Guest Post #6 – Travis Rohe

Guest Post #6 – Travis Rohe

My last guest post came in a few hours before the end of Pregnancy and Infant Loss Awareness Month and it feels fitting to end this series of guest posts by letting my husband have the last word. When I decided to invite guests to post on my blog I decided to refrain from adding my own commentary in the introductions so that you may all form your own opinion. It is hard not to comment on this one so I will leave it as this…I absolutely love this man

Thank you to Travis Rohe for sharing his story.


I’ll give this blogging thing a shot. If my story can help someone, it was worth it. I used to be able to write pretty well. I was well practiced because of college but it has been a while. My wife, Cari is an excellent writer, and contributing to her blog will hopefully be introspective for me and possibly cathartic for her and other parents who struggle with loss.

My plan is to lay it out there from my point of view. A recap on the background: at the time we found out Cari was pregnant, we had 16-month-old Logan, who was an amazing baby and the easiest kid ever. We decided to try for another baby to have them close together in age as playmates. I was hesitant to have children in the beginning but after having one easy one, the choice was easy to give Logan a sibling. Cari was an ever-loving, patient, and happy mother. Her first pregnancy was uneventful and she was calm and content during her 9 1/2 months carrying Logan. Even though Logan was so easy, I still found fatherhood challenging and at times overwhelming. Balancing childcare, work, and caring for my wife, was a lot to handle.

We tried for a month and got pregnant for the second time. Cari was acting “off” and I suggested she take a test. A minute after she took it I forgot about it and sat playing with Logan on the floor. She captured my reaction on a video on her phone. I was a little shocked. A month or so later she had some bleeding and we feared the worse. A follow up showed no signs of problems but we both continued to be cautious with our optimism. I never grew too attached to the idea that everything was going to be ok with this pregnancy. I could tell Cari was anxious and had feelings of doubts herself.

I forget the exact sequence of events leading up to our emergency trip to Denver. Something was wrong with the measurements and milestones of the pregnancy and we had an appointment at Cari’s office with the ultrasound specialist. Logan was being babysat by one of Cari’s co-workers. I took a few hours off in the middle of work to join Cari at the appointment. I knew the possibility of bad news was high. The ultrasound results were bad. The measurements were poor and indicated that our baby had not grown in several weeks. The ultrasound specialist left us alone and the news and the reality hadn’t sunk in. We assumed we would play things out and take them as they came over the next three months. Then the neonatologist met with us and tipped the world upside down. We had to go to Denver, a 3-hour drive and across the mountain range, for an indefinite stay in the hospital. That’s when things really looked impossible. The helplessness and unknowns were overwhelming and the only definite thing in our future was adversity at best and devastation at worse. 

I had many worries as we drove to Denver. When the bad scenarios would play out in my head I would rationalize them with my normal optimism that things can’t be that bad. But the reality, for one of the first times in my life, was that things were really that bad and they were certainly going to get much worse and my family was along for the ride. 

We got to Denver and checked in to the high-risk pregnancy inpatient floor at Presbyterian St. Luke’s. It was a great hospital. The staff and care were top notch but it was hell and prison none the less. The time is a blur of emotional pain that my mind has blocked out of memory. I tried to be supportive and rational about the likely outcome. We received support from another couple from the Durango area with another high-risk pregnancy. I received support from my co-worker Harlan, who has two children with special medical needs and he gave me hope for the future that seemed impossible. I talked to friends and got support from them. Cari’s parents arrived and took care of Logan and stayed at a family friend’s house 40 minutes away. 

We waited two days that felt like a week. We went to an education class and toured the NICU. It was awful. The fear was setting in and again overwhelming. I’ve done a lot of scary stuff in my life. I knew whatever laid ahead was truly daunting and would test me and my family more than any other challenge I had experienced. My parents had triplets in 1987 when I was five. The longest surviving one lived a month. I knew from a young age that babies born that early die and sometimes they die terribly and take relationships with them. My parents are divorced after 37 years of marriage.

Then the fetus started having decelerations indicating distress. Cari was 26 weeks and 4 days. Too early. Things deteriorated through the night. It was sleepless and long. Cari was given painful injections and was scared of the impending c-section delivery.

Around 6 am, We got prepped for surgery. The team wheeled us in for an emergency C-section. Cari was cut open and they took our baby out. She was the size of a rabbit. Tiny. She opened her eyes and tried to breathe. Her arms squirmed and legs wiggled, her mouth gasped to breathe. She was alive but instantly dying. My heart shattered. I recorded the events on video as I knew it would possibly capture her few minutes alive with us.

They took our tiny baby girl to the resuscitation incubator near the foot of Cari’s bed. A team of three nurses and doctors attempted twice to intubate her using the smallest ET tube they manufacture. I knew it was futile and they were twice unsuccessful. I watched the pulse oximeter and heartbeat on the screen plummeting to fatal levels over three minutes time. A nurse started chest compressions with two fingers. I stepped forward and made the hardest yet rational decision to make. “We don’t want any CPR”. The nurse nodded and stopped compressions. The team looked as helpless as I felt as they looked at each other. I knew there was nothing else to be done. I stepped forward and gestured to the neonatologist’s stethoscope, and asked to listen to our baby’s heartbeat as I knew it would be my only chance. The neonatologist handed me his stethoscope. I listened to her heartbeat. 55 beats per minute and slowing. I looked at her suffering, gasping face. She was in pain. It broke me. I wanted it to be over. I hung my head and wept shortly before cradling her and bringing her over to Cari. “She is not going to make it,” I told my wife. In the background, the surgeon’s music player played the randomly selected Beatles song: Live and Let Die. Cari held her for a moment and gave her back to me as they sewed her abdomen. I held my baby. The cruelty of death was not swift. She gasped and squirmed in my hands, her eyes blank and dying. No words come to me to describe the helplessness I felt and the pain. It forever changed me.

It was 20 minutes before she was finally still. We were brought to the post-op area and met our nurse who just came on shift. Cari’s Dad arrived as we were being wheeled in. It was just horrible. We were numb with grief. The only comic relief was a pediatrician who mistakenly pulled the curtain back, introduced himself, and asked excitedly if there was a new baby for him to see. We all looked at each other and I said, “not a live one”. His face changed to embarrassment and horror as he realized his error in thinking we were another couple with a new baby. He apologized and quickly left. We joked that we just made someone else’s day just as bad as ours. Together with Cari’s dad we stood and reflected on our recent loss. We needed to name her, Cari chose the name, Ava Scarlet Rohe.

Cari had postpartum bleeding. She healed over a few days. A partial autopsy was conducted and determined that the placenta had significant clots and several internal organs had not formed properly. We made arrangements to transport Ava’s remains back to a mortuary in Glenwood Springs ourselves and had political and bureaucratic tape to get through. Ava was put on ice in a sealed styrofoam cooler. We left the hospital and returned to New Castle, CO.

I felt like I could help my family best by problem solving and logistics. We planned to have the funeral that Sunday and only had a day to prepare the documents and mortuary arrangements. Cari and I prepared Ava body together and washed her and wrapped her in a linen scarf as is traditional in Jewish law. I remember being a zombie from grief and mental and emotional exhaustion.

A particularly therapeutic and cathartic experience for me was the preparation of Ava’s casket. My friend and co-worker, Denny, assisted me in fabricating the casket from scratch. Denny supplied the materials and tools and did much of the work. Woodworking in his shop, we made a tongue and groove box slightly bigger than a breadbox with a tight-fitting lid. Only raw wood and no hardware was used as is consistent with Jewish tradition. It was amazing and I am forever grateful for his help, as it is a favor I can never repay.

Grieving is long and anticlimactic. I have always thought there would be catharsis and closure, maybe at the funeral or after placing the headstone at her one year birthday, but it was not the case. The grief process is slow and ongoing even 19 months later. As to be expected, it was overwhelming during the first week and all-consuming. The next two months it was manageable but still pervasive in every aspect of life. I was irritable, anxious, and tired at home. Low energy and absentminded at work.

The same month I was back at work we did an infection control medical training and I was the lead paramedic for a fictional scenario. The training scenario involved a pregnant patient with an imminent home delivery. I delivered the baby in the scenario and then led the resuscitation efforts of the dying baby without batting an eye. Airway, intubation, IO, CPR. Saved the fake baby. I just went into autopilot. We ran a real call immediately after the training and on the drive back my partner asked me if that scenario bothered me and if I was doing ok, it didn’t even occur to me that I had just witnessed a similar event play out in my own life not two weeks prior. It sunk in more after that was brought to my attention but I was surprised how mentally removed I could make myself. For better or for worse. Later it bothered me, I am trained to save lives, even babies, but I couldn’t save my own. I know she was unsavable. I do not feel guilt or have blame, but I find this to be painfully ironic.

After two months things improved and at three months I felt mostly back to normal. Cari lagged behind me in the process but around three months she was doing pretty well. Then she went back to work at the OB/GYN clinic and we took a few steps back. She loved her job before Ava, but after Ava, she was faced with constant painful triggers of grief. At six months I was pretty much back to normal and only thought about Ava when interacting with Cari or when I was faced with a trigger like the questions, “how many kids do you have?” “Are you having more?” Seeing babies, especially girls is still difficult. It brings up painful emotions but they are getting less painful.

I don’t know how to express the grief stage I am in now. Cari and I are continuing to focus on ourselves, our relationship and our family. There are good and bad days. We have decisions to make about having more children. Which is a difficult subject for us to talk about. Years from now I hope to look back at this time in our lives and see the positive progress we have made.

I hope my perspective on this event may help others cope. Please know that you are not alone in grief. Grief is a very real thing that can destroy your life and relationships if you let it. I am so fortunate to have Cari and Logan in my life. I am also so thankful for my friends, family, and coworkers that have supported me and helped me along this journey. It is not over but I know that we will make our life whatever we want it to be.

2 thoughts on “Guest Post #6 – Travis Rohe

  1. Thank you so much for sharing this Travis. You and Cari have been through a lot, but it’s comforting to know you have each other to lean on. Ava is in always in our hearts. ❤️

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