Today Harper would be 10 months old. In honor of her, I would like to share her story with you from a father’s perspective. Much of this was written in the days and weeks following Harper’s birth and burial. It is still hard to read and relive even ten months later.
You can read A Father’s Perspective Part I HERE , Part II HERE, & Part III HERE
You can find Alexa’s perspective of Harper’s story HERE.
-E
May 22 after they took Harper and we were alone
We should have wanted the nurses to take our crying daughter away for us to take a 3 hour nap before they brought her back to feed, but instead we were having the nurses take her away for the final time. Forever. We still couldn’t believe it and just sat and held each other in silence for several minutes.
The funeral home called me and said that the nurses had called them and just needed to go over some details with them. I still couldn’t believe that I was doing this, but I went over all the details with them.
I texted our friend so he could update our church class, “Hi, just wanted to update you. Alexa delivered baby Harper Jane today at 7:15 am. She was 18 inches and 7 lbs 4.5 ounces. We got to hold her and make prints of her hands and feet. We got lots of pictures too. Hudson and Henry also met her and it was tough to explain to Hudson. She is gone now to the funeral home and we are discussing having a memorial service on Thursday afternoon or Friday morning. Please send this on to the class. We will update you when we have more information on the memorial service.”
We facetimed my parents so that we could see the boys. They were just as happy as always. It must be nice to be as innocent and naïve as they were. I envied them.
I texted my boss so she could update our team.
She said she could talk now, so I called her to talk about what had happened and what plans we have for funeral service and time off.
I called the funeral home again so I could start getting information on cemeteries and talk about decisions like cremation/burial OR open casket/closed casket. Decisions I never thought I would have to make for myself, let alone my daughter.
I called a few cemeteries to get more information about how much they cost. We were trying to look all around our house to see several cemetery options and pricing so we could go visit once we got out and pick one. We wanted to find a cemetery that was nice and peaceful, not run down and “creepy”.
Our neighbor set up a Meal Train for our family and it quickly filled up 3-4 meals per week for the next two and a half months. We didn’t even know how much of a blessing that would be.
The person who did the hand and footprints in clay for Harper sent us a picture of them. They were beautiful and we were so glad to get the reminder of our daughter.
My dad texted and asked how long we let Henry cry when we put him to bed. I just thought about how frustrated I got when Henry would cry and thought about how I needed to change my appreciation for Hudson and Henry. I called my dad and told him that they probably need to pick his animals up off the floor because he usually throws them out of his crib. I had a little laugh in the midst of all of this pain.
I sent my dad an important text. I told him to please double check that all baby stuff is put in Harper’s room. I didn’t know how we would react to seeing her bassinet in our bedroom or the swing in the living room, ready to lie empty. My parents were great and got pretty much all of the baby stuff and put it in her room.
Around 11:20 PM, we talked to the nurse and felt we were ready to go home. We left the hospital different than usual. Normally I would be taking pictures of Alexa and our child as we rolled down in our wheelchair… Instead we were numb. We went into the hospital with a baby girl, and we were leaving with the clothes she would never wear, a few hours of memories, and a large hole in our hearts.
I drove to Walgreens to get Alexa’s medicine for her recovery. We had to wait for 30 minutes while they filled the prescriptions. We sat in the car and just tried to make small talk even though we only had missing Harper on our minds. We got the medicine and drove home. We walked in the door without our 3rd child, knowing that life in this house, life in general would never be the same.
That night, when I was going to sleep. I had trouble falling asleep. Normally, I am asleep almost immediately when my head hits the pillow. I remember after laying there for about 15 minutes, Alexa saying “What are you thinking about.” I just said that I was missing Harper. We talked for a few minutes and then eventually fell asleep.
WEDNESDAY 5/23 The first day without Harper
We woke up to Henry talking to himself in his crib. He always does that. I looked at the clock. It was 7:15 AM, the same time Harper was born yesterday. Luckily, my parents were still in town so Alexa and I could just stay in our room for now. We had made a list (ok Alexa made a list) of everything we needed to do, so we just started doing them.
I called the funeral home to schedule a 10:30 appointment to discuss all of the things parents should never have to discuss. After that, I called our pastor and let him know when our appointment was, so that he could meet us there.
My parents texted me and said that they were going to take the boys to the park. We came out of the room to say bye to the boys before they left for the park. They were happy to see us.
Many people texted throughout the day that they were praying for us in this difficult time.
We drove to the funeral home in silence. We didn’t really know what to expect. We had so many decisions to make and we had never thought about them until yesterday. We stopped at Taco Cabana on the way there to get some breakfast.
We sat in the room at the funeral home and had to answer a bunch of questions for the death certificate. Then we started discussing what we want for Harper’s memorial service. We were active in two different campuses of our church, so we had to decide which location to have the service at. We decided on the main campus because of the beautiful chapel there. We had to decide on programs, order of service, look at the casket, choose which pastor would do the service, select a date and time… Too many decisions we shouldn't have to make…
This funeral home was very good and tried to help us with as many decisions as possible so that we didn’t have to think about them. They showed us the casket that they had and we decided it was great.
After we decided on the things we had to decide on at that time, we rode out to the cemetery to look at our options for locations to bury our daughter. They showed us a location that was in an “old” section. We weren’t the biggest fans of that one. They then said that they think another location is where we should choose and showed us a new section by a cross that was donated by a local church. It was close to another girl who had died during birth just weeks before. We decided that we would go with that location. It was so "nice and peaceful".
After we left the funeral home, Alexa and I decided to look at other cemeteries. We went to one that was along 75 (on my way to work). If we used that one, I could stop to see my baby girl every day on the way to work… We felt that it was not as peaceful and it was more “business-like”. There was too much traffic noise. We were going to go look at additional cemeteries, but both decided we “liked” the first one.
We then went to a nail salon so Alexa could get her nails done. She had planned to get her nails done right before she went in to induce on May 24, but that plan was obviously changed. She decided to get her nails black in mourning of Harper. We told the nail place about what happened and they were sorry for us. She added a nice touch and painted flowers in two of Alexa’s nails.
While I was there, I called my police officer friend to ask if the police department could do a police escort. He said that they only do escorts for police officers, but gave me the information for a company that does motorcycle police escorts.
Alexa and I decided to use the pink funeral programs, so we called the funeral home and the church to let them know who would create the programs.
I called the motorcycle escort. An operator let me know that someone would call me back to get more information.
We headed home after Alexa got her nails done to start working on our program for Harper’s memorial service.
I texted the photographer to let her know that we needed to have some of Harper’s pictures we took by tonight because we wanted to have them for the program and the slideshow. The funeral home basically said we needed to have all that information by 8 PM that night, so we had our work cut out for us. I also told the photographer about the funeral service in case she could make it. She said she was uploading the pictures and she had been crying the entire time she went through the gallery. She said she would be there on Friday. I let her know that she was such a blessing for our family.
Alexa and I were eating fried chicken that someone had brought us in our bed when the photographer emailed the pictures.
Alexa started looking at the pictures. I stopped eating my chicken and looked with her. We both started crying just thinking back to that time in the hospital room. Even though it seemed like ages ago, it had just been this time yesterday that we were still holding our baby girl.
The pastor who we wanted to do the service for Harper called me. We chatted for a few minutes and scheduled a meeting the next day.
Alexa and I began working through decisions for Harper’s memorial service. What songs should we have our friends sing? Who should speak? Should I speak? What order do we want things in? Should we play a slideshow of pictures or not?
Hudson came in with us to spend a little time with us. Even though we had a lot to do, we made sure to talk to him and spend a little time with him when he wanted to. We couldn’t neglect our children even in these trying times.
Someone had set up the meal train and gofundme for Harper’s funeral expenses. We would periodically look at these. The food sign ups were filling up. The gofundme was rising rapidly. Alexa and I were feeling so blessed even in the midst of our planning for our daughter's funeral.
We continued looking online for songs and trying to decide the details for our baby girl’s memorial service. Alexa and I were working hard at this as we knew we would never get to plan birthday parties, never get to plan a wedding, and never get to plan graduation parties. We wanted to put all of our efforts into making this funeral service as good as it could be.
Alexa and I finished up the program for the funeral. We had listened to so many songs, looked at so many Bible verses, and looked through so many pictures. We finally felt that the program was just the way we wanted it, so we sent it over to the funeral home, so they could begin printing them for Friday.
The funeral home called me and told me they had received it and verified a few details. I told them that we would send the songs and the pictures for the slide show shortly.
While we were working on that, the funeral home called me again and told me they would be gone for an hour or so for a “death call”, but they would look at our pictures and songs when they got back. So nonchalant…death call. I don’t know how they do that.
We ate at some point, but we were not able to eat much.
We emailed some photos to the funeral home that we would like in the slideshow and later emailed the songs that we would like included. Alexa continued making an “invitation” to send to people about the funeral service. It was strange making an invitation to a funeral, when it should have been a birth announcement.
Once Alexa completed that, I forwarded that and the funeral home information to my boss, so she could let others at work know about it.
The last decision we had for the night was to decide on pall bearers for Harper. We discussed it and determined we would like our dads to do it. We sent their names over to the funeral home. It was now 11 PM. Our day was so busy. Having tasks that needed to be done, and deadlines that needed to be met kept our minds off of missing Harper. We got ready for bed and laid down and we just talked and cried. We remembered that we had lost our baby girl again. What a productive day in such a terrible way… Eventually we both fell asleep for what would be another busy day the next day.
THURSDAY 5/24 So much to do, so little time
We woke up around 7 AM when we heard Henry talking to himself again. I got up and got ready for the day. I went and got the boys breakfast and then went back to our room. We spent a lot of time in our room with the door closed while my parents took care of the boys. It was easier to just be in our own world and not have to deal with the normal daily routine.
While Alexa got ready, I started texting people the information about Harper’s funeral. I scrolled through my phone contacts. Now, I don’t talk to too many people on a regular basis. I have a small group of people that would regularly show up on my recent calls, so scrolling through and deciding who to notify was tough. I would see someone and think, “I haven’t talked to this person in years, would they possibly come to funeral? Would I want them to come to the funeral?” I ended up texting my old fraternity brothers, my old boss, my first friend at my current job, my buddies from college, a friend from my previous job.
Nana and Papa left and took the boys to a splash pad. They periodically sent us pictures of the boys playing in the water. It was bittersweet seeing how much fun our oldest two children were having…
Alexa and I left to drive to the church to meet with the pastor who would be doing the service. On the way we stopped at Chick Fil A and got some breakfast.
The meeting with the pastor was tough. We went over all the service details. We discussed showing the slide show or not. The pastor prayed with us and told us that from what he could see in the way we were acting and what we were saying, he could tell we were clinging to each other and clinging to God. Being at such a big church it is rare to meet one of the teaching pastors. We had talked to him a few times at celebrations for how long he had been at the church, but sitting here, he made us feel like he had always known us.
The pastor finished our meeting after we had discussed the order of service by praying for us. He told us that he was proud of us.
We left the church and went to the mall right there. Alexa wanted to get some accessories and clothes for her and the boys. We walked around the entire mall visiting all of the stores. We went to Anthropologie, Banana Republic, Dillards, Francescas, Janie and Jack, Loft, Macys, Neiman Marcus, and probably other stores I don’t even remember. While we were shopping, I was receiving texts back from friends who I had sent the funeral invites to.
“I’m so heartbroken for you guys…I love you brother.”
“Eric, I’m so sorry to hear about your family’s loss. I can’t even begin to imagine the heartbreak. I’ll keep you all in my thoughts and I hope you’re able to find peace eventually. Love you guys!”
“Oh man I am so sorry to hear that Eric. We will keep yall in our thoughts.”
“I’m so sorry to hear about Harper. I can’t imagine what you’re going through right now. Let me know if we can do anything to help y’all out.”
“Sorry for your loss brother. Let me know if I can do anything for you.”
“Eric, I’m so incredibly sorry to hear about Harper. I won’t be able to join you all tomorrow but I am sending you guys all of my love <3”
So many kind words of caring people wanting to grieve with me, wanting to mourn with me, but just meant nothing to me right now. Nothing could take away the shock and sadness of losing my daughter.
