r/ChildLoss

Without going into too much detail, my daughter was having a routine, outpatient procedure in December and went into cardiac arrest. The hospital staff performed CPR incorrectly, and made at least two other errors I know of, resulting in a code that lasted 10 minutes. My daughter lived through that, but died one month later because the prolonged arrest caused her to develop heart failure. I’m just wondering if anyone else is going through something like this. Sometimes, this lawsuit is all I have to hold onto. But I fear the day it ends because when it’s all said and done, no matter the verdict, my baby will still be gone.

I lost my son as a baby years ago and Im trying to find a way to look at his upcoming anniversary in a different point of view. I have struggled year after year when mid August comes and only this year did my therapist help me find a way to better celebrate his birthday that didn't leave me a total, depressed mess. He helped me see that I should celebrate and remember his birth and the short time we had together instead of missing him and mourning his loss. That helped me so much.

Im hoping that maybe some other parents have any ways they've found some sort of solace or peace on the anniversary of them passing though? I know I will not be going to where his ashes were spread as the entire experience leaves me entirely broken, but I want to know if theres ways anyone has found to see the better side of it, if you can find anything at all. We all know how impossible it is to forget that day and the emptiness it leaves, but Im hoping more of ways to frame it so its not just reliving what happened again.

Most people think that asking, “How many kids do you have?” or, “Is he your only one?” are harmless small talk questions. But to those that have lost a child or children it is complicated beyond belief.

Should I be honest? Who is asking? Is it a complete stranger? A checker at the grocery store? A potential new friend?

When my loss was fresh I didn’t care who was asking. Everyone who asked these personal questions was going to learn about Cora and damn it if it ruined their day or made the situation awkward. It was how I felt I needed to honor her and her life.

It’s now been 5 years since my daughter died. I give a more curated response when answering. I often say “he’s my only son”, or “I have 1 son”. But I’m running into a new problem. Now these people think I’m one and done, and I need advice on family planning (my son is 3). It is getting hard to bite my tongue.

The worst interaction I’ve had recently was a checker at the grocery store who said, “oh they grow up so fast, you should have another but put them in the freezer so they stay little”. Cue images of my dead baby in the morgue, and memories of holding her cold body before the funeral and internment. As you might imagine the rest of that transaction was incredibly strained and awkward.

Thanks for reading, I just needed to vent to the only other people who would understand. I know members of this club have different strategies on answering these questions. Have you had any success in navigating this?

Do you ever stop wondering if something could have been different? Not blaming yourself, just wondering what you missed? What you could have done differently? Does acceptance ever really come?

Can we stop pretending it's all the same? It's not. I'm so tired of seeing child loss grouped in with miscarriage, stillbirth, infertility, etc. Putting us all in the same category as "bereaved parents." I say this as someone who suffered from infertility and had a missed miscarriage at 11 weeks. Yes, these were difficult things to go through and felt like the worst pain imaginable at the time. But losing a CHILD is a billion times worse than ANYTHING. I lost my 7yo daughter, my firstborn child who was the absolute light of my life. I know we're not supposed to compare grief but I'm so sick of biting my tongue whenever I see social media posts lumping all loss parents together. It dismisses the enormity of the immense, all-consuming pain and grief that I feel every second of every day. We don't need to be "all inclusive" all the time and in this case trying to include ALL loss parents in "one size fits all" grief support is doing a huge disservice to ALL of us.

My kid (19) passed away suddenly on Nov. 24. I am still numb. My kid was my best friend and I am very much struggling to adjust to my new reality. I go through the motions of my daily life, try to be present for my partner and her son (18) but in the quiet moments, especially when I try to sleep, that day replays in my head over and over again. Therapy doesn’t seem to help. It’s not like this is something that I can work through. While I am still taking care of myself and participating in my life I really have lost most of the joy and happiness that kept me going. I miss my kid all day every day, I hate that this is what my life has become. Sorry for the long post from somebody who just joined l but I don’t really have an outlet of people who know exactly how I’m feeling.

This year marks year seven since my first child was born, and year six since she died.

I haven't known how to celebrate her birthday or death anniversary or how to include her in holiday celebrations since she passed. Ultimately, I just feel stressed and anxious and end up doing nothing besides getting through the days as best as possible. I feel bad for not doing something, but I keep finding myself in a state of paralysis.

My pregnancy started in January. She was born in October. We had one Halloween, one Thanksgiving, one Christmas, and one New Year's together. I was in the hospital with her by Valentine's Day, and she died at the end of February. My whole year feels wrong without her in it.

She was four months old when she died. I hate that she will never get any older, never know her sister, never walk or talk or sing or dance or go to school or make friends or create art or grow up or fall in love or chase her dreams. It feels wrong to have a baby who will always be a baby; worse, a baby who will never get to be a baby again, much less anything else. It also doesn't feel right to treat each year passing as her getting older, though.

I've had phantom pregnancy symptoms lately. I just feel lost and my heart is achy.

If you're not in a place to read something light right now, skip this one. I've written plenty in the dark throws of grief. But this poem was written a little later on. Perhaps 5 years after my daughter died.

I wrote “The Builder” after I started feeling Marcella in my ordinary days. Not just as a wound anymore. Not just as a sadness.

I believe there are invisible lines connecting every one and every thing. Most days, we move through them without noticing.

But grief changes the way you see.

Loss makes those lines brighter, more impossible to ignore.

This poem and painting came from that place—from the feeling that Marcella is still here, connected to me and others who love her, still building something I can’t always see…

but can feel all the same.

https://preview.redd.it/0lgyebr2mgah1.jpg?width=1200&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=f68cd3fe34cac94d4627093e63b42fb584e032ea

https://preview.redd.it/dznpw9r2mgah1.jpg?width=1200&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=08b8330c2aaeb55233fcceb2770d1992d50b39c5

https://preview.redd.it/j46l19r2mgah1.jpg?width=1200&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=602d53913890d72c84fc65eff7b469f6162d79bd

Hi everyone,
I recently lost my baby daughter. She was 6 months old and passed away peacefully in our arms in the hospital. For all 6 months of her life we were only in hospitals, so everything feels very intense and overwhelming right now.
We are now planning her cremation, and we were told we can stay with her until she is taken into the cremation chamber.
I’m trying to understand what most parents usually do in this situation. Do people typically stay until that final moment, or do most say goodbye and leave before the actual technical part?
I don’t feel afraid of being there, but I want to understand if there is anything emotionally unexpected about it that I might not be thinking of right now in this state of shock.
If you’ve been through something similar — what did you choose, and would you do the same again? Why or why not?
Any perspectives would mean a lot.

You think this can never happen to you.

Every parent's worst nightmare has happened to my family.

My 9‑year‑old daughter's best friend lives one block up the street from us. They have been friends since birth and grown up together since it's the son of my best friend of 30 years.

They have a sleepover once a week.

On Friday night she was invited for a sleepover.

She packed a bag and walked up the street as she normally does.

She called me before bed to say goodnight.

I got an update from the parents that she was eating lots of breakfast in the morning, and told them to send them down to my house when they leave for the wedding they had to attend later that afternoon.

At around 1:30 p.m. I got a phone call from a social worker at Royal Columbian Hospital saying she’d been hit by a car and was in critical condition. They told me to get there now.

My heart dropped; I didn’t know what to expect.

That drive seemed like the longest drive of my life. My friend and her two daughters were staying at my house at the time and I was with my part‑time boyfriend, who drove me there. I left my son at home with my friend, as I had no idea what to expect.

My bf dropped me off at emergency and he went to park the car. I walked in alone and just ran through admitting to trauma and said my daughter got hit by a car.

They told me to stand right there and they would get the social worker.

While I was waiting, the first person I saw was the dad () of the friend she was with. My friend and he had broken up years ago so I hadn’t seen him in a long time. He was sobbing and hugged me.

They put us in this room to wait for the doctor to talk to us.

At this point it didn’t even seem real.

This old lady outside the door said she had put prayers out for our children at her church. Then she asked if she could say a prayer so I said sure and we all just sat in this room and prayed. Max had shown up at this point. So it was my bf the dad and I

They told the dad he could go see his son. So he left. Then he came back and the doctor came in.

He started off with her friend injuries.

Basically his leg was super mangled, broken bones and fractured arm and leg, nerve damage, and he needed surgery ASAP, but he was conscious and talking.

Then they switched over to my daughter . I still hadn’t been allowed to see her at this point so I knew it wasn’t going to be good.

They said she was stabilized for now, but she’d hit her head with no helmet on quite significantly. She was not conscious, they didn’t know if her spine was broken, she was on a breathing tube, and she needed to be transferred to Children’s Hospital immediately.

They kept asking me for her medical card through all of this because they had no info on her. The kids came as Jane Doe, and the only reason they were able to tie her to me was because her friend was awake and could identify her.

They asked me if she was pregnant at one point…. I’m like, she’s 9. And then that’s when I realized they had no idea about anything. So I gave them my son’s info by mistake at first. And they came back saying that number was for a 7‑year‑old boy. So they still didn’t have info because I had given Hudson’s. Finally I got the correct health number to them and then they finally said I could go and see her.

I went into this huge room. It must be the trauma room or something. I think there was a patient at the very far end of the room, then her friend in the middle and my kid to the far left. Like, this is a huge room. They have those privacy stands that don’t block anything. But I just remember the room being massive.

It was super bright and it was chaos. Paramedics, doctors, nurses, first responders, surgeons, social workers — just a million people in this room running around.

I walked up to my kid and while I was seeing her I could just hear her friend screaming in pain from across the room. The paramedics were the ones working on her and stabilizing her. She had a tube down her throat and a neck brace on. Black and blue bruising and bandages were everywhere. There was a pad under her head, like those puppy pee pad square pads. And it was just soaked in blood.

I sat beside her with all this chaos going on around me and it took forever for the paramedics to get her ready for transport. I said I’m riding in the ambulance and told bf to meet me at Children’s and take my car. So he left.

While we were getting wheeled out of there, we kinda got stopped. And this head guy yelled at everyone in that room, “Everyone shut up and listen right now!!!” The chaos stopped and about 30 people were all quiet and listening. The person continued to shout, “We have a car crash coming in right now which consists of child badly injured, mom injured and dad is deceased.”

So as soon as we were leaving the room to get in the ambulance, they were scrambling to deal with this trauma that was coming in hot right after us. I remember thinking, I guess it could be worse…

They put her in the back and I wasn’t allowed back there. I had to sit up front with the driver and two people in the back with her basically keeping her breathing pump going, etc. They had to move her so carefully because they had no idea about the spinal cord.

So I sat up front with the buddy who was driving. We left and as we pulled out the driver started driving and then goes, “Is that a median?” I’m so blind I’m like, I’m not sure. So he keeps driving as we get closer. I tell him, “YES THAT’S A MEDIAN.” and he’s like, “Oh shit,” and then tries to steer away from it but still hits it. And we go offroading for a bit and the guys in the back are yelling “WHOA!!! Careful.”

So in my head I’m like great, we probably killed her just getting out of the parking lot.

That was my first time riding in an ambulance when they are really ripping. He kept driving in the oncoming traffic lane weaving in and out.

He taught me about trauma hospitals and said only VGH, Royal Columbian, and Abbotsford are the only three hospitals that treat this level of trauma. And then went on about how he basically transports all of Surrey to Royal Columbian all the time.

Before we pulled up to Children’s the driver warned me that there’s a trauma waiting for us in there and it would be overwhelming.

So they unloaded her and I had a smoke. I took a deep breath and headed through the doors…

About 40 people were waiting all masked and gowned up. We went into another big room, but it was just her in this room and all those people were for her only.

They laid her under this light to do a full checkover.

It was silent and one person was in charge telling who could talk.

The paramedic started talking. He read off all of these numbers and stats that I couldn’t even comprehend, and then told them that somebody did CPR on her on site and that she was thrown quite far from the car. She also smashed into the windshield and all of this without a helmet. They said no helmets on site.

(They were wearing helmets. They just got flung off when they got hit, but this is what I was told initially — that there were no helmets — and I was like, what the fuck.)

They sat me in a chair while all this was happening with a warm blanket. I just watched and listened in disbelief.

I’m basically holding my breath as they check her over. After he was done his announcement, the person in charge then got some of the doctors to start the check. As they went they were yelling back what they found.

I’m holding my breath hoping that this isn’t where we’re going to find out she’s a quadriplegic or just a vegetable. They started with the head, which was a time of shattered glass in it. They checked her eyes and they dilated. That was my first breath of good news. Then I held it again as they were going over all lacerations that needed plastic surgery to help close up, and it was only on her hand and hip (and head of course). That was my second breath. They got her arms to move when they put pressure on them. Next breath.

And finally the legs. They couldn’t get any movement out of them. They were trying. Next thing you know they were stabbing her feet with full force over and over and finally there was a tiny movement. I was like, OMG, thank God.

So then they wheeled her off. I went into the hallway and the cops wanted to talk to me. They put me in a room and told me they couldn’t tell me anything but that this hits home for them.

I was like, that was useless.

We got admitted to the PICU right away. And honestly I don’t remember the first few days in there.

I know the neurosurgeon said it’s a severe head injury; we will know more when we get the MRI, but as for right now they need to relieve the swelling. If this doesn’t work, we may need to look at more invasive surgery in the brain and take off a piece of the skull, but we’re not there yet. Let’s start with the bolt. The bolt is what they call the hole in her head to just let the brain fluid drain out. So they cut a hole in her head to release the pressure and let it drain. And I think they had her on ketamine, morphine and fentanyl. She was on heavy, heavy ketamine for the first week and a half.

So we had to wait until she was stable enough to get the MRI and get X‑rays.

So now I can’t remember what came first — the MRI or taking the breathing tube out — but it all happened roughly around the same time.

So about five days into it, they said her breathing was stronger than the machine and they wanted to take it out. If you leave it in too long, it’s super damaging to the body. So they wanted to get it out as soon as possible.

That was one of the scariest things I’ve ever watched.

They took it out and she was gasping for air and her breathing sounded like it was on an amplifier — the loudest gurgle noises I’ve ever heard. I’ve never actually heard anything like it before. I thought it was a fake sound. They told me it was her breathing. And we all watched her twitch trying to get air. Her heart rate sat at 240 for almost two hours after. I just remember the vitals on the big screen flashing red nonstop.

They had to suction all her thick secretions in her throat. She didn’t know how to cough, so to clear her throat they would have to violently shake her chest while the other person suctions.

That went on for weeks and weeks because the breathing tube had of course given her aspirated pneumonia.

Then she got a staff infection so she was on vancomycin.

She had a couple blood transfusions.

For that week and a half I didn’t know if she was going to make it. My ex husband told everyone she was doing great. But realistically, the odds weren’t in her favor to overcome all that just to get to the stable point.

And then she was finally stable enough for an MRI and X‑rays.

Wow this is a lot to write out. I’m only halfway into week two at the hospital. And I’ve been here for two months.

I remember feeling so nervous to get the results because I knew it wasn’t going to be good. And once we officially knew, all the hope that maybe it’s not as bad as we think gets taken away.

The MRI came back and every part of her brain is damaged. There’s grey matter everywhere. Lots of shearing which means dead brain and tons of internal bleeding. The only thing that wasn’t damaged was her brain stem. The brain stem controls the basics, like the ability to breathe or heal a wound— that type of thing. But everything else is damaged. That being said, they still can’t give us an answer of what her outcome will be because the brain is so unknown and the only thing they say is she is going to have to show us what she can do.

There’s also a ton of fluid in her spine and we were going to have to wait to see if that means impairment of using her legs.

But miraculously she didn’t have a single broken bone or fracture. That’s when they finally removed the neck brace and could start moving her so she didn’t get bedsores. I think around the same time they finally put a feeding tube in through her nose.

Her legs have lost all muscle; they are toothpicks.

She has to wear foot braces so that her ankles don’t lock.

Then they started bringing her off the ketamine.

Her brain was misfiring so much that she was stuck in this fight‑or‑flight mode called dystonia.

This is when her eyes are open super wide with the most scared look and super dilated, and she can curl toward her body into a position that is so messed up and every muscle in her body is so stiff and she sweats nonstop and her heart rate goes to 200. That gets off by any little irritant.

While we are shoving a suction down her throat every second because she doesn’t know how to cough, and a feeding tube in her nose, she’s constantly irritated, so this went on for about four weeks, and if you don’t break the cycle, the brain will rewire itself to thinking that this is normal.

What happens when she’s in that state is she starts tearing apart all of her muscles and then her blood starts getting high enzymes and then her kidneys shut down and we have to do dialysis.

So now we have her super medicated.

I remember at one point I asked the doctors, “Is this what awake is for her?” and they told me to try to not look at this as awake.

Finally the episodes weren’t as severe anymore and they moved us out of ICU after being there for a month. She had learned to cough and her heart rate was finally not spiking at these crazy numbers.

Her last big episode was her birthday on begging of june

So now we are up on the 7th floor. That’s where they try and get her strong enough for rehab — trying to get all the medication just right, etc.

They say after a brain injury you’re supposed to stimulate it right away. The sooner the better. The cases where people are in comas for long periods of time have way worse outcomes.

It’s now been over a month and we’re still not able to stimulate the brain and get it going because we have to heavily sedate her because of the dystonia.

One day I looked over at her and she was making a sad face. I was sooooooo happy. This was the first sign of consciousness. Very, very low level. But I’ll take it. This means she can cry and has tears.

But what this also did is open up a whole new can of worms to figure out and deal with. She cried for a week straight. I don’t know if it’s emotional or pain. But she can’t tell me what it is. She has no control of any motor skill. We scanned her whole body over and over again and never found out what was bugging her.

I was convinced it was the feeding tube in her face, which eventually I fought hard and got her surgery booked to get it moved into her stomach.

She had that surgery and everything went well. Had to put her under general anesthetic and then basically stab a hole in her tummy for the tube to come out. The tube is a lot bigger than I thought it would be. Then the recovery room where we have to wake her up every 15 minutes for six hours straight — ugh. But I’m getting ahead of myself.

We could never locate the pain. It was frustrating. Then I played a voice note from her best friend and she smiled.

That was her first smile. So that tells us there’s memory there. She loves it when friends come to visit.

She laughs at me when I tell her I have a fat ass.

But I would say a joke and get reaction time was super delayed. Not sure if she can see, but she can hear and understand everything that’s going on and seems to know who everyone is.

Now we’re still around the same spot. A lot more smiling, not as delayed reaction. Still can’t communicate as she can’t move anything voluntarily or speak.

She had to get turned in the bed every two hours because of bedsores. We have to stuff her in a sling and make her sit in a wheelchair four times a day.

We have to see if she can track or recognize anything like grab the ball or look at the cup, which she can’t really do.

Still haven’t medicated for the dystonia and now need meds to pop more consciousness into her.

They want us to start planning for home. So I will have to get lifts and wheelchair stuff built in my home. I’ll have to get a car that has a car seat that can support holding her head up.

I have to have a 24‑hour care aide live in.

And no one can tell me how far she will come back or if this is it.

I’m starting to realize that my daughter I had is gone. And that is a pain that I can’t describe. Whatever this new version of her is, I’m here to love and support it. I don’t even get the chance to mourn my daughter. And she was amazing.

Every day I have to get up and do rehab with her and OT, the PT, the speech pathologist. Then I have to carry her in a chair and sling three times a day. Read to her. Keep her spirits up. Watch her vitals. Change her feed bags. Watch her temperature.

As well as try to keep a normal life for my son.

The hard part about this is you watch everyone fall apart. My mom bawling on the floor outside my room.

My son hitting himself and hurting himself and this weird stuff.

My ex going into denial.

So not only do I lose my daughter, I watch my entire family fall apart.

I can’t do my job. I can only manage my long‑term clients. I gave away almost 30 contracts because the last thing I can do is have any patience for the issues I have to deal with. But I need to work or I can’t afford to live so I’m just holding onto the bare minimum and gave away all my income. I just can’t do it.

Nor do I have the time. My life consists of parenting two completely traumatized children, living in a hospital during rehab with one daughter all day long every single day for the next four months: not being able to be home or do anything at my house, not being able to work, not being able to have one second where I can just sit down and not have anxiety riddled in my brain because when I have a quiet time in my mind, all I do is miss her

And all social media has to say is negative things about the kids crossing a crosswalk when ot was to late and saying I should learn my lesson.
This could happen to anyone, who are these people that say shitty things when a child’s life gets taken.
This is my first post about this and I’m nervous to leave it. But I need support so bad. Not to be trolled

Today is the one month anniversary of my 24 year-old daughter’s death. I took her to the doctor on a Tuesday thinking she had a sinus infection. She was sent by ambulance to the hospital, and then sent to ICU with a diagnosis of Acute Myeloid Leukemia. She passed away less than 48 hours later. I’m devastated and confused. When you put all the symptoms together, it makes sense, but it was so easy to attribute the night sweats to new birth control, bruising to heredity (as I bruise easily), and knee pain to walking up and down our stairs. I’m so mad at myself for not insisting she went to the doctor sooner.
I have looked it up, and most people do not pass this quickly from it, but I can happen fast…just not this fast. I wish I had had more time. More time with her, more time to fight it.
I’m so broken hearted and lost.

Like many others here my faith was shaken after I lost my toddler suddenly & unexpectedly. I had a really close relationship with God and had experienced and felt the presence of a higher power many times throughout my life…. Yet after experiencing such a traumatizing loss I was questioning if God even existed. Yet I had no doubt that God existed before the loss of my child. It made me think to myself…” am I going to choose not to believe in God anymore because my daughter died or because I feel it is his fault?” . People die every day all around the world, men, women & children. Was I OK with God as long as it wasn’t one of my loved ones who died? As long as it was other people’s children and not mine? Is death a reason to not want to believe in a higher power anymore ?

I use to love the me time when kids use to be asleep or when they are at grandparents or out to play. Lost my daughter just 2 days back and now this silence is killing me. I have a son too but I just don't know how I will spend the rest of my life. I am searching for her every time in the whole house. I know I will never be able to see her but I still keep searching, thinking she will come and hug me. I don't know if this feeling will ever get better with time or no! But it's the worst ever. My world collapsed. I don't know how to survive without her. I don't know how to stay happy. I just love her so so so much.