

10/26/12, 10:06pm: Elliston Rae Pitts was born. 6lbs, 9oz. I’ll never forget what happened. As she came out, I pulled Tiffany’s face into my chest & said, “Don’t look yet. You don’t want to see her like this.” I buried my face into the top of Tiffany’s head. You could hear the shock in Dr. Bullaro’s voice as she counted the number of times the chord was wrapped around Elliston’s neck. 1,2,3,4,5,6,7… and there is a knot in the umbilical cord. As she said these things aloud, you could tell she was crying. Jenn tried to radio in the information, but was crying too. Tiffany & I began to cry. Another nurse took Elliston over to the “heat lamp bassinet thing” and began to clean her off. After a couple of minutes she brought her over to us. There was such an overwhelming amount of emotions. Heartbreak, fear, anger, confusion. How could this happen. She was perfect. Beautiful. I felt an incredible rush. “Don’t be scared, she’s your daughter and you love her.” We held her and cried. I kept thinking and praying. God, you can fix this. I would stare at her just hoping more than I ever had that she would take a breath. For some sign of movement. Had you walked into the room, and not known what was going on, you would have thought she was a perfectly healthy baby sleeping. She was the most beautiful thing I had ever seen.

10/26/12, 11:47pm: Jenn, our nurse, informed us that the organization of photographers couldn’t get anyone to come out to the hospital. I was really frustrated by this. An overwhelming fear came over me that there may come a day when I wouldn’t be able to remember ever detail of Elliston. She had Tiffany’s nose and my ears. Her long little fingers & toes. Those chubby little cheeks. Jenn told us that she wasn’t okay with us not getting pictures and that she worked as a nurse part-time and was a photographer outside of the hospital. She called her husband and had him bring up her gear. I don’t think she’ll ever know what the photos mean to us. The weight it lifted off of our shoulders. Relieving the fear of forgetting. I was so angry with God but thanked him for making Jenn our nurse. Her and Tiffany talked throughout the evening. They cried together. It was obvious to me thatJenn wouldn’t just be a nurse we had in the hospital one time. Today, Tiffany calls her “New Friend Jenn” and I call her N.F.J. for short. Haha… ridiculous. It’s crazy the people that get placed in your life.

                                                   

                                              

10/27/12, 3:38am: At this point Tiffany & I had been awake for over 24 hours and hadn’t eaten in a day and a half. I was holding Elliston, but was so exhausted I finally had to place her in her bassinet. I wheeled it over next to Tiffany’s bed so they would be close to each other. I laid down on the hospital sofa and fell asleep.

10/27/12, 4:46am: I woke up and we spent the next several hours just sitting with Elliston. Talking to her. Talking to each other. Around 8:30am Suzanne & Cara came back to the hospital. A bit later Kathy(Tiffany’s ex-sister in law) & Georgia (another friend of ours) came to the hospital & sat with us. They held Elliston and we talked about how beautiful she is. As the day progressed I noticed Elliston’s body began to change. Jenn’s shift had ended earlier that morning and our new nurse Whitney had come on duty. I pulled Whitney aside & asked her what changes were going to be coming regarding Elliston. She explained things to me and told me some things I could do to prolong the changes. We wrapped Elliston in an additional blanket and when someone held her, I would nonchalantly wrap a blanket around them as well. I tried to guard everyone from these changes for as long as possible, but science began to take ahold of her little body.

10/27/12, 2:17pm: People had been in & out all day and Tiffany & I took turns holding Elliston. Jenn had emailed us one of the photos she had taken & it turned out beautifully. Some of the changes that were happening to Elliston, I could no longer hide from everyone. I explained to Tiffany some of the things Whitney & I had discussed. We decided it might be getting close to a time to leave the hospital.

10/27/12, 5:32pm: We had spent several hours sitting with Elliston. We both took showers. I packed up our things & Suzanne & Leila helped me carry everything out to the car. Whitney came and talked with us andpromised us she would personally take care of Elliston when we left. The normal procedure is to place the baby in the bassinet that is in the room and leave, but Tiffany & I knew we couldn’t do that. We couldn’t bear to walk away from her.

10/27/12, 6:12pm: There’s a lyric in a Brad Paisley song that says, “A man doesn’t have to die to go to hell.” It sounds dramatic, but that’s how I felt. Knowing there was a clock counting down to having to hand Elliston over and never see her again. Everyone had left the room. Tiffany was holding Elliston and I lay in the bed with them. We began to cry. Really cry. A heartbroken cry I had never experienced before. We told her how much we loved her. I said I was sorry this happened. That she deserved to live a long life. We told her how beautiful she was.How proud her mom and dad were to call her daughter. That we missed her so much already. We decided to pray. I told God how pissed I was. I don’t understand why this happened. That if he was protecting Elliston from something, then why let Tiffany get pregnant with her to begin with. I pleaded with God to take good care of her. To let her know how much her parents love her. That there will be a hole in our hearts forever. To let Elliston know that her parents will dedicate their lives to being people she can be proud of. We kissed her little face. And then we cried some more.
   

   How do you say goodbye to your child? Knowing you will never look down on her beautiful face again. Having to take the first step in accepting that she’ll never run, play, or laugh on this earth. We told her we love her so much. I walked over & pressed the button to call Whitney in. I asked Tiffany if she wanted me to hand her to the nurse. My wife is the strongest most incredible person I know. She told me she wanted to do it. I knew it was the right decision. It was something a mother needed to do. We kissed Elliston’s face, told her we love her & Tiffany handed her to the nurse. Crying, Whitney delicately took her & walked out of the room.

10/27/12, 6:52pm: Numb. That’s the only word I can use to describe the feeling I felt. Tiffany and I held each other and cried. We told each other how much we love one another. That we know the statistic is against us. But that we’re above that statistic. That we honor Elliston too much to turn on each other. Tiffany is my best friend. I told her we’ve been through too much over the last 5 years of marriage to be with anyone else. Whitney came back to the room a few minutes later to walk us out of the hospital. She had brought Tiffany a wheel chair and Tiffany refused it. She said she would walk out on her own. Another example of why I love her so much. Her strength. It was heart-wrenching to walk out of that hospital empty handed. Going through labor & delivery and leaving with a stuffed animal the hospital had given us in Tiffany’s arms. Our nursing staff had cleared the waiting room so we could leave in peace. Leila had pulled my car up by the front door & I helped Tiffany into the passenger seat. Whitney gave me a hug and said she was really sorry this had happened. I told her to please take good care of Elliston & with tears in her eyes, she said, “I will”. I got into the car and we drove away.