CD3 strike

October 7, 2011

I keep going back to the puppy dog face the doctor gave me, the way she said, "Mawww, I'm sorrrry," and how I wanted to kick her energetic, fake-tanned head.

Going in to see the doctor wasn't my idea, but I was sure treated as if it was. Instead of having a real discussion, I got a pat on the head like a little girl whose only problem is lack of patience. I'm ignorant of some things, but fertility isn't one of them.


Pointless. It'll probably cost me a small fortune for a trip that served no purpose, a trip that I didn't ask for.

It gives me something outside of myself, my failed body, to be angry about, but more anger isn't helpful.

My favorite part is when I'm told that nothing can be holding me back, because I already have a beautiful healthy boy, and then I'm told not to try to conceive until next month. Guess what, if I took your advice? I wouldn't have my beautiful healthy boy.

I have to strike while the fertility iron is hot.

1 out of 3. My body has contained more death than life. Or so it feels as I walk this walk again.

On repeat. "Nocturne" by The Marquis. Instrumental.

CD1 miscarriage, poem

October 5, 2011

Invisible

To me, you were born.
Your heart pounded.
You heard my voice.
You opened your eyes

and saw the dawn,
and the moon fading,
and the snow falling.

You stretched and grew,
and ran like a bird flies,
chasing sunshine with
invisible wings.

You sang loudly
off-key, and we
traveled on together.
You skinned your knees.
You laid in the grass
beneath fireworks
and held my hand.
You made me laugh.
Your heart yearned,
and your heart broke.
You ached and cried,
and lost your faith,
and gained it back again.
You let go of my hand,
but kept your wings.
And when the sun finally set,
you sang softly
off-key, and we
traveled on together.

4w2d train coming

October 4, 2011

I was feeling really good about this pregnancy today. Lots of nausea and fatigue. A nice high temperature. Oddly, though, the pregnancy test was still faint and I thought it should be a good dark line by now. I decided I would test again tomorrow, and I put it out of my mind.

I pulled out my old pregnancy books and paged through the first two months. I imagined the future. How we would announce the pregnancy. How we would prepare a nursery. What it would be like next June, when I'm the mother of two.

I have no cramps. Nothing menstrual. No warning.

But now I'm spotting.

I had deluded myself into safety, forgetting that I have no control, that believing in a dream doesn't make it last. Today, the reality I'm waking up to caught me completely off guard.

Tied to the train tracks, all I can do is wait and watch the train that's coming to destroy me.

4w1d scared

October 3, 2011

My temperature dropped almost an entire degree. If history is any indication, this means miscarriage. Today.

Today I could lose a baby I barely had.

I saw the warning in Andy's eyes all weekend: Don't get too confident. Don't be too sure. It's too early.

As usual, he was right, but I'm not built for heeding this warning. You are my baby, you are here, you exist. You, the one inside of me, will always be the person I cannot keep at a distance, no matter how smart it would be, no matter how many times I tell myself that you may not survive. That chances are you won't.


Please. I'll beg you. I'll beg the universe. I'll beg God. But it feels like I'm talking in an empty room, standing alone here, with you.

Please don't leave. We only just found each other.

Tribute

To the baby

I was never
to meet.
To the baby
who answered
endless months
of yearning.
To the baby
whom I cherished
in every moment
of its shaky existence.
To the baby
I'll never see
never hold
never name
never know,
whose presence was,
despite its brevity,
absolute.
To the baby
I still
one year later
feel.
To the baby
I couldn't save.
I love you.
Still.

August 5, 2009 (conception) - August 22, 2009 (miscarriage)

basal body temperature chart, baby number one

basal body temperature chart, Fletcher

35w 1d lost

I hope everyone in my world can forgive me if I'm a wee bit sensitive. "Wee bit" as in I started a fight over a sentence in a car seat manual. As in I cried half of last night over something stupid and then started scrubbing down the kitchen in an attempt to refuse to talk about it. Yeah, I roll like that now.

Although my emotional state isn't rational, it is still real. I can gain perspective and see that what had seemed absolutely heartbreaking yesterday should not have been. Because really, it was just stupid words and no one is out to hurt me intentionally... But it doesn't change the fact that my heart did break. Does that make sense?

How horrible must pregnancy be for someone who truly is alone, instead of just feeling alone with all of this.

Tomorrow is our first baby's due date. Fate reminded me today via iPod shuffle with one of my favorite songs, Last of Days by A Fine Frenzy, which I cannot listen to without thinking of the baby I would never get to know or see or hold. I've posted the song before, but I just want to post it again, for the little lost one. You'll never be gone, not for me.

the sun is in the east,
rising for the beasts
and the beauties
if only I could tear it down,
plant it in the ground to warm your face

I built myself a castle on the beach
watching as it slid into the sea

the world carries on without you
but nothing remains the same
I’ll be lost without you
until the last of days
until the last of days

through wars and harvest moons
I will wait for you.
the world carries on without you
but nothing remains the same
I’ll be lost without you
until the last of days
until the last of days

7DPO fear

Even when I'm so busy I can barely breathe, the wait is slow and unchanging. Each new moment is as unanswered as the last.

In four days, I'll test for the first time since the miscarriage. I'm scared through.

There are stretches of time where I forget what it was like. Then I remember. Happiness like I've never known before, powerful, complete, a living dream, as tied to my beating heart as I was.

What will I do if that's gone, and my heart just keeps on beating for me alone? A negative test will kill off another part of me. There won't be much left. I can't go back to the mere frustration I felt in the months of nothing before the pregnancy. It's all or nothing now. A life or a kind of death.

From "Little Earthquakes" by Tori Amos.

I can't reach you
Give me life
Give me pain
Give me myself again

Oh these little earthquakes
Here we go again
These little earthquakes
Doesn't take much to rip us into pieces

CD10 nothing

More than a week has passed. I think again of Bella in New Moon.

Time passes. Even when it seems impossible. Even when each tick of the second hand aches like the pulse of blood behind a bruise. It passes unevenly, in strange lurches and dragging lulls, but pass it does. Even for me.

One positive result of the ordeal (for me, anyway) is that Andy is almost as eager now as I am for a successful pregnancy. The way he put it, this was like a failure, and he feels the need to prove that we can do it right.

Whatever gets him involved is fine by me. I didn't want to admit to myself before that his nonchalant attitude hurt. It shouldn't have -- there's nothing wrong with feeling like "if it happens, it happens." But I (secretly?) really wanted him to feel as strongly as I felt. Like this whole decision is huge and exciting and really desired.

So this adds a nice little positive to combat the negative. I'm not alone with my craving.

But the heavy sadness and bulky impatience are twisted tightly around each other, inseparable, unbreakable, growing in strength. It ties me tighter every day. At moments it will pull at me without any warning, squeezing my chest until I can't breathe. I have no choice but to endure and wait. No alternative. Nothing to do in the meantime. Nothing even to numb me, anymore. A bit like Bella's New Moon night terrors, there's nothing but nothing.

"Numb" by Sia.

I saw you cry today

The pain may fill you

I saw you shy away

The pain will not kill you

You made me smile today

You spoke with many voices

We traveled miles today

Shared expressions voiceless

It has to end

Living in your head

Without anything to numb you

Living on the edge

Without anything to numb you

It has to end to begin

Began an end today

Gave and got given

You made a friend today
Kindred soul cracked spirit

It has to end to begin

Living in your head
Without anything to numb you

Living on the edge

Without anything to numb you

It has begun

CD7 effects

While the emotional effects are becoming more manageable, the physical effects of the miscarriage are hanging on longer than expected. My week-long headache is entering migraine territory, and the hypotension has me dizzy and nauseated for most of the day.

I feel as if I could lay on the couch for about two weeks straight just staring into space. If I had any energy I'd feel like Forrest Gump deciding "for no particular reason" to run across the country and back. I need some empty space, some numbness, to disappear for a while, and maybe I would be sane when I returned.

I should be careful what I ask for -- if the hypotension gets any worse I'll be in a coma.

We're planning to attend church on Sunday, and it has me a little nervous. I don't know what God and I will say to each other.

From "Do What You Have To Do" by Sarah McLachlan.

Fate has lead you through it

You do what you have to do


And I have the sense to recognize

that I don't know how to let you go


Every moment marked

with apparitions of your soul

I'm ever swiftly moving

trying to escape this desire


The yearning to be near you

I do what I have to do



But I have the sense to recognize
that I don't know how to let you go

CD5 repression

Andy surprised me on our anniversary by taking me to the movie theater. He expected me to choose The Time Traveler's Wife, but I still don't feel up to watching a movie that I know will feature the romantic love story complete with child. So I chose Inglorious Basterds, and loved it. Very different, very funny yet gory, very Quentin Tarantino.

Today feels a lot more bearable to me. I am coming back. The dominant feelings now are impatience tempered with disappointment, and I can live with that. I've found a corner where I can put the pain and forget about it for longer stretches of time, as long as I'm not watching romantic baby comedies and the like.

It reminds of New Moon, when Bella avoids all things that remind her of what she lost, in order to stay numb.

I am relieved that my petty anger is also gone. Though there is still jealousy, it is small and more natural. All in all, it feels like a better day. Empty, but not desolate.

A good friend that I've had since childhood and her husband recently welcomed a second baby girl to the family, and I feel joy and relief that baby and mother are both healthy now (despite a scary third trimester). No one deserves it more, and I can't wait to meet her!

This is one of my favorite quotes from New Moon by Stephenie Meyer.

I was like a lost moon -- my planet destroyed in some cataclysmic, disaster-movie scenario of desolation -- that continued, nevertheless, to circle in a tight little orbit around the empty space left behind, ignoring the laws of gravity.

CD4 guilt

I met with my regular doctor, who said everything looks good and normal and fine. Except that maybe I should eat some ice cream because I'm "on the slender side" and some extra saturated fat and calories might convince my body that it has what it needs to take care of a baby.

?

I'm trying to stop myself from going down the I-wasn't-eating-right-so-it's-my-fault path. But I don't know how. Could my baby have survived if I hadn't been keeping my calories low? I'd been obsessed with being healthy, but also with staying thin. Did my vanity do this?

I can't change it. I can't bring back that life that had been so real, if only to me. Now there is nothing in me to take care of or protect or worry about. There's just nothing. And now I'm supposed to eat ice cream? It seems comical, but I'll do anything.

The doctor said that sometimes a miscarriage is the kickstart a body needs for a successful pregnancy. And now I have the name of the obstetrician I'm to see if we experience another miscarriage.

Another miscarriage feels almost... likely. Am I, at heart, a pessimist? Does failure just seem more real and logical to me now, because it is what I know? Will I survive it?

Still, my impatience for the next step is growing growing growing.

Today is my second wedding anniversary. I love you, hubby. Even without this baby, my world carries on because I have you.

From "Last of Days" by A Fine Frenzy.

I built myself a castle on the beach
Watching as it slid into the sea

The world carries on without you
But nothing remains the same

I'll be lost without you
Until the last of days

CD3 anger

Part of me has gone cold and mean.

I was at a birthday party yesterday for Andy's niece Lily, who turned three. At one point, Andy's grandmother turned to me and said, "Have you heard the good news?"

Immediately, I knew. Andy's (biological) cousin had, in a roundabout way, wound up marrying Andy's step-cousin. They are pregnant. They haven't even been married a year yet.

A rushing sound flooded my ears and I nearly lost it in this odd sort of panic. Andy came over then, and I said, "Did you hear? They're pregnant." He told me later that the disappointment I felt was obvious on my face. I have never been a good actress.

They are due in the same month that I was supposed to be due.

Without saying anything else, I tried to casually walk to the bathroom before breaking down. As I had hoped, Andy followed me and let me hang on to him while I cried. After he went back to the party, I stayed in the bathroom for a little while trying to figure out what was happening to me.

Was I so petty that I couldn't be happy for two wonderful people who deserved happiness? I like them both very much. Was this just jealousy? I've thought about it a lot, and the answer isn't exact. Nothing in this situation is black and white.

But I have figured out the crux of the matter. It is that I will never experience pure happiness again.

During that one week, I was 100 percent happy. Pure joy. Now that that is gone, it is gone for good. Because even if I do get pregnant again, I will be living in a climate of fear. It's tainted now. I've been cheated of my happiness.

I assume this couple has it all -- they're able to enjoy their pregnancy with this complete joy that's been stolen from me.

Yes, it is jealousy. It's rage at the feeling of unfairness. It's anger with things that are out of my control. It's "why me?". It's knowing that what is lost will never completely be found again. So it's truly a kind of death.

It's self-absorbed and depressing and petty and snide. How can I get rid of this? I feel ugly and dirty.

There's no way to know exactly what will happen next. Maybe I will ovulate soon, or maybe it'll be another couple months before I'm back to "normal." I'd like to be pregnant again as soon as possible, but the health of a future infant is my main concern, and I haven't discussed the effects of miscarriage with a doctor yet.

The second pregnancy will be different from the first in a number of ways. Living each day with the fear of another miscarriage will have its effects. This time, I won't be eager to tell anyone right away. I won't want to constantly talk about it with Andy. I won't be able to accept, in my heart, that I'm pregnant until at least the second trimester.

If I embrace it, it will hurt too much when it ends.

Now I'm back at the beginning, waiting, starting from scratch, constantly conscious of the utterly slow passing of time, with the addition of this terrible pain keeping me company in every moment.

Enough. I've had my fill of this depression. I want to be the happy wife that Andy deserves. All I can do is try. I can try to block this out from my mind. While I can't pretend that the pregnancy didn't happen, I can try to be hopeful. The hope is tainted, but it's there, and I must find a way to focus on it.

And I will focus on my husband, who is the best man I know. Last night I apologized for my lack of "intimate" feelings at the moment, saying I at least wanted to wait until the cramping subsided. His response? That that's okay because he's saving it all up for our next try.

He is my hope and my humor and my happy. I love him completely.

Tomorrow is our second wedding anniversary. I received a card from my aunt that said, "Hope this coming year will be a continuation of your dreams coming true." How could she know that that's exactly right?

I must remember that this is all just a continuation of our dreams coming true. And I must hope.

From "Missing You" by Jem:

Tell me it's not happening
Say it's not as it seems
Tell me that I'm going to wake up
It's just a bad dream
Please tell me that it's fiction
Tell me it's just a lie
Whatever you choose to tell me
Please say he didn't die

[Return to introduction post.]

CD2 miscarriage

I am empty.

How can the loss of something I barely had be so devastating? My future had been tied to that small life, and its end has destroyed me. It is the end of hope.

I have to grieve, accept, and get up each morning when I'd rather close my eyes and shut out everything that reminds me I once had a dream that came true.

Is there a limit to how much happiness a person is allowed to feel? I took too much pure joy for myself this past week. It couldn't be allowed to last. It had made the universe off balance. I had to suffer in equal measure.

Last night, we got together with four friends whom I met through my husband. Matt and Tiffanie, a truly awesome couple, shared their own struggle with me. It was very comforting, and I am so thankful for them. Their two beautiful children are proof that miscarriage is an ending, but not the ending.

As my husband said to me, "We are not the first people this has happened to." After crying almost straight through a five-hour period of time yesterday, this made me want to smack him. But he is, of course, right. He usually is, and he is good at grounding me when I am off in an unhealthy place. I am a very lucky woman to have him at my side.

So I will get out of bed today. Eventually. Some of my time will be spent crying, some of it feeling numb to everything, but I will go through the motions of the day.

Tomorrow, I receive the results of the blood tests that were done the day before my excruciating miscarriage, day one of yet another cycle. Will they be able to see the tragedy that had been coming? Or will the nurse call and congratulate me? Will I be able to not burst into tears when I tell her it's all over? I plan to meet with the doctor or request more tests during this new cycle. I'm tired of wondering and wasting time. I want to know for certain if something is wrong with my ability to sustain a pregnancy.

For now, I am enduring. There is no other choice.

"Not As We," by the amazing Alanis Morissette.

Reborn and shivering
Spat out on new terrain
Unsure unconvincing
This faint and shaky hour

Day one day one start over again
Step one step one
I'm barely making sense for now
I'm faking it til I'm pseudo making it
From scratch begin again but this time I as I
And not as we

Gun shy and quivering
Timid without a hand
Feign brave with steel intent
Little and hardly here

Day one day one start over again
Step one step one
With not much making sense just yet
I'm faking it til I'm pseudo making it
From scratch begin again but this time I as I
And not as we

Eyes wet toward
Wide open frayed
If God's taking bets
I pray he wants to lose

Day one day one start over again
Step one step one
I'm barely making sense just yet
I'm faking it til I'm pseudo-making it
From scratch begin again but this time I as I
And not as we.