M is for Miscarriage

My, the difference a day (or four years) makes.

Four years ago, I found out I was pregnant. I cried for days when I found out, and they weren’t tears of joy. When the home pregnancy test said I was pregnant, my world ended. Or so I thought.

On Dec. 24, 2012, Tom and I found out we were pregnant. We were actually trying to get pregnant this time. We had been trying for six months, and it was the best Christmas present we could have asked for. I went to the doctor and confirmed the pregnancy.

“You’re five weeks and two days,” the nurse said.

I was excited. Tom was excited. Matthew, our 4-year-old, was excited.

Everything in my life was perfect.

On Dec. 29, 2012, I went to the emergency room at 2:30 a.m. because I started bleeding.

The doctor did an ultrasound, and he said my uterus “looked like it had been pregnant.”

Looked like it had been pregnant.

I was confused. “I am pregnant.”

He went on to say that either I’m too early in my pregnancy or I am having a miscarriage. Apparently, talking to a patient about having a miscarriage is the same as talking to your buddy about what you had for dinner.

Same tone. Same inflection. Same nonchalance.

I thought to myself, “Surely I’m just too early. I would know if I were having a miscarriage.”

I spent the day crying. I kept telling the universe I wanted this baby, that I was having this baby. “This whole situation is ridiculous,” I thought. “I mean, now that I want a baby, my body is rejecting it? Now that I am not on birth control and my husband and I are pushing for this miracle, the universe says no?”

On Dec. 29, 2012, at 9:00 p.m., I went back to the emergency room with severe abdominal pain and heavy bleeding.

At 11:17 p.m., they told me I miscarried.

My world was shattered. I cried so hard earlier in the day, my eyelids swelled up. Well, they aren’t getting any less swollen. I lost my baby. We lost our baby. Matthew lost his brother/sister. Matthew didn’t understand why I was crying, and what could I say to him?

This miscarriage left me feeling gutted. I felt like a failure. I couldn’t give my husband another child after six months of trying. I was beyond sad, devastated even. Not only that, I felt like I was not allowed to be this sad since I was only five weeks along.

But we had names picked out. Tom started the registry. We were shopping for strollers and a car seat. That baby was a baby—our baby—the moment we conceived it, not some arbitrary day someone else decides. It’s been more than two weeks now, and I finally feel like I can breathe.

I’m okay. I guess what they say about time and wounds is right.

Like my friend Nikki said, “now you all have a special little angel watching over you.”

That I do.