1:4

by JP Esq | Jun 7, 2017 | Uncategorized

TRIGGER WARNING – *If you’re triggered by graphic talk of pregnancy/baby loss and grief, this is not a safe read for you.*

—

It was a Monday in September.  

I remember walking around our apartment that morning daydreaming about who I’d tell I was pregnant first. I pictured showing up in my hometown unannounced and surprising my Nanny with the news. I’d tell her it was a girl. I have no idea why this was the source of my day dreaming that day. I wasn’t pregnant – I was just bored. 

What I didn’t know was that I actually was pregnant. What I couldn’t imagine was that within 8 hours, everything would be different. 

By that evening, I was alone in our apartment trying to be sure the thing I was replaying over and over in my mind was real. My Nanny had passed away. I was immediately consumed with unbearable regret – that I didn’t get married closer to home two months prior so she could be there; that I didn’t come home between July and September; that I hadn’t called back to talk to her in her birthday in August as she was asleep when I called the first time.  
By Friday evening, we were dealing with another life transition. 

Two pink lines. 

What is even happening? We weren’t trying. 

We weren’t not trying. 

Two pink lines. 

I didn’t even wait the three minutes. It’s been like 37 seconds. 

Two pink lines. 

We aren’t ready for this. I was scared out of my mind. The older I get the more I feel like I’ll never be ready to raise a competent human. At some point the anxiety gives way to intense joy and hope. 

Weeks passed and I started going to a local birthing center, seeing the midwives for my prenatal care. 

Soon enough, my first trimester would kick my butt. Three hour naps midday because you simply can not. Eating chips (only the ones cooked in cottonseed oil) and cheddar cheese (Dietz and Watson) for every single meal and snack because your stomach simply can not. Gaining 10 pounds because you’re SOHUNGRYOMG and it hasn’t registered that perhaps protein-rich foods are better than chips and cheese. The heartburn. Goodness, the heartburn. 

I could barely do normal activities – like walk aimlessly around Target – because I was beyond exhausted. Like – contemplated laying in the middle of the aisle – exhausted.  Like – fell asleep in a chair at Best Buy while husband was looking at electronics we weren’t going to buy – exhausted. 

I still can’t drink Reed’s Ginger Brew from the sheer amount I drank trying to control the nausea. Thinking about any food other than chips & cheese caused so much dry heaving that I really should have a better set of abs. 

I wasn’t miserable, but I’m pretty sure I said more than once that this would be our only child. 

We’d be in the “safe zone” after Thanksgiving, so other than our families, we hadn’t yet shared the unexpected news. 

Thanksgiving Thursday came and something felt weird. 

By Thursday evening I had a stomach ache that I blamed on a fluctuating lactose intolerance and the macaroni and cheese. It felt like it was the macaroni and cheese.   

The 1.5 hour drive back home on Friday is hazy for me. And the next two days exist in a series of still photos in my mind. Snapshots of events I want to forget.  Perhaps the subconscious protects itself in this way. 

The sky. 

Southern sunsets can be amazing. The sky. The colors. Peace. I always notice the sky when life is tough. Because the sky seems to remind you that everything is going to be ok. I don’t know why the sky looks a canvas of painted wisdom. I don’t want to see that kind of assurance right now. It’s the macaroni and cheese.  

Ugh, the macaroni and cheese. I need my husband to stop at a rest stop because at this point I must admit to myself that lactose intolerance is real and I can’t keep eating dairy like it’s my job. 

Five more stops. 

Too much pain. Something isn’t right about this. 

Call the midwife. Take some tylenol she says. If you’re close, come into the birthing center and we will get the Doppler so you can sleep better and not worry, she says. 

I hate meds. We weren’t close. 

Walgreens. 

Orange juice. Tylenol. Doubled over. 

It’s probably not the dairy. 

It’s not the dairy. 

Get me home. 

My husband pulled the car out of the parking lot.

The curb. 

The bump. 

The pop. 

The gush. 

The relief. 

Not the dairy. What is happening? This is happening. 

The initial shock froze all of my emotions. Please just get me home. 

The pain. 

These are contractions. This is labor. This is not supposed to happen. 

We just crossed into the “safe zone”. This isn’t supposed to happen. 

Contractions. Rapid. Painful. 

This pain. Ugh. 

We arrive at our apartment. I refused to go to the hospital. I just wanted to be home. My blood soaked clothes can be trashed. I just want to shower. 

I can feel my body trying to heave life. Contraction. Pain. Urge. Push. It would be the refrain of my nightmares. 

Contraction. Pain. Urge. Push. 

The sound. Like something throwing water balloons against a cold ceramic floor. ICant forget the sound. I don’t want to look, but I have to look. 

“Is my baby down there?”

The bathroom looks like something horrific happened here. My husband. God, my husband. I can’t look so he is retrieving what is left of the life that was growing. Scooping up red hope in his bare hands. 

My body’s only response is yelping and shivering. At some point I realize these sounds aren’t coming from me, but from the man on the ground wailing and writhing. My husband is broken. My body is broken. 

The rhythm of death won’t stop so I get as together as I can and we go to the emergency room across the street. Thank God it’s across the street. 

Contractions aren’t stopping. 

“Honey I’m sorry”. 

“Sweetie your body is laboring”. 

The nurses do their best to comfort. 

I have to go to the bathroom, but there’s too much blood to move. 

Help me. 

At some point a doctor makes the decision to transfer me to another hospital where the OB/GYN on-call will do an emergency surgery. 

We wait what seems like hours for ambulance transport. 

It’s morphine.

And it isn’t working. 

Still have to use the bathroom. Still can’t go. 
More morphine. 

Ambulance arrives. Seems like hours. 

Bumpy ride. Seems like hours. 

We arrive at the other hospital. Admitted. I ask my options. Surgeon says she can let me bleed out or I can get the surgery. 

There isn’t enough morphine in the world to make that an ok thing to say to me right now. 

Phones ringing. Family phone tree. Do all families do this? 

Operating room. 

Why is there so much stuff in this hallway?

“Do you have a DNR?”

Anesthesiologist. Breathing tube. Uncontrollable crying. 

Someone approaches with that needle. 

“I’m going to give you something to help you relax”. 

I don’t want to relax, I want to wake up from this.  

Black. 

Black until I wake up and immediately ask for fried chicken. Throat hurts. Not dreaming. Not dead. Realization of what just happened washes over me in waves. 

I asked for fried chicken.

Uncontrollable crying. 

My nurse is an angel in scrubs. 

The sun. How long has my husband been awake? 30 hours and counting. My parents turn around from their trip, drive five hours back to us. 

Body is empty. 

Baby is dead. 

Body feels empty. 

I feel empty. 

Please stop telling me statistics. 

1 in 4. 

I’m 1 in 4. 

[I’m now one of the 2%, but that’s another story for another September].

Don’t want to debate when life begins. 

Baby is dead. 

For the next week, my parents are with us, but we are present in body only. 

My husband promised to be there through these moments. The thing is, nobody ever wants to have the for worse/in sickness/for poorer moments. But when they come you better make sure your person is your person. 

My husband is my anchor. 

I watched him gather remnants of our massacred future that would not be. I don’t understand how he is still functioning. 

How is he still upright?

I can’t talk to anyone. My phone is turned off and thrown in a drawer. I can’t face anyone. I can’t do this today, tomorrow, ever. 

Someone needs to call the midwife. 

What am I supposed to feel? What is supposed to happen? Has anyone providing medical care to me ever even experienced this? Nothing you are saying makes any sense and everything you are not saying makes me angry. 

Eventually everyone goes back home and back to work. And I’m here, alone with my thoughts and my empty body. 

I feel like a discarded carcass. 

Thursday. 14 weeks 

Thursday. 15 weeks 

Thursday. 16 weeks 

Dot. Dot. Dot.

Thursday. Today. 40 weeks. 

You never stop counting. You never stop wondering. Your new normal includes not ever being ok. 

And yet, life goes on. 

I’m sure people mean well when they tell me to be happy I don’t have kids. They don’t know my body is a graveyard. That we are free to travel and enjoy being married. We have so much freedom. 

Please stop saying words. 

I can’t make eye contact with babies right now. There’s no freedom in that prison. 

I can’t touch an infant without getting sucked into the black hole of grief. There’s no freedom in that prison. 

I can travel wherever I want, but I can’t separate myself from my empty womb. There’s no freedom in that prison. 

I feel the bandana of taboo tightening around my mouth, forcing me to keep inside the bitterness, the questions, the story. Because no one wants to hear about your failed pregnancy and your dead baby. There’s no freedom in that prison. 

No one wants to talk about baby loss. No one knows what to say; I don’t know what to say. After your initiation into this underground society of tears, you find other women – shamed to silence by a world obsessed with 1×1 snapshots of life’s high points. Other women – desperate for a corroborating story. Desperate for some indication that this betrayal by their body isn’t actually their fault. 

I talk about it because I have to. Every experience is different, but some things are universal. The isolation, especially on days like today, is insufferable. 

I was struck by the incapacity of my medical professionals, including my birthing center. No one offered me resources, support, comfort. Scrambling for explanations, observations, and expectations. Nothing. I hope this doesn’t happen to anyone else.

[I’ve since learned there are postpartum doulas who specialize in loss – miscarriage, stillbirth, infant loss. I wish I had known.  I’m considering becoming one.]

But know that my entire existence is different. Everything I am is tainted by the stench of failure – specifically, my body’s failure to complete a thing it was intentionally made to do. 

And so today, I try to cope with empty arms and a quiet home. Trying not to imagine her. Trying not to be consumed by the what-ifs. 

I will never be ok, but I do have joyful days. The grief comes in waves – for both my grandmother and my child. I let myself sink into that because I know it won’t last forever. I can’t get stuck there. 

I will never be the same. 

I am one in four. 

I am now one of the 2% of women who have back to back miscarriages. 

And so my clock starts ticking again. The clock that reminds you of betrayal; of brokenness. The clock that reminds you that a time will come and pass and your arms will still be empty. You are still a carcass.

It is Mondays now. 

Monday. 27 weeks.

Monday. 28 weeks. 

Dot. Dot. Dot.