Well here we go, I’m sorry if this seems all over the place but I’ve never wrote down my story before or even really been ready to completely talk or think of certain events that happened after she died. I’m still full of sadness, anger, guilt and loads of other feelings but sometimes I feel peaceful and I don’t know if I’m writing this to help me or to help anyone who reads my story. I think I’m doing it for both and to let people know they are not alone in how you can feel sometimes and thought you have.
I am going to be a honest as I can be. Please don’t judge anything I say. Look there I go thinking that I can’t be honest because people may judge. This is one of my big problems.
I hope this helps someone even if it’s only for a minute. By the way I’m the worst speller ever so sorry in advance for all the spelling mistakes.
My Ruby was born on the 14th of March 2020 the day before the hospitals went on complete lock down. She was so beautiful I remember looking at her and I finally felt complete. She looked just like her sister Ella who was born 18moths before her.
My Ella is ginger and as Ruby was coming out my mum shouted out to me ‘Jess she’s got dark hair’ this is a very good memory for me because it still makes me laugh and I don’t feel guilt when I laugh at this, like I do when I find myself laughing in life now.
What I do feel complete guilt about is, I don’t remember what time Ruby was born, I also didn’t think I remembered how much she weighed but it just come to me the other day she was 7lb 2oz.
I think my brain shut down as a survival mode after she died and I forgot a lot about the 3 weeks I had her for. This brakes my heart that I can’t remember so much and I feel I took the time I had with her for granted.
What I do remember is leaving the hospital with my beautiful little girl and when I got home it was just me and ruby for a few hours and I cleaned the house from top to toe with anticipation cleaner while she just lay perfectly on the sofa.
I don’t remember my other 3 children coming in but obviously they did at some point. Then this is when it feel like 3 weeks was only a day. I remember every time I put a dummy in her mouth Ella would run over and take it out and put it in hers. She obviously thought ruby had come just to steal dummy’s. This is another memory I can smile at and not feel bad.
The day before she died I run out of petrol at the most beautiful bit of the road and the sun was shining down on me and her I was standing in front of a lovely field while we waited for my dad to bring me petrol. I’m so grateful this happened because this is my real last memory of her being alive. She was wide awake sitting in my arms looking straight into my eyes. I think this was the first time she could see me properly and it was probably the only time I really had time just me and Ruby.
Sounds mad but then 10 minutes mean everything to me and I’m so grateful I got them.
The next morning I looked at her and thought she looked a little blue on her cheek as I picked her up I remember shouting Ruby Ruby and pulling her eye open and I just remember it looking so blue. I run her next door as the man who lives there is a fire man and I thought he would save her. He wasn’t in and I remember shouting at his wife she note breathing.
Next thing there was police and ambulances everywhere it was like they got there in seconds. I remember seeing the air ambulance people running into next doors with full protection suits on a bit like they were dressed to go into a nucula Plant. If that makes sense. My mum and dad live ten minutes away from me and it felt like they were there is seconds too.
I don’t know how long there were working on my Ruby for but it must of been a while. I wasn’t aloud in the house and in my memory I was just standing there on my own. I definitely wasn’t but that’s what my mind tells me. The next thing I remember is the air ambulance lady coming out saying ‘where’s mum Where’s mum’ In kind of a good news voice.
This is one of the worst things they could of done to me and one day I want to talk to people about if there job is to give people the worst news of there life’s think before you talk. Because them few seconds of hope I can not get out my head and this is one of the things that I can’t stop feeling anger towards them for.
So I run into the house expecting to be told there were going to take her to the hospital and she said ‘sorry but she has died and I had to hold her hand while they took all the equipment off her.
There was my little beautiful baby girl laying on the floor with machines all over her. I fell to the floor screaming no shock her, make her heart start, take her to the hospital and they told me no she is dead and this is unfair on her. So I healed her tiny little hand and let them take them off her. I don’t know how I done that. Next thing I remember I was in the back of the ambulance holding my Ruby wrapped in a blanket. She looked like she was still breathing and I think I believed she was and they was all wrong.
I then realised my 7 year old son was out side the ambulance. He was so proud to have two little sisters and they are everything to him. It suddenly come to me that I had to let him see her in the ambulance because how else could I explain to him she had died.
My dad explained to him that she had gone to heaven and asked if he wanted to come into the ambulance and say goodnight and give her a kiss. My little Frank did and I’m so proud of him. A few days after Ruby had died he told me that that day his heart broke forever. He has never been the same since and he asks me why he couldn’t die with her so he could look after her. Obviously I knew I wouldn’t let Frankie come to the funereal he was to young to see her tiny coffin go in the ground and watch his mum and his grandad full to pieces.
My Frankie loves animals and I knew I didn’t want a black car to carry her little coffin so I decided to have white horses and a white carriage with her name wrote down the side of her white coffin in pink. The undertaker told me he had never heard of this but I knew what I wanted and I was going to do this my way and that was that. As this was the last thing I could do for Ruby, she will never have a birthday or get married so her funeral had to be perfect. I’ve gone off track a bit I’ll obviously write more about this later and the fight I had to do this.
Back to Frankie i took him with me so he chose the 2 White Houses that would take Ruby to her final resting place and he was so proud he got to do that.
Back to being in the ambulance with my Ruby dead in my arms but not really believing she was dead.
My mum was there with me but as they went to close the doors I said stop get my dad. This was one of the best things I could of ever done because I would never of be able to get though what happened at the hospital with out him.
I just looked at her and looked at her all the way to the hospital kissing her telling her I loved her and I knew they was all wrong she wasn’t dead she was a warm as normal and the blanket looked like it was moving up and down and so was her soft spot. So how could I believe she was dead.
When we got to the hospital they took her off me for tests and then give her back to me and she still looked and felt alive just asleep. I sat in a tiny little room with her holding her for hours but it wasn’t just me obviously my dad was next to me but there was two other ladies there and a doctor asking me all kinds of questions. I don’t even remember talking back to them. Another thing I’m angry about. Don’t ask a mother question about if she had a dummy in or not when I found her and all other kind of question, while I’m holding my dead baby in my arm not even believing them she is dead. Then telling social services that one minute I’d say one thing then another. Thank you to social services for coming to see me after and reassuring me I done nothing wrong and I am and was a good mum.
Off track again sorry.
They kept telling me it was time to let them take her, I believe I should of been aloud as much time as I needed with her with out feeling that I was taking up room they needed. I glad I stood my ground and told them no I’m not ready. I could feel her skin getting colder and colder and I noticed her soft spot had gone in. I looked at my dad and said ‘she’s not breathing dad’ and he said to me ‘Jess I’ve been thinking the same for the last 7 hours she looks like she breathing and just asleep, but now it’s time’ I told them I was ready. Then they told me I could not carry her to where they were taking her next. I stood my ground again and told them yes I was. I do not know where I got the strength from to stand my ground with these people but I am so glad I did now.
So they put me in a wheel chair and pushed me down to what I didn’t know was the morge. We went into a tiny room first and then they opened a door that I wasn’t aloud though. There was a little tiny Moses basket in a big square room with some teddy’s in. I realised what it was though when I felt the cold come out the room. I held her in my arms so tight again and told her how much I loved her and told her to wait for me at them gates and I’ll be there soon.
I know what I meant now. Because when I got back to my mums I thought how have I just left her at the hospital I need to go back there. Then my mums stairs caught the Conner of my eye and I thought Ruby is all alone my other children have my mum and dad. I was planning on ending my life when everyone went to bed so I could be with her again.
They gave me a little teddy to sleep with and gave ruby the same one and told me when I get her back we can swap them so i had her scent and she had mine.
I got told that I wasn’t saying good I was just letting them do what they needed to do and I would see her again in a few weeks.
When I got back to my mums I got a phone call saying if it come back she had coronavirus I wouldn’t be able to see her again. I felt so much anger, do not lie to a mum just to get her to hand over her baby, another thing I feel hospitals need to know.
I don’t know how I slept that night but I did. But the one of the worst experience was waking up thinking it was all a dream and than it all hitting you again. My baby is dead.
I don’t remember the days after, people come to see me from the hospital but I couldn’t even talk I don’t know what they said all I remember is they was meant to come back and never did.
Then I got the strength from somewhere to try to organise the funeral. I think I realised that I could do something for her and I was going to put my all into it. Little did I know what a battle that would be. I felt like I was just another person to them (obviously I am) but if your in that line of work you should listen to what someone wants and not try and change there mind because you want more money or to get one in one out. I put down the phone on so many funeral directors because they would tell me that I had to do the funeral with in weeks of her dying and they wasn’t willing to keep her for longer than two weeks. I would get told that’s not fair on her or me as a mother. Another thing I’m so glad I found the strength to put my foot down to.
We was in lock down and I wasn’t going to have a half hearted good bye to my little girl. Also I would never had been ready. I berried Ruby 11 weeks after she died and I just about got out the house then. We was a hour and a half late for the funeral because I was using every excuse not to leave the house. I made them change all the flowers round until there were completely perfect but looking back now. I just didn’t want to do it.
But when I look back now I wish I could have that day again. Not that I’d do a thing different, my words about the day is it was beautiful but just so I can do something for her and with her again.
So I finally found a funeral directors that was happy to keep her till i was ready. So I booked her funeral with them for the 19th of June.
When she was ready for me to see they told me she looked fine, so I took my 13 year old daughter with me. They do not embalm babies, no one could ever tell me why so I had to see her fast. She may have looked fine to them but her nose had gone in and I was not expecting that. My poor Tyla who is only 13 took one look at her and walked straight out. I regret letting her see her so much. I really did just think she would look like she did last time I see her, just like she was asleep.
The next time her skin had started pealing but she looked beautiful to me, she is my baby and all I wanted was to stay with her.
I had a bit of a brake down after that and phoned 5 days later to see her again and got told that wasn’t a good idea. This might so strange but it was comforting after a while knowing that I wasn’t putting her body in the ground at her funeral just her bones.
I do not know how I got though them weeks up to her funeral but I did and I didn’t kill myself to be with her like I planned to from day one.
Her funeral was beautiful. As we pulled into the cemetery there was over 70 people standing there waiting for us. It made me feel that she did matter to people. No one met her we was in lock down so I felt only I knew her and she only mattered to me. I felt alone in all my feelings. Obviously no one else felt like me but I was very grateful for the support.
But yet again I might as well been the only person there all I remember is me standing by her grave on my own. My Tyla read a poem, it was beautiful and I was so proud of her. Another thing I feel guilt about is that I can’t remember what she read and I don’t want to ask anyone because I don’t want to upset her. I didn’t let Tyla watch her coffin go in the ground, she had seen enough. But as my Ruby’s coffin went into the ground all I felt was the sun beam on my back as I dropped to my knees. I’ve since been told as she went down the sun come out of no where. This gives me some kind of warm feeling inside.
I don’t remember after much between June and September. I do remember most nights though I wanted to drive to the cemetery and lay next to her grave and cuddle the big pile of mud on top of her.
I can’t remember if this was before or after her funeral but I just kept trying to get her post-mortem I kept having to ring them and ring them. They told me on one phone call that they could find anything so they had took her brain out and sent it off to another hospital. I didn’t need to know what they were doing to her. Yet again how can they not think what they are saying to someone. I Just needed answers not know that they were cutting her head open and taking her brain out. I was told when it come though they would come to me with a doctor and explain it all to me. Another lie I just got it sent to me by email and had to read my baby died and there was no answers why. I didn’t understand some of the wording and I got told to ask my doctor what certain words meant. I didn’t do this my friend gave me good advice. The answer SID meant there wasn’t a answer and I didn’t need to phone a doctor and be put though the ins and outs of what they done to her in her post-mortem.
If there is a few bits of advice I can give to someone who is going though what I am is please don’t lay in bed thinking if only I’d done this or that they wouldn’t be dead. This will not change anything. They are dead and we can’t change what happened.
Don’t lay there asking them to come back, we are asking them to do something they can not do.
Please allow your self to feel the pain. I didn’t and covering it up didn’t help in the long run because I had to deal with it later.
I’ve started meditation, I always thought it was a load of rubbish and throw my phone but now I do it daily I don’t wait for thing to get so bad I can’t do it because that’s when I throw my phone. It has given me some peace at night.
Don’t get me wrong I’m still broken hearted and nothing is ever going to mend my heart and I cry every day but I find i feel better after.
I still get angry at loads of things and only now writing this I’m thinking. There was loads of people at her funeral I’ve heard from about 5 people since. But I also understand people more on with there own life’s. Ruby is my baby, Tyla, Frankie and Ella’s little sister and my mum and dads granddaughter. No one else loves her and missies her like we do. But I’m ok with that.
I talk to her all the time and tell her how much I love her, I say goodnight to her before I go to sleep every night. I’ve come to terms that she is gone and nothing I can do will bring her back.
I still can’t look at photos of her or look in her box they gave me at the hospital. But I can finally listen to the music I played at her funeral and feel peaceful with it. I haven’t got any other songs that reminds me of her. I only had her for 3 weeks but I’m grateful I got to be her mum for them 3 weeks and got to carry her inside me for 9 month.
This is my story about my Ruby. I’m just taking it day by day and know it’s ok to have bad days or good days or minutes. I feel guilty sometimes when I’m laughing at something one of the kids are doing, I think what have you got to be happy about but I’m trying and that’s the best I can do. She existed and I will never let anyone forget that. I will talk about her when I want. I will write her name on cards. I will try to help others if I can.
Even writing this has made me feel stronger just for the minute. So thank you for letting me tell my story. I’ve probably missed out so much. But hopefully what was meant to come out did 
