on miscarriage

Warning: Content is potentially disturbing.

It's been eight weeks since the miscarriage. This has been a really strange thing to deal with. In a lot of painful situations how to respond emotionally seems clear--there is an expected reaction and people respond to that expected reaction in expected ways. But I really didn't know what emotions should correspond with a miscarriage and people didn't seem to know how to respond to me, either. That sounds strange to say, but I felt it strongly.

I had a nagging feeling that something was not right--more than normal worry because I mentioned it to my doctor. I had my first appointment and had an ultrasound that showed the little creature and its little heartbeat alive inside me. And the very next day I held the fetus in my hand. I was at home alone when it happened, and I looked at it, telling myself out loud what it was--like I had to explain to myself what had just happened. That is an important detail to me because it is the image that appeared in my mind suddenly and frequently for weeks, and I had a physical reaction every time. Like I had run into something. Or like I was about to walk into that image and had to stop short to avoid it. I even turned my head trying not to look. When I came home from the doctor's office after I miscarried, I threw the ultrasound photo in the trash. I wanted to separate myself from it--I did not want to ever look at it again. Because then it would be like I lost a baby. I did everything possible to emphasize to myself that it was not a child but the idea of a child--the hope for a child--the potential of a child--that was lost.

But it is not an idea in that it will all go away if I can have another child. This was the hope for a specific baby, born at Christmas, when RB is two and a half. I had begun to think of myself as a mother of two, and now I am not that. When I fill out forms at the doctor's office, there will always be more pregnancies than children. I am not "dwelling" on the experience, whatever that means, anyway. But I am aware of it as a presence in my life that will be there always.

I don't have a lot of emotions about the miscarriage anymore. I feel a dim kind of sadness sometimes, but most of the time I feel not much at all. Just a kind of understanding that this thing happened. Right after it happened I felt depressed and sometimes very sad but the emotion that was surprisingly powerful was anger. I wanted very much to be pregnant and I was not anymore, and that pissed me off. I wanted to be pregnant again right away because it was very hard to be in the middle of all the plans I had made in my mind and then have to toss them out. It was just over. I was so angry about that.

And it was hard to talk to people--and everyone knew I was pregnant, so the topic came up. Most of the time I didn't want to talk about it and other times I didn't know who to confide in. When people heard the news, some responded as if it were a great tragedy, and it wasn't. That was uncomfortable for me. Others responded as if it were no big deal--"Well, you know, it's not that unusual."--also uncomfortable because despite the statistical frequency of miscarriage, it is a big deal to me. Of course, the response that was helpful (which I did get, too) was just quiet listening and "I'm sorry" and "I love you." Isn't that always the right response? Why do we forget that all the time?

But now I am good and not angry and not sad--at least not in the same way--but I am changed. And the way that I think about pregnancy is changed.