Grieving my newborn baby boy, my mother and other loved ones lost during the pandemic

It's been almost 4 months since my first baby son Percy died at just a few days old on 11 June 2021. It's been the worst experience of my life. I am living in Melbourne, Australia, which is the most locked down city in the world right now due to the pandemic. It's become difficult to see how the lockdown and grief is affecting me because, they are so intertwined for me. I spent most of my pregnancy with Percy in lockdown.

Percy's death - whilst still being investigated by the Coroner - appeared to have been avoidable if we had received better advice from the midwife who was visiting our home. She dissuaded us from taking him into the hospital and he did not receive extra care he needed in time and died on day 3 after a straight forward labour and birth. He was my previous first born and it feels like his life was taken from me.

Prior to being pregnant, we were in lockdown #2 which went for 4 months. During this time my father-in-law passed away from a sudden heart attack in August 2020. Due to covid restrictions we were unable to visit him during his care in ICU. It was traumatic for my partner. We fell pregnant a few months afterwards after a year or so of trying. And a couple of months into pregnancy my cat died in November 2020. I had adopted my cat Terrence a couple of months after my Mum died from pancreatic cancer in 2018 to have emotional support and comfort during my grief. In April 2021 at the cusp of my third trimester, my bandmate died by suicide. She had struggled through Melbourne's lockdowns and suffered for PMDD which had only been diagnosed in the last couple of years of her life.

All this to say, I have very little resilience left to cope with this succession of losses, the latter of which have been more traumatic and tragic. The most deepest and darkest I have felt is in the weeks after Percy passed. I just couldn't believe that would happen after enduring so much pain already.

Despite my trauma my partner and I are holding each other strong and decide to live each day because - we may as well see what life brings us. And in that, we hope we can conceive another baby and have a sibling for Percy and start to put some of this horror behind us. But even in that hope, we are mired due to ongoing lockdowns, pandemic stress and my body still being in shock and not being able regulate very well. My sleeping is all over the shop. Though some weeks I have a good run of preparing healthy meals and exercising, speaking with some safe friends and journalling. Many nights I lay awake, tired but unable to let myself fall asleep. My mind ticking over anything and everything. Sometimes spiralling into what ifs sometimes trying to count numbers ...

I used to be a very social, active and creative person. The secondary losses accompanying Percy's death have been overwhelming, my other two bandmates were due at similar times and are enjoying their lives with their babies. I can't easily continue those friendships these days. Many triggers pop up on my trips to the shops and even going into the basement of my apartment building for fear of seeing my neighbours loading their baby into their car. I think, that should be me. That should be me.

Sometimes I cry for my mum, I wish she could have guided me through my pregnancy and I think, maybe I would have Percy with me. That is just one of the alternate lives I wish I could live. But this is my life now. And I am writing here just to share how difficult cumulative losses are to endure, even for the most optimistic and resilient folk. Lockdown is surely increasing my depressed moods and helplessness. I wish I could fall pregnant again easily and have something to hope for. I wish for any sign of hope really.

That's my story

x Becky

 

I am not sure if anyone has read my story, but I received an update this week as to the possible cause of death of my son Percy. They suspect he died from a genetic metabolic disorder. It was not picked up in the carrier screening I had in preconception.