Mean Girl

She says "No offence but..." and then says something completely offensive to me.

She says "I hope you dont mind but..." and then says something that she knows I will mind

She excludes me and makes me feel like a third wheel in my own friend group when she is the one who is new. And then says (to other people, mind you, not to me!) that she feels sad I took it personally. Because of course, it has to be me thats oversensitive,. I take things personally. It can't be that she was just a "mean girl".

When she hijacked my lunch plans, I said nothing. When she just automatically joined our friend group, I treated her like a friend. And THIS is how I get treated in return.

And my friend says to me "you're being sensitive". "you're just feeling anxiety and its coming out this way", It hurts.

It all hurts.

Sometimes I think why make friends at all.Its so hard to find someone who you actually click with and then something always happens. Or someone. And then you're left with your heart wide open with stab wounds and buried knives.

And pain.

Its time to practice being alone again. I know how. It just takes a little work closing the wounds.

Ups and Downs and Ups

Life is hard. Feelings are difficult to control. You can be puttering along, feeling happy and then suddenly, BHAM! the pain and hurt depression rears up and grabs you by the throat.

This is pretty much how I have been feeling the past few days. Things had been going well. I was making a good effort at losing weight, the diet was going well, and I felt positive about myself. I was working towards my goals. And then, out of the blue, the feelings of hopelessness and pain hit me.

Its not fair. Why am I forced to starve myself and to pray and beg and plead for something that should have been a normal facet of life? Other women, known to me personally, have no trouble. In fact, the one person actually got pregnant by accident and had to get married ahead of schedule. A classmate of mine from high school is expecting her second child. At least 5 other classmates have children who are 2-3 years old. Family members, friends, work colleagues.. all expecting a child or have had children in the last 2 years.

And the pain of losing my babies hit me again. Fresh, almost as if it had just happened, rather than having happened a full year ago. And the same words that were said to me last year were said again. Don't worry. It will happen. Just pray. Just be positive. You will have a child.

And all I could do is cry.

Slowly, I am pulling myself back out of this. It takes time to forget again. To make myself whole. To shut that door again and continue trying to move forward.
I recently read a passage that explains this better than I can.

Its from a book called "The Name of the Wind" by Patrick Rothfuss :

 

PERHAPS THE GREATEST FACULTY our minds possess is the ability to cope with pain. Classic thinking teaches us of the four doors of the mind, which everyone moves through according to their need.
...
Second is the door of forgetting. Some wounds are too deep to heal, or too deep to heal quickly. In addition, many memories are simply painful, and there is no healing to be done. The saying “time heals all wounds” is false. Time heals most wounds. The rest are hidden behind this door.
...
While my mind slept, many of the painful parts of the previous day were ushered through the second door. Not completely. I did not forget what had happened, but the memory was dulled, as if seen through thick gauze.

Silver Linings

The old cliché is there is always a silver lining hidden in every dark cloud. But when you are mired in that darkness, it is often difficult to find that lining. Everything happens for a reason and things happen according to Gods/Universes divine plan, I keep being told. And although I do believe that, while I was stuck in the dark it was incredibly hard to take comfort in it.

Recently, I read this post by Amy over at TTC Baby Blog. It is something that I think anyone who is going through a miscarriage or loss should read and take note of. For me, reading that post helped me to find my silver lining and restore my faith in the universe.
Perhaps my miscarriages and everything that happened after, was to make me appreciate what I had.

I am blessed to have a husband who would do anything for me, a beautiful home that I can call my own and a pair of doggies that love me unconditionally. I am still alive against incredible odds (for the second time in my life) and I still have hope for a child of my own. I have parents who gave me strength when mine was flagging and a network of family and friends that will always be there for me. To all of them, I say a huge thank you. I know it can't have been easy to watch my struggle with depression but you were always there, trying to help.

And I second what Amy said about never taking anything for granted when it comes to our future babies. Because we know how hard it was to get there, we will never ever take anything about them for granted. This point was driven home to me recently, as I watched a new mother basically hand off the responsibilities of caring for her baby to others in her family. It would make me crazy to see her not realising what a precious miracle she had, one that I would do anything for. To watch her not appreciate every single second she had with her baby and spend less time with him by choice, hurt me.

And then I realised that hidden within the pain was gift. When I do eventually have my baby, I will appreciate every second I have him. I will want to do as much as I can for him by myself. I will see him for what he is. A miracle that has come into my life. A blessing.

In Amy's words

"We have been conditioned to be the best parents on the face of the earth, and by that I feel lucky... "

Again Part 2...

And then it happened. So fast, I didn’t know what was happening. Pain, bright and sharp, exploded through me. Help me.

I lay on the floor, bent over, calling out, crying in pain. A thought flashed through my mind. “Maybe this isn’t real. Maybe I’m having a physical reaction to the emotional pain of losing the baby. It’s only been 6 days since the D&C. Maybe it’s all in my mind” That was logical, right? I felt hysterical.

But still the pain came in waves.

He was there, trying to help me. “Please, baby, I have to get you to the car. Try to get up.” I could hear him trying to reason with me, trying to get me up. For him, I tried. For him, because I could hear the fear in his voice.

We staggered out the room, and that was as far as I could make it. The blackness rushed in again and when I awoke I was freezing. The tiles beneath my body, the wall against my head, were all like ice.

Shivering made the spasms worse and every time the spasm wracked my body and involuntary cry of pain spilled from my lips.
He ran for a blanket, wrapped me in it. But I was still so cold.
Help arrived. The voices of my dad, my brother, interspersed with my husbands.

“What happened?”
“How do we move her?”
“She’s in too much pain... won’t let anyone touch her”
“... maybe the blanket ...”

Hands were moving me, trying to lift the blanket I was lying in, but that caused another spasm to rock through me.

“... place her on a board or platform ... keep her still”

Finally we made it to the car. As we sped toward the hospital, suddenly things became clear again. My vision returned and I was suddenly and completely aware of my surroundings. Of myself. And I realised that my tongue felt swollen and was sticking out my mouth as far as it would go. I turned frightened eyes toward my husband, and he looked at me not knowing what to do.

“Don’t worry,” he said to me. “We’ll get you to the hospital. They’ll help you.”
But when we got there, none of the doctors could figure out what was wrong. I wasn’t able to stand- I kept passing out- so the abdominal x-ray was inconclusive. Finally, they decided to do a CT scan. When the radiologist came to speak to my mother, I could hear snatches of the conversation.

“... pelvis and torso filled with fluid...”
“... Blood ...”
“... usually ectopic pregnancy ...”

I wasn’t pregnant. I had just lost my baby. My mind was screaming this out, while my body continued with its pain spasms.
None of the pain medication helped. All it did was deaden my body so that I couldn’t cry out, couldn’t brace against the spasm. Until finally, finally, I was taken into surgery. The anaesthetist injected his chemicals into my blood stream, the oxygen mask went on and I was finally free from the pain.

Later, they told me what a narrow miss I had had. They told me about how extremely rare it was for this happen. They told me that my baby had implanted in my tubes and though they had removed the sac, the placenta had kept growing in my tube until it ruptured. I had been bleeding internally, but they repaired it.

That tube is closed off, they told me. And this more than anything else, started my fall into depression. I was damaged. My body had rejected 2 babies, had killed them, and now my ability to try for another was diminished. And what right did I have to even try for another? Would my body then just reject the next one, kill another baby, so that I would go through this again?

People would tell me their stories. They knew exactly what I was going through. They had lost their babies too. And look, they went on to have children. When I would speak of my pain, I would be told that I must stop being negative. That it will happen for me too. But I can’t help but wonder, what if I try again and this time, I lose not only my baby, I lose myself?

Again Part 1..

9 weeks. I made it to 9 weeks without anything going wrong. Surely, surely this time, everything will be fine. I’ve done so many pee-on-a-stick tests. They all came out positive. This time, there is a baby there. Last time was just an aberration. My body wasn’t ready for it. I rushed to do a blood test too soon. That’s all it was. This time, I waited. This time I was more careful. I did everything I was supposed to. I took all my vitamins. I didn’t stress out about anything. I didn’t drive to work.

These were my thoughts as I waited in the waiting room for my first antenatal visit. The doctor’s rules were that he doesn’t see pregnant women until they were 9 weeks. I had waited, so impatiently, for those last 3 weeks to go by. And now, finally I was here. My husband waited there with me, nervous as well, but happy. We were going to see our baby for the first time. I couldn’t stop the what-if questions though. What if something was wrong again? What if...? Will I be able to handle another miscarriage?

Finally, we were admitted into the doctors’ rooms. He took my information and then off we went to the ultrasound room. The gel was cold on my skin and I shivered while the fear and anticipation tangled. I watched the screen as he moved the wand over me. And then he said

“Hmm”.

The fear won and my mind started screaming.
“Not again. Please, not again.”

Finally, he spoke.

“There is some cause for concern.”
“You should be nine weeks not six.”
“I think we should do some blood tests.”

The next day he called.

“Well, we knew there was cause for concern...”
“..Progesterone levels too low for a viable foetus ...”
“..Possible need to do an evacuation ...”

Two days later, I started to bleed. Again. It happened to me again.

We went back to see him on Monday.
“... the foetus hasn’t grown..”
“... need to do an evac today..”

When it was over, I wasn’t pregnant anymore. The baby was gone. Days passed. I began to heal. I can try again. The doctor will help me through the next one. He promised. I just have to wait a little while.

Blood

Blood. That first spec that showed was old, brown and thick. Nothing to worry about, she thought. The pain she’d been having that morning was normal. She had read about it. Just a little pain to show when the little ball of cells implanted itself into the walls of her body. Blood was common when that happened. Of course it was. Two hours later there was nothing. “See, nothing to worry about”, she told herself. An hour after that, there was a faint pink line. Heart beating a little faster than usual, that niggle of worry settled itself in at the back of her mind.

Another day went by with more of the same. The niggle of worry got stronger. That night, she stayed up reading stories that other women had written. Some said they worried for nothing. Some said that there was a reason to worry. She didn’t know what to think. “Just keep positive,” her husband told her. “Until we know for sure theres a problem, its better to hope there isn’t one. We don’t want to create a problem by worrying, do we?”

He made a lot of sense. Finally, finally she was able to sleep. The next morning, the stain was a little bigger. A little darker. A little more red. She showed it to him, and he hugged her.
“It will be alright,” he said. “And if it isn’t.. well, we’ll cross that bridge when we come to it.”
Logical. Reasonable, even. But the niggle of worry was not just a little niggle anymore. She spent the long drive to work calming herself with music. She could lose herself in the music and the concentration needed to drive safely. No room to think about what might or might not happen. Every now and again, she would place a hand on her belly and pray. She would tell the baby that she loved him. That she hoped he was ok in there.

He wasn’t. He wasn’t even a “he” or “she” in there. There was nothing. But she didn’t know that. In her mind, the baby lived. The pregancy test had said so, hadn’t it? When she arrived at work, the second she stepped out the car, she knew. Fighting fear, she walked as calmly as she could to her desk and dropped her bag. She would have to check of course. When she did, praying all the while that she was wrong, the shock was still incredible. She had felt it, but seeing was another thing entirely.

Blood. It was no spec. It was not old. It was not brown. And it was everywhere.