I’ve debated long and hard about writing this post. It’s a difficult thing to write about, silly as I’m now at the stage where I can talk to other people about it, but somehow it seems different typing it. I guess it’s mainly due to the fact that you can’t see the reaction of whoever is reading it, whereas face to face I can tell what they are thinking. But, I’ve decided that this is meant to be a day of unity so I’m uniting and telling my story too.
It’s strange because 3 years ago I wasn’t even aware that this day existed (I think it’s rightly gained a lot more support since then). I was also pregnant. Pregnant with our first baby. Yup I can see you doing the maths now, Polly isn’t that old, it doesn’t add up. That’s because I wasn’t pregnant with Polly. I was pregnant with a baby we would never meet. Just 9 days later I would wake in the morning to get ready for work to find I had started spotting. Not unheard of in early pregnancy. But I knew. I knew straight away what it meant.
What follows next is something that will stay with me forever. They don’t tell you about this in the baby books. They don’t tell you about this in sex ed classes at school. No-one talks about it. So, nothing can prepare you for what happens next.
They don’t tell you that it will hurt. Not just physically but emotionally it will push you to your limit. There will be a pain in your heart that feels like your soul has been ripped out. Then this pain changes to emptiness. Then hopelessness. Then you realise this is where your baby will live forever. Safe in your heart because they weren’t safe in your belly where they were meant to grow and become your world.
They don’t tell you what actually happens when you lose a baby. You will be thrown many insensitive remarks from people who think they are helping (actually some of them don’t even think that they just don’t understand or care). At least one person will tell you- “It wasn’t a real baby.” I beg to differ. When you pass that ‘bundle of cells’ that’s ‘just like a heavy period’, you soon realise you are very much passing a baby. It is messy. And it will break you.
They don’t tell you that it will nearly ruin you and your husband. That you will cry, a lot. That he will cry. That you’ll turn on each other as that’s your only outlet. That you’ll say things that are unforgivable. That at your lowest you will shout at him ‘that he should leave you and find a real woman who can give him a family’. They don’t tell you that you’ll burst blood vessels in your eyes from crying so much.
They don’t tell you that you will blame yourself. You’ll analyse every aspect of the pregnancy to find out what YOU did wrong. How you failed your unborn child.
They do throw statistics at you. They tell you not to worry, that you’ll likely have a successful pregnancy next time. Well they were wrong again in our case. Just 3 months later, on Boxing Day we found ourselves in the same position.
They don’t tell you how difficult it will be when you do have a sticky bean who makes it past that precious 12-week mark. That every niggle and twinge sends you back to that dark place where you think you’ll never make it to be a mother. That you’ll check your pants 20 times a day to make sure you aren’t losing another one. That when you don’t feel your baby move for a few hours you start envisaging all kinds of horrors. That you won’t truly be relaxed until that baby is out, breathing, in your arms. Safe in your arms because your womb is not a safe place.
They don’t tell you a lot when it comes to miscarriage and infant loss. Instead you come across a lot of insensitivity and callous remarks. Not just out in the world but also in the healthcare system that you find yourself falling on in your most vulnerable and distressed state. Not everyone is bad. Each 111 operator I spoke to each time, they were amazing. The 2 doctors who scanned us during our first loss, they were amazing. The A&E doctor who saw us the day after Boxing Day, he was an arsehole. The problem is many people still don’t think miscarriage is something to get upset about, they think you’re overreacting. These are the people who don’t see what you lost as a baby. These people have no idea- lucky them. In my opinion as soon as you are pregnant, you are just that- pregnant. You have life inside you. As soon as you know it’s in there then all that promise, all that future, starts growing in your mind and your heart. You start thinking names, imagining their first words, first day at school, whether they’ll get married and have babies of their own. Then it’s gone. All gone. You are very much entitled to grieve that loss as it is just that, a loss. A huge loss. So, grieve however you want to. Scream. Cry. No-one has the right to tell you how to grieve your baby.
This is dedicated to all the Angel babies who are sitting in our hearts instead of in our arms.