Walking Back In | Now I Lay Me Down to Sleep

I walked back into the hospital and this rush of emotions came flowing over me like a wave that snuck up behind me. I had no control. I have heard of it happening to others and that fear of being back in the same place where the memories took place would just be easier to avoid than to be confronted with that emotion. I had no choice. We rushed our youngest son to the hospital for some breathing concerns. As I left his side to go find a restroom, it hit me.

I immediately saw myself in the hospital gown the first time that my husband rushed me there because I passed out from losing too much blood. Then the second time that I was rushed back a few days later I went to open the door as we arrived and I passed out again. Me intermittently waking up with a team of nurses surrounding me in worry and then passing out again. The pain of the doctor telling me that I had to have a surgical procedure. The ache of being in the postpartum recovery room and a doctor asking where my baby was. The lullaby that goes off for all to hear when a new baby is born. Even the memories of seeing my husband in pain when we rushed him there for kidney stones. All of these memories rushed back and pushed me to tears.

It has been eight years since we lost the hope and dream of our first baby together. Such vivid memories of every event that took place during that time. Every little memory lives in us as if they happened yesterday and they all came back as we walked back in the hospital.

Photograph courtesy of the Ramsey family

Even though those memories are there with me every day, we have tried to combat the memories that knock us down with those sweeter memories of us honoring our baby. One of those special ways is hearing our baby’s name read during the Now I Lay Me Down to Sleep’s Remembrance Walk.

Being surrounded by other families and friends that understand the pain that you are going through and then the silence as each baby’s name is read aloud. The proud release of the butterfly and watching it flutter away into the sky. We do it for him or her that couldn’t be with our family. We do it because that is the special day that we set aside each year for our Baby Eddie.