17th August: The day before

17th August: The day before.

After an exhausting and emotionally draining weekend, with highs of family visiting and lows of knowing why they where there, myself and Frances where completely drained. 

This was going to be our final full day with Oliver and we knew it, but most of all we felt it. The struggle to find any sence of happiness was overwhelmed by the sadness of knowing that tomorrow we will be saying goodbye to our son. 

Making our way into the hospital together was undescribable. For us this was out of the ordinary, not so unordinary for couples outside of covid, but we had never been able to see Oliver together unless it was bad news. Although the situation was an averwhelmingly sad situation, for us this was the first time together we got to spend the whole day with our son and that was special to us.

We had a professional photographer come and take some lovely photos of us, and as nice as this was I couldn't help but think soon this is all we will have, just photos. The emotions to having these thoughts just added onto the ones I was already feeling, somehow I managed to carry on.

I spent most of the day being as strong as I could, holding back my tears and just trying to make it through the day. I wanted to be strong for Oliver and I wanted to be strong for Frances, although she was probably the one helping me.

As the hours passed we just took it in turns to hold Oliver. We spoke to him, I even sang to him, we played music and we just took in what a powerful day this was.

Yes that is country music, I always played it to oliver and he always responded to it, even when he was in frans belly.  (Hank Williams jr)

Hand and foot prints: 

We got as many Hand and foot prints as we possibly could. We also managed to get x3 lots of clay moulds.

As fun as this was and we did laugh as Oliver was let's say reluctant to participate, deep down I knew this was going to be all we have, after he passes.

No one prepares you for feeling this way, and even if you could somehow be prepared, I don't think you would ever really be ready.

Olivers first bath.

Covered in paint and clay, we was offered something we never even thought about, Oliver was going to have a bath. Surprisingly the nurse just came out with it "would you like to bath him". Me and fran just looked at each other, "can we?".

Moving Oliver into the bath was not easy as we had to menouver around wires and his breathing tube, all this aside we got to undress Oliver and I got to hold him and lower him into his bath and fran got to wash his feet.

I can't explain in anyway just how much this meant to us, we got to do something normal with our son, something so trivial as bathing a child to us was something magical. 

Oliver didn't seem to enjoy his bath, probably because it was a new sensation and because he didn't like to move, lets just say, if looks could kill.

Back into his incubator so that me and fran could get him dry and dressed we placed Oliver into his baby grow and then got him our for more cuddles.

His baby grow said, mummy and daddy are the best.

Hours must have passed, and the feelings of holding him and seeing him open his eyes and be alert made me second guess everything. 

I didn't know what was right anymore, questioning myself, am I doing the right thing, are we doing the right thing.

Our first full day with Oliver together had felt so magical and I was about to give this up. The weight of the guilt felt heavy, I had this pain that no matter what, wouldn't go. I knew the choice we made and I knew the reasons why we chose it, so why did I feel like this?.

The whole day and even the weekend with family I knew what we was doing for Oliver was right, but even now nearly a year on that guilt is something that eats away at me. 

The time came to leave Oliver for the final night, mentally drained and knowing tomorrow was it, (Time unknown at this point) We didn't want to leave.

Laying him back into his incubator before we left, we left him with his favourite toy, the stollen pink turtle from physiotherapy.

Next, goodbye Oliver, we love you 💙