Something That I've Never Talked About

I am very open. Just browse around and see for yourself, I tell you perhaps too much about TTC, miscarriage, D&C, pregnancy, and parenthood after loss.

One thing I have never talked about is one of the most shattering moments of my infertility journey. I am not sure why it sprang to mind just recently, but the imagine has returned to me, a painful part of my past that I buried and forced myself to forget about. Now that it's back, I can't get it out of my head. Writing here has always been healing to me, so I am hopeful that I can exorcise this image a bit. I don't want to forget it, per se, I just want it to stop hurting so much.

Perhaps it is the fact that we are nearing the next OB appointment. I fear that visit as I have feared every single ultrasound since discovering Gummy Bear's heart was no longer beating. I was 11 weeks pregnant then. I will be 11 weeks pregnant next week. The past definitely has been haunting me lately, as I alternatively cling to hope and yet try to steel my heart against possible pain.

In any case. . .

January 2006, we lost our first pregnancy at around 6 weeks, 2 days. I doubt the pregnancy ever got much past implantation, based on my last beta, but there was a little lump of tissue that came out after some especially bad cramps on the second day of bleeding. Whether it was a clot, or whether it was actually a part of our beloved baby, I will never know for sure. But it was different than other clots that I had before and after and I truly did believe it was the products of conception. . . or part of them in any case.

I remember passing that tissue or clot and it dropping directly into the toilet with a soft plopping sound. I felt it leave my body and turned to look at it out some sort of primal need to see it. I stared at that poor little lump as the emotions cascaded around me. I cried harder in my life than I have ever cried, even losing Gummy Bear. I sobbed and grieved and longed for a different ending to our tragic tale. I railed against everything that had ended this small life and taken away my hopes and dreams. And then the moment came to flush the toilet. . . and I could not. That was my child. It might have been just a clump of cells, but it was so very loved. To flush it like a piece of waste, to push down that handle, was something that was beyond me. I came out of the bathroom, sobbing, and my husband asked what was wrong. I told him what had happened and that I could not flush our baby. He understood, but I could also see that he didn't get it and perhaps even thought I was being melodramatic. He came into the bathroom,"ready" to do what needed to be done. And then he got it. He couldn't do it, either.

Instead, he knelt down next to me where I had once again crumpled to the floor. He took my hand. We cried, we railed, we sat in silence. And then, we did the most terrible thing that a couple ever has to do. We "buried" our child. It wasn't pretty, there were no flowers, no gravesite to visit, no headstone to mark the place. M did say some words, I just sobbed, so in many ways, it was like our memorial service. We reached out and pulled down that handle together and as the toilet flushed, I felt my heart going down that drain.

That moment in our bathroom was desperately awful. It is a moment that I hope and pray that no one ever has to go through... and yet, so many do. There were many times that I passed our sweet angels at home. I got "better" at flushing the toilet, if one can ever improve upon such a thing. M no longer had to do it for me. But it never got any easier.

I don't know why I remember this moment so vividly right now. I think sometimes, it is easy to forget everything that happened before. It is easy to get frustrated with how I feel about this pregnancy. I forget that I have a reason to be afraid, to guard my heart, to stand back a bit. The pain of losing your baby is something you never forget and that lives in your heart, changes the fibers of your soul. No matter how you prepare, no matter what logic you might apply, it will always hurt.