Julia Rose

We were so excited to be pregnant again (our first ended in a miscarriage at 11 weeks, and then we had Sam -4yrs and Josh-3yrs) I immediately told everyone that we were due to have a baby on November 17th 2005. The first part went well with not much morning sickness, just abit tired, but I was really looking forward to the scan where we would find out if we were having a longed for little girl. At 20 weeks we went and found out that this baby was indeed a healthy and very active girl. I told everyone again and mum started knitting pink stuff and my mother-in-law started buying pink things. We named her then and the boys started talking about her as Julia. Things went well for some time - my midwife appointments were always with no problems, heartbeat seemed good etc. When I was about 27 weeks my parents left to go to England for 7 weeks. This was a really hard time for me because I had alot of pelvic pain, which is normal for me, and I was really tired all the time. But still Julia seemed healthy and fiesty.

At 33 weeks I noticed that she wasn't moving as much, so at my midwife appointment, even though we supposedly heard the heartbeat, she booked an ultrasound just to check everything was ok because she was concerned about me measuring 36 weeks instead of 33. So that day I went and got the scan all by myself (my husband wanted to come, but I thought there was nothing to worry about, and I said everything is probably fine I'll be okay).

I'll never forget the look on her face when as she was looking at the screen, she was quiet for what seemed like forever and then finally said that she had some bad news, the heart wasn't beating. That was just a total shock to me because a few hours ago my midwife and I had just heard what we thought was Julia's heart but must have been mine. The lady doing the scan showed me the screen because I didn't believe her, she said there was fluid around...actually I didn't hear the rest of what she said, I just broke down crying. Robert came to get me and we went to the hospital after talking to my midwife. At the hospital, I had some blood taken for tests, then we talked to the doctor and social worker, they suggested to wait a day before inducing. Wednesday is a blur I don't remember what we did, but I remember it raining and being very sad.

On Thursday we went to the hospital at 9am and waited all day, I was having contractions but only really small ones. Finally, after an epidural, I gave birth to Julia at 1am Friday morning. My sisters were there as well as mother-in-law and Robert, my husband was there too. It was the hardest thing I have ever done in my life - she weighed 2335g and had lots of dark hair, she was so precious and would have been beautiful.
We had a funeral the monday after and buried her at Schnapper Rock Cemetery. Julia will always be in our hearts and I'll never forget her.

By Rosie Braly

<< Back to Stories