Miscarriage: Fighting Fear and Harboring Hope

            “It is that turning [Jesus] wants for them, which is why he tweaks their fear. Don’t worry about…the things that can come crashing down on your heads, he tells them. Terrible things happen and you are not always to blame. But don’t let that stop you from doing what you are doing. That torn place your fear has opened up inside of you is a holy place. Look around while you are there. Pay attention to what you feel. It may hurt you to stay there and it may hurt you to see, but it is not the kind of hurt that leads to death. It is the kind that leads to life.”

                                                            ~ Barbara Brown Taylor in Home By Another Way  

________________________________________________________________________

            While Victoria’s death suctioned the life out of me and left me feeling certain the acute visceral pain of grief would actually kill me, news of this baby’s death left me anchored in an atmosphere of female inadequacy. My heart felt heavy, weighted down and resigned to being eternally wrapped in a ball and chain of perpetual sadness and defeat.  

           

            The following Friday, August 12—one week after the initial miscarriage diagnosis—I returned to Dr. Gordon’s office for the mandatory re-check. Although I’d experienced no further bleeding or cramping, I did continue to feel nauseated and fatigued. He attributed the fatigue to stress and felt the queasiness was the result of still-elevated hormone levels. He assured me, again, that it would take time. All I could do was nod wearily, smile weakly, and say, “Okay.”

           

            After discussing what to expect physically post-miscarriage, and when Chris and I could realistically, and safely, try again, he instructed me to go home, relax, and take a long soak in my spa tub.

           

            That suggestion surprised me. Hot spas or baths increase the risk of miscarriage. A previous neighbor had lost her baby after soaking in her backyard spa. His prescription sounded so good, so inviting. So…unnerving.

           

            Maybe I still wanted so badly to believe that I continued to carry a baby in my womb that my overactive imagination manufactured hopeful feelings that I might still be pregnant. I knew Dr. Gordon was considering the optimal prescriptions for my recovery from another loss, but I couldn’t do it. I just couldn’t give up on my pinhead-sized hope.

           

            Just maybe they’re wrong, I thought. The pathology report hadn’t returned yet, so we didn’t know what kind of tissue I’d lost; and I had experienced the same problem during Victoria’s pregnancy. All of the doctors had been convinced then that I’d miscarried when I hadn’t. 

            It’s probably just leftover tissue causing my elevated hormone levels. I’m probably living in a dream world, here. But what if they’re wrong, and I do something stupid to jeopardize my baby’s life?

           

            Yet both Dr. Gordon and Dr. Landry concurred: I could expect to be nauseated for some time until my hormones leveled off. This was nothing to get excited or concerned about.

           

            I went home and tried to get back to life. 

           

            And the following night, even though we had to recognize our new loss, Chris and I had a wonderful date. Anticipating the birth of another child would have made our eleven-year anniversary celebration sweeter and more memorable, but we had so much to celebrate and so much for which we could be thankful.

            Despite my attempts to ignore it, my queasiness had worsened—not waned—as the days elapsed. I needed the relaxation of the soothing moist heat, but I still wasn’t going to climb in that hot tub. I could do that anytime. I don’t want to look back on this with a lot of what if’s floating around like sticky cobwebs in my mind. I’ll wait. Just a little longer. I’ll wait.

           

            Even if my tingling expecations were unrealistic, and I painted a pathetic picture of desperateness, I was going to cling to those vestiges of hope and maybes until someone proved me nuts.

           

                                               

********************

           

           

            Four days later, the nausea was bad enough to prompt a call to Dr. Landry. He was out of town, but his partner patiently listened on the phone to me prattle on about my concerns. “If you are that concerned, we can arrange for a blood test to be performed which will show us your hormone levels. That should tell us if they are continuing to rise—as they do in a normal pregnancy—or are leveling off. There might also be the possibility of a remnant of embryonic tissue causing the hormones to increase, which would require a D & C to remove. Other than that...(audible sigh), I can’t honestly explain why you would still be so nauseous. You can have blood drawn, and Dr. Landry will call you with the results when he gets back on Thursday.”

           

            I needed that blood test if only for my own sanity, particularly since a second home pregnancy test lit up with those positive pink lines. Checking and re-checking; hoping and hanging on. The unknown drove me into an agitated state.

           

            The blood was drawn, and the days ticked off while I anxiously awaited Dr. Landry’s call. When I spoke with him on Thursday, before the results had returned, he sounded irritated at my insistence about the possibility that I might be pregnant.

           

            “Hormone levels can stay high for quite a long time,” he snipped. “And I refuse to believe you’ve had an immaculate conception!”       

           

            Confusion rocked my brain as I struggled with feeling as though I’d just been slapped through the phone for saying something stupid. Did I miss part of the conversation? I felt a sudden plummet of my intelligence quotient.

           

            “What are you talking about?” I muttered.

           

            “I refuse to believe that you miscarried, then immediately had intercourse and became pregnant again!” He was nearly shouting at me, and I felt my resolve and hopes slipping like sand through a sieve.

           

            That was not my definition of an immaculate conception but I assured him his version was impossible. Chris and I had declared a hiatus until everything was clearly back to normal.

           

            “Well, the blood tests are not back yet, “ he sighed in a tone mixed with fatigue and frustration. “I will call you when they come in.”

           

            I’m driving everyone nuts, I thought, including myself! Hang it up, Andrea. It’s all a pipe dream.

           

            Yet something deep within me wouldn’t allow me to hang it up.

           

            Languishing through another night of nausea, I stared all night at the ceiling fan. Just what did they find in that ominous little tube filled with my vital fluid? That precious red fluid harboring critical information about whether I still carried life within me…or not.

_____________________________________

NEXT WEEK: God trumps human wisdom…

_____________________________________

Until next week,

Thanks for joining me!

Blessings,

Andrea

Miscarriage: Fear, Sorrow and Unmet Expectations…

            In jubilant giddiness, with the vision of those pink test strip lines lingering in my mind, I practically skipped to the car with Parker that Friday morning. It was a beautiful August day, and I planned to attend my gym’s aerobic class and then take Parker to the movie theater to see the weekly children’s movie. With season tickets, our Friday movie adventure had become a fun, highly anticipated ritual.

           

            After checking him into the gym’s child-care room, I headed into the aerobics area to carefully set up my steps and select dumbbells and Thera-bands. I eased into the first several minutes of the workout, carefully avoiding any twisting and abdominal work.

           

            Now let me stop my story right here for a minute. For those of you have read through my blog from the beginning, know my story, and “suffered” through Victoria’s death and the circumstances surrounding it, you might be asking yourself at this point, “Andrea, what were you thinking!? Are you nuts!? You should have known better than to do any kind of exercising, given your pregnancy history.”

           

            Well, maybe I should have. Or maybe I was just too giddy and hormone-infused to think straight. Or maybe I just so desperately wanted to be “normal” like other women. Whatever it was, I went to the gym.

           

            Not more than ten minutes into the aerobics exercise, I felt that distinctive flow familiar to all women. I bolted from the gym and sprinted to the bathroom, where—in terror—I stared at the slowly emerging blood. “Oh, please, God! Not again; I can’t take this again!”

           

            I thought I was mumbling, but a woman quickly emerged from a stall and asked if she could help, after first locating me lying on one of the changing benches. I managed a controlled, “No, but thank you,” and briefly explained my fears. While talking to her, my mind raced to engineer an action plan. If there were any action plan available to me at that point.

           

            Dr. Gordon’s office is just across the street, I thought. If I can just make it over there in the car without bleeding anymore, I might be able to have him look at me. Like a woman on an impossible, desperate mission—which she knows only too well she is likely to lose, but remains driven to continue in spite of odds or logic—I scooped up my gym bag, snagged Parker from his play room, smirked briefly at the child-care attendant who looked me up and down and said in a mildly sarcastic tone, “But you just got here!” and left the building as quickly and gingerly as I could.

           

            Within minutes, I stood trembling at Dr. Gordon’s reception counter, babbling at his receptionist about what had happened, saying I was sorry, but I didn’t know what else to do, and was hesitant to drive forty minutes south to the other doctor’s office. Her suggestion that he might want me to go to the emergency room of his hospital for an exam terrified me even more. Not that emergency room, again! I thought. No way!

           

            I stood catatonic and wide-eyed at the counter, while she retreated down the hallway and disappeared into an examination room to locate Dr. Gordon. As she padded back up the hallway toward me, she assured me he’d see me right away, and then she escorted me to one of his comfortable, homey accommodations. Parker trailed behind me.

           

            If I can just get my feet up in the air, maybe I can stop this from happening, I thought. After carefully scaling the examination table and assuming the head-down position with which I was so familiar, I stared at the ceiling tiles, twiddled my thumbs and awaited Dr. Gordon’s arrival. Parker proceeded to investigate the room and its unusual crannies, while I fought to keep my heart from escaping the confines of my chest cavity. Finally, Dr. Gordon entered the room.

           

            I blurted out my condition and fears, and, after a soothing word and sympathetic look, Dr. Gordon conducted an examination. After several minutes, he extracted what appeared to him to be placental tissue. Within seconds, I started cramping.

           

            “If you haven’t miscarried already, you are probably in the process of doing so,” he announced. “It’s nothing you did,” he rapidly assured me. “Things like this happen all of the time, for a variety of reasons; many women miscarry who don’t even know they’re pregnant, don’t even suspect that they’ve lost an embryo. Just go home and relax. I’ll have the sample sent to the pathology lab for evaluation. I suspect it will be normal, but if it’s not, then we’ll have more tests to perform.” It all sounded so clinical, but I was used to clinical. Being used to clinical briefly made my brain switch to a mode of hearing facts I wasn’t personally related to. Textbook facts. That’s all they were: textbook facts, and I was the specimen experiencing them. My brain switching into that mode afforded me some protection against losing every last sense of sanity I possessed. 

           

            Then Dr. Gordon ran through the possibilities falling in the “abnormal” category along with the possible scenario of excess tissue remaining in the uterus. I heaved a sigh, resigned to the realization that nothing more could be done.

           

            Dr. Gordon helped me to a sitting position.

           

            I was numb.

           

            “Chris doesn’t even know I’m pregnant. I was planning to surprise him tomorrow night at dinner,” I mumbled pathetically.

           

            With a sincere, commiserating expression, he said, “Chris is a great guy. It will be hard, but you will both be fine. I want to see you next week; I should have the pathology report back by that time.”

           

            What am I going to do now? I thought. I no longer wanted to sit through a movie at the theater, but I didn’t want to be alone, or answer any of Parker’s persistent questions.

           

            What I wanted was to crawl into bed and block out the world. Is this what infertile couples go through? I wondered. Months of unsuccessful efforts, only to find out one day you’re pregnant—and then the next day you’re not? How could they continue on the roller coaster for months, or years?

           

            I had nothing to complain about. I already had a beautiful, healthy child. So why did that feeling of incompleteness and failure, of being robbed of reproductive ability and joy rage through me? Why do I have to be so abnormal?

           

            Clutching Parker’s soft little hand, I shuffled across the parking lot to the pay phones located outside the grocery store. Oh, I hope he answers the phone, my mind groaned. A relentless ache pummeled my heart as I dialed Chris’s office.

           

            “Hello,” came the familiar voice over the receiver.

           

            “Hi,” I squeaked. Not this way, I thought. I don’t want to tell him this way. He deserves better. I tried so hard to sound strong. I wanted so badly to remain cool and controlled, but that veneer sheered off in a nanosecond.

           

            “I need you to come home; I just had a miscarriage!” I blurted, dissolving into tears.

           

            The words spewed from my lips. “I just came from Dr. Gordon’s office, and I’ve had a miscarriage. I don’t want to be alone; I can’t be alone!” I screeched into the phone. “I was going to surprise you with the news tomorrow night; I’ve known since Wednesday. I gulped in air. “I wanted it to be a surprise! Oh, I’m so sorry.” I gulped in more air. “Will you come home?” I begged.

           

            “You go home,” Chris said. “I’m leaving right now.”

           

            “Thanks…I’m sorry, Chris.” I whispered. “I’ll see you in a little while…I love you.” I re-cradled the receiver onto the pay phone.

           

            What must he think of having such an inadequate wife who presents him with so many health problems? I wondered.

           

            Still clutching Parker’s hand, I struggled to tell my him why we’d have to skip the movie and go home. Then I quickly abandoned my attempts to explain anything to him. Explanations seemed useless and inadequate. He had no idea what just transpired. All he understood was that his extremely upset Mommy was bleeding again.

           

            The small parking lot appeared to stretch endlessly in front of us as we walked back toward Dr. Gordon’s office building. Hours earlier, I’d eagerly anticipated my Saturday night date with Chris, where I’d beam proudly and expose my precious secret. I had acted it out countless times.

           

            Now I had to muster all of my emotional energy reserves to drag myself and an invisible weight across the hot, radiating asphalt. At least the cramping has stopped, I noticed with gratefulness while sliding into the car.

           

            No more cramping. No more baby. That was swift and final.

           

            When will this nightmarish ride end?

           

            Maybe Chris and I would have to end it…right here.

___________________________________________

NEXT WEEK: God plays His hand…and we begin the ride of our lives…

___________________________________________

Until next week,

Thanks for joining me!

Blessings,

Andrea

           

            

Trying Again: Pregnancy Fears and Anxiety After A Loss

            A funny thing happened when I finally decided to slow down, remove Parker from preschool, and learn the fine art of how to be a wife and mother. I relaxed. Really  r-e-l-a-x-e-d. And so did Parker and Chris.

           

            Parker finally stopped asking all of those morbid, rapid-fire questions regarding my health, his health made a miraculous improvement, and Chris seemed to like being home more because edginess and anxiety no longer reigned supreme in the house. The family atmosphere meter registered somewhere between happiness and contentment, all of the time. And, to Parker, all was finally right with the world. He had his mom’s full attention and we spent hours sprawled on his bedroom floor overseeing the function of an extensive Lego airport.

           

            We even started taking a three-day vacation every month, and launched our family’s love of train travel by riding the Amtrak rails to Santa Barbara one weekend. We felt like a thriving family again.

           

            And I got the first inkling that my emotional and spiritual healing had made progress when the question of trying again to have another child started rattling around my brain.

           

            Should I, could I, would I? How does Chris feel? Would Chris even want to try? Is he finally ready to discuss it?

           

            It turned out that Chris had healed a lot emotionally and spiritually, too, because he was finally able to discuss it. When I asked him how he felt about it, he said he was interested, and ready to try again.

           

            “Well, do you remember what you said to me when I was lying in bed with Victoria, receiving treatment for my severe morning sickness?” I asked him tenuously.

           

            Chris blinked in response.

           

            “You said to me, ‘I don’t know about you, but if something happens to this pregnancy, I’m not going to want to go through this again.’”

           

            Chris blinked again, then nodded slowly. “I do.”

           

            “Are you positive you want to try again, then?” I nudged. “Absolutely sure? Because I’m not going to even attempt to have another baby if I’m going to be a single parent again, with you working on getting some other business venture off the ground, while I’m going through a possibly tenuous pregnancy, raising Parker pretty much on my own, and holding everything together around here. It’s not fair to Parker or me; and I won’t do it. It cost us way too much last time.”

           

            My words were greeted with a moment of thick silence before Chris responded. “I

know. And I’m ready, and I’ll be here. We should try again.”

           

            “Even in spite of the high possibility of my having another placenta previa?” I didn’t have to tack on the line, “I might die this time, you know. Are you ready to confront that possibility?” although I knew both of us were thinking the same thing.

           

            He took a deep breath as I tried to read his eyes. 

           

            “I’m ready. We should try.”

           

            We sealed our pact with a hug and kiss. And once again I went to the Lord on my knees.

           

            “God, am I in Your will, here? Are we in Your will? I want Your will to be done, not mine. I’m prepared to give everything up to You.” Then I sneaked in a request for a smooth, uneventful, easy and enjoyable pregnancy, like Parker’s had been. Yet even as I asked for all of that, I knew in my heart that if I weren’t granted those pleasures, God would see me through it. He would not forsake me, in either a difficult pregnancy—or another loss.

           

            Saying those things in prayer were altogether different from outwardly displaying the peace and confidence those confident words implied. When Chris and I actually put our words into action, I rapidly liquefied into a jelly-like human amoeba.

           

            The abdominal pain, from which I suffered since my pregnancy with Victoria, increased. I started suffering what seemed like heart palpitations and rapid heart rate episodes accompanied by an annoying fainting sensation. Gall bladder attacks emerged as inescapable post-meal assaults. The doctors tested me for thyroid disturbances, gallstones, heart problems, scar tissue and aortic aneurysms. I received a thorough scouring over by an ultrasound technician, donated blood for analysis, wore a heart monitor for twenty-four hours, and had one of those lovely lower gastrointestinal enemas scheduled so they could take a digestive system peak.

           

            Meanwhile, during this three-month medical marathon, Chris and I attempted to verify our fertility during the monthly opportunity window. And that became an emotional, physical and spiritual burden. With each unsuccessful attempt, my heart plummeted and depression crept in like dark, persistent clouds smothering our hopes—until the next month’s opportunity window flipped over on the hormonal calendar, and we psyched ourselves up to try again.

           

            While we kept the home fires lit, the medical test results rolled in. All but one returned with a “normal” judgment. The abnormal blood test showed an increased potassium level, which may have been the culprit behind my heart palpitations. The highly scientific diagnosis: Cut down on the vast quantities of bananas and banana bread I consumed.

           

            In my anxiety, I’d driven my body into another steady state of constant panic and fear, and the stress had triggered a variety of illnesses. My bodily systems were in overdrive, unable to equilibrate and function properly; unable to maintain what physiologists and doctors call homeostasis—the happy status quo the body loves to maintain, for all systems to function properly.

           

            While unenthusiastically awaiting my lower GI enema test, it became evident to me during the first week of August of 1994, that I might be pregnant. With glee, I canceled the test—not allowed in pregnant women due to the body-assaulting radiation—and nibbled my lip until the magic time arrived to perform a pregnancy test. Being the impatient type, I headed to the store to purchase one of those over-the-counter, do-it-yourself models. (Back then, those pink line, “yes,” blue line, “no” wands had just become readily available in the grocery stores, and most women still sojourned to the doctor to provide their mid-stream-only test sample and fork over their co-payments to have the test read by a nurse. With only two to three weeks having transpired since possible conception, I suspected the results were likely to be inaccurate, or false, chucking my emotions right back in the depression basket.

           

            After pacing the bathroom floor for the prescribed waiting time, I closed my eyes, sucked in some air and then peeked apprehensively at the indicator.

           

            I blinked. Then I readjusted my vision and squinted at the wand protruding from my clenched hand, which was shaking spastically in front of my peering eyeballs.

           

            Pink lines.

           

            Positive pink lines!

           

            A firestorm of emotions ripped through me. Elation. Fear. Apprehension. Ambivalence. Yet thrill out-muscled the others and emerged the victor. Giddiness stretched my lips into an ear-to-ear smile and vision-clouding tears dribbled down my cheeks. I kneeled on the bathroom tile and choked out, “Thank you, God! Thank you…”

           

            Then my analytic mind kicked into gear. “Better get official test results from Dr. Landry before telling Chris,” I mumbled to myself. “Their high-tech equipment will provide a firm diagnosis.”

           

            I bounced, light-hearted through the day and managed to keep my secret through the night. The following morning, I waited on edge for Chris to leave the house and then called Dr. Landry’s office. Thankfully, they ushered me into an appointment that afternoon. After filling their cup, re-screwing the lid and gingerly setting it into the prescribed lab tray, I returned to the waiting room to jiggle my legs in anticipation of a verdict. Finally, the smiling nurse poked her head around the waiting room door corner and escorted me to Dr. Landry’s officer, where he sat immersed in some charts.

           

            Dr. Landry looked up, invited me to sit down, offered grinning “Congratulations,” instructed me to buy seasickness bands for the impending morning sickness and wrote out a prescription for pre-natal vitamins. Then he sent me home, “to relax.”

           

            Relax!? How would that happen? I  o-o-z-e-d euphoria and made mental plans to surprise Chris with the news Saturday night, when we had a scheduled date to celebrate our eleventh wedding anniversary. That was three days away. I’d have to keep my secret stuffed away until then and avoid donning the affectation of a Cheshire cat.

           

            What will he say, I wondered. Will he be excited? Stunned? Self-satisfied?

           

            I didn’t know what the future held, but, for that sweet, adrenaline-infused moment, I was going to soak myself in the supreme joy of knowing God was taking us down this road—one more time.

_________________________________________

NEXT WEEK: Fleeting joy and broken hearts…

_________________________________________ 

Until next week,

Thanks for joining me!

Blessings,

Andrea