After a long courtship (do people still use this word?), we married in 2007 and started trying to have a child in January of 2008. After six months of trying, my dream of becoming a parent of my own child was about to come true: On July 3, 2008 I got a BFP (big fat positive) on a home pregnancy test.
I was on cloud nine. I could not stop smiling. For four weeks, my life got richer and brighter. And then, just like that, it ended.
After several visits, blood draws, and ultra sounds with the doctor, he 100% assured me that my baby had stopped growing…that I had suffered a missed miscarriage…that although I was still experiencing all those first trimester symptoms of pregnancy, it was over.
The next day, on July 29, 2008, I had a d&c to remove my baby. (This was a choice I made very reluctantly as I never in my life imagined doing such a thing... but my body simply wasn't recognizing the loss and I felt too old and tired to let the miscarriage occur naturally because I was told it could be weeks and I could very well still end up needing a surgery anyway.)
Honestly, looking back, I don’t know how I went on after the surgery. Those were the absolute darkest, longest, emptiest days of my life. I’m not quite sure how I didn’t lose my mind, to be honest.
Everywhere I turned there was a pregnant woman or a child. If I turned on the TV, someone was giving birth. If I went to the store, a woman with a protruding belly wobbled in front of me. And the kids…oh the kids were absolutely the hardest to see: their cherubic faces and big eyes and snotty noses. I remember I had two birthday parties to go to for babies turning 1 during that first month following the d&c. It took everything in me not to completely lose it at these parties, and several times I had to excuse myself to be alone, to talk myself out of the tears, or to just let it all out for a minute.
It took me nine months to get pregnant again and during those nine months more and more babies were born and more women were announcing their pregnancies. And I was forced to sit by on the sidelines yet again… as if the first 35 years of my life wasn’t enough time to sit by like a spectator in life.
This is a small blog entry near the end of those nine months, just before finding out I was pregnant again:
Sunday, April 19, 2009
The next step
I've had several ... breakdowns lately. For the most part, I'm dealing but every so often, I just kind of lose it.
S and I have talked and we've come to a decision: If this cycle doesn't leave me with a BFP, I'm calling the doctor and scheduling an appointment for the "next step" in all of this.
Sigh.
I'm just too old and too tired to continue on with this month to month bullshit of trying to get pregnant when everyone else around me gets pregnant and pops out babies at the drop of a hat.
I hate who I've become since the miscarriage. I really and truly hate it. I'm too bitter, too sad, too angry. And it's not fair to anyone, especially myself. I deserve more than this. My husband deserves more than this. My family and friends do, too.
A little more than a week later, I got my second BFP. Finally. And I’m extremely fortunate and blessed because that BFP turned into the most beautiful baby girl ever to exist just 8 months later…
I want to be clear about one more thing: Although I finally found myself pregnant again, my pain and heartache from the missed miscarriage didn’t automatically disappear. In fact, it made for a very difficult pregnancy – one where I was left many days feeling a tremendous amount of guilt for the lack of … emotions … I had for the current pregnancy. I didn’t start to really connect with my baby until about 20 weeks. I hate that this is a fact, but it’s one that I don’t think is too uncommon after you suffer a loss.
To read more about my loss and how I dealt with it - as well as some feelings about my successful pregnancy - feel free to visit cleansingmyheart.blogspot.com. It’s a public blog that was created the day after I had the d&c so it may not be uplifting or inspirational, but if its raw contents can let one person feel like they aren’t the only ones going through something horrible, then that’s all that matters to me.
