Today is Tommy's second death anniversary. We've been wanting to write about what happened 2 years ago since we started the blog but we never had the courage or energy to do it.
Tommy was a very healthy boy -- he never needed antibiotics and was rarely sick. We were also "psycho-parents" and were very careful with him, especially health-wise. And if you don't know what 17 months looks like, imagine Tommy running, climbing and even starting to jump.
We went to grandma and grandpa's house on Thanksgiving and planned to spend the long weekend with the whole family. Tommy had a mild cold and a low fever which quickly went away with Tylenol - nothing worth worrying about, we thought. He was a little less active than normal but still played with his cousins and ran around the house. He didn't eat much at dinner time, and around 7pm we gave him a bath. We thought that he wouldn't enjoy it because he was sick but, oh boy, were we wrong! Tommy had a lot of fun gargling water, practicing his back float and trying to make bubbles in the big bath tub with Daddy. Then he wore his brand new Christmas red reindeer pajamas and drank a little milk from his sippy cup. Tommy had outgrown his playpen so that night was the first time he would sleep on the floor. I sang the good night song to him and put him to sleep around 8pm; I noticed he was very tired as he laid his head on my left shoulder. We normally used the Angelcare (breathing-sensing) monitor, but since we were not at home we used a regular audio monitor instead. We heard nothing on the monitor after putting him to sleep.
Around midnight I went to check on him in the bedroom. I thought that it was weird Tommy didn't move when I opened the door and that he was completely face down. I touched him and his back was warm but he still didn't move. I called his name and kept touching him, but he didn't respond. I finally turned the light on and knew he was dead as soon as I saw him. I called Troy and asked someone to call 911. When Troy arrived and saw Tommy he fell down on his knees and started crying desperately. We immediately started CPR even though we knew he was gone. The paramedics arrived not long after the call but there was nothing they could do to revive Tommy. He was pronounced dead a little past midnight the day after Thanksgiving. The police arrived at the house and everything became a blur. We wanted to hold Tommy but we couldn't because everything was considered a potential crime scene, so we both laid down next to his lifeless body and cried telling him we were sorry for what happened. It was horrible being asked pointed questions implying that we might be at fault, or worse, directly responsible. When the sheriff was done taking photographs and collecting information he needed to start an investigation, he said that they were going to take Tommy's body to the coroner's office for an autopsy. We didn't want to let them take him away from us, nor were we able to go to the coroner's office with them. It was a cold night in November so we sent a warm blanket with Tommy. We asked the driver to be careful with Tommy and he said that he understood our concerns because he also had children. We were in disbelief. A stranger took Tommy away from us and there was nothing we could do about it. That was the last time we saw our son.
The fact that the autopsy showed nothing was both comforting and disturbing. Comforting because we wouldn't be criminally charged, and because there was nothing we should have noticed and taken him to the doctor for. But it is profoundly disturbing because we'll never know what happened and how to prevent it if we choose to have more children in the future. We spoke to the doctor that did the autopsy and she said the cause of death was Sudden Unexplained Death in Childhood (SUDC). SUDC -- like SIDS -- is a "diagnosis of exclusion" which means that it is prescribed when all known causes of death have been ruled out. In other words, saying that someone died of SIDS / SUDC is the same as saying, "we don't know why they died." The only difference between SUDC and SIDS is the age of the child. SIDS is for children under 1 year old; SUDC is for children over 1 year.
We have no regrets. We enjoyed every minute we spent with Tommy, and we did our best to make his life happy. He will always be a part of our family and, of course, we will always miss him.
