Giving birth to a stillborn baby is one of the hardest trials a woman can endure. Never being able to look into those innocent eyes or feel the baby’s tiny hand grasp yours is something most women who endure a stillborn birth never forget, even if they try to.
One woman, Rachel Whalen, who didn’t want to see a photo of her stillborn later changed her mind. But was it too late?
When Rachel was 28 weeks pregnant, the doctor informed her she was suffering from preeclampsia, a complication of pregnancy, and her baby did not survive.
On Feb. 22, 2016, Dorothy Grace Helena Whalen was stillborn.
“They asked if I wanted photos,” she wrote on Facebook.
“I said no. … I was certain that I wanted no memory of this moment—the day my daughter was stillborn.”
Staff gently repeated the question, but she refused. Later, when the realization hit her that she could never see her baby, she yearned for a photo, any photo, of Dorothy.
“I want every memory of that day. I want to see what it looked like when I held her. I want to see what we looked like as a family of three. I want to see the memories of that day, but I can’t.”
One nurse had an instinct that Rachel would be forever grateful if she took a photo for her.
“Except for one nurse. I don’t know who it was, but she took a photo of my daughter. She dressed her and wrapped her up. She positioned her hands so delicately and tilted her head just so. And then she took a photo--our only photo of Dorothy,” Rachel wrote.
Those unendurable feelings after losing a baby can become bearable with time, and as Rachel wrote, “I wish we took more photographs.”
Thank goodness for that kind nurse, and that one very treasured photo she took.
