I've been away from blogging for a bit. One of those insane realities you face when you write a public blog - even if you have a readership you can count on your hand - is that when something huge affects your life, it's sort of hard NOT to write about it, even if you don't really want to write about it. And I haven't wanted to write about this, really, but perhaps saying it gets it out from underneath dark shadows.
Right before the New Year, Jason and I found out we were pregnant. Took the pregnancy test after feeling very hormonal, achy, and becoming the Human Disposall of All Things Unhealthy... and it was positive. Spent a few days in shock, and then several more after that dreaming of baby names, looking at online baby registries, sticking out my stomach to see what being pregnant in a few more months might look like. Since I've always been irregular with my monthly cycles, my OB ordered an ultrasound, and Jason and I spent a sleepless weekend, brimming with excitement because even if we just saw a little dot, we would be seeing our new Little One.
Ultrasound day: couldn't see anything but a shady gray area. OB informs me that we have either caught the pregnancy too early (so nothing notable to see) or something might be wrong, like an early pregnancy failure. And she felt compelled at that point to quote me miscarriage statistics, presumably to cover her own ass for liability, and I just sort of sat there, shaking and dumbfounded. Pregnancies aren't supposed to go wrong, and how many times had I heard from my parents that neither side of the family ever had pregnancy problems? Another ultrasound was ordered for two weeks later.
Next ultrasound comes... and the ultrasound tech, a terminally chipper person, points out the yolk sac (bigger than last time), my ovaries, my uterus, my cervix. When it comes to measuring what looks like a little kidney bean, I get excited: look at it! But the ultrasound tech sounds less chipper, and the text at the bottom of the TV screen says "Fetal HR ?". The question mark never gets replaced, but the one inside my heart does.
Ten minutes later, I found out I miscarried. I've had no bleeding, no cramping, but I've miscarried - the medical term they used was "missed abortion", which means the baby stopped developing for whatever reason but I'm still carrying it inside of me, and my body is still recognizing itself as pregnant, so I'm still producing hormones (hence the increased, er, yolk sac). I don't remember much after that: I was fighting as hard as I could not to cry because my OB is this no-nonsense kind of woman who, upon the last time I cried when I heard there might be a problem, started interrogating me with questions like, "What are you most afraid of?" which made me want to staple things to her head.
Today, technically, I am still pregnant. I still have this Little One, lifeless, in my body. I still have the hormones. And I have no resolution. I had scheduled a D&C to get it over with, but the only time they could do it was during a week of exams and clinicals at school, and even though I am training to be a nurse, the idea of general anesthesia, sharp scraping instruments, and questionable recovery symptoms when I needed to be mentally alert for school just scared me, so I cancelled it. I am supposed to "expel" this tissue on my own, sometime between immediately and 6 weeks from now. Six weeks seems like a lifetime. And in the meantime, I may have blamed the hormones for fatigue and cravings, but I've stopped my regular running and eaten everything in sight, so I'm feeling and looking worse.
Friends have been extremely supportive. Family has loved on me. Jason has been a saint, even though he is grieving, too. Ironically, I've heard the insensitive stock phrases every woman who experiences miscarriage fears to hear: "you'll get pregnant again" and, in my particular case, "at least you know you can get pregnant at all". Even more ironic is that those phrases came out of MY mouth, not anyone else's. I'll have many moments of sanity and regular life, but occasionally I'll see a late-pregnancy mom-to-be with her proud belly or I'll hear a song and it will unleash this flood of emotion that I cannot control. One of my favorite violin recordings is Pinchas Zukerman playing Vaughan-Williams' "The Lark Ascending", and when I heard it on the radio one morning heading to class, I wept. If you listen, the repeating violin motif, which literally sounds like a bird taking off into the sky, just made me think of this Little One and perhaps its own soul taking off into flight - corny, I know, but I cried and cried. Never mind that the song already reminded me of another poignant time in my life, living in Princeton and trying to prove myself (to myself) as a singer. (Side note: even now, the sensory memories of that time are so vivid when I hear the piece... I can smell the house I lived in, the combination of old creaky wood floors, fresh air, and the slightly musty smell of houses which are older than your grandparents)
Life continues on: some days easier, and other days feel like a giant step backwards. It's not something I like to talk about, unless I run across one of the several or so friends who have confessed their own miscarriage/child loss stories to me, friends that don't get that scrunched, uncomfortable stance of one who feels bad for you but has NO idea what to say. And not all of those friends, either - I still have several people, even an especially dear one who had suffered a similar situation just weeks before I did, that I haven't yet spoken to... because I think I'm afraid of opening the gates and seeing what happens. There's also a kind of embarrassment that sets in regarding the people you told about the pregnancy (when it was still a positive, much-anticipated event), because they were just as excited as you, and having to share the bad news... you just can't erase the memories of going out to dinner with your dad and giving him a picture frame that says "Grandpa" or the excited conversations over milkshakes you had with your mom the night you found out.
For everyone who has kept me in their prayers and offered support: thank you. Forgive me if I have dropped off the face of the earth or else acted as if nothing was ever wrong. It still hurts a lot, and it's just not a sharp learning curve for me.
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