At a friend's "Hey, We're Having a Baby!" dance party recently (one where I didn't do much dancing, because I was worried about my pregnancy--hah!), they were given a card. When you opened it, it started playing Salt-n-Pepa, beginning with the chorus, "OOoo, Baby Baby! Ba-ba-ba-Baby!" Funny.
Now Hallmark does have a new line for miscarriage, but it's a little cheesy. Other online stories have miscarriage sympathy cards, but really I'm not much of an butterfly-kisses, angel-wings, rainbow-bridge, name-your-embryo-and-call-it-your-guardian-angel type of person.*
But if they had music, music that plays when you open the card, I might be interested. So Andrew and I were debating what songs they should play.
His contribution: "So You Had a Bad Day."
Mine: "There's that Janis Joplin's song that goes, (singing) 'Bye... bye... bye, baby bye bye!'"
His suggestion: "Wasn't there a Justin Timberlake song that went, baby ain't no lie, baby bye bye bye?" **
Me again: "How about Sunday Bloody Sunday?"
Him: "...."
Me: "Hmm. Too far?"
Well, we'll keep working on it. We'll make millions.
(In other news--physically, muuuuch less pain. Emotionally, well, today is better than yesterday, and tomorrow will hopefully be better still. And I took a shower today! Is this where I say "baby steps"?***)
*Not that I begrudge anyone their coping mechanism. If that gives you comfort and that's how you get through this, y'know, go for it. Me? I make bad jokes and get angry at inappropriate times.
**By the way, he totally did some dance steps with that one. He'll deny it, but I was there.
**See? Baaaaaad jokes.
Showing posts with label loss. Show all posts
Showing posts with label loss. Show all posts
Sunday, February 25, 2007
Saturday, February 24, 2007
If you want to know.
I am doing fine.
I am horrible.
I am calm, almost serene.
I’m a wreck.
This happens to women all the time.
This happened to me.
Two days ago, I was pregnant. I woke up Thursday, and I was pregnant. And I forgot my prenatal vitamin. Isn’t that weird? I mean, it’s merely coincidence, and if a movie had that as a plot device, it’d be clunky and cheesy and touchy-feely beyond belief. But I did and I keep remembering that, and just thinking, “How weird.”
Two days ago, 2007 was a good year, one that would totally make up for the shitty year 2006 was from beginning to end. Two days ago, I was debating whether I would be okay to go to my cousin’s wedding. In October. Because, you see, that would have been about six weeks after my baby was born. We’d seen the heartbeat—heard the heartbeat!—twice! We’d seen and heard the thrum of a wee little hummingbird’s heartbeat. A hard-won and so-wanted pregnancy with a wee little hummingbird. And then it was Thursday.
By four o’clock—so, like, a day and a half ago—I started feeling unwell. I’m not sure I can go back to that grocery store ever again, because I was pushing my cart down the cereal aisle and just started wondering how quickly I could finish and leave and get back home because I needed to stop noticing how crappy I felt.
By five o’clock, I’d already called Andrew begging him to come home. I couldn’t lie down, curl up, stretch out, into a position that was bearable. I hurt. I wanted to vomit. My back hurt, and it felt like I was being ripped from hip to hip, jaggedly, repeatedly.
And I begged. I begged my body, I begged my hummingbird, I begged my uterus. I begged until the words became a rhythm, a four-count, meaningless except for the up and down and rumble of my voice. Please be okay. Please don’t leave me. Please be okay. Please don’t leave me. Please don’t do this. Please. Please. Please.
I begged so I could stop crying.
Andrew came home and held me and he was okay and he wasn’t and all he wanted to do is help. He helped me arrange for a substitute to come in Friday, he let work know he’d be “working from home” on Friday, and he stroked my hair and stroked my hip and tucked me in. And we were scared together.
And that was Thursday.
The answering service for my doctor said that if I wasn’t bleeding profusely, I didn’t need to go to the ER. And I wasn’t. Despite all this pain, there was so little blood. It felt like I should be bleeding a Mississippi River but there was only hurt. So I waited until my doctor’s office opened the next morning, at 8:30. By 8:31, I had told the doctor I could be there in ten minutes, and they said to do so. By 8:32, A had his keys and was standing by the front door, ready to help me to the car.
By 8:45, we could see my empty empty black hole uterus in black and white fuzz.
And suddenly 2007 needs its ass kicked in a dark alley by some very large bouncers with crowbars and tasers.
There was more to yesterday. I mean, I’d been telling people because we’d heard a heartbeat and that’s supposed to be the safety mark. Everybody said. But I couldn’t tell this the same way. The words wouldn’t come. I have great friends, but I needed to not think about it, be blank, be numb, be nothing, be empty for a while. So I posted to one blog, and I called one friend, and just said that I wanted the others to know but I couldn’t tell them all one by one.
At about 8:00, I ran my hand along the back of my sweatpants and felt the waistband string, and realized that I’d put my pants on backwards. When I left the doctor’s office. And I hadn’t noticed until now. And that it had been almost twelve hours.
And I talked to my mom.
And that was yesterday.
Today?
Today is Saturday.
I’m fine as long as I only wonder what am I going to do today? (Take a shower, watch a DVD, maybe change out of what I was wearing on Thursday.) I can maybe wonder about what I’m going to do tomorrow.
I am horrible and broken when I think of how much I’d already planned this year in little packages without even meaning to and how none of it will be. A spring growing into maternity clothes. A summer break of slowly and lovingly furnishing a fairy room. A Christmas with a baby. Poof.
I am calm, almost serene as I reinforce the mantra that there is nothing I or anyone could have done and it’s not a judgment on me and it doesn’t mean I won’t get pregnant later and research says and experience shows and blah blah blah yadda yadda yadda insert cliché here.
I’m a wreck as I look at the onesies my mom sent for my birthday, tucked under the blanket, the one I’d used as a baby, the faded pink blanket with the satin edging that still shows all of Mom’s repairs, that I can’t bear to look at and can’t bear to pack away.
This happens to women all the time.
This happened to me.
I am horrible.
I am calm, almost serene.
I’m a wreck.
This happens to women all the time.
This happened to me.
Two days ago, I was pregnant. I woke up Thursday, and I was pregnant. And I forgot my prenatal vitamin. Isn’t that weird? I mean, it’s merely coincidence, and if a movie had that as a plot device, it’d be clunky and cheesy and touchy-feely beyond belief. But I did and I keep remembering that, and just thinking, “How weird.”
Two days ago, 2007 was a good year, one that would totally make up for the shitty year 2006 was from beginning to end. Two days ago, I was debating whether I would be okay to go to my cousin’s wedding. In October. Because, you see, that would have been about six weeks after my baby was born. We’d seen the heartbeat—heard the heartbeat!—twice! We’d seen and heard the thrum of a wee little hummingbird’s heartbeat. A hard-won and so-wanted pregnancy with a wee little hummingbird. And then it was Thursday.
By four o’clock—so, like, a day and a half ago—I started feeling unwell. I’m not sure I can go back to that grocery store ever again, because I was pushing my cart down the cereal aisle and just started wondering how quickly I could finish and leave and get back home because I needed to stop noticing how crappy I felt.
By five o’clock, I’d already called Andrew begging him to come home. I couldn’t lie down, curl up, stretch out, into a position that was bearable. I hurt. I wanted to vomit. My back hurt, and it felt like I was being ripped from hip to hip, jaggedly, repeatedly.
And I begged. I begged my body, I begged my hummingbird, I begged my uterus. I begged until the words became a rhythm, a four-count, meaningless except for the up and down and rumble of my voice. Please be okay. Please don’t leave me. Please be okay. Please don’t leave me. Please don’t do this. Please. Please. Please.
I begged so I could stop crying.
Andrew came home and held me and he was okay and he wasn’t and all he wanted to do is help. He helped me arrange for a substitute to come in Friday, he let work know he’d be “working from home” on Friday, and he stroked my hair and stroked my hip and tucked me in. And we were scared together.
And that was Thursday.
The answering service for my doctor said that if I wasn’t bleeding profusely, I didn’t need to go to the ER. And I wasn’t. Despite all this pain, there was so little blood. It felt like I should be bleeding a Mississippi River but there was only hurt. So I waited until my doctor’s office opened the next morning, at 8:30. By 8:31, I had told the doctor I could be there in ten minutes, and they said to do so. By 8:32, A had his keys and was standing by the front door, ready to help me to the car.
By 8:45, we could see my empty empty black hole uterus in black and white fuzz.
And suddenly 2007 needs its ass kicked in a dark alley by some very large bouncers with crowbars and tasers.
There was more to yesterday. I mean, I’d been telling people because we’d heard a heartbeat and that’s supposed to be the safety mark. Everybody said. But I couldn’t tell this the same way. The words wouldn’t come. I have great friends, but I needed to not think about it, be blank, be numb, be nothing, be empty for a while. So I posted to one blog, and I called one friend, and just said that I wanted the others to know but I couldn’t tell them all one by one.
At about 8:00, I ran my hand along the back of my sweatpants and felt the waistband string, and realized that I’d put my pants on backwards. When I left the doctor’s office. And I hadn’t noticed until now. And that it had been almost twelve hours.
And I talked to my mom.
And that was yesterday.
Today?
Today is Saturday.
I’m fine as long as I only wonder what am I going to do today? (Take a shower, watch a DVD, maybe change out of what I was wearing on Thursday.) I can maybe wonder about what I’m going to do tomorrow.
I am horrible and broken when I think of how much I’d already planned this year in little packages without even meaning to and how none of it will be. A spring growing into maternity clothes. A summer break of slowly and lovingly furnishing a fairy room. A Christmas with a baby. Poof.
I am calm, almost serene as I reinforce the mantra that there is nothing I or anyone could have done and it’s not a judgment on me and it doesn’t mean I won’t get pregnant later and research says and experience shows and blah blah blah yadda yadda yadda insert cliché here.
I’m a wreck as I look at the onesies my mom sent for my birthday, tucked under the blanket, the one I’d used as a baby, the faded pink blanket with the satin edging that still shows all of Mom’s repairs, that I can’t bear to look at and can’t bear to pack away.
This happens to women all the time.
This happened to me.
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