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Her name was Camila Amalia, she would be my second child. Our little family; my husband, my 1 year old son Salvador & I; was full of joy. We prepared for months to welcome Camilita. With my first child, I had a cesarean, it was a horrifying experience completely led by doctors.
After having gone through a painful birth experience, I wanted to be in control of this pregnancy. I wanted the best for Camila & I. My pregnancy went without complications. At 41 weeks, during my last visit to the doctor, I was seen by a Midwife who "stripped my membranes" & told me to go home and go to the hospital if I had contractions.

I went to the hospital 3 days later with contractions & because I wasn't feeling Camila move. We waited for about an hour. No one checked the baby, just my pulse. When I was called into triage, I was laid on a bed and the nurse checked for the heartbeat with the Doppler. She found nothing & left the room. In an interval of 1/2 hour, 3 different doctors came in & out with ultrasound machines & no news.
Finally, they all stepped in & began smalltalk about my son Salvador, I interrupted them & demanded answers. One looked at the other & said "you want to tell her?". The woman came to my bedside & said "I'm so sorry, your baby has no heartbeat". These words brought the most intense pain I have ever experienced in my life. My heart pounded as if it wanted to explode out of my chest & I wailed moans of despair and sorrow, wails that I had never heard out of a human mouth before. My husband trembled with devastation and meanwhile our son watched his parents; his pillars of safety; crumble to pieces as no child should ever see.
Our daughter was dead, she died inside me, under my care & I didn't even notice. I had another cesarean because Camila was breached and it posed a danger to my life. Camila was born weighing 9 pounds 3 ounces & was 22 inches long. My husband & I held her in our arms for little while. I had a few minutes alone with her. I checked her from head to toe, she was breathtaking. I held her in every way possible, smelled her, kissed her chubby cheeks & sang her a song. On my days on earth, I would never again get to do all these things with her. If love could resuscitate people, she would've come back to life just from all the love I felt for her. We buried Camila on May 12. It was surreal and angelical. I spent months of despair, depression anger, guilt, sorrow...all the possible negative feelings one can think of. I was in a living death everyday. Friends went away, people began to disappear & I felt as lonely as a human can feel, & then I realized that i wasn't alone. God was right there, waiting for me to come to him. God has been my Saviour & he's never left me, he's brought me back to life even though I felt that my pain was inconsolable. Today, her headstone reads the words of the song that I sang to her when I held her in my arms, there's a picture of her and an engraved illustration that I drew of my husband, my son and I holding our Angel Camila in our arms. My daughter is alive, she is in heaven.

Learn more about this author, Carolina Suarez.
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