I buried my grandson today.
We huddled as an extended family on a cold winter’s day and prayed then placed the body of Aaron Emmanuel Tolson in the ground. I looked around at my daughter and son-in-law again burying a baby who seemed to have been stolen from them; at my wife and my daughter’s in-laws and our “adopted family” members. We will all process this tragedy in different ways, but all in the light of our faith in a good God.
When we had said all that needed to be said, and cried and hugged and wordlessly expressed powerful love for one another, we left and came home to our church. We ate morning tea and talked and chatted about nothing much; we just hung out together because we are family.
I buried my grandson today.
I remember when Susannah first came and told us she was pregnant again. We were so excited. After the loss of her first child, Henry, who was still-born, surely now we could look forward to a happy, healthy, lively addition to our family.
We were under strict instructions to keep it quiet as she had only just taken over the ballet school. She was afraid parents might pull their girls out, thinking they would be left high and dry by a pregnant dance teacher who was not up to the job. But after a few weeks, everyone knew anyway, as they do in a small town.
In April it was discovered that there may be a development problem with the baby. The news was devastating, and at first it seemed like there was only a small chance of the baby surviving. Then people started to pray, big miracle faith-full prayers, and a neo-natal surgeon said there was a good chance. There would be inconvenience, maybe a month of living away from home to be near the hospital before the birth, and an unknown future after that.
I buried my grandson today.
But then, seven weeks too early, Susannah started labour. They gave her drugs to stop it, and they seemed to work. An air ambulance was flown up from Sydney and she was flown to Newcastle. It was a rush to get her there in time because the drugs had stopped working and she was in full-on labour all the way.
As soon as Aaron was born he was rushed to NICU, the Neo-natal Intensive Care Unit. Machines and monitors and tubes and wires were hooked up to every part of his body.
His little lungs were too under-developed to get enough oxygen into his body. No matter what they did, he just couldn’t get that oxygen into his blood stream.
We arrived in the evening, not knowing what to expect. Susannah had just been told that he wasn’t going to make it. They took us all up to the NICU and proceeded to move all the tubes and wires so she could hold the baby.
For the next few hours she held that baby and stroked him and told him that he was loved and sang to him. As she did that, the numbers on the monitors seemed to take a turn for the better. Susannah and James poured love into that little baby in the best way they could.
I watched and saw two people who love one another grow strong in caring for this tiny life. I saw a miracle in that room, although not the one we so desperately wanted.
A photographer came and took some really nice photos. At one stage she asked Susannah to life Aaron’s leg. As if he had trained all his life for this moment, he pointed his toes- a true dancer.
We prayed and handed him over to the Lord. A little while later the nurse put a stethoscope to his chest and said in the tiniest voice, “There’s no heartbeat.” The nurse practitioner and the nurses grabbed a tissue each.
I buried my grandson today.
It must have cost tens of thousands of dollars to give Aaron a chance at life. I thought about that in the shower this morning as I tried to come to terms with what would happen in a couple of hours. The cost of bringing a specialist plane from Sydney to Narrabri, then down to Newcastle. The ambulances. The millions of dollars of equipment in NICU and the staff who were dedicated to his care.
Then I thought of how politicians in Queensland are contemplating abortion without restriction in a state that is literally a two hour drive from my home. It is so contradictory that we can at the same time spend huge amounts of money to save a baby’s life but also hold on to the myth that another baby who might be inconvenient can be disposed of without consequence. I know that it is tough for a mother to go through grief with all the support in the world, but how tough would it be if there was no support, no value on your baby’s life?
I buried my grandson today.
I know in my heart that one day I will see him again, not in a body that is too weak to cope, but in a new body, a resurrected body.
New Life Narrabri 