To try or not to try again: a conversation via text

Today 8:47 AM

Sweet Pea: I want to try again

Me: If only it didn’t mean giving up coffee… sigh.

Sweet Pea: LOL! If only it didn’t mean potentially giving up sleep!

Me: Or giving up coffee and sleep – for nothing!

Sweet Pea: Yeah

Sweet Pea: It’s only if we are both on board of course

Me: No, I want to try and I am incredibly scared.  You may have to be willing to endure sarcasm as I mask my pain – are you willing?

Me: I give up coffee and you endure sarcasm – sounds like we will both be suffering.

Sweet Pea: Lol. I am on board

Me: Ok.

Me: I will have to continue moving toward our goal of moving (or get clarity with you on whether we are actually going).  I can’t put all my eggs (no pun intended!) in one basket.

Sweet Pea: I think we can do both

Sweet Pea: I want the ocean

Me: I’m unable to focus – literally shaking by the decision to try again.  I want to – I took a prenatal vitamin and texted X – but I can’t stop shaking and I am literally unable to make a pancake for Little Bear – about to throw out the batter I tried to make.  I think I’m having a trauma response.

Sweet Pea: Oh honey.  Just remember that we don’t have to.

Sweet Pea: Our lives are full enough

Me: I want to. And I’m having this response.  Shit.

Sweet Pea: Yeah. I wish I could help.  I wish I could do it.

Me: We are at Modern Times. Wish you were here.  Still all shaky and out of it. Gave up trying to make pancakes at home.

Sweet Pea: Glad you had a back up. Sorry this is so hard.

Me: It’s crazy.

Raw – another loss at 10 weeks

I dared to hope.  I dared to try again, against reason, against despair.  And here I am again: another loss.  Another miscarriage. This time, we will not hope again.  This time, we’ve decided to give up hope and turn our hearts toward all we have: each other and one beautiful boy.

In one day, I gave up the dream of my son having a brother or sister.  In one moment, the dream of a second child dissolved like the honey I stir into my tea.

This time, the loss does not hurt so badly.  This is my second miscarriage in 6 months.  The luck I have in falling pregnant on the first try feels like fool’s gold.  Who cares if I can get pregnant on a dime if it all goes down the toilet? Who cares if it all leads to this, these red rivers of loss?

I remember now that the first few days were okay, after my last loss.  I wasn’t actually okay: it was shock.  But once the shock wore off, the grief woke up and took me for a wild ride.  Will it happen again? Will it slam me down with the force of a thousand horses? Or will it be less intense? At least this time, I didn’t hold my baby’s body. At least this time, there is no body to bury.  But does that make it easier?  Or worse?

I am not compelled to name this baby.  I did not learn his or her gender; no one did.  But I dreamed of this baby.  I dreamed of a girl this time, with brown eyes and brown hair.  I dreamed of her birth, over and over.  I imagined her plump wrists and smooth cheeks.  And because of these dreams, I felt calm.  I felt confident. I dreamed none of these things when I was pregnant with Julian, my son I lost in my fourth month of pregnancy. With Julian, I carried a sense of dread, a fear of loss I couldn’t shake even after we passed the first trimester.  While I was devastated by his loss, I could recall my sense of foreboding and it gave a sense of inevitability to his death.

But not so, this time.

This time I feel confused.  What about my calm assurance? What about the sense of peace and calm I received while doing Chi Gong at the meditation center — a sense that could let go of my grief for I was going to have a baby and it was all going to be okay?  What about that?

9 days after

I sat in a cafe today and laughed with a woman about the absurdity of keeping our babies in the fridge and freezer respectively.  We cried and we laughed and I felt the ache subside in my chest.  I felt the possibility of happiness alight on my shoulders as the warmth of the November sun shone through the windows on two women joined in loss and love, our bodies having birthed babies alive and dead.

She knows what it is like to hold her baby in her hands and to bury that baby in the earth, to feel the dirt in her fingers.  And I thought how crazy we must seem, how witchy and macabre to speak of blood and death and birth and dirt with laughter and tears. She with her long dark hair and me with my red rimmed eyes and long, black coat.

I wrote this 9 days after my miscarriage. I dreaded running into the other parents at Little Bear’s school and having to tell them of our loss, so I got in touch with one of the mothers who is very warm and extroverted.  I figured I could count on her to be kind and perhaps share with others what had happened. 

It was awkward: I had to look up her email and then email to ask if I had the correct address and if she minded me emailing her. She responded immediately and so I wrote to her and told her about the miscarriage.  She wrote back and said she had experienced a similar loss, offering to meet and talk with me in the next few days. 

I was stunned by her generosity and vulnerability.  She left her two children with her husband and showed up with flowers.  I will never forget that meeting. 

Before bed, with Little Bear

We are lying side-by-side on Little Bear’s bed about to begin our nightly ritual of stories and songs in the dark.  Just before we begin, Little Bear references an earlier conversation about my placing a shell beside his baby brother whom we are going to bury in a few days.

Little Bear: Did you give him one of my shells?

Me: No, I gave him one of mine.  I wouldn’t give him one of yours without asking.

Little Bear: Do you have more of your shells so I can have one too?  You didn’t give him your only shell?  I want one.

Me: Oh, yes, you can have one of my shells for your very own.

Little Bear: I want one that is red or gold or pink.  If the shells are just pale, I don’t want one.  You didn’t him your only shell? You saved one for me, right?

I smile in the dark.  Here it is: sibling rivalry and my son’s younger brother isn’t even alive.  We had been speaking of the burial that is happening in a few days. Before sleep is the place where I learn what is on the heart and mind of my child.  It’s a liminal space, lying together in the dark, not sleeping, but not in the world of the day.  This is why bedtime has always been so precious to me (even on those nights when I just want him to go to sleep already).  Here is where I hear his fears or worries, what is puzzling him or some nugget I would never hear when he is busy running about.  Now is when we slow down, lie down together.  Our ritual is three stories, some singing and then sleep.

We used to read stories but then we started telling them in the dark.  For the longest time, I told him stories about vehicles; we created Diego the Dump Truck, Franny the Front Loader, etc and their adventures. For the past six or seven months, we have telling “Caillou and Rosie” stories.  He gets Caillou books from the library and sometimes enjoys Caillou episodes on netflix. Our Caillou and Rosie stories always begin in the same way: Once upon a time, there was a little boy named Caillou.  He and his sister Rosie would wake up early together every morning, go downstairs and make breakfast.  While they were eating, the bell would ring, ding dong and in would come Little Bear and all the kids.

These stores always involve “Little Bear and all the kids.”  The “kids” are an assortment of children from his school and neighborhood, cousins and characters from books.  And they always solve a mystery.  Though I tell most of the story, there are parts we share.  He will often talk for Little Bear, though if he doesn’t want to speak and I’m pausing, waiting for him to add his part, he’ll say, “you” and that means I speak for Little Bear. Other times, he’ll jump in and narrate the action, often with some wild twist in plot that only a four year old could come up with.  Or he’ll speak as one of the characters (And then Harriet said, Come on!  Let’s go jump on the spaceship!).

But there is always a mystery, like I said.  And the mystery is always solved, most often by the end of the story, but if not, we solve the mystery in the second story.  And there is never more than three stories.

Tonight, the mystery my son announces in character is this: we are looking for a box.

Me, as Paloma (one of the kids): What kind of a box?

Little Bear, as Little Bear: A box with my baby in it.

Me, as Paloma: A box with your baby in it? Why is your baby in a box?

Little Bear, Little Bear: Because he died.

Me, as Paloma: How did he die?

Little Bear, as Little Bear: He came out too early.

Me, as Paloma: Too early?  What do you mean?

Little Bear: Mommy, you know.

Me, as Mommy: You want me to speak for Little Bear?

Little Bear: Yes.

Me, as Little Bear: My baby came out of my mommy’s belly too early, so he died.

Me, as Paloma: Oh. What’s his name?

Little Bear, as Little Bear: His name is Julian Skye.

Suddenly, writing this, I can’t recount any more of our conversation, for I  just realized something: as the character interacting with my son, I did not ask him how he feels.  I’m stunned by this.  How could I have missed the opportunity to ask my son how he feels about his baby brother dying?

I suppose I did not ask him because I was in character.  As another child, I asked him what a child would ask, not a mother or a therapist.

He went on to tell me the baby would be buried.  And then he had me play Little Bear again, telling the kids (and himself, of course) what was going to happen when we buried him. From there, we broke out of the story and Little Bear asked the questions he must have been wanting to ask for days:  Did we dress the baby?  What about the baby’s skin?  What does his skin look like? Does he have bones?

Suddenly, I regretted not giving my son a chance to see Julian’s body.  It had been so important for me and Sweet Pea.  But my son?  Speaking so frankly about the death of his baby brother already feels like such a taboo.  And we had been hiding the fact that Julian’s body was stored in the freezer (see https://givemethesky.wordpress.com/2014/11/14/little-bear-wants-to-know/).

But now, he had to know.  The mystery of where the box was located had to be solved and it was. Next morning, first thing, Little Bear asked to look in the freezer.  So, we did.

Now there are two

I feel embarrassed that we are planning a small ceremony and burial for our baby boy. I feel embarrassed that we named him.  I can hear the jeering, mocking comments in my head.  I didn’t know him. How can I feel this way over someone I never knew?

And I don’t like that I’m embarrassed.  When will I stop feeling embarrassed for who I am, for what I care about, for how I live my life?

The shooting pains down my legs are normal, the midwife said. I’ve been bleeding for four days.  At times, only a little.  At others, I can barely stand the pain, lying down with a hot water bottle on my belly, my back.

This is what I want, what needs to happen.  I need every trace of you gone.  My uterus shrinking to the size of my fist – or smaller? I do not know the proper size.  All I know is that it grew, rounded and firm.  The day before you emerged tiny and perfect in my hands, the midwives had felt my belly, found the top of my uterus and told me, this is exactly the size you should be.  Exactly the size, but something was wrong, despite my high, firm, rounded belly, despite the perfection of your hands, your slender legs.  Something went terribly wrong and for this, I bleed.  For this, I cry at moments I least expect.

And I feel so silly for being so sad.  I never knew you, you tiny creature, my little son. But even now, writing this, I feel a catch in my throat.  Before your arrival, any time I wrote or thought the word, “son,” I meant only one: my firstborn.  But on that day,  I held in my hands a small baby boy who came from my body, my blood.  Is not the word for a male child I have birthed, “son?” So, now there are two.  I have had two sons, one of whom came early and died.

My tiny someone

You’re in a box in the freezer, wrapped in velvet cloth, a shell beside you for the ocean you will never see.  You should be in my belly, growing, not in a box waiting for burial, waiting for us to be ready to say goodbye.

Right now, we can barely breathe, let alone say the words we will wish we had said when we lay you in the dirt.

Right now, we are getting through.  Making sandwiches and soup. Sleeping in the day.  Crying in the night. Walking the dogs.  Reading to the older brother you will never meet, who may never be an older brother.

A neighbor called across the yard today, laughing, “How are you feeling? Pregnant, right?”

I shook my head and walked to the fence, not wanting to shout, I lost the baby. A boy. He came early on Friday. I held him in my hands, but I cross to her and say these words, followed by the words I say but do not mean: “We’re okay.”

And maybe those words are true. We ARE okay.  We’re not dead, right? But someone has died.  A tiny someone I carried in my body.

You have perfect feet, little nostrils, tiny hands.  Your eyes shut tight, eyes I’ll never see or kiss. I’m sorry, baby.  We wanted you. For your short life you were loved. You will always be loved, even if you never heard those words. Even as you will always be lost, to us.

What can I do for you?

I’m eating honey on bread.  Hot tea and squares of dark chocolate sit beside me on the table.  D brought the jar of honey when she drove in from Buffalo,  along with a card and flowers.  M and S dropped off a lasagna from Costco.  Sweet Pea’s mother and boyfriend sent us fruit.  J and T gave us bread, cheese, chocolate, apples and took our son for the afternoon.  Now, we are building a box for the baby we will bury in our back yard, the little boy who arrived too early, but looked perfect just the same.  Our tears flow easily because our living little boy is with our friends.

Show up when people lose a child – a baby, a pregnancy, no matter how early or how young.  Don’t ask what you can do, just do it.  A card, flowers, food; it doesn’t matter what it is or how much.  What matters to those grieving is that you express your care.  By doing these things, you show that it mattered to you too.  That this loss is real.

The day after

I feel like I am going insane.  This didn’t really happen, did it?  Did I dream it – that I was pregnant, that is? This whole experience, how do I make sense of it?  I can’t sleep when I lie down to go to bed. And I can’t bear my thoughts — over and over I write emails or have conversations about what has occurred.  This lack of sleep makes one mad.  I know this.  I need to sleep.  But just now, I get up to go to the bathroom and then into the kitchen for a few bits of banana and it hits me, this feel of unreality, of now knowing if this is true, of doubting I had ever been pregnant.  I feel crazy, unmoored.  The experience in the bathroom at work, bleeding while I held my baby in my hands.  A baby.  My baby?

I need to stop this and sleep.  I have lost reason.  And with that, I lose hope.

I will get through this. With time and care, this sorrow will lesson.  It hurts. It hurts terribly.  I did not think it would hurt so much.  I did not think it would happen.  Oh, I worried about it happening, but as time went on, I let myself settle into believing it was going to be okay.  And it was not.

Why does this feel like humiliation? Why do I want to hide? Do I blame myself, my body? Is it because the experience is not the one heralded as the true experience of motherhood — a joyful pregnancy followed by an adoring and contented postpartum-hood and a lifetime of caring and commitment for one’s child? This experience deviates so severely from that narrative, I am left breathless, shamed, unseen, abhorrent. The bleeding, the pain, the silent birthing of a still baby, the placenta which followed, the milk which beaded on my nipples in the bath tonight, milk intended for a tiny, eager mouth.

I feel so foolish grieving over a baby I didn’t know. I feel so selfish and foolish wanting another one, when I have one already: so perfect, so whole.

How can it hurt so much?

My little astronaut

You were perfectly formed: your feet, your nose, little hands, eyes closed. While I was trying to love you, you were leaving me – a reason it seems for the ambivalence that came over me just days ago, a premonition that our connection had been severed, perhaps.

The midwife said you look like you had recently passed, fresh if you will, not like a baby who died a while ago, so the movement I felt only four days ago may have been true.  It may have been you letting me know for the last time that you are here. You were here. My body, your body: proof.

I held you while I bled.  You fit in my hand, your umbilical cord stretched out broken from where it should have been attached. My little astronaut floating in the space of my body, now set free.

And now, I love you, this is certain.  I miss the child you might have been, the man perhaps you may have become.