Loss: Acknowledgment and Healing. Or so I hope.

After reading some other blogs of mommies who have babies in heaven it brings back some memories that are sorta tough and that I sadly don't like to bring up or acknowledge. In Oct 2008 I miscarried my first baby. It was early, very very early in the pregnancy.  So early that I've tried to 'discount it' when I did have to talk about it to my doctors. But in private, I still get weepy thinking about it. I never even talked about it to family or friends really until recently and even then, I sorta just brush it off.  And then later that day my conscious will kill me about brushing off such a thing.  And then I cry.

Here's my story, I'm putting it to words to not only acknowledge what happened but to be more at peace with it as well. I suppose you could say that the Lord was merciful in that I didn't have to have the procedure to remove the fetus (which would have broken my heart more). Instead my body removed it on its own, which was painful, in more ways than one. That is actually what led me to the doctor.

So, I'd had a period a couple weeks prior as normal. Then sort of out of the blue, I started having really, really bad cramps and abdominal pain like I'd never had before. I had this strange urge to go to the bathroom and when I did, I had this burning pain and a lot of blood. When I looked down, I saw this little bean shaped thing probably the size of a lentil. It sort of looked like a blood clot...but different. Something inside of me, in my heart, ached an ache I never had felt before.  I bled a little more and still felt pretty ill, so I called my doctor.

They got me in right away and asked if I could be pregnant. I wasn't sure, I mean we weren't trying per se but we we also weren't preventing. He did a urine test. It was positive. A rush of emotions filled me. First came panic - what had happened to me in the bathroom? Was it a miscarriage? Was it an ectopic pregnancy? Was this accurate? Then came that joy: oohh, pregnant! Yay!
I tried to keep a level head and my doctor and I spoke about some possibilities and it kept coming back to the opinion that he was pretty sure that I'd had a miscarriage or what he termed: a spontaneous abortion (aka my body had killed it just as soon as it had formed).

Naturally, I say: but the test just showed positive?!  He said that the hormones in my body via the urine test would linger for a day or two even after miscarrying. He asked me to come back in 2 days to do a blood draw for a definitive determination.

I made up my mind to not try to get excited or say anything to anyone outside of Sam for fear that it might have been a miscarriage and I wouldn't want anyone else to ride that emotional rollercoaster.

The next couple days were pretty emotional and stressful. I wasn't sure what to feel. I kept trying to keep myself occupied so I wouldn't think about it. Friday morning came and I went over for the blood draw. I went home and tried to keep my mind off of it all.  They'd know the results by Monday sometime they said.
I got a phone call Saturday morning from the doctor. He was gentle but blunt, the result was: Not Pregnant. He said I'd likely miscarried as we had discussed.

I spent the day sad, teary and wondering what had gone so wrong. It was way to early to find out the sex or to feel anything.  After all, in reality, I had just barely even been pregnant. He figures at best, I was 3-4 weeks, possibly even less.  But to know that I had been and was no longer and to recall what I had seen in the bathroom was just overwhelming and so sad.

So I did what many do when something awful happens. I blocked it out, pretended it didn't happen and moved on.

Except that during quiet times I'd think about it.

Even after I got pregnant with Mr Man, I thought about it (in fact, my entire first trimester I lived in fear and in a mild state of panic that I'd miscarry).
I still think about that miscarriage and that baby. I never got to know was it a boy or a girl and that honestly haunts me. In one way I'm glad I don't know, because if I had known the sex it'd mean that I miscarried much later and what an even more tragic and horrid experience that would have been. But at the same time, I don't know really what to mourn besides a 'bean'. A life. I'm not sure if that makes sense to anyone but me.

I feel bad even now thinking about it. I feel bad that if I mourn that loss or wish that I hadn't miscarried, it would mean that I wouldn't have my Mr Man. And I cannot imagine being without my precious little boy.  But all the same, I'm still sad in the quiet times when I'm alone with my thoughts.

I am over the moon for the child I have and wouldn't trade him for anything. I love him more than I could ever express. I'm happy for what I have and hopeful for another (or two?) in the future. But I think now, I'm at peace with the fact that its okay to remember and even to be sad a little. That me being sad about what I lost doesn't diminish what I have. In fact, maybe it makes me even more thankful.