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| A moment that changed me: it’s my third miscarriage and I’m losing the plot | |
| (about 1 hour later) | |
| Just under a year ago, the first positive pregnancy test. “Keep everything,” the woman on the phone said not much later, Mother’s Day. “Put any pads and the tissues you use to wipe yourself in a bag.” We carried it around the hospital, sat with it in the waiting rooms. We asked the doctor discharging me what to do with it. He threw the bag away. There wasn’t much to see then; but the second time there was no mistaking what was happening. I felt it going, let it lump into my hand, looked at it and flushed it down a toilet in Brooklyn. | Just under a year ago, the first positive pregnancy test. “Keep everything,” the woman on the phone said not much later, Mother’s Day. “Put any pads and the tissues you use to wipe yourself in a bag.” We carried it around the hospital, sat with it in the waiting rooms. We asked the doctor discharging me what to do with it. He threw the bag away. There wasn’t much to see then; but the second time there was no mistaking what was happening. I felt it going, let it lump into my hand, looked at it and flushed it down a toilet in Brooklyn. |
| Can I tell you these things? Should I? I want to. I want you to know why I was boring, and then sad. Why I ignored invitations, was sober on hen weekends and miserable at birthdays. Why I left rooms abruptly and steamrollered conversations. Why I lied every time you asked, “How are you? What have you been up to? How was New York?” | Can I tell you these things? Should I? I want to. I want you to know why I was boring, and then sad. Why I ignored invitations, was sober on hen weekends and miserable at birthdays. Why I left rooms abruptly and steamrollered conversations. Why I lied every time you asked, “How are you? What have you been up to? How was New York?” |
| Three times now. Three times is too much. Three times is the new normal. And I’m losing it. | Three times now. Three times is too much. Three times is the new normal. And I’m losing it. |
| We didn’t want the world to know we were trying, to nudge each other when I refused a drink, to provide unsolicited advice about folic acid and cured meat. We didn’t want our miscarriages laid out for inspection, for others to speculate on our age and our lifestyle. | We didn’t want the world to know we were trying, to nudge each other when I refused a drink, to provide unsolicited advice about folic acid and cured meat. We didn’t want our miscarriages laid out for inspection, for others to speculate on our age and our lifestyle. |
| In our Airbnb room in New York, after the abortion clinic where we’d been sent to get rid of the empty gestational sac, the moment replayed every time I shut my eyes. Lying on the trolley with general anaesthetic going in at the wrist, how my chest tightened and my heart sped up so much it blocked my head with a high-pitched buzz. Wondering if my racing heartbeat was killing me and trying not to cry. Then the tears streaming cold into my ears because it wasn’t working, the anaesthetic wasn’t fucking working and I wasn’t asleep and I’m here, naked on a trolley, my legs already pulled apart and hooked over stirrups, and he’s walking up from the other end of the room and he’s going to start while I’m still awake, I’m still awake. Then I’m not. | In our Airbnb room in New York, after the abortion clinic where we’d been sent to get rid of the empty gestational sac, the moment replayed every time I shut my eyes. Lying on the trolley with general anaesthetic going in at the wrist, how my chest tightened and my heart sped up so much it blocked my head with a high-pitched buzz. Wondering if my racing heartbeat was killing me and trying not to cry. Then the tears streaming cold into my ears because it wasn’t working, the anaesthetic wasn’t fucking working and I wasn’t asleep and I’m here, naked on a trolley, my legs already pulled apart and hooked over stirrups, and he’s walking up from the other end of the room and he’s going to start while I’m still awake, I’m still awake. Then I’m not. |
| After it’s done, the nurse asks if I’m crying because of the pain or the emotion. “Both,” I tell her, and I say loudly: “I’m on holiday and it’s the worst holiday ever.” I explain that I’m not having an abortion, I’m having a miscarriage and it’s my second one. She takes my hand and looks me square in the eyes. “It’s nothing you’ve done,” she says. “I promise you. It’s nothing you’ve done.” | After it’s done, the nurse asks if I’m crying because of the pain or the emotion. “Both,” I tell her, and I say loudly: “I’m on holiday and it’s the worst holiday ever.” I explain that I’m not having an abortion, I’m having a miscarriage and it’s my second one. She takes my hand and looks me square in the eyes. “It’s nothing you’ve done,” she says. “I promise you. It’s nothing you’ve done.” |
| Is it OK for me to tell you this now? I need people to know without me having to say the words for the first time, over and over, but there’s no right time or place. When does one bring this darkness to pregnant friends and family? I imagine them scattering, terrified that I’m contagious. | Is it OK for me to tell you this now? I need people to know without me having to say the words for the first time, over and over, but there’s no right time or place. When does one bring this darkness to pregnant friends and family? I imagine them scattering, terrified that I’m contagious. |
| There are too many daily pinprick stings to say that all of them devastate; if you were floored every time, you’d never get out of bed. A comment about pregnancy while yours is still leaking away. Attending a baby shower on your due date. The assumption from expecting friends that you know nothing about the exhaustion, sickness and secrets of the first 12 weeks, despite the patch of hormonal pigment by your eye still marked enough to need concealer. | There are too many daily pinprick stings to say that all of them devastate; if you were floored every time, you’d never get out of bed. A comment about pregnancy while yours is still leaking away. Attending a baby shower on your due date. The assumption from expecting friends that you know nothing about the exhaustion, sickness and secrets of the first 12 weeks, despite the patch of hormonal pigment by your eye still marked enough to need concealer. |
| Did we really do this? Have we really had a year of this? Three times, three actual pregnancies? If I think about it too much it can punch the breath from my lungs. The third time, we stopped off at home before going to the hospital, made sandwiches and filled water bottles. We took the next day off sick, went to the supermarket, bought a big TV. In work the following day, I feel panicky about anyone speaking to me, like I’ve shed my skin but I’m the husk, not the new person, and one question will blow me away on the wind. | Did we really do this? Have we really had a year of this? Three times, three actual pregnancies? If I think about it too much it can punch the breath from my lungs. The third time, we stopped off at home before going to the hospital, made sandwiches and filled water bottles. We took the next day off sick, went to the supermarket, bought a big TV. In work the following day, I feel panicky about anyone speaking to me, like I’ve shed my skin but I’m the husk, not the new person, and one question will blow me away on the wind. |
| It’s a disconcerting thing to realise that even the people closest to you can’t really help. You love them for trying but just want them to stop. I can’t tell any more if I’m reacting with real emotion or what’s expected. I can’t tell any more what kind of a person I’m being on the outside. Three times has made me selfish, three times has made me ashamed. | It’s a disconcerting thing to realise that even the people closest to you can’t really help. You love them for trying but just want them to stop. I can’t tell any more if I’m reacting with real emotion or what’s expected. I can’t tell any more what kind of a person I’m being on the outside. Three times has made me selfish, three times has made me ashamed. |
| I’m ashamed of getting so hysterical signing “termination” forms in the abortion clinic that I had to be removed from the waiting room. I’m ashamed that of all the things to live through, that this was nearly the end of me. | I’m ashamed of getting so hysterical signing “termination” forms in the abortion clinic that I had to be removed from the waiting room. I’m ashamed that of all the things to live through, that this was nearly the end of me. |
| So I swing like a pendulum. Needing people to know, to acknowledge and nod, “Yes, yes, that must have been terrible and it’s right and understandable that you’re on your knees”, to know all that the word miscarriage can actually mean, to know there’s a reason for my disconnect. And then I’m disgusted with myself for not coping. If this is the worst thing we ever experience, I count us lucky, I promise. To have each other, to not have spun off in different directions. To have friends and family to let in, that makes us lucky too. | So I swing like a pendulum. Needing people to know, to acknowledge and nod, “Yes, yes, that must have been terrible and it’s right and understandable that you’re on your knees”, to know all that the word miscarriage can actually mean, to know there’s a reason for my disconnect. And then I’m disgusted with myself for not coping. If this is the worst thing we ever experience, I count us lucky, I promise. To have each other, to not have spun off in different directions. To have friends and family to let in, that makes us lucky too. |
| So what of us now, with our moses basket in the loft, our own “baby shoes, never worn”? What’s one more on top of three? I’ll keep taking supplements and peeing on sticks, getting needles in my arms and lubed-up scanners between my legs. We’ll keep taking our bags of bloody tissues and homemade sandwiches to waiting rooms until one of us says that’s enough. | So what of us now, with our moses basket in the loft, our own “baby shoes, never worn”? What’s one more on top of three? I’ll keep taking supplements and peeing on sticks, getting needles in my arms and lubed-up scanners between my legs. We’ll keep taking our bags of bloody tissues and homemade sandwiches to waiting rooms until one of us says that’s enough. |
| • If you are affected by any of the issues raised in this piece, support is available from the Miscarriage Association | • If you are affected by any of the issues raised in this piece, support is available from the Miscarriage Association |