The day before Tilo was born now seems full of special, resonant memories. It was my very first day of parental leave and Tilo and I had been so busy! Finally I could now be a mama full time and I couldn't wait. Everything I did seemed so full of joy and anticipation, the world was perfect, Holger and I could not have been happier. I had bought the cot I wanted, been to the library, visited a friend, and Holger and I had gone out for dinner at a little Thai place ( I could barely squeeze behind the table I was getting so big). The last thing I did that evening was have a bath; Tilo was jumping around as always, I couldn't believe that soon we would get to meet him. I kept on saying "I can't wait to meet him! I can't wait! I am going to be a mama! What will he look like?" We were both full of dreams and love and hope.

   Holger and I feel asleep as always with me grumbling about how I was getting uncomfortable, but "I can't wait to meet him!" was such a solace for this.  It was beautiful, the three of us together.

   Later in the night I woke up needing to go to the loo, which was not unusual at 38 weeks. But I noticed that this time there was some mucus too and I called Holger in. We wondered if it was the plug; was I going into labour ? But it didn't seem anything to worry about and our midwife had assured us to stay tight if this happened and to try to get some rest, so we went back to sleep.

   A bit later on I woke up with a funny feeling, indescribable really, I just sensed something was wrong, some kind of pressure in me. I tried to sit up in bed and suddenly, awfully and shockingly - a huge rush of blood poured out of me all over the bed, down onto the floor. It was as if a bucket of blood had been turned upside down.

   At first I thought it was my waters breaking. But when I turned the light on it was all blood. Holger woke up immediately to my frightened screams "what was this?" I thought, my goodness; is it a bloody show?! No-one said that it would be like this!  I felt frightened but uncertain. We called our midwife and dialed for an ambulance. I was going into hospital straight away. At this point, I still thought that maybe everything was alright. Maybe it was waters breaking? Reassuring for me was that I still felt perfectly fine. A small voice in the back of my head wondered why our baby wasn't moving anymore, but as I am generally an optimist I thought "well it is just like this in pregnancy sometimes.. And we are going to hospital straight away, everything will be fine."

   So I busied myself with having a quick shower, throwing things into the hospital bag and choosing which outfit Tilo would wear home. Actually I was quite excited. Promisingly, I had also stopped bleeding. But still that thought was there, nagging at me  "why aren't you moving anymore Tilo darling? Why was there so much blood?"

   Thinking back I imagine him as a heavier weight inside of me, more than usual, poor Tilo, he must have been unconscious already; already very, very sick, and I didn't know or didn't let myself know.

   By the time we arrived at hospital it was 45 minutes since I had woken up to all the blood. The ambulance people had had a little trouble finding his heartbeat, but it was there. Our midwife looked worried and kept looking at the heart trace. It looked a little distressed, but not in emergency she kept saying. Even so people were coming in and out to check things and soon I was being prepped for an emergency c-section.  I was also in labour, but not much - I couldn't feel anything. When we heard that I was about to have a c-section, I remember smiling at Holger and saying "great! Now I don't need to go through the pain and hard work of labour! AND we are going to meet Tilo in a few hours!" I am so sad to look back at this thought now; but I really had no idea.

   Looking back I have so many gaps in my memory. But some things stay sharply and painfully in focus. I remember the weight of him leaving me as he was lifted out by our very worried looking obstetrician, then the words like "adrenline!", "transfusion!" and I even imagine I heard "vasa previa". I heard the sound of the defibrillation paddles being charged up and so much activity in the corner of the room where my little baby, who had been so active bouncing around until these shocking past hours, was lying still.  We were separated from each other for the first time; I felt so helpless and unable to do anything. I was holding both of the anesthetist's hands so strongly that he had to gently ask me if he could have just one back. Many people seemed to be looking at me with tearful eyes. My husband Holger was standing beside me and he had to leave the room briefly, in shock, terribly worried about me and our baby.

   For a while, lying there, I couldn't bear to look at Tilo, I kept asking people "is my baby dying? Is he?" Then I looked at him for the first time as he was wheeled past me: dark hair, round baby body, large and beautiful, covered in tubes and monitors, our child I had been so waiting to meet. I know now that he took his first gasp later than 10 minutes. That his Apgars were 0 0 1. That there had not been a baby transfused in the hospital for 17 years. That it took tremendous skill to resuscitate him. Consultants came to see me, speaking kindly and gravely, and I don't remember now what they said or how much time passed as I was in the recovery room. Holger went to be with Tilo and to call his parents in Germany. Another woman behind a curtain had her lustily crying baby girl given to her after a cesarean and she cooed over her baby, a second child for her. Staff checked me, the spinal was wearing off, I started to shake uncontrollably as an after effect and honestly I was pleased to be very medicated up, feeling, empty and crazed.

   Everything was surreal and dreadful, I felt that we had been in a car crash or a jet plane had crashed into our house: out of the blue everything went wrong. My pregnancy was perfect. I was healthy and well the whole way though; just a little nausea and tiredness at first, but nothing major. I loved being pregnant. I understood finally why people called pregnant women "expecting" - it is a time of expecting (and hopes and dreams and wondering).

   We are both grateful for the time we were able to spend with Tilo after this. Throughout the next 40 hours, the incredibly kindness and high quality of care we received at Wellington Women's hospital helped us enormously.  But it is no surprise to people who have lost their children to vasa previa, that Tilo's life was going to be very short. After tests and consultations we knew that he was dying: every organ in his body was damaged disastrously, and it was starting to shut down.

   It was heartbreaking seeing him like this: I couldn't believe I was finally holding my beautiful child who to me was exquisitely and perfectly beautiful in every way. From the outside, he looked pink and healthy; it was hard to believe that he was so sick. The other tiny babes in ICU looked so much more fragile and sick than he did. In photos from this time, we both look blissfully happy and heartbreakingly sad. It is amazing that the human heart can hold so much difference at the same time. We had finally got to meet him, but we were losing him too.

   Holger hung onto every hope imaginable. He thought of donating a kidney ("maybe if he makes it to 5, I can give him one of mine?"), further organ transplants, therapy ("well he might not be the quickest child, but he would still be Tilo"; "maybe his brain will recover in other parts and learn to do the things the damaged parts usually do?") He did not want to give up hope: this was heartbreaking to me but also amazing to see how he tried to do everything imaginable for his wee son. I had no hope from the beginning. Strangely, I knew that this was it. Sometimes I feel guilty that I didn't have more hope for my child, that I should have fought for him, but in the end it would not have made a difference.

   Before we let Tilo go, we were able to give him a beautiful baptism where we rubbed sand and water from "his" beach on his feet, we gave him a lovely warm bath (finally his body was not being cooled anymore) and cuddled him for some hours. We played music, we had our dearest friends around us and we gave him everything we could.

   He died very peacefully in our arms. He held onto our fingers for quite a long time. We talked to him and told him it was okay to go and to feel safe, we loved him. He never took a breath of his own.

   Tilo has enriched our lives enormously. Through all the pain of grief we do manage to see beauty and kindness and goodness in the world, often in every day things. Vasa previa also reminds us that bad things often happen randomly. Before this, neither of us felt that we had ever been particularly lucky or unlucky: this time we were both. Unlucky with VP, lucky that we had such a beautiful and strong child. Some days it feels like I am looking at the world through a crystal: everything is upside down and every facet of the crystal holds a picture of our darling wee boy. He will always be there, a part of the world for us.

~ Kate & Holger

 Tilo Spill - 2nd - 3rd June 2006, Wellington, New Zealand
'Love never ends'