5 Years But Feels Like Yesterday
Five years ago sitting in a training for work, 6 weeks pregnant I had my first miscarriage. Five years seems like so long ago with all that has happened since but the feelings and experiences of that day are still so fresh in my mind. I can visualize going to the bathroom and seeing the blood, knowing something was wrong.
The details from that day and the next still are so active in my mind and I get brought back there often. I have never talked about the entire experience, or shared about my own thoughts. I had a 2 hour drive home, I cried the whole way. I tried to stay positive, but i knew inside what was wrong. The next afternoon my miscarriage was confirmed via ultrasound.
I can still picture the room we were in when the doctor said it out loud. My husband was with me. I just sobbed. The thing that i don’t think people who have not had a loss do not understand is there is no here’s whats going to happen or heres what to expect talk. Yes they go over bleeding, not using tampons, and when to go to the ER but otherwise, mamas are really left on their own to figure things out. My appointment was less than ten minutes, maybe even five. You don’t get any answers. You have to keep going in to confirm that your HCG goes all the way to zero. It feels like torture, blood draw after blood draw.
After my appointment , I remember being angry with my husband who wanted me to stay in the room while i calmed down. i just needed to leave. I did not want to be in that place for another second. We drove separate , I sobbed the whole way home. I called my mom, who did not know i was pregnant since it was still super early. She was so confused and had never been through a loss but struggled to hear me hurting.
I remember putting my son to bed that night and laying on the floor next to his crib with a pad on and sobbing while he drifted off to sleep. How am i supposed to continue working, parenting, doing life when inside i feel like falling apart. Somehow i was able to go back to my training to finish, crying on and off throughout. Pretending like everything was okay. It was not okay. If I could change anything from my experience , it would be to give myself time. My work ethic and high expectations put too much pressure on myself and I didn’t get to rest and heal like i should have.
Looking back on how this changed me, i can think of a million ways. The one that sticks out the most, is it took away my innocence and ability to experience the joy and excitement that usually accompanies a pregnancy. I have never gotten the opportunity to fully enjoy a pregnancy since that day, there is always fear in the back of my mind.
Sometimes, I feel guilty because i have been lucky enough to experience a healthy pregnancy since but worry and fear over shine the excitement. How can i enjoy something and stay positive when i know how quickly it can be ripped away.
I am a researcher by nature, i am constantly reading and learning. I quickly started to research miscarriage and pregnancy loss. How can women around the world be experiencing something so common and feeling so alone. thats how i felt, alone, overwhelmed , like nobody in the world could understand.
And honestly, the people close to me couldn’t. Nobody in my immediate family had experienced a pregnancy loss. My husband tried his best, but the connection a women has to the baby is different. Thats not to say he wasn’t hurting but it was a different hurt. I ended up shutting down, i stopped talking about it, i started to feel like a burden, and i stopped going places. I would say i didn’t feel well and send my husband to family dinners without me. I didn’t know how to be in a room full of people and not acknowledge how i felt inside.
Because I set extremely high expectations for myself, which is probably connected to my anxiety, I went back to work on the next Monday . My loss happened on a Thursday. I walked into my first meeting and the mom announced to me that she was pregnant and due the same month that I was supposed to be due. I got to my car and cried. Like I wasn’t feeling bad enough, trying to manage it all. It was like the universe was showing me that i should be at home resting and healing.
I remember reading a book, continuing my need to gather as much information as i could. There was a very detailed chapter where the author talked about having her miscarriage while in the bathtub and that she remembered holding the baby in her hand after passing it. I couldn’t take it, that sounded so much better than what I experienced . I passed my baby in the bathroom of a public library. I was guilty and felt so much shame around this. How could I do this to the baby that i loved so much. but again, I had no idea what to expect. I had nobody that was supporting me through this. Just figuring it out as i went.
Agh, the blame and guilT i put on myself was so high. I thought of every little thing that i did wrong or that ‘jinxed” it. I hyper focused on wearing my maternity overalls the day it happened. I kept asking myself,”why would I wear maternity pants when i was only 6 weeks, thats just asking for something bad to happen” I never wore those pants before 12 weeks again. I made up a huge story in my head of why this loss was my fault.
what i recognize the most while reflecting on my own journey is this huge feeling of not being understood. When i think of the “why” behind Miscarriage Mamas Connect, I think of all of the mamas out there feeling just like I did. The mamas who are lacking a community where they can feel a little more at ease, a little more connected, a little more understood. Now I know that we cant take all of the pain away from mamas going through pregnancy loss but i absolutely beleive that we can make it easier. That we can help them feel understood, we can give them a place to share their sotries where they are understood and validated.
I don’t want to end my story without including the positive people and experiences. I went back and forth about if i should post something on social media. I kept coming back to it. Looking back, i was trying to fill my need of acknowledging this baby that I had felt and loved and without the recognition , it felt like I wasn’t giving other people an opportunity to celebrate and grieve with us. After my post, a friend bought me a book that had helped her through her loss. It was the most kind gesture and I have never told her but I have bought that book and passed it on to multiple other mamas . My mom also bought me a personalized necklace, and my husband a personalized item in memory of our sweet baby. It felt so good and so hard for it to be acknowledged. My doctor and nurse team sent me a card after my loss was confirmed. I cried, these busy nurses and doctor took time to sign a card and say they were thinking of me.
-Kayla
