Mom, I Have to Die So You Could Live!

        What pain! Inside my body I felt like I had broken glass and every movement I made I felt like I was going to faint. I fought not to do it since I had Elias at home. Elias was a three-year-old boy that I took care of at home from 7:00 a.m. to 4:00 p.m. His mother was a teacher in the city. I was pleased that when she arrived she found everything ready. Her bottles, her clothes and her things arranged in her bags. The poor girl came by train and the trip was about an hour long. She had a six-year-old daughter that she had to pick up before getting to pick up the baby. She arrived so tired that out of consideration for her I didn't like her to waste time waiting for me to put things away. She was very grateful for that. 

        I had been married for several years. I loved my husband intensely. He was extremely kind, funny and had a sense of humor. I called him the man who could fix everything. From electronics, wood and whatever he didn't know he would research and improvise how to fix it. He studied and worked at the same time. I had such faith in him that I said that if I broke down like a robot I know he would find a way to fix me. That was my faith in him. 

        We were young and I never took anything to avoid having children. We noticed that I wasn't getting pregnant and everyone was asking when we were going to have a baby. There were days when this bothered me but there were other days when I didn't even notice the detail. We were young and had a lot of energy. Because of the love we had for each other, trying wasn't a job but rather a party. With lots of laughter and excitement I would say to myself, "Today we are going to make a boy." When you are young you don't think about doctors or that there might be something wrong with your reproductive system. You live to love, laugh and solve the problems that arise.

        Years went by and nothing. We educated ourselves on the subject of infertility. We consulted doctors, specialists and nothing. They changed my label. I was now the butch wife who couldn't have children. I hated that word with all my soul. I was forbidden to touch the flowers in the garden because since I wasn't fertile I could dry up the bushes. Where did people get this nonsense from? Or maybe it was intentional cruelty?

        I remember as a child, I had innocent fantasies that I would have ten girls. I knew of a house that had that many girls and it seemed like they had a party every day. There was music, dancing, laughter and fighting. My mother had three children and I was the only girl. It was a bit boring and there were a lot of rules. My father, my two brothers and especially my mother. 

        Life went on and I practiced being a mother with Elias. My husband was studying and working. I was totally frustrated and my beloved was very patient in putting up with my melancholy and hormones.

        The day I got sick, with the pain I felt and that sensation of broken glass inside me, I had to call the teacher to drop everything and come pick up Elias because I felt like I was going to faint. I felt horribly cold. I put on layers and layers of clothes inside the house. It was like I was in Alaska, naked in the street. GOD, what was happening to me? My fear was that I was going to faint and Elias would be left alone in the house without caring for him and not understanding what was happening to me. I put him in the crib with a lot of pain to make sure nothing would happen to him if I fainted. I called my husband and told him the same thing I told the teacher. They both worked in the city and I needed them to not stop anywhere and to get there as soon as possible. 

        My coldness increased and I decided to get into the bathtub with the water as hot as my body could stand. Mistake! My pain increased and the cold did not go away. I got out as best I could since the pain was intense. Every movement felt like someone was cutting me with a knife. The teacher arrived first and I assured her that maybe it was nothing. That it might be gas or indigestion. She left worried but I told her that my husband was about to arrive. He had called. 

        When my husband arrived, I was lying in layers of clothing under an electric blanket, almost unconscious. I was white as a sheet and the pain was so intense that I told him I would rather die than go downstairs. He called the ambulance, took my blood pressure, and told my husband that it was dangerously low. They had to get to the hospital quickly. They put me on a stretcher and we got to the hospital.

        I didn't know what was happening. I just watched the rush and rush. The doctors were talking to my husband. I saw him crying like a child. They had told him that he might die. He had internal bleeding and had lost a lot of blood. The hot water made things worse. They told my parents to notify me of my serious condition and that they wouldn't provide me with insurance. They were in Puerto Rico.  

        They only told me that I had to have an operation, but that was all. They didn't tell me that I might turn into a corpse. When they passed me in the hallway, I gave him instructions to feed my little dog, Pupi, and not to be so strict with him, since he complained that I spoiled him too much. He started to sob, since he knew I was dying and I was worried about my little dog.    

        They took me to the operating room and I felt like I was going. I could hear voices giving orders and people putting monitors, blood and IVs on me.

        Suddenly I felt a peace. Maybe it was the medicines, but I wasn't afraid and I felt sleepy. Suddenly, I don't know where the face of a baby came from. It looked like a picture of my husband when he was just a year old. I saw him clearly. He had a round face like him and he had his unique smile. The baby looked at me and smiled with me and said, "Mommy, I have to die to save you. I want you to live and be happy." 

        I left the world and when I woke up I found out that I had been pregnant and that I was three months pregnant. Since I was not in the uterus I didn't realize it. The baby was growing and at three months it exploded causing internal bleeding that almost killed me. It was a miracle that I was alive! When they opened my belly they also found a tumor with roots that had damaged many parts of my uterus and they had to remove half of it. Maybe because we were young, with that half I could get pregnant. It never happened. 

        How can this event be explained? I don't know. I only know that I feel like my son warned me like an angel that if he hadn't positioned himself outside my uterus, perhaps they wouldn't have found that tumor and I would have died of cancer. 

        How do you explain this? There are things that have no explanations. You take it and process it in your mental computer. Without going crazy or bitter.

        A secret: Every day I see the face of my hero baby on the face of my dear husband. His round little face and his smile telling me to fight to live and I feel at peace.

        If my husband only knew.

        I just thank GOD…for my life.

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