As the 1 year anniversary of the day I miscarried approaches, I am trying to come to terms with loss and move forward on my journey to motherhood. By re-examining how I survived the past I am hoping to discover the strength to embrace my future. This is the past.
I’m pretty sure that if you had to describe hell it would be the time between your morning doctor’s appointment and the afternoon when the RE calls to give you your results. In that time the devil smiles.
The phone rang and Dr. Doom proclaimed that yet, once again, my beta more than doubled. The devil would have to wait another day to get his due!
Things were looking up. Many assured me that seeing a small pregnancy sac at such an early ultrasound wasn’t uncommon and that as long as my beta was doubling I was safe. I believed them. I trusted my heart. I knew at my next ultrasound I would see my beautiful baby. That whole week I celebrated. I bought little clothes and blankets and toys. I looked at cribs and googled ideas for the nursery. I envisioned my baby shower with Sissy L. I chronicled each shining moment in my pregnancy journal. I was looking forward to seeing that little flicker of a heartbeat on the screen…
I probably should have seen the writing on the wall but I didn’t. I knew I could get pregnant. I knew it in my soul but what I didn’t know was that I could miscarry. I truly didn’t possess that knowledge and when I was faced with the knowledge I had no idea how to process it.
A week later I went in for my ultrasound. I knew this ultrasound was going to be different. Dr. Doom would print out the picture of my beautiful baby and hand it to me. Or so I thought. When I arrived at the clinic, Dr. Doom wasn’t there. The Face Nurse told me he had been called away on a personal matter and that she would do the ultrasound. I was a little thrown off. She is not a doctor but I figured she knew what she was doing.
I stripped and skootched and got ready for the “probe”.
All I really remember from that point on was the Face Nurse saying “This doesn’t look good My Dear”.
Yes, she said “My Dear”. More than once.
“It doesn’t look good My Dear”. And then she said “There is no heartbeat My Dear.”
She removed the “probe” and I said up. Stunned and shocked. She put her hand on my shoulder and I wanted to smack it off.
I didn’t. I just sat there. She explained that I would have to wait for the doctor to call…the meaning of hell…the devil smiled…
She said that when he called he would tell me when they would schedule my D&C. As she walked out she said “Take as long as you need”.
I got dressed immediately and left. I didn’t cry on my way home. All I kept thinking was that I hope something bad happened to Dr. Doom and that’s why he was called away. I know I shouldn’t have wished that. I am not proud I did…
When I got home something snapped. I had messages and texts of excitement and promise from my sister inquiring how everything went. She kept calling. I picked up the phone and went off. I can hardly remember what I said. It was filtered through hysterical sobbing. It went something like “Aren’t you glad you kept calling wanting to know how it went? This is how it went…I’m losing my baby” and on and on I sobbed with unstoppable sorrow and uncontrollable anger.
I left day. Not physically but I left.
One of Dr. Doom’s partners called me. Dr Whatshername and all I remember is her saying she wanted me to come to the other office in the morning get confirmation of the results from a doctor. I freaked on her too but in the end agreed.
I don’t know if I slept that night. I don’t know if I ever stopped crying. What I do know is the next day I had to relive it all over again. I went to see Dr. Darth Vader.
Come to the dark side…
The drive was a blur. The wait in the reception area a blur. Going into the examining room, stripping and skootching a blur.
Then Dr. Darth Vader came in and started the ultrasound. He was mechanically. He was clinical. He pointed out everything on the screen. I didn’t look. And he said in that mechanical, clinical voice “As you can see there is no heartbeat. The sac is measuring a week behind and it is deformed”.
Deformed! I wanted to scream “You’re deformed and my baby is just small!”
I didn’t. I laid there silently as my tears quietly streamed down the side of my face. I sat up and then Dr. Darth Vader started giving me my miscarriage instructions.
He told me that I should miscarry naturally within the next 2 to 6 weeks. I was confused. I asked about a D&C. He recommended a natural miscarried. I was mortified by the thought of possibly waiting 6 weeks for this to start. He told me it usually happens within 2 weeks. I kept asking questions.
I asked “What if it doesn’t?”
He repeated “It will be between 2 to 6 weeks”.
“But what if this…”
“And what if that…”
He cut me off. Just like that, Dr. Darth Vader lifted his hand to cease the defiant questions and choked me silent by saying “Just call us when you bleed”.
I walked out. I never went back.
I week later on Saint Patrick’s Day I started bleeding. I never called.
