Warning: This post is going to talk about some normal bodily things about pregnancy, not in graphic detail, but blood will be mentioned.
We found out we were expecting another baby on Tuesday, January 7th. I decided that if my period had not started by that Tuesday, I was going to pick up a pregnancy test along with our weekly groceries and find out!
The results showed a faint, but very present, second line. I was thrilled! John and I had been trying for a while, and the whole process of monthly waitings and disappointments had been difficult.
We were about to leave for Uruguay in the next 10 days, and I was eager to be seen by my doctor before that, because, with Kateri, I had been prescribed progesterone to help support the pregnancy, and thought I’d likely need the same this time around. Luckily, they got me in right away, and prescribed the progesterone.
A few days later, I started spotting. It scared me quite a bit, having not really happened with Kateri. This time around, it began to happen daily, or every other day. There’s nothing scarier in pregnancy than seeing blood. We were getting closer and closer to travel, and I was very nervous about the long hours in-flight, especially because one of the red flags of bleeding in early pregnancy is ectopic pregnancy, which can be life-threatening if not caught in time.
I called my doctor the day before our flight, which happened to be a snow day as well! He recommended coming in if possible, and I decided that with the weather being what it was, we’d take our chances, and I’d go to the doctor in Uruguay if anything happened. He explained what miscarriage would be like if it happened on our trip - oddly enough, I was reassured by his straight-forwardness.
In Uruguay, the bleeding continued to be daily - always light, and always tapering off throughout the day, but consistent. Every day, I was convinced I was about to have a miscarriage, which made it hard for me to stay in the present and enjoy our time. I spent my anxiety on baby forums, reading stories that sounded similar to mine, and it became a compulsion. I recognized that reading the forums was only increasing the anxiety I felt, but that didn’t always stop me from going there.
I noticed along the way, that what I was really searching for was certainty amidst the uncertainty. I wanted a conclusion to the story - was it going to be a healthy pregnancy after all? Was it going to be a miscarriage? I thought that if I could just know for sure, then I could deal with the reality. But the limbo state was, for me, crazy-making.
Kateri is in an ECFE class that discusses parenting through the lens of mindfulness. One of the big lessons of mindfulness is staying in the present, which is the only “real” place to be. And this is a concept that has been promoted by hundreds of wise thinkers throughout history. I think the first time I read about it was in The Screwtape Letters, where Wormwood counsels his nephew to get humans to think either about the past or about the future, but never about the present, because that’s the only place that anything real happens. It’s funny how you can be totally on-board with a concept in your mind, and find it so hard to live! Each day I saw spotting, I wanted to know why. I didn’t want to just observe the symptom without judging it or concluding what it meant.
W. Somerset Maugham’s story, The Painted Veil, introduces another concept that kept coming to mind during this time. In the beginning, a man is buying flowers for the woman he wants to marry. She tells him that she detests receiving flowers because they are only going to die, so what is the point?
There were times that I said, “If this is baby is just going to die in the womb, what is the point? Why can’t it just be over now? Why would God allow a life to be created, only to be lost soon after?”
One good thing I read on the baby forums, was the word of mothers who had miscarried - what an honor it was to carry that baby in the womb, even if it had only been for 6 weeks, 8 weeks, 11 weeks, 27 weeks, 38 weeks. And that, even though the baby died, they were thankful for that time.
A big part of my world has been shaped by my dad’s premature death when I was 15. Since then, I’ve feared unexpected suffering swooping in. I do what I can to prepare myself for pain whenever possible, because that was a pain that was so unprepared for and which brought so much chaos to our family for years to come.
During these days and moments of uncertainty, I found myself trying to prepare for pain in the same way. Trying not to get too attached. When John and I started a conversation about baby names, I cut that conversation short, and said, “We can talk about that maybe if I get to the second trimester.”
In Punta del Este, the farthest eastern point of Uruguay, we swam in the waves. Wave swimming is fun. You try to predict exactly where the wave is going to crest, and you try to be in the spot where you can enjoy the movement of the waves without getting engulfed by them. And sometimes, if you don’t hit that point in time, you are told to swim underwater, so that the water doesn’t hit you, choke you, destroy you.
I have often felt that way about grief. If I just mentally prepare enough… then it will be safe. Then it won’t create the chaos and completely topple life as we’ve known it. One thing I’m terrified of is the toppling of grief.
I thought about that a lot as cautiously, I saw days go by, and hours go by: that death is a part of our lives. I often look at the deaths of family and friends as interruptions to what is real - and what is real, in my mind, is life. The toppling of grief, then, I’ve seen it as the thing that wasn’t supposed to be a part of life.
Here’s another thing that comes to mind: Brother David Steindl-Rast, who went through World War II in Austria, I believe - he said he remembers that time as being a very poignant one for himself, for his friends - because “we had death before their eyes.” And seeing that life is a gift, and knowing it was a gift that could easily be taken, gave them a new joy in each moment, and a new thankfulness for each day.
With every morning that brought blood, I realized that my dad’s death, while “toppling” our lives and reshaping them and changing them forever - that’s exactly what we need to embrace, and that’s not just a peripheral part of life - that is life...Because we are living beings, and we will die. There is nothing more real than that to be learned in school, or read in books, or studied, or spent time thinking about.. I think about the ways that waves, when they hit the shore, take some shells back to the sea, and bring some shells to the shore. You might have just spent hours building a castle that gets completely destroyed - and there’s no one to be mad it, because it’s just what the sea does. The entire landscape is changed. And it happens with each and every wave. That’s a metaphor for life. Life is a beach.
We got back home, and one of the first things I did was to schedule an ultrasound.
We got to see our little baby and the heartbeat. I was filled with relief. The only thing that worried me was that I was supposed to be nearly 8 weeks, and I measured a bit more than 6 weeks. I knew that the ultrasound technician couldn’t really say anything, but still, I asked if a 9 day difference in dates was worrisome. She said, a bit offhandedly, that it could be all sorts of different things, and that my doctor could explain it to me in more detail.
But my clinic only called to say that the ultrasound had looked good, and they didn’t need to see me for a follow-up. They asked me to schedule another ultrasound for two weeks later.
The waiting was excruciating. And during that time, I again compulsively sought certainty through the forums, through preparing for pain, through prayer. I found again and again, that the only thing that was actually helpful was accepting the present day, the present hour. And another thing that was helpful was to focus on creative work. Because when your
thoughts want to spin around on the same thread, the only thing that can break that pattern is something creative.
This past Tuesday, we went back for an ultrasound. Kateri was with me, and she sweetly snuggled her little head next to mine when the ultrasound tech started the ultrasound. In retrospect, I’m so glad she was there.
Immediately, I could tell something was wrong, because the baby was the exact size it had been at the last ultrasound, only somehow fuzzier and less easy to see. The ultrasound sadly said, “I’m sorry, I’m not sure I can see a heartbeat. Would you mind if I called in the PA for a second opinion?”
And I knew that we had lost the baby.
It’s been a really sad and weird week, after. I didn’t realize that when you have a miscarriage, you have to have so much follow-up work: blood tests, ultrasounds, etc. When you’re pregnant, ultrasounds are scary but exciting - because you have the chance to see the living being that is there inside of you. You collect those pictures in the same way that you collect details about a person you’re in love with - every little thing you can learn is a gift. Post-miscarriage ultrasounds are the opposite - you’re seeking to confirm that all signs of life are now gone - that is the thing you are looking for.
I decided to write this post because people keep saying, “No one talks about miscarriage.” And when you go through something like this (at least for me) there are so many things you think about, things that go through your mind. And there are also things that you learn. My mom’s generation must have felt and thought all of these things too, and where did those thoughts go? Did they just stay silent and absorb it all?
It’s an honor and a gift to be able to bear and nurture life in your body. But we tend to talk openly about how beautiful it is, or how much of a burden it is, etc. One thing we don’t talk much about, openly at least, is what a miracle life actually is, and how keenly you can feel that when it is hard to conceive. To even become pregnant! You might wait months and months, years and years, hoping, doing all the “right” things, and find that you’re still waiting. And then, if you do conceive… just think about all the things that can go wrong along the way, all the things that have to happen right for a baby to even be born. Think about the absolute miracle that it is that it was you - that sperm and that egg that became you - beat out all the other possibilities.
So, as we mourn this lost life, I am thinking of all of this. Death is now before my eyes, and I realize again what a gift that a human life is.
