When Eggs Go Bad...

Because I said so

It was the possibilities I lost

That day. Those hours, those years

Of football games

And packed lunches;

Of watching through the rain

To see you trudging

Wet and shivering from school.

Kissing you, steaming by the radiator as you dry,

One eye already on the TV.

 

“Mum, why can’t I?!”

“Because I said so.”

 

And later, head bent over school books

And secrets you think I am too old to notice.

 

Who would you be?

 

I did not lose a baby that day.

I lost you. And the possibilities.

That loss, stark against the antiseptic white and hospital green,

Like a living thing. You were not.

 

But you were.

And were loved.

Because I said so.

(c) Liz Smith, 2008

This time...

This time 10 years ago, I had just left my psychological bully of a first husband. I didn't know it yet, but within months I would be embroiled in a desperate attempt to keep custody of my daughter. I eventually got shared custody, which brought daily misery to my life until just this year.

This time 5 years ago, I was recovering from an 8 week stint with viral meningitis. I was so desperate to have a normal Christmas that I made my partner take me to our work Christmas do. I think we managed to stay out until 9.00pm.

This time 3 years ago, partner had become husband and we had dreams of starting a family.

This time 2 years ago, we celebrated Christmas while grieving 4 lost babies and wondering if we'd ever have a child together.

This time last year, I had lost another baby, but its twin was alive and well inside me. I wondered whether he would come before Christmas. He did.

This time this year, I have had nearly a year with my precious boy and his amazing big sister who is turning into a young woman before my eyes. I have seen my husband be a daddy. I have heard a young voice call him dada.

This time thing. This wibbly-wobbly, timey-wimey, heals-all thing. It's really rather amazing, isn't it.

Happy Holidays.

A Funny Turn

I'm not sure whose body I'm carting around, but it's sure as hell not mine. I have my suspicions that it belongs to a cat-burgling bowling enthusiast as I seem to have somehow secreted a large and exceedingly heavy bowling ball about my person. I'm not doing a spectacular job of hiding it, either.

At my last midwife appointment, all was well. Blood pressure normal, pee normal, measuring precisely where I should be, and Bad Boy's heart rate was good. The only problem at this point is that he is still in the breech position. There's still plenty of time for him to turn, I'm told, but it does raise the issue of a possible Ceasarian section. Nevertheless, everything looks good, and I should be basking in these last few weeks of pregnancy, right?

Um, no, not so much.

The ghosts of my dead babies apparently have not yet been laid to rest so I have spent the past week becoming more and more anxious, peaking at terror on Tuesday when I was convinced that Bad Boy had died. I hadn't felt movement for several hours, it seemed, and usually I am pummelled on a fairly regular basis from within. I ended up in my office, door closed, prodding my belly and begging him to move. He did. I cried.

I honestly thought I had come to terms with my earlier losses. After the unrelenting anxiety of the first trimester, I had spent the second trimester and 6 weeks of the third feeling good about everything; confident, even. I have no idea why suddenly I should feel this sense of doom. Maybe it's the small skull and crossbones magnet that appeared mysteriously on the floor last week. Mr Badeggs stuck it on the fridge, assuming it belonged to the teenager (I think he's secretly hoping she's a latent Goth; I believe he still has some black nail varnish from his own youth that he can share). But Badeggs Daughter professes to know nothing about it, and it's definitely not mine or Mr B's. The really spooky thing is that a similar small skull magnet made an appearance in our old house and that one, too, belonged to no one. Mr B disposed of said skull and crossbones this morning. (I asked him to remove it from the house, but he tossed it in the bin. I can see I am going to have to dig it out tonight and hurl it into a field somewhere.)

I suppose at the root of the matter is the fact that I am still angry that we ended up losing so many babies in a row, something that happens to only 3 women in a thousand. When someone tries to reassure me now by telling me that something is exceedingly rare, I just laugh bitterly. Rare maybe, but someone still has to suffer it, and God has indicated in no uncertain terms that I am his bitch. So I guess I am waiting for the sword to fall.

I wake up in the middle of the night for yet another trip to the loo and end up lying awake worrying about cord accidents and excess amniotic fluid, and not enough amniotic fluid, and the excessively cruel incidence of 'unexplained stillbirths' and it's all I can do not to race to hospital and insist they remove my baby from my womb so that I can physically watch over him. Not being able to see what is going on inside me is a source of extreme agitation, and I know I must be passing those feelings on to Bad Boy. The poor child will be a nervous wreck by the time he's born. He'll come out like some tiny Woody Allen, looking pale and slightly terrified of life.

I have decided that if he stays breech, I'm definitely going for a C-section. The hospital would support a 'natural' birth (read stirrups and forceps), and my midwife has even said she'd support me doing it at thome (ass pointed skywards; very dignified). But for the latter, as much as I'd like to do it, I'd also need to hire an independent midwife who has experience of breech birth and at £2500 it's out of the question. And, frankly, given my (admittedly irrational) worries, I just want a quick swipe of the scalpel and to have my baby in my arms. If it means 6 weeks or more of pain and discomfort, so be it. I have people to help.

I hope this anxiety quells itself, I really do. I've been going back for acupuncture to try to turn the baby, but next session I am going to ask for treatment just for me. if Bad Boy doesn't want to turn, I'm not going to try to make him.

Wish us luck.

Thirtysomething

I can't believe I've managed 30 weeks of gestation tomorrow. When I think of the torture of those first 12 or 13 weeks, how we expected every scan to reveal the worst, I'm amazed we've come this far. Bad Boy moves pretty much constantly and apparently has strong opinions as to how I position myself at my desk, on the sofa, in bed. If he doesn't like it, he lets me know. Or I could be wrong; he could be doing little happy dances to let me know he likes my choice of posture. I can't be sure.

I'm so happy to still be pregnant, but I have come to realise just how much damage my miscarriages did to my psyche. I'm no longer the relatively easy-going and forgiving person I once was. These days I am quick to judge, I don't suffer fools gladly, and I find myself getting very irritated by things that would never have bothered me before. I keep people at a distance more than ever now. I was never a truly gregarious person, but I was always friendly. Now, I find I have to force myself to stay in touch with all but my best friends and as for making new ones, I'm just not interested. Most people just annoy me. Or that's what I tell myself. The truth is something altogether deeper, I'm just not sure what it is. Maybe some fear of getting close to someone. Two very close friendships have ended this year (my handiwork, though not, I feel, without provocation). One was a direct result of the miscarriages; the other when I realised that I just couldn't be what this person needed me to be. So maybe I'm just scared of having to make that decision again? Or maybe I am just a stupid, arrogant bitch, as someone called me recently (a total stranger; nice).

I'm bitter, there's no escaping that. I feel angry a lot, and I'm worried I'll end up one of those old women who scares everybody, and whose house the neighbourhood kids egg when they're not spreading rumours about how I live on cat food and bourbon. Yet I don't know how to change!

My only hope is that I'm still pregnant. Maybe, somehow, seeing my son for the first time will help dissolve some of this latent rage, this blackness I feel for everyone and everything. Or maybe it will  be the start of post partum depression that will just consolidate it all. I'm really scared of what I'm feeling.

Turned Off

For those who are interested (and it looks like there's really not that many), I've disabled comments on this blog.

When I found myself worrying at 2.30 this morning about the dearth of comments, and feeling angry and hurt that the only time I get a lot of them is when my heart has been ripped out by a miscarriage, I knew I had fallen into the trap of letting this blog be for other people instead of for me.

I will still update about UFO's progress, but I just don't want to fret about how many people are reading the posts and be constantly comparing myself to other bloggers whose comments number in double digits. It's too tempting to base my sense of self-worth on it, and frankly I've lost enough popularity contests in my youth to want to start playing that game again at 37. The whole idea of the blog was to work through my grief at my losses and now (Universe willing) to document my pregnancy with my son. I don't need comments to do that.

To those who have made the effort, whether once or many times, please know how much I appreciate it. I hope you'll keep coming back to read.

Exes and Ohs

Did you miss me? (What do you mean was I gone?!)

Had an excellent vacation (with huge apologies to those of you with whom I had tentative plans to meet up; it just didn't happen for various reasons including me being sick with a cold the entire first week!). It threatened to start out badly, as Mr B and I had to tell the Badeggs Daughter that her father had been arrested.

We knew it was coming. He has harassed me for 9 years now with awful, upsetting letters and the occasional phone calls, and Mr B has been on the receiving end for the past 4 years. It has got much worse in the past couple of years, culminating in police involvement during 2004, when our wedding was preceded by several letters commenting on everything from our choice of wedding day (11th September) to whether I was entitled to a church wedding seeing as I am a liar and a cheat. More recently his parents started sending things to me, and his letters became increasingly upsetting, and that's when we decided to involve the police again. He was asked by them to stop writing; his response was to start writing letters to the police! He was asked to stop again; final warning. He wrote a letter to me that actually threatened me (smart guy, eh?). So on 23 July at 11 pm he was taken into custody and interviewed for a few hours. His parents bailed him out, apparently, and his mother telephoned mine to tell her how depraved I am. Yeah, cry me a river.

Anyway, you can imagine how difficult it was to tell my daughter. We decided to do it ourselves, rather than risk having her hear it from her father or grandparents, who would of course skew everything so that it was all my fault (because the police are always arresting people on my say so, don't you know). It's hard for her because she hears her father say that he's only trying to start a dialog with me about her. She can't understand that his letters are nothing to do with creating a dialog or building bridges but are simply a vehicle for abuse. And of course she wants to believe her father is a decent person. Mind you, deep down I think she knows that he has problems. About a week before we left, she came down and spoke to both Mr B and myself (unusual; it's usually just me) and spoke of how her father is always talking to her like she is a stand-in for me. "I am worried he's going to end up in the loony bin," she said, "He's so paranoid."

Daughter cried when we explained about the arrest (hell, even I cried; I never wanted it to end up like this) and I told her it was OK to feel angry and upset with me and with the situation and even with her dad. She went to spend some time on her own, but within hours she was talking to me and acting normally. She had a lot of heart-to-hearts with my younger sister who has the gift of being able to temper bluntness with humour, and my daughter shared the content of those talks with me (or at least some of it). By the end, she was happy to simply let it be the grown-ups' problem. In fact, when her grandmother called towards the end of our trip (yes, they can never let the child just enjoy her time in America) she took the call in full earshot of my sister and mother and was heard to tell her grandmother: "I don't want to hear it, Grandma. it's not my problem." What a kid!

She's now in France for 10 days on a school water-sports trip. By the time she's back, we should know whether her father will actually be charged with harassment or just given an official caution.

Arrgh! Enough about the exes; now for the Oh!s. Yesterday was my 20-week scan (and I am officially 20 weeks' pregnant tomorrow). I've made it to the halfway point and baby has all his/her fingers and toes and everything else it needs. And the kid yawned, I kid you not! RIght there on the monitor. I guess we were boring it. (Ha! Just wait 'til you're born, kid; we're the most boring people on the planet.) We did have the gender 'confirmed' (they never give you 100% certainty, but they were fairly confident in what they saw/didn't see) but we're not telling. Only my sister and best friend know! I will try to get the photos scanned so that I can post them via a link, but our scanner's shot, so I have to find someone at work to do it for me. Don't hold your breath! (But I do have the cutest shot of his/her little feet!)

It was all very emotional. I didn't cry, but I kept thinking about all the babies we had to lose to get to this place. And though I know that they simply weren't 'compatible with life', as they say, that something in their genetic make-up had gone wrong and they simply couldn't have lived, it still makes me sad to think what might have been for those sons and daughters of ours. And it just kills me that there are mothers and fathers going through the agony of repeated loss or inability to conceive right now. I just wish so much that I could fix it for everyone.

It's good to be back. Work is busy and the broadband at home is down, so I may not be able to post very much for the time being. But you know where to find me.

Spelling the Psyche

I addressed an envelope today to the Miscarriage Association, and placed it on one side of my desk for posting.

Later, I caught a glimpse of it and realised that my imperfect handwriting had turned the word 'Miscarriage' into something that looked like 'Miscarnage'.

Altogether a better word for it, don't you think?

Still Flying, Still Crying

Twelve week scan yesterday showed everything progressing just fine. In fact, the UFO is measuring an entire week ahead. I find that highly amusing, because having inched my way forward week by excruciating week towards the hallowed 12-week 'things might just be OK' point, I ended up speeding right by it to 13 weeks! Of course, I know when I ovulated, so I know I am only 12 weeks in reality, but all the medical notes now say 13. And you can't argue with medical notes.

I'm not quite sure what to do now. I've relaxed a little bit more, to the point where I am now starting to feel survivor's guilt. I am keenly aware of all the women who are still trying to conceive or who have just experienced yet another miscarriage. Or those who have experienced their first, but know too much from the infertile sisterhood about recurrent loss, and wonder if they will be the next to be placed in that category. I worry about the women who are about to discover a missed miscarriage, who will have to go through the agony of knowing they carried their dead child within them for a week, perhaps two or three. I grieve already for that 1% of women who have had one miscarriage and have convinced themselves that next time it will be OK, but who will go on to experience recurrent loss. I feel the desperation of those who have just had a second loss yet know they will not receive help until they have had a third. And most of all I feel guilty that I seem somehow to have come out the other side on this one.

Of course, nothing is ever certain in this reproduction thing. I could still find myself the mother of another dead child. The hospital will scan my cervix at 16 weeks to ensure that repeated D&Cs have not left me with a potential second trimester time bomb. I also insisted that they swab me for bacterial vaginosis, another cause of late miscarriage. I found an article online that said that late miscarriages "are almost always the result of a rare catastrophic incident or an ever rarer genetic mishap". That means the likelihood is very low. Of course, so was the likelihood of three recurrent losses. So was the likelihood of a miscarriage after having seen foetal heart activity at 6 weeks. But they happened. I'm not counting chickens too soon.

Yet, I still find myself burdened by this sense that somehow I am betraying those women who are still suffering. No, burdened is not the right word, because it is not a burden. It is a memorial. A not-so-gentle reminder that babies die in their mothers' wombs; that sometimes our bodies betray us by consistently failing to conceive; that human reproduction is ruled by nature, and nature can be cruel in its emotionless, efficient disposal of less-than-perfect embryos.

To my sisters who are still struggling: I cannot forget, nor do I wish to.

Yeah, Uh Huh, Thanks

Before Mr B and I got married, back in 2003/2004, we used to go to church. Not regularly, really, but periodically. We wanted to get married in church, and I thought it was kind of rude to just show up and pay and use the church for your nuptials. No, better we should at least try to be part of the community. And mainly it was OK. The minister was an American (a ginormous one at that, but I digress), and he was pretty cool all things considered. The congregation were all quite nice, and I even ended up volunteering to put together the quarterly church newsletter.

Three miscarriages later, Mr B and I have found our faith in God shaken to the core. And not just in a "Why is God so mean to us" way, but in a truly questioning the basic theological tenets of Christianity way. We stopped attending church, and I stopped submitting the newsletter.

Eventually, Rev'd Giant American went back to America and the church got a new minister, Helen. She e-mailed me to ask about what happened to the newsletters. I explained about our miscarriages and our shaken faith, but said that I felt I would like to keep doing the newsletter even though we felt unable to attend church. I expected to get at least some interest in the whole shattered faith thing. After all, this was a minister. Her whole job, indeed her whole life if you believe in ministers being 'called' to walk the pastoral road, revolved around helping people to examine and live their faith, right?

Only not so much. I got two short paragraphs of platitudes, ending with some guff about God being there whether we believed in him or not. Right. Thanks.

I've done 3 newsletters since then, and every single one makes me want to vomit. All this mindless crap about God and faith being spouted, in among the notices for bake sales and coffee mornings. I mean, where is the examination of the theology? Where are the tough questions and the hard answers?

So, yesterday, having finished the latest edition, I sent it to Helen and told her that she needed to find someone else. That I was finding it increasingly difficult to put together material for a God and a church I no longer believed in. I admit it; it was a test. I wanted to see if she would show any more interest than she did last time? Would she ring me up and try to find out where my journey has taken me? Would she e-mail me back, quoting scripture that might help? What do you think?

I had an e-mail from her today: "I'm sorry your faith in God hasn't recovered. I'll look for someone else."

And that was it.

I don't know where God is, but I can tell you exactly where he isn't.

Do You Know Who I Am?

According to Lesley Regan, "sporadic miscarriage affects 25% of all women and 15% of all clinically recognised pregnancies miscarry". Most studies put the chances of having three consecutive miscarriages at around 1%, that's one woman in every hundred. But it's only that high because of the fact that some women have physiological, hormonal, immunological, environmental, infectious or thombotic causes. According to Regan, "the statistical chance of having three miscarriages in a row [just due to random chromosomal factors] is 0.34% -- 3 to 4 cases per thousand women".

Gee, I always wanted to be special but give me a break. What? I couldn't be the 1 in 333 who, I don't know, wins £10 on the lottery?

Do you know the really fucking sad thing? I now KNOW the other 2 or 3 women in that sample of a thousand, because they're all heartbroken like me, and we all congregate in the ether, swapping stories and crossing fingers and toes and eyes that the next pregnancy doesn't self-destruct in our apparently inhospitable wombs.

But for those of you who don't know who we are, we're the ones sobbing quietly in the loos at work when yet another colleague announces that she's 5 minutes pregnant yet we all know she'll end up with a healthy baby in the time it takes us to lose three more. We're the ones with the fixed smile whenever the baby photos are pulled out. We're the ones who make up stories about being on antibiotics to explain why we're not drinking at the office party, because we don't dare tell anyone that we're pregnant again, only to have to explain later why there's no bump. We're the ones who scour the internet, bookshops and medical journals to find that elusive piece of information that might hold the key for our reproductive dreams. We're the ones who are willing to believe any new theory or undergo an unproved, risky treatment, regardless of whether it might have long-term implications for our own health.

We are also the ones who know that we are, in some strange way, lucky compared to our sisters who cannot conceive, who stab themselves with needes and sit back to wait for swollen ovaries, painful retrievals, undignified treatments and, God help them, the possibility of yet another failure.

We are the 3 in a thousand. would you know us if you saw us?