Mike Dolny
03-24-2007, 01:47 AM
My son Ethan is 4, my daughter Emma will be 3 next week, and my daughter Molly was born on March 14th and lived for only and hour and fifteen minutes. She was beautiful.
My wife carried Molly for 33weeks. I'll never know how that felt. I want to know how that feels. To be a baby's lifeline. To have the responsibility, the gift of a life growing within you.
For the last 11weeks of her pregnancy, she was carrying the knowledge that our daughter would be able to continue living only as long as she stayed inside of her. That once she gave birth, our daughter would die very soon afterward. How does that really feel? I'm not talking about hearing a verbal answer. There are some things that our language could never clearly convey. It's that deep, personal, primal experience that has a thousand variables every day. The motherly instinct to nurture. The motherly instinct to protect her child. But there was absolutely nothing she could do. How hopeless can hopeless be? We continued to have hope and faith until the end. But how much faith and hope would it take for a miracle. We gave everything. I gave all I could, but I couldn't give as much as her. She is the Mother! The Mother. My role was/is to be strong. That's easy. I can't carry my child. I can only walk along side of the mother of my children. My tears are no less genuine. My heartache is no less painful. Yes, it is less painful. I'm not the mother of my daughter. I'll never feel her pain. I'll only have mine. I don't feel it's enough. If I curled up into a ball in the corner, it wouldn't be enough.
My wife wakes up in the morning and gets out of bed. How??? I see some men get really bent out of shape when their team loses a game. My wife lost her daughter.
Over the past 4 and a half years, I lost my mother to cancer, my brother committed suicide and the dog my wife and I got as a puppy when we got married 10 and a half years ago has a brain tumor. I can't imagine my pain and heartache over all of these could even be close to how our daughter's death alone feels for my wife.
Today, we went and picked up Molly's ashes. I told my wife to sign for custody of them. It is her baby after all. I drove away from the funeral home, my wife beside me, Molly's ashes on Sandy's lap. It's not supposed to end that way. ..................She's the mother of that baby.
My wife carried Molly for 33weeks. I'll never know how that felt. I want to know how that feels. To be a baby's lifeline. To have the responsibility, the gift of a life growing within you.
For the last 11weeks of her pregnancy, she was carrying the knowledge that our daughter would be able to continue living only as long as she stayed inside of her. That once she gave birth, our daughter would die very soon afterward. How does that really feel? I'm not talking about hearing a verbal answer. There are some things that our language could never clearly convey. It's that deep, personal, primal experience that has a thousand variables every day. The motherly instinct to nurture. The motherly instinct to protect her child. But there was absolutely nothing she could do. How hopeless can hopeless be? We continued to have hope and faith until the end. But how much faith and hope would it take for a miracle. We gave everything. I gave all I could, but I couldn't give as much as her. She is the Mother! The Mother. My role was/is to be strong. That's easy. I can't carry my child. I can only walk along side of the mother of my children. My tears are no less genuine. My heartache is no less painful. Yes, it is less painful. I'm not the mother of my daughter. I'll never feel her pain. I'll only have mine. I don't feel it's enough. If I curled up into a ball in the corner, it wouldn't be enough.
My wife wakes up in the morning and gets out of bed. How??? I see some men get really bent out of shape when their team loses a game. My wife lost her daughter.
Over the past 4 and a half years, I lost my mother to cancer, my brother committed suicide and the dog my wife and I got as a puppy when we got married 10 and a half years ago has a brain tumor. I can't imagine my pain and heartache over all of these could even be close to how our daughter's death alone feels for my wife.
Today, we went and picked up Molly's ashes. I told my wife to sign for custody of them. It is her baby after all. I drove away from the funeral home, my wife beside me, Molly's ashes on Sandy's lap. It's not supposed to end that way. ..................She's the mother of that baby.