Here is how I buried the body of my fifth child: I took myself to the emergency room because I was in labor and bleeding. The baby on the ultrasound screen lay still in the curve of my belly, its heart silent. Fetal demise resulting from spontaneous abortion, the medical term for miscarriage. The room was quiet as I delivered the baby. At first I was afraid to hold my child, who fit the length of my hand, its clavicles and ribs delicate as strands of hair. Then I saw the face, and the features were perfect. I marveled. My baby was soft, its bones not yet hardened, and still warm from the heat of my body. In my grief, I was granted a glimpse into secret places. I am made, and I make. I was no longer afraid.
The room went black as I lost consciousness, hemorrhaging. I awoke breathing through an oxygen mask, surrounded by concerned nurses. I avoided emergency surgery because my physician manually extracted the retained placenta lodged in my cervix, a common complication of late-term miscarriages, and gave me a shot to stop the bleeding.
When I left the hospital, I signed a form stating that I was transporting human remains in the small cardboard box they gave me. Inside, the baby rested on a pillow. Some older ladies had knitted hats and booties to remember miscarried babies, and I kept the gift for my other children, aged six, four, two, and ten months. Escorted in a wheelchair from the hospital’s antepartum unit, I was told to keep the form with me in case our vehicle was searched by police on our way home.
