A few years ago I wrote an essay entitled “Unmothered” that was picked up and published on another site. I was making the point that each person’s story of motherhood missed or motherhood lost is uniquely painful. In it I gave tips on how to talk to someone struggling. One of those tips was to not immediately assume that someone struggling will be encouraged or feel your compassion by hearing your story of loss. I do believe that sharing our painful stories can connect us, but timing is important. So I wrote this post at the same time but didn’t want the one to be too close to the other. Well, since it’s been lost in my drafts folder for a few years, I suppose enough time has passed. I don’t share it with any current emotion. But I also don’t want to sweep it under the rug. I believe every person’s story has value. Maybe my children can read this one day and understand me better when they’re explaining their crazy mom to their therapist. This post does not take into account the magic of motherhood, which absolutely outweighs the hard stuff. This is just an acknowledgement of the hard stuff. There’s no lesson. No bright side. This is just a list of depressing things. Feel free to skip this post. Seriously. I don’t need empathy for it at this point. And I can’t think of any of you who needs to read an outdated (2.5 year old) venting session. But it was already written and it felt weird to just delete it.
Right before my first miscarriage, a dear friend experienced one. I had no idea what to say or do for her. I didn’t know if she needed space or needed to talk. I tried to do both, but I doubt I did it very gracefully. She was the first person I knew while they were going through it. A few weeks later I was in the exact same situation. When I went in for a routine check-up, we found the baby had died a week prior. A D&C surgery was scheduled for two days later. I was devastated. I was embarrassed. I was angry. I was lost. To top things off, my body had deceived me. Even after I knew the baby was dead, morning sickness (ooh, I should have called it mourning sickness) was raging and I was still puking my brains out, and measuring perfect for 13-14 weeks.
I could have never anticipated my grief. I had never reacted to death with such anguish before, even when my mom, or Gary died. I didn’t want to talk to anyone (except Rachelle who had just been through this) for days. Maybe even weeks. We had just announced our pregnancy, so RJ had to break the bad news to everyone. Unfortunately, I couldn’t hide away and was therefore faced with the well-meaning sympathy of others. Most were so incredibly kind. Many wanted to share their own stories of miscarriages (What? Where did all of you come from! Has EVERYONE had a miscarriage?!) and some were just…well-intentioned stabs at the heart. “At least you know you can get pregnant!” “At least you wont have a baby with chromosomal problems!”
It was at this point I determined that any time I was tempted to start a sentence with “at least” that I should attempt to keep my mouth shut. The most healing response I received was from dear Mike Patton, a longtime friend. He said simply, “I’m so sorry. I love you.”
To add insult to injury, I had complications with the D&C. My heart stopped while under anesthesia. When I woke up, the post-op guy greeted me with a shocked “Whoa! You’re awake?!” It took several hours of being unconscious for my heart rate and blood pressure to stabilize so I could finally see RJ. Meanwhile he was sitting in a waiting room, where the lullaby song would play each time another baby was delivered. I had an arrhythmia for about 6 weeks afterwards. Thinking back on this period still makes my throat tighten and my eyes sting.
A short while later, I was pregnant again. Gun-shy, I didn’t tell anyone. Anxiety ridden, I checked for bleeding constantly. And angrily, because of my distrust for my body, I puked and puked and puked. Because morning sickness is a cruel beast. Then around week 9, on a beautiful evening in the temple, dressed in all white, and seeking divine assurances, I had an unmistakable sensation. So much blood. The baby was gone. I spent the weekend in pain on the couch. To my astonishment, my reaction was wildly different than the first time. Although it was physically much easier, emotionally it was much harder. Instead of hiding and avoiding everyone, I desperately wanted to talk it out. But we hadn’t told anyone so it felt awkward to say “Hey! Guess what! I’m pregnant. Just kidding. It died. Mourn with me?!” Even RJ had no idea how to comfort me. I felt desperately alone. And scared. And bitter. Grief is so unpredictable. You can’t can’t anticipate how you will respond or what you will need to get through.
Many women, while experiencing infertility/miscarriage, note that EVERYONE IN THE WORLD is pregnant and having babies. During this time, social media is flooded with the happiness of these people and several baby shower invitations come in the mail. Now, I see that this depresses most Unmothered women. In spite of my jaded attitude and deep pain, I actually found comfort in celebrating new life with others. It was a reminder that things can work out and not everything ends in agony.
But life continued. Work, RJ’s graduate program, church callings, and outdoor adventure filled up our time. But as the trimesters passed, darkness grew in me where babies were supposed to be. My naive optimism and hopeful idealism about the world in general were replaced with jaded frustration, or what people often call “realism”.
For Christmas I surprised RJ with new backcountry skis and a New Years trip to Jackson Hole/Grand Teton National park. On New Years Eve, we chose a longer 10 mile route out and back to Jenny Lake. The air was so crisp and cold that your nose hairs instantly froze upon exiting the car. The sky was clear and blue. The magnificent Teton mountains were a stunning backdrop to the white path before us. Our conversation started out cheerful and light but within a mile or two, something inside me broke. Soon, despite the most stunningly happy views, all of the darkness began pouring out of me. Tears froze to my eyelashes and on my cheeks. RJ told me to stop and he put his arms around me as I sobbed. He had somehow not realized the darkness I had been growing. I was too tired, physically and emotionally, to carry it anymore. So I delivered the darkness, full-term, there on the trail. The rest of the way to the lake, and the entire way back were easy. Light. Speedy. I had actually left the darkness there. Not all of my anxiety was gone. But the darkness was.
It took a year but we finally got our “Rainbow Baby”. That pregnancy was terrifying. Also I puked through the whole 41 weeks. The only time I could breathe easy was when I was watching her heartbeat on the monitor. Otherwise I was playing out worst-case scenarios in my head. But she came. Like a rocket blasting through everything in it’s path (namely my body). And my world changed forever. My previous life and identity evaporated in an instant and I took on the title I had wanted my entire life: Mother.
I don’t know what it would be like to be a first time parent who hadn’t struggled to get there. I imagine the learning curve is just as steep. But when you add loss to the mix, maybe there’s an extra layer of anxiety. Georgia was a featherweight and had GERD and colic. Stressing about every ounce she wasn’t gaining and agonizing over her discomfort and crying was awful. The pediatrician had us on an intense nursing schedule where I had to feed her every hour throughout the day. She was a lazy eater and entirely refused a bottle, so I basically lived with my shirt off for months. My entire life revolved around feeding her, yet I always felt like she wasn’t getting enough. Now in retrospect, I realize she was just a featherweight. She still is. But I didn’t know that then. Also, as we moved cross country after her birth, I didn’t follow up with an OB/GYN in Maryland. I didn’t know that you shouldn’t still be bleeding 6 months postpartum. There’s just a lot I didn’t know.
Fast forward and we were lucky to get pregnant with Millie right away. Soon after her birth, which was marked by severe nerve damage and a spinal injury, we discovered a growth on my cervix. In the few weeks before cancer was ruled out, I went through all of the stages of grief a few times, as I mourned that I might not have any more children. I hadn’t been prepared for Millie to be my last. It was determined to be pre-cancerous so the doctor wanted to remove it, but the removal would compromise my ability to have more children. He said “Its now or never if you want another one”. Having already reconciled that I wouldn’t have any more, the possibility of one more child felt like an abundant and generous gift from heaven.
Month after month, we tried and failed to get pregnant. There were a few late periods that were extra painful. As I had refused to take pregnancy tests, we’ll never know if any were early miscarriages. Every period felt like a loss regardless. I accepted that we would have no more kids. I was almost ready to just have the cervical stuff removed. But a month or two later I had a spiritual experience that told me we’d have one more. Two months after that, we were pregnant with Flora.
This is what I had prayed for. This felt like a miracle. So you’d think I was happy. But no. Instead I spent two months with the blues. Prenatal depression! I felt guilt and shame for not being happy. There were definitely happy moments. But chemical depression isn’t something you can shake off just because you know it doesn’t make sense. Thankfully, the blues lifted fairly quickly. Knowing that this would be my last pregnancy, I began to thrill at it. Instead of agonizing about the puking, I just kind of accepted it, and approached my triggers with curiosity instead of resentment. I relished in the discomfort of my massive belly. I cherished when she punched and kicked my organs or got hiccups at 3am.
Flora’s birth was the “easiest”, though it did leave me bruised and swollen. And it was so much easier to enjoy her infancy because I knew she was my last. Also because I had the experience to know I could keep her alive. And I knew how quickly the time would go by. But her first four months were not without bumps. When we was a month old I had hemorrhoid surgery. Which was the worst thing I’ve ever experienced. A month after that I had the cervical procedure. A week after that, an artery in my cervix blew and I hemorrhaged, leading to a scary emergency surgery. Three weeks after that, my abdomen was like “WHAT THE HELL?!” (I’m sorry Ginny, but it really did cuss.) And there was an emergency appendectomy! So yeah, I gave birth then had 4 surgeries in less than 4 months. IT. WAS. AWFUL.
So now my uterus is just sitting there, useless. Except that every month it sends me a week of weepiness, bleeding and cramps. The jerk. I know I should be grateful for it, since it brought me 3 perfectly formed babies. But it’s given me 27 years of awful periods. And did I mention the time it took me to the emergency room with burst cysts when I was only 12, and two male techs had me naked and alone on a surgical table and couldn’t get in a catheter while I blacked out from the pain? Years and years of trouble and only 3 babies. Because of the precancerous growths, and my mom’s cancer that started in her uterus, I feel like it’s a ticking time bomb. I mean. I am grateful. But I’m also so DONE with that thing.
No woman has it easy. In fact, thinking about those who read my blog, there are a few who have endured much more than anything I’ve written about. Last month I read Pachinko (don’t recommend) and the main message of the book is “Women are born to suffer”. I hated that premise. But it is true. The only redemption I find is Newton’s third law. For all of our suffering, there is equal and opposite joy.
Anyway, there it is. Having a uterus is hard. The end.
the dispencery 
😢😩😳😔😊
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