My Mummy's Babies Died

This is the scan of Rachel at 20 weeks when we started to believe we would hold her in our arms.

Rachel has been speaking a lot about my miscarriages since watching Marley and Me. I had no idea that the film would include a scene showing how parents can find out about their baby having died at a routine ultrasound scan.

For information, this is called a "Missed Miscarriage" because the mum has not known the baby has stopped growing and therefore the act of miscarriage has been missed. I have had a missed miscarriage and it is an unbelievable cruel term for what is the loss of a baby; I felt it put the blame on me for "missing" it, that is not the case.

I have had four miscarriages, three before Rachel and one after. She knows about the fact that I have had four babies die in my tummy, she knows that her brothers are in heaven. She talks about it whenever someone announces they are expecting a baby and sometimes when siblings are being discussed at school. She is open about it, sad about it and also aware that she is a very special child born to a mum who thought she'd never have a baby grow up. Well Marley and Me seems to have really moved her, she has been asking many more questions and talking about it a lot more; and this morning in my bed she came out with the following...

Mummy I was telling xxx that your babies died and she didn't believe me. I said that they are my brothers and they are in heaven and she said I was being silly. It is true isn't it mummy? (Yes Darling.)
Did it hurt to have them die in your tummy? (yes, it hurt my tummy and it hurt my heart.)
Did they have funerals? (no, but I remember them all the time and say prayers for them.)
Mummy will my babies die in my tummy? (I don't know darling, I hope not, but I don't know.)
At least I will have you and you help people whose babies die, so I will be OK. I am going to pray lots that God stops babies dieing in mummy tummys. (that's a wonderful idea baby.)
Mummy I love you, you must love me loads and loads, enough for me and my brothers, that's a lot. (yes darling, I do, I love you more than anything.)
Can I go and see Granny now? (yes love, be good.)

I blog about my miscarriages quite openly at LLM calling, but today I wanted to share Rachel's views and thoughts about it. Many children have to deal with the miscarriage of their siblings, perhaps this post may help them in some way.