Bodhi & Brock's story

Speaker 1

So my life circumstances when I found out that I was pregnant with, with Bodhi, I'm trying to cast my mind back now, it's actually eight years ago today to the date, that we lost Bodhi, which is why I decided I wanted to record this today. Um, so our daughter was, I think, over two and a half when we, or just, just two, about two and a half. And, um, I'd had a very, very easy pregnancy with her. Although some kind of slight complications after she was born, that I very briefly had to go back into hospital, but my pregnancy with her was utterly, utterly blissful. And, and, and I felt really well during it. I worked pretty much all the way through my pregnancy with her. I had scheduled or thought I had scheduled when, when she could, when she would come, arranged all my work around it, and when she did arrive that kind of threw everything up in the air. But, but yeah, it was, it was kind of blissfully easy. So when we decided we want, we knew, we always knew we wanted to have a second child. And then there was some kind of debate between us about when would be the right time, when we could fit it in with work, when would be the right time, how old she would be. So kind of in my textbook of perfect endings, I thought, you know, I felt that the age difference between her and her sibling should, would ideally be like three years. So we kind of had all of this in our mind. But we had a lot of kind of work stress going on. So it wasn't ideal timing when we were trying to get pregnant. But we tried for a couple of months. And then it seemed, then it happened. And I was, I was still working. And in fact, I was filming something. Whilst I was still, I was still acting quite a lot at that point. And so there was a little bit of worry about, you know, would would it show. But it was very, very kind of early. I think I was about three, two, no not even, probably, yeah, it was like really, really early in the pregnancy, about six weeks into the pregnancy that I was filming. So anyway, but as a result, I had to tell quite a few people because, I had to tell a couple of people who were on the film set, I had to tell someone I'd had a part time job with just because it was affecting my energy levels. So you know, people, people started to know. And then when we went to see the doctor and they said, you know, you know do you, obviously the questions about do you, do you want screening and we'd talked about that and we were kind of like no, actually we don't want to screen. We, we're going to accept whatever comes you know, whatever our child, however our child is that's what it's meant to be, so, so we opted not to have screening for, for downs and then, and then we, we went away on holiday. So we missed our scan date at 12 weeks because we were on a, we went on a holiday to a, we borrowed my mums time share in Lanzarote. And we went, we got our holiday there, which was very, very nice. And whilst I was on holiday, I was busy telling people that I was pregnant. Because I was worried I was looking fat in my bikini. And, but if I'm honest, the whole time, I felt like I was telling people in order to convince myself because I remember it was so distinctly, when I got pregnant with my daughter, I and, people think I'm nuts for saying this. But the night that I conceived her, I knew it had happened. Like, obviously we did what you need to do in order to conceive a child, but I, afterwards I felt like so, the only, you just, I just felt super, super awake and I was so, kind of, so awake and alert that I went and sat on a meditation cushion for like, quite a long time because I couldn't sleep I was just kind of, I was observing this like very tiny, very, I can only describe it as like a little kind of, it felt like there was a little light inside the centre of my abdomen. So that I had, which is a slightly odd experience. But it was very distinct for me when I got pregnant with her. And when I got pregnant with Bodhi, I didn't have that same kind of energy. I just didn't. So that, the whole way through the pregnancy, I was like, and I was also, I also was struggling quite badly with morning sickness, like real nausea, not the sickness, but just really, really bad nausea, which I hadn't really noticed so much with her. But anyway, we went on holiday, we had a really lovely time as a family. And then we came back and by this point, I was, I think 13, 14 weeks pregnant. And I'd told everyone by this point, um, and we went to the hospital for the scan, and we took my daughter with us, because we'd talked to her as well, extensively about the fact that she was going to have a sibling. There was a book that my sister in law had passed on to me, there's a, there's a house in mummy's tummy or something like that. So I'd been reading that to her. So kind of, in my head, you know, I'd already got it all planned out, I think we'd even put the cot up in the spare room. Um, we had, yeah, we'd put the cot up we'd like, we'd still got all of Suki's babies things. And we'd put, I'd started setting up the spare room to be the nursery, nursery, to be the baby's room. Anyway, so we went to the hospital. And all three of us were in the screening room. And as I was lying on the screening couch, the, I don't know whether it's a sonographer, the woman who was performing the scan, just went very quiet, and just was, and kept moving the scanner around my abdomen. And, and then I can't quite remember what order it happened. But there was a kind of a bit of a bustle and the, I think by now there was two of them in the room, two nurses in the room. And the woman said to us, she said, look, I, I know that you have said that you don't want to know about the results of this scan, but we found something, we found an anomaly and we're duty bound to tell you about it. And like I remember that moment as like, you know, like on record player when like someone just like swipes the needle off the record and it just kind of makes this horrible scratching noise. Whoosh. And it was just like, like that, that is a very distinct memory for me. So we, so then we were kind of moved out of that room and put into a side room because all, this was all happening as it does on the maternity ward. So there were women and their partners or women everywhere with pregnant bellies, wandering around at various stages of their pregnancies. So we were taken into a little side room, and we were, the, I can't remember what her, she had, a midwife came in who was, it was her specific job, I think her specific job was to give people shit news. You know, it was her, her, I can't remember what her job title was... But basically, and she then stayed as our point of contact through all, everything that happened next, but she was really nice. And she just said, look, we've discovered that there is an anomaly in the scan and the, the nuchal fold the back of your baby's neck, I don't know whether, at what point they started referring it, to it as the fetus rather than your baby. But um, there's a very large, the, the measurement of the nuchal fold was above the normal range, which is an indicator for downs. And we were like, okay, okay, well, we know, we've said that that's not something we want to... But she said, look, you need to be aware of what your options are. So what you can do is go and find out more about what's, what's going, what's going on. So, or you can, you can terminate pregnancy. But what I didn't really pick up on at that time was we were at the threshold of being able to have a surgical termination. Because once you reach, and I now well can't remember the sort of the thresholds, but there is a point at which once if you decide to terminate your pregnancy, that over a certain number of weeks, you could no longer do that by a surgical termination, it needs to be a medical termination, which is where, which is the induction of a, of delivery. So I wasn't kind of really registering that because obviously, we'd just been told that there's something potentially very, very wrong with my baby. And at that point, I was, terminating the pregnancy just wasn't in my mind, it was not something I wanted to do. So what we opted to do was to go to the neonatal unit in Birmingham, because they just had much more advanced screening equipment. So I can't quite remember what happened next, to be honest, because it was a bit of a shock. We had our daughter with us, she was two and a half. She didn't know what the hell was going on. But we left, we left the scan and like my, literally my memory of the next couple, next few days is really disordered because I can't remember what happened in what order. Something, significant things that did happen were we came home. My husband was actually working from home at that point. And they were trying, he had a colleague staying in the house, my God. Because we were, he was working on a project. So that poor guy, Jesus, I was like going, I just like, I just went, just was inconsolable. And then at some point, I think within a couple of days, we got the appointment to go to Birmingham. So we drove to Birmingham, took my daughter to my mum's house and then drove into town and went for the screening. And we went into the, into the neonatal care unit, and waited in the waiting room, I can still remember it was kind of like peach colours. And then we were taken into this, into an examination room, suite with a very kind of, a massive, massive screening machine. And I was the, I lay on the bed and those, the consultant did the scan. And it was, it was incredibly detailed. Like he could show us the picture of, of Bodhi. And what he showed us was that yes, in fact, there was a really kind of significant nuchal fold at the back of the neck, which was an indicator for downs but that also he could show us that his heart wasn't properly formed and that there was a hole in his heart, that there was a whole kind of raft of complications with his intestines, and that there was a problem with his lungs as well. Um, and we were looking at this stuff and just like, I didn't know what to do and Lisle was very kind of, just needed, I really appreciate that he asked this question, he said to the consultant, he said, look, can you just tell us like, what, what is the likelihood as a percentage that this baby can survive the pregnancy. And the consultant kind of looked at both of us like really square in the face and just said, it's 90 to 95% likely that this baby's going to die before you reach full term. And he said, but I also need to make you aware that if you do, if you could carry this child to full term that when he was born, he would immediately need a whole raft of really invasive operations. And we can't, we couldn't guarantee that we would be able to, but this, I'm paraphrasing now, but there was no guarantee, obviously, that they'd be able to save him. But he was just saying, look, you know, as soon as a child's born doctors are, they, you know, they've taken a Hippocratic Oath so that they have to preserve life. But that ultimately, this little baby wasn't really designed to live. So. Ah, so we got that news. And I also had amniocentesis so that they could find out what the genetic anomaly was, and whether it was something I was likely to experience if I got pregnant again. And we went home. And we picked up our daughter. And then at some point, during that time, we went to see some very good friends of ours who are, have been meditators for a very, very long time. They teach meditation. They've taught us both meditation. And because the hardest, what I just kept thinking was like, I, you know, I follow, I follow a code of morality that says that, you know, I guess it's like the 10 commandments, but it's a promise that I've made that I will not kill. And I was going to make this decision to kill my baby, is how I felt about it. Um, and that was a very kind of emotive, I guess, way of looking at it. But that's what I was wrestling with. And my friend said to, said to, both of our friends said to us, look, you know, we don't live in a perfect world where everything is black and white. We live in a world where we are given now huge amounts of information. So, when you're taking any action in your life, you have to examine yourself as to what your, what's your intention by making this decision? Are you making this decision to harm your baby? Or are you, well he left it there, you know, look, what, what is your intention? And when I kind of, when we sort of examined it from that perspective, it was like, no. And I've heard this said since, since then, which, I didn't get access to all of these amazing charities at this point. I got access to them later, but through Sands and through Arc, I heard this said and I found it really useful. It's like I, we made a really difficult decision and we suffered so that our baby didn't have to. So that's what we did, we made the decision that we would terminate the pregnancy. So now, you know, I was now well over 16 weeks pregnant. And that meant being induced. So then I kind of had to navigate that realisation. So, Lisle's mum came and stayed to look after our daughter, and we went into hospital. And we went into, not into the maternity suite, we went into another ward that's I guess, specifically for women who are losing pregnancies, having to make this decision to terminate a pregnancy and deliver. So we went into this little pink room. And the nurses came in and gave me the first set of tablets, don't know if there was a suppository as well. But I took the first set of tablets, and the pain started, oh my God. But we didn't, I'd made a decision that I wanted to be, I didn't want pain relief during this procedure, because I wanted to be kind of mentally alert. So I could kind of be present to what was happening and be present for Bodhi. But after a certain amount of time, the contractions were happening, but it wasn't progressing. And we'd, I mean, this is like, this feels so kind of macabre now but we were, because we knew we were having to wait for ages we'd like downloaded some videos, DVDs, not DVDs, just downloaded some films to watch on our laptop. And so we were watching, I think it was like Borat or something with Sacha Baron Cohen in so like, so in contrast to what was happening. But we, anyway, I had another dose of medication, and then the contractions started coming very, very strong. And oh my God, the pain was just so overwhelming. And simultaneously, I think that like, for me, the emotional kind of impact of what was happening and my guilt over what was happening. So like, was just agony. And I was going into like, I was having to kind of go into the bathroom and like bleed into bedpans. But as it was kind of progressing and then it started really, really accelerating and I just became completely hysterical. And the, like I was losing my mind. And the, both Lisle and the midwife just said to me look, please, you know, take, we can give you something for the pain, we can give you something to kind of sedate you effectively. So they gave, so at that point, I agreed to take something and I took, I think it was Pethidine. And then like, so that it was searingly painful. And then just suddenly, it, the pain just stopped and it was almost like I was kind of like hovering over the situation, rather than like in the situation. And I just felt really like, I just felt suddenly peaceful, which was the drugs. And very, very soon after that I delivered Bodhi and I felt him come out away. And we called the nurse and told her but neither of us looked at him at that point. And I still regret that because I don't know whether he was alive when he arrived or not. And then the nurse took him away and cleaned him. And then she, I don't know what Lisle and I we're doing at that point, like, just literally shell shocked. And then they, they brought him back, just wrapped in a little bit of blue paper. And he was like, and I got to hold him in my hand. And he was just like, he just fitted in my hand. He was like, I could really see then, I could see that he was like, he was not okay. He was not okay, and but he was really beautiful and he was my baby. I mean, I think I was just like, off my head on Pethidine, but I just kept thinking how beautiful he was. Even though he was really clearly not very well. And Lisle held him for a bit and I think he knew. And we've talked about it since, I mean, I think that experience was just so, so traumatic for him. So you know, just anyway, why am I saying anyway? Um, but, so, you know, I can't remember how long it took, how long I was given to recover. I mean, after a certain, we didn't spend out of, you know some people told me since they kind of spent hours with their baby, but we didn't, we spent, like, you know, we spent a bit of time with him. But then it was kind of like, it was just too weird the whole thing. And so, then the nurses took him away. And, you know, later we arranged for him to be cremated and we collected his remains, I can't remember when it was, it was probably about a week afterwards or something. But then we went back home. You know, there was my little girl, and it was just like, I just, oh my God, I just felt like my world had just been like blown up and then there was this little girl that I still needed to look after. So thankfully, Lisle's mum was around for another day or so. And I kind of, I don't think I got out of bed, I just felt like, just like I was cast in concrete. Or just it was like this massive, heavy thing pressing me into my bed. I just couldn't get up. So again, I can't really remember the timeline of the next few days in great detail. I do remember, the first time I was on my own afterwards, where my daughter had gone to nursery and my husband had gone out to work and I just sat in the kitchen and I just felt like I wanted to die. I really did. It just felt like, it's such a cliche, but I felt empty and I felt worthless and I felt awful. And at that point, I think the GP had given me, at some point during that, this time, I'd seen the GP and she'd given me the phone number for Sands. And I called Sands helpline, because I thought if I don't talk to somebody, I'm worried I'm going to hurt myself or something. Like I felt that bad. But we had an electric oven, I remember thinking we've got an electric oven, I can't stick my head in it. And also, of course, I needed to like, I knew I needed to get my shit together because I needed to look after my daughter. But I rang the helpline and I spoke to this amazing guy. And he was, he was so like, he literally just kind of, I can't even remember what he said to me now, but he just talked to me, he was just so compassionate to me. And also then told me about Arc, which is a charity for people, specifically, who've faced this decision. So, you know, not just, not just baby loss like that, I don't mean not just, that, that there is a complication in your grief, that you are grieving and that you've made a decision. So he put me in touch with Arc. And that was really, talking to him at Sands and get, making contact with Arc, it was a really, was kind of a lifeline at that point. But I started to, you know, anyway, I started to function again, because I had to, you know, to get food, I can't remember how long I was, like, couldn't get out of bed, but it couldn't have been more than a week or two at the max, I don't even think it was that long, because I had to get up and get on and, and actually I feel very fortunate that I had this beautiful person, little person that just still needed her mum to do stuff with her. Um, but I remember, you know, there was other things like, I remember taking her to like the, Jesus, the morning, then like, mother and child group, after, like, maybe, it wasn't probably the week after, it was like two weeks after it happened. And I think by then word had got out in our social circle, to a certain extent about what had happened. And one of the mums who'd had a miscarriage kind of was, had reached out to me actually, and just said, look, you know, this is what happened to me, and, but also kind of said, you know, I would never tell anybody when my scan date was, because I'd told them all when my scan date was. So I felt, I felt like they were being sympathetic, but also slightly kind of judgmental. But then kind of, you know, when people were kind, but it was almost, like, I felt like I was radioactive, or something. And just like people, what, I think probably they were just too scared to know what to say. But what it felt like, was that, like, I was carrying some kind of contagious, appalling condition, and that if anybody got too close to me, or too, that was catching. Um, so I felt, I felt, felt very, very isolated. And then simultaneously, a very small number of women made themselves known to me that they had had, you know, they'd experienced pregnancy loss in, in one form or another. And then that sort of stuff opened up this kind of quiet network of other mums who'd kind of sidle up to me at the car in the car park, or just kind of get in touch via text or something. And, and this kind of, like, where almost like a spider's web of almost invisible support and communication. And there was, I felt comforted by that, but I also felt kind of appalled by the fact that like, none of us felt like we could talk about it publicly. And that's, you know, obviously inspired me to want to do something. Um, um, to want to, make work about it, and to want to talk about it and to encourage people to talk about it. So, anyway, that was, I think, the experience of losing Bodhi. We took his ashes to a bridge over the river, a footbridge over the river somewhere where we really, you know, somewhere really special to us. And we went and scattered his ashes. And then, and that's kind of our place of memory really. That's where we go back to, to remember him. So after a certain amount of time, I mean, I was, I was really, I was traumatised by that experience. And I have subsequently realised that I, well and then what happened next, but the two experiences kind of together have given, it's taken me a long time to get over it. But I, after a certain, after a couple of months, I couldn't bear to be in the house that we'd been through all of this in. And I was, became absolutely obsessed with moving house. We hadn't been able to own a house up until that point, and then suddenly, and we were in a position that we could buy somewhere, which was really fortunate. So I just threw myself into finding us somewhere new to live, I had to like, physically get myself out of where we'd been. Oh something else I've just remembered randomly... Like, literally, I think it was a week before this happened with Bodhi, we'd been, gone and planted trees, up at a meditation centre. And so yeah, I, whenever I'm there, and I notice those trees, and how much they've grown, it always kind of really registers with me. That, you know, and of all the ones we planted, some of them did not make it, you know, some of them died. And I feel like that was kind of, I'm always really aware of that, like, not all of them make it. Anyway, so we moved house and that was a massive improvement. And, and also, we still wanted, I was still absolutely adamant I wanted a second child. So I think after about six or seven months, after I'd kind of physically recovered a bit. I think we started trying again, and this time we struggled to conceive. It just and I was, you know, oh God, measuring my temperature and doing my fertility calendar, and it became really quite, it was an obsession, to try and hit the dates and hit the times. And I think, you know, that's a familiar situation to anyone who's tried to conceive. And then we, I think eventually I got pregnant towards... It must have been just after we moved in actually from getting, you know, if I'm thinking about it properly, yes, sometime just after we moved into the new house, I fell pregnant again. Probably towards the end of October. And then, so this time, I didn't tell anybody. And but I'd gone back to, I was working, rehearsing a new show. And I was feeling quite tired. And I had this like, I had this couple of days where I really kind of, where I like was madly cleaning the house. And I was, went to my yoga class and I went to, I went to a rehearsal and I was working quite hard physically. And, and all this stuff that now actually I would never have done. But I got in a, and I was in a really bad mood, I could just feel this like kind of like, I just felt really depleted. I can't quite like and it made me feel quite kind of antsy. Anyway, on the, it was a Monday and I took my daughter to, I picked my daughter up from school and then we were going for her swimming lesson in town, and I got to the you know, and it was hassley like, you know, get, getting, getting her changed and getting her into the pool and, and this is just so now she's like just before she's four, maybe older than that... Oh God, memory, anyway... No, she was must have been like just before she was four and then I went to sit in the kind of balcony area where you could watch the, the activity. And as I was sitting there, I felt this like, I felt a pain. And then I felt a sensation like I was starting my period. And I thought, oh my God. So I kind of left the seating area and I went to loo in the swimming baths. And I know there was blood in my underwear, and I just was like, no. And then I had to go and padded, to use some like tissue to pad my underwear and then went out to, back to the spectators gallery and had, and sat and waited for my daughter to finish her swimming lesson. And it was like yet again, like before I'd gone to the loo was all this like sitting, chatting with the mums. And then I was like, I came back and I was sitting there and it was like, I think I'm starting to lose my baby and I didn't tell anybody. And I just sat there in silence while they all just carried on chatting. But I just needed to get out of there as quickly as possible but my daughter was in the water. So as soon as she was finished, I got her out, I got her dressed, I like got out, got into the car and like rang my husband and I think we rang the doctors and as soon as I got home, we went straight up to the doctors. And the doctor was, was awful. It was a locum doctor, and we finally got in to see her and I was like shaking and I was like I'm, I think I'm, I'm starting you know, I think I'm starting to miscarry and she was like, oh, well, you just need to go home and have a cup, a cup, a cup of chamomile tea, and it will come away. And I just felt that, I felt slightly kind of insulted by that. But anyway, whatever. Um, came out and then had, came out of the doctors and as I walked out of her office, I had this huge rush of blood like come out of me. And I kind of ran to the bathroom in the doctors surgery and just like I mean, it just went, it went everywhere. And I like, I managed to get, I was on the toilet but it was just like, I mean, there was just a lot of blood. And I kind of managed to clean myself a bit and I kind of wrapped my coat around my jeans, because it was all over my jeans. I was like feeling really shaky. And I was still bleeding and then I kind of went back because I think, I can't quite remember how this but, one of the pharmacists because there's, there's a dispensary within the doctors surgery like a saw me and was like, she was like she banged on the doctors door and said this woman needs to go to the hospital. And it was the same locum and then the, the locum looked kind of like slightly terrified because she'd been, frankly useless. And they were like right, yes, no, you need to get to hospital right now. So I came, but we, obviously we needed someone to look after my daughter. So we came home and some friends of ours, called some friends of ours and they came round. I tried to like, I mean I was just covered in blood. So I got into the bathroom and started just to clean myself, to shower myself. But as I got out, I did that and then I got out of the bath and then I fainted in the bathroom because I'd lost blood. So then Lisle came in and picked me up. And got, got me dressed. Our friends were here by this point, so they were kind of keeping my daughter busy. But then we started walking towards the front door and then again, I felt really, really dizzy and I had this really weird kind of this like out of, out of body experience where like I, I kind of, I could hear these like, it sounded like whispering voices. Like, and I fell, collapsed and I was kind of like outside looking at myself and looking at Lisle and our friend trying to pick me up off the floor. While there was these kinds of voices going like... I'm making, I sound like I'm insane. I'm aware of this. But it was a really, really, really distinct and very weird experience. Anyway we got, got me into the car, our friend was saying call an ambulance. And Lisle was like no I can drive, by the time we wait for the ambulance I can get her to the hospital quicker. So we, he drove to the hospital. We went into a&e, I think he carried me into a&e actually. And then we were, I was in, I was put into a room, and I was put onto a drip to try and stabilise my fluid levels, and then my blood pressure was just dropping and dropping and dropping and dropping and dropping. And they just kept saying like, you know, come on Claire, Claire, like, I could hear them talking to me. But the whole time, you know, this whole time... I just, I was like, oh, I'm remembering something else now... So this is maybe, maybe it, maybe it didn't sorry, maybe it didn't happen on the same day, maybe I came back from, I think we were, ended up going to the doctors twice. I think I'm conflating two events. The first one where I was told to go home and have a cup of chamomile tea, then the next day, possibly when we went back, but I cannot remember exactly. Because I know at some point, in this time, I remember lying on my bed, and just crying. And like trying to hold on, like trying to hold on to this little baby because I didn't want them to go. Um, so anyway, the reason I'm saying that is because then when we were in a&e and I was, my blood pressure was going the, the doctor said, actually look, we need to, we need to, we need to open the cervix with a speculum because the fetus is, is stuck in the cervix. And she's just losing blood. And so that's what they did. They opened my cervix and removed the baby. But I think like it, on some level, like that's what I was doing. I like was holding on because I really didn't want to lose him. So they did that. And but this time around because it was in a&e and because I was so poorly and it was so chaotic and they were trying to like just you know bring my blood pressure back up because I was in I think, not I think, I was close to dying. That in all of that and the few days afterwards, I was kept in hospital to kind of just stabilise me and get my fluids back up and, and all the rest of it. But we never, we were never offered our baby’s remains and I never kind of thought to ask for them. So as we came away from that experience, and I came back home, then I was... By now, this time around, I was really depressed. I mean, it had been pretty bad the first time around, this time around, like there were, it's probably, it's several weeks of not being able to get out of bed for sure. So that was by now a severe depression. And I think actually, you know, also post traumatic, PTSD, like the, I had for quite a long time. Afterwards I had flashbacks about what happened in the doctors surgery. And it really I felt like a massive failure. Like, it's just a massive failure. And this one whilst I couldn't, it didn't feel like my fault in the same way that Bodhi had felt like my fault because we made the decision. But I did find numerous ways to blame myself, that I shouldn't have been so active, I shouldn't have got so stressed about stuff. I mean, that's the other thing that I haven't kind of really mentioned that the, emotionally from the moment I found out I was pregnant with Brock, my anxiety levels were absolutely through the roof. I was so terrified that we were going to have a similar situation that we had with Bodhi, that I was stressed out my mind the whole time. Um, you know, it, I was so anxious. So then I blamed myself for my anxiety and that that had caused me to miscarry. Anyway, um, the way I kind of, the way we cope with it, the way I cope with it again, you know, I was still the mum of a young child. So there was still, I did need to get up out of bed at some point. For sure, Lisle seriously stepped in for a while. But at some point, I had to get my shit together. So I did start to get my shit together. And I started, I had, I'd been seeing a grief counsellor, um, after losing Bodhi, I went back to them to deal with this situation, at some point, I also got diagnosed, I also got some support on the NHS with some CBT, cognitive behavioral therapy. And then I had to physically get well, because then I started having all these like really weird physical kind of complications. I developed labyrinthitis, where after kind of getting out of, managing to get out of bed for being so depressed, suddenly, I had this thing where the whole room would spin. And like the, it was an inner ear, something had affected my inner ear, but so I was kind of treated using physiotherapy and stuff on the NHS but actually started, was seeing a Chinese medical doctor who was prescribing herbs and acupuncture and you know, this whole, it was all kind of, I was just so, so physically run down by what, the two kind of losses. Um, that it, I had this like mad physical thing where like, I'd stand up and fall over. It was so weird. So it took a while to get well from that. And it physically it really did, like, I was physically depleted for quite a long time afterwards and emotionally, really quite scarred by the experience. And at a certain point, you know, the doctors were, now we were kind of, like, they knew who we were now. So there was also conversations about were we going to, between Lisle and I like did we want to have another, did we want to try again. And after this one Lisle, Lisle was like he, you know, he'd watched me nearly die. So he was pretty adamant that he didn't want us to try again. But we, through the GP surgery who were brilliant, with the anomaly of the locum, but everything else we had to do with them they were brilliant, and they referred us to see a consultant who was able to talk to us about what our chances of conceiving a successful pregnancy would have been. If we wanted to proceed with that, and also what level of support we would receive, because I was now kind of deemed at risk and a geriatric at this point, a geriatric pregnancy, because I think I was now 39. So we thought about it. We both, and we talked about it a lot. We both had therapy about it. We both went away and meditated. We got, and we got on with our life. And then after a certain point, we just kind of, I think we both got to the, and by this point our daughter was now four, you know, into, getting up to, getting up to being five, and I just thought, like, how long am I going to give my life over to obsessing about falling pregnant, having anxiety around whether I'm going to lose a baby, going, potentially going through either of those two scenarios again. Or if we were successful then, being able to go on and have a second child. And I think we just got to a point where it was like, do you know what, we're so fortunate that we managed to have our daughter, I just need to get on with living my life. And not spend every waking moment obsessing about some degree of pregnancy or pregnancy loss or, and, and I need to be here for her. So that's what we did. And, you know, at that point, you know, I then really threw myself into my work as well. That was how I could like, that's where I could put this, this creative energy that wasn't able to manifest into another being. I could manifest it into creating other things. So, that's where, that was the decision that we made. And I think most of the time, I'm really peaceful with that. And I do definitely still have moments where I'm like, I wish I could have had another baby. And I also really think about what Bodhi and Brock's life would have been. And, you know, I had, I had an abortion when I was in my 20s. And I didn't, it was just totally not the right time in my life for me to be considering becoming a mum. And I was quite clear about that at the time that it wasn't going to be right for the, to bring a child into the, our life as it was at that point. But with both of these losses, I then really started to kind of mourn that pregnancy as well. And it's so complicated, isn't it? Like, even as I'm saying this now talking into a microphone, I'm so conscious of people listening to it and making a judgment or, or politicising that decision, because it has become a political thing. But anyway, for me, I've been pregnant four times. I have one child that lived and I still, and I remember the three that didn't come. And they’re, they are still with me. Because they've literally been in my body. So they were part, part of me and part of who I am. And I feel very sad about, about Bodhi and about Brock and I remember all of them and, um, and I also, I also know that I made the right decision, I made, yeah. So I guess there is some peace around that. But it's such a, such a shit thing to go through. And I don't wish it on anybody and I have so much compassion for anyone who has experienced loss. Anyone who has experienced loss and anyone who's experienced loss in this way. And I just hope that we can all talk about it a bit more. So that we can help each other. And yes, eight years on, eight years to the day, I do still feel sad. It does creep up and I just like two days ago, I was just started getting that like heavy, heavy weight creeping back up on me. But it doesn't last as long. And I'm really glad that I'm able to do this as a way of remembering.

And I've, so I've just remembered that after, something really helpful that I did after losing Brock and we didn't, you know, we didn't get the remains and I just felt like I didn't, I felt really clearly that I needed to hold him in the way that I've been able to hold Bodhi. I've like needed to feel the weight of him in my hands. So I got some of my, my daughter's air drying modeling clay and I made, I made him out of clay. Like the size, like the size that he would have been. Which was tiny, smaller than Bodhi. Because I was, I was 11 weeks along when I miscarried with with Bodhi, sorry, Brock, Jesus, when I miscarried with Brock. So I, yeah, and then, so I had him next to my bed for like, it's quite a long time. It was like a couple of months at least afterwards. And I'd just, sometimes I'd just hold him in my hand. And that was really, felt really helpful. And then at a certain point, I can't remember how far after, I think actually maybe we did it on the, on the day he was due to be born, because he was due to be born in May. So we went to the, we went to the bridge where we'd scattered Bodhi's ashes, um, and we, I made a little boat, an origami boat, out of paper. And I can't remember, I've got a feeling my daughter might have been with us. I think she was. And I think we like put flowers in the boat. And then we, we sent him off down the river. And we watched him go off around the corner, and then that was it, he'd gone. And that was really, that felt really important to say goodbye to him. That, you know, in the same way, we'd been able to say goodbye to Bodhi and scatter his ashes. Then we, actually, no, I'm totally confused in this because we, I don't think my daughter was with us... Anyway, oh God, I don't know, it's, it is a bit of a blur. But I do know that we've talked to my daughter about both of them since and how, and she's had her own kind of grieving process for her two brothers that didn't get to come. She made them both little gravestones that were in our garden. And you know, as a family we've like, we acknowledged that they were, they didn't get to come and they didn't get to be part of us, but they are part of us and they always will be. So that, that felt like some closure to a certain extent, for Brock. And also I think we'd always said we wanted to name our son, if we had a son, Brock. We wanted to name him Brock. And I, you know, when we named Bodhi, I think we weren't giving up on the idea that we were going to have another child. So we kind of kept Brock's name in reserve. But with Brock, we, by naming him, I think there was an element of us acknowledging that we weren't going to, we probably weren't going to have another child, even before we knew that we were ready to make that decision. I hope if you've listened to this, that you've found some, that it's been helpful and I'm really sorry for your loss.