Five years of marriage without a child does something to you; the couple, the marriage, and how you see life. You ask yourself what you did wrong in your previous life. You look at happy couples with their children and you yearn for what they have. A cat cries behind your window at night and you sprinkle holy water in your room, casting the evil in the cat’s tears from your life. These feelings aside, the physical shape of your marriage is never the same again.

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My husband was detached from me. When he was quiet, I thought he was thinking about divorcing me, and he was very quiet often. He would go to work and come home very late. I didn’t blame him. Instead, I asked myself, “What does he have to come home to?” I would wait by his food, warming it twice before his arrival so he would come home to a warm meal instead of a warm embrace from his kids.

He would come home, greet me, and go inside the bedroom, sometimes never coming out again, leaving me and my food to look at each other. I was bothered. I cried silently. I pitied my situation, but I also felt sad for a husband who had told me years ago that he loved children and would love to have many around him.

One evening, after waiting for his return all day, he came. I told him I wanted to talk to him. “Do you still want this marriage?” I asked. He didn’t answer, but his eyes wondered why I was asking that question. “Because you’ve been very distant,” I continued. “Even when we are together, we both still appear lonely.”

“Oh, I didn’t notice that. I will try to do better,” he said while walking to the bedroom. I thought he would come back and start doing better, but he didn’t. He slept without bathing or eating the food I’d warmed twice before his arrival. That night I prayed and asked God for a change, a miracle, or anything that would restore happiness into our marriage.

Before our sixth anniversary, I got the news I’d been waiting for. I missed my period. When I had the results from the hospital and it said I was pregnant, I couldn’t even rejoice. I was too tired to jump or shout. I whispered, “What took you so long?”

I got home and told my husband about it. “How did you know?” he asked. I threw the results at him. He watched while his eyes glowed. He muttered, “Wow…” and then looked at me with the same glow in his eyes. He said, “Finally…” I responded, “Yeah, finally.”

We talked all that day long and continued in bed while sleeping. We had something to talk about. We had a dream come true, something both of us were invested in. We brainstormed on names for both sexes. “Isaiah, if he’s a boy,” he said. “Nhyira if she’s a girl,” I said.

The ultrasound said it was a boy, so we started shopping for baby things once the sex was known. My husband teased that he had won. It brought a lot of play between us, something we’d lacked for years. My husband at one point apologized for all the times he was absent in the marriage and asked me to forgive him. I assured him I didn’t blame him. I told him I knew a time like this would come.

At six months it felt like I was in labour. I was kept at the hospital for days on medication. When I was discharged I was told not to do any heavy lifting or hard work, which I wasn’t doing in the first place. I went home and did everything the doctors asked me to do, but guess what, Isaiah couldn’t wait for nine months to be born, so he was out two weeks short of eight months.

He was very tiny but was strong. My husband was there. He was scared to look at him. The nurses whisked him away and a few hours later, I was told he couldn’t make it. The body they brought looked different in my eyes. I told my husband, “Look at him very well; those nurses are lying. This is not Isaiah.”

I was crying, wailing, to be honest with you. I was shouting at them, “You better go and bring my son before I make it a police case. What are you telling me?” My husband wrapped me up and told me to relax. By that time my mom had come and my husband’s family were also on their way. I knew once they were around, I would get my child back.

Later, my husband told me, “It’s Isaiah. They are not lying.”

I screamed, “How much did they pay you? How much did they buy your conscience?” Several hands were needed to calm me down. To date, I still believe what I saw wasn’t my son. My husband thinks the hurt clouded everything for me. I think he didn’t feel it, so he couldn’t have known.

I was scared I was going to lose my marriage again. Ultimately, I was scared I was not made to have a child and so being a mother was a lost dream for me. I went through therapy. My husband was by my side. I went to work and came to meet him in the house. He had made something for me. I complained of body pains and my husband started the massage from my feet. His newness made me think the nurses who exchanged Isaiah also exchanged my husband.

One evening, I opened the toilet door and he was there sobbing on the toilet seat. His face was buried in his palms and he was sobbing deeply and painfully. I thought he didn’t feel the pain, not knowing he was just being a man in my eyes so he could work through his tears alone in the dark. I tried to console him but I ended up crying more than he was. Today I pray no couple should ever lose a child.

The change in my husband came from a place of hurt. He stayed close to me and did lovely things for me not because he needed to, but because he also needed a companion in grief. I was his strength just as I saw him as my strength. We ended up having couples therapy for months.

Just when we thought all was lost and gone, another pregnancy announced itself again. This time it wasn’t loud and fanfare. It was silent, like a tiptoeing child. We’d lost one before, so we treated this with optimal care while letting go of all our dreams. We didn’t brainstorm a name. We didn’t bother to check the sex and didn’t bother to shop. I took my vitamins and folic acid and minded my business.

We had a daughter. I asked my husband for a name and he said, “Joy. Joy has come to stay.”

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The next one was a boy, and then another boy, and then a girl. We have four now. Indeed, joy came to stay, and I thank my husband for it, for being the man I needed at my lowest and understanding the situation even when I accused him of being bought.

We still haven’t forgotten about Isaiah. We have his birthday marked and we celebrate it each year, reminding ourselves where we’d come from, when we nearly let go, and when a child came to restore what we’d lost. We remember this so we don’t take for granted what we have.

—Odelia

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