a little heart

It was a question I would never need to ask:

Mommy, why do bad things happen to good people?

It's not that I wouldn't think to ask, or be interested to know. I would probably have been as curious as anyone to find out. I might have even gone to great lengths to investigate the issue. But, the fact remained: I simply would not need to worry about such questions in my lifetime. It was a type of freedom, really, and I know there are many not so free...

The Asian man rubbed some jelly on mom's tummy and then rubbed a plastic thing over her skin. Dad sat on a stool across the room, watching the monitor with a serious look on his face. I know they were proud of me, because I did exactly what I was supposed to do. I just let my little heart beat like it wanted to anyway. Even though it was easy, I knew how important it was, and I wanted to help as much as I could.

I already knew mom loved me very much. I knew that ever since her miscarriage, which happened a couple years before I showed up, she did all sorts of things just for me. She took her temperature every morning and recorded it in a little journal. She read one book after another about pregnancy and nutrition, and even changed her whole diet. She drank some awful-tasting stuff, like a weird kind of herbal tea and some strange fish oil. I don't know exactly why, for sure, but I knew it was all for me. She even wrote down everything she ate. And, she did a lot more that I don't even know about. Oh, that's right, she paid a lot of money to go to this place where they poke you with all these little needles. Ouch! Can you believe that? Well, I don't know whether all that worked or not, but I do know that at some point, I came into the picture. And mom was pretty happy to learn about me, I could tell...

After mom knew about me for just a couple days, I could tell she was worried. She said she was bleeding or something wasn't normal. She thought it was another miscarriage, and was very, very sad. She cried and cried. The last time she had jelly on her tummy they didn't see a heart beat, and she didn't want that to happen again. But, I was here the whole time. She took pregnancy tests that were positive, and waited for the miscarriage to happen, knowing something wasn't right. When it didn't happen for several weeks, she finally went to get a blood test. That was just a few days ago. Then, last night, things got very bad.

Mom was very sick and pale, and didn't feel very good at all. She thought she was going to throw up and had pain in her tummy. She thought it was going to happen; the miscarriage that is. But, it didn't, and the pain just got worse. Dad asked if he should take her to the Emergency room. At first she said no, but later, when she could hardly move with all the pain, dad carried her to the car and drove her to the hospital. He drove very fast. When she got there she was very faint, and even passed out. They stuck a needle in her arm and attached a hose that hooked up to a bag of clear fluid. They also asked her a bunch of questions. Mom was fading in and out, but she could understand things. When the doctor said that I may not be in the right spot, she was sad. Everyone was busy taking care of mom because she was in a lot of pain, and bleeding inside. There was nothing I could do about it, but I wish there was.

That was when we went to meet the Asian man with the jelly and the plastic thing. They were looking at me all snug in my cozy little home. Mom asked what he could see, and at first he said he didn't know. Dad was watching the monitor, but he didn't seem to know what he was looking at. Finally, after rubbing that thing over her belly for a while, he told her I was not in the right place. I wish I was in the right place, and dad wished I was too, but I wasn't. Mom began to cry. Then, he showed her my little heart beating. Mom cried very much when she saw this; when she saw me saying "hi." I didn't want her to be sad, and I didn't want dad to be sad either. But, I knew I was also saying goodbye, and no one likes to say goodbye. I was glad I could at least do that, though.

So they took mom into a different room and they made sure I couldn't do any more harm to her. I am glad for that because I did not want her to hurt any more.

I know mom and dad have to ask questions like 'why do bad things happen to good people?' I know mom and dad have a lot of other things to think about too. But me? I'm lucky. I don't have to worry about any of that. All I know is that I am loved very much. I figure I don't need to know much of anything else.