Ashley Branch

And yet, there is Everly.  The biggest part of my faith journey is Everly’s story. When Charlie and I  married, I already had Mia, but we wanted to have a family, that was ours, together.  We started trying almost immediately after we were married. I was almost 35. They call us old people when you are 35 and trying to have a baby. Geriatric is the word. Our wedding was in May, and we were pregnant by December with Everly. From the beginning she measured huge. It was also this joke.  Being an anxious person, I was using the app to check her heartbeat and those things. Two days before my next appointment, I was having a hard time finding her heartbeat.  I thought, it’s me. I’m being silly.  I’m being anxious.  For the next appointment, Charlie didn’t go with me. I took my daughter, Mia. We had the day off of school. I thought she hadn’t seen an ultrasound. This will be so fun, so I took Mia. 

On the way, I told Mia that I had a dream about Everly. Mia was sitting in the front seat. Mia had this little stuffed dog she took everywhere. She threw the dog into the back seat and, as the dog passed by, Everly was gone. When I looked out the window, my grandmother, who had passed, was holding Everly. Mia, who was 10 at the time,  looked at me and said, “I dreamt about Everly too.  That she was gone and there was this man with curly hair. He looked like the guy from The Wedding Singer, and he was holding Everly.  Then there was this woman walking around kind of protecting them.”  We laughed about it. Mia and I have always joked that we have this cosmic connection.  We thought how strange that we would have similar dreams.

Of course, we get into the exam room, and we are with the nurse practitioner for maybe five minutes. I can just tell something is not okay. Everly is laying on her side, and she’s not moving.  The nurse practitioner  leaves quickly.  I’m looking at Mia, who doesn’t know this is different, it looks like her baby sister is sleeping, and I start praying automatically. I went into protective mode.  There was nothing else I could do for Everly, but I could  protect Mia.  

The doctor came in and said, “Listen, there is no heartbeat. We are going to send you over to your OB, and start the process.” I had to walk over to where Mia was, so she could start processing what was happening. Mia was  only ten. She started to cry. She had no idea what her feelings were, but she was scared and sad. I don’t think I cried up to that point, but then, I called my mom. I also had to tell her, “Hey someone has to come and get Mia”  They were about to admit me. I wanted to talk to Charlie, but he was out working a wreck. He was working for  TXDOT at this point and was in some little bitty town of five people where a cattle truck had crashed.  I couldn’t  get a hold of him, but my mom worked with his boss. Mom was able to reach out to him, and they drove out and picked up Charlie. This is when we first saw our small town come together and surround us.  My parents drove Charlie out to the hospital. 

Once Charlie was there, the staff started the process of having me deliver Everly. I had a C-Section with Mia, but was advised, if I were to have a C-Section with Everly, it might affect my ability to have future children. The best thing would be for me to have this child naturally.  They gave me pitocin, and I was extremely allergic. My heart rate dropped. I kept telling Charlie I was so cold. I was shaking from head to toe. They kept putting blankets on me. The doctor came in and said I had 104 degree fever. We were on a roller coaster. I lost my vision. When it was time to start pushing, I couldn’t see.  I was literally blind. I don’t know if that is a metaphor from the LORD, but I was so scared. It wasn’t just blurry. It was true blackness.

I begged Charlie to call Mia, I wanted to talk to her. I vividly remember saying I wanted to talk to her. He turned and looked at me and said, “If you are planning on going somewhere, you need to stop it.  It’s going to be okay.  You will see her tomorrow.” I delivered Everly, and the minute I delivered her, I could see again.   I remember seeing her little fingernails and her perfect tiny, tiny little hand.  She was thirty-five weeks old. She was almost there. She had a little bit of hair and Mia’s button nose.  Her eyes were open.

At first, they had told us she was a boy.  For a little minute she was named Benjamin Blake after my Pawpaw and his brother.  Then, my doctor came in and said that it was a girl. He asked if we wanted an autopsy, and I said absolutely not, there was no reason. They could do blood tests and that sort of thing, but not an autopsy.  

They asked us what we wanted to do. I said I wanted to keep her. She slept that night on my chest.  It was a very odd peace.  It was one of those moments. I knew, I knew, I knew, I knew it was for a reason even though my mind didn’t want to believe it. And yet, I sang her the songs that I had sang to Mia. It was so odd to me the moments that I wanted to specifically have with her, I did.  While she slept on my chest. I think I slept a little, but not very much. I made sure Charlie held her.  The nurses were so kind. They kept telling us to do what we needed; that everything we felt and did  was okay. 

My brother and mom came the next morning.  I was going to be discharged that evening.  Our local funeral home had lost a daughter similarly. They showed us so much grace and allowed my mom to take Everly home from the hospital.  The funeral director met my mom at her house with Everly’s little coffin.  Mom was  able to have time alone with her.  Mom said she sang to our Everly  the entire way home and spoke to her by saying how loved she was. I had asked mom to get a picture of Mia holding her. I wanted a picture, even if it was just for me, of them holding one another. We did that.  

This took place on a Wednesday. On Friday morning, we had her funeral.  It was a blur. We only  did graveside. But, truly, truly, truly that little town wrapped us up.  Our dogs had been fed and watered. There was food in our freezer and refrigerator. Someone mowed the lawn. Men, who didn’t even work in Charlie’s unit, called and gave him days off.  He was able to stay home the rest of the week and some into the next. 

That summer I walked about ten miles a day. The cemetery was a few miles from our house, so I would walk it over and over. Subconsciously, I was trying to punish myself. In the thick of it, you know at some point you won’t be sad forever, you won’t hurt forever. And yet, there is that part of me that sometimes thought, if I’m not hurting then did I love her enough? What did I miss?  What did I do? 

We went to church one Sunday morning. One of our little elders and his wife came up to me. She told me they had lost a child in the 50s in much the same way.  She told me that she was unable to even see her son. They simply took him away. They told her not to talk about it.  She told me, if I want to talk about it, she would talk about it with me.   were so sweet and kind. People cried with us.  People loved us by  praying with us and for us.  In the later part of that summer, I received test results that Everly had a condition which, typically,  isn’t  fatal except in rare circumstances.  The condition was genetic. They tested Charlie and me.  It came from Charlie’s side.  It was one of those moments when we had to ask ourselves if we want to go further. I knew we either trust God or we don’t. If it doesn’t work we have a beautiful, healthy ten year old, we are fine. 

Then, that October, I got pregnant. As nervous and anxious as I am, I thought  there is no way I could make it  through this without valium or something. And yet, God gave me the craziest peace I have ever experienced through that pregnancy,  I was obviously high-risk,  I had to go to all the specialists. Every other week, I was in a doctor’s office. That pregnancy couldn’t have been easier.  I was never sick that much.  We kept the news of this pregnancy super, super secret. I wore extremely baggy clothes; then,  on New Year’s Day, we announced that we were having a baby.  The excitement was really fun!  I had focused so much on how Everly’s  loss had affected us, I hadn’t given much time to how it affected everyone in our family.  

Three days after the UIL State Speech and Debate Championship, Hattie Mae entered the world, and hasn’t looked back since.  

Hattie knows she has another sister. And yet, there’s always that question: Would we have Hattie without losing Everly?  That is something I think about now. That’s something I approach very gingerly because I never want Hattie to think for one second that she wasn’t wanted. Hattie was born looking like her daddy. This little Charlie, this little clone of a  good man, who loves our family so well.  All of it is a  testimony that God provides, He listens and He knows.  He absolutely knows the desires of our heart. Hattie is the joy our family needed.  

Though the fig tree does not bud
    and there are no grapes on the vines,
though the olive crop fails
    and the fields produce no food,
though there are no sheep in the pen
    and no cattle in the stalls,
yet I will rejoice in the Lord,
    I will be joyful in God my Savior.

The Sovereign Lord is my strength;
    he makes my feet like the feet of a deer,
    he enables me to tread on the heights.

Habakkuk 3: 17-19

Editor’s Note: Ashley has degrees from Texas Tech and OU. She’s a public school teacher in Texas where she coaches Academic UIL. She loves her family and others well.