Two Kisses for Maddy_ A Memoir of Loss & Love - Matthew Logelin [7]
And four months later we found out we were going to be parents.
Chapter 3
together during
the worst of times
is better than
being alone at
the best of times.
Early on in Liz’s pregnancy, there were concerns about the health of our child. She had awful morning sickness. I mean awful. I called it “morning, noon, and night” sickness. It was so bad that her obstetrician, Dr. Sharon Nelson, prescribed her Zofran, which is usually given to people undergoing chemotherapy to help them control the nausea. Liz was worried about taking the medication, but Dr. Nelson assured us that it wouldn’t harm the fetus. Though it did little to actually help her feel better, she took it for almost her entire pregnancy.
More often than not, the nausea led to vomiting, and with the vomiting came a significant loss of nutrients to Liz and to our baby. The nausea also ruined Liz’s appetite, so she ended up losing weight, and as a result our baby was not gaining the expected amount of weight at each gestational age. To assess the situation, Dr. Nelson suggested we see an ultrasound doctor, Dr. Greggory DeVore.
Dr. DeVore’s primary concern was the health of the fetus. That’s not to say that he didn’t care about the health of the mother, but we were warned by some parents in the area that Dr. DeVore had a bedside manner that made him seem rather cold. More than one of these people referred to him as Dr. Doom because of his proclivity to present the worst-case scenario. When we arrived at his office, I immediately felt that his waiting room was one of the most depressing places I had ever visited. On the walls there were photos of Dr. DeVore surrounded by his large brood, giving me the feeling that the photos were there to provide reassurance that the babies in his care would turn out as healthy as his own kids had—apparently, if the recommendation of your ob-gyn along with this guy’s copious certifications, published works, and awards didn’t make you believe that this guy knew what he was doing, then these photos would. It wasn’t just the decor, though. The waiting room was filled with expectant couples. Yeah, families. Unlike every trip I’d made with Liz to Dr. Nelson’s office, there were actually men in this waiting room. Maybe the seriousness of these tests convinced them that they should be there to hold their wives’ hands, but I found the presence of these men most disconcerting.
Many of these families were here because an earlier test had indicated something of concern. Others, like us, were there preemptively, hoping to rule out their worst fears. But everyone in the room had the same sullen and pale look, and it was obvious that they were wondering the exact same thing that we were: were they about to hear that their unborn child would be the one out of every thirty-three babies born with birth defects? I still remember the words from Dr. DeVore’s website that followed that shitty statistic—that these birth defects are the “leading cause of infant death and childhood disability.” We hoped this visit would rule out the unnerving possibility that our baby would wind up dead or disabled, and we saw firsthand how quickly that hope could disappear. More than once we watched as a woman, held tightly by her partner, was led through the doors in tears. We knew exactly what that meant, and each time Liz squeezed my hand a little tighter.
The door opened and a nurse popped her head through, calling Liz in. As she lay down on the exam table, I sat down next to her and grabbed her hand, aiming to give her the kind of reassurance that only the report of a completely healthy baby could provide. Within minutes, Dr. DeVore entered the room, sat down at Liz’s side, and with very few words began to perform the ultrasound.
I know that Liz had a thousand questions for the doctor; she always had a thousand questions, and I can’t think of a time in our twelve years together when she bit her tongue. But here, she was intimidated into silence by Dr. DeVore,