(Content warning/Trigger Warning. I'm gonna talk about miscarrying. I've read that the world is still demystifying it, and even having had the extraordinary misfortune to have been present when family has lost children very late during a pregnancy I don't feel like I'm overtly qualified to throw any new commentary on the matter- but something I learned was that there are a lot of different levels of what it means to miscarry. Here's what happened to us.)
Chapter 4..."Honey? I Think We're Pregnant!!!"
On February 10th, 2018 my wife woke me up to say she was pregnant.
On March 26th, I got a phone call while I was at work that said that it wasn't going to happen.
Dates become very important during a pregnancy. I learned that it wasn't just the developmental milestones (You've probably seen new parents do the whole "gauging their pregnancy based on what kind of produce the kid is" pictures) but after you pee on the stick and the initial euphoria (Or terror? I seem to remember a cautious fugue state setting in. I asked if my wife was sure, as she was crying holding a piece of plastic that had only recently had engaged in water sports.) after all of that you start to consider things first on the 9 month timeline- but there are many other important dates to consider as well.
Developmentally, you get the initial exam/meeting with an Ob/Gyn to tell them you're pregnant where they have you pee on your hand again (Just go with it. Feigning disgust as my wife waved the pregnancy exam was something we did for a giggle.) and then see if you like them enough to be the one prodding your spouses nethers during subsequent visits. Each of the follow up appointments (6 weeks and onward) and ultra sound visits are going to give you a fetal heartbeat, and generally how your kid is looking until it gets down to the 36 weeks and the visits become more frequent until you're finally admitted for delivery. Basically, I learned that you don't get a hello and handshake at month one, then one terrible black and white ultrasound where your kid looks like an awful blend of Skeletor and a Rorschach test to post on social media and give to your family before you finally meet them in the screaming crying flesh 9 months later.
But the big thing is that 1st infant heartbeat. It's usually after that appointment when you are able to more or less safely say to friends and family that yes: a bambino/bambina is on their way.
Impatient and more than a little excited, naturally we told mom and dad more or less right away. Her brother and sister in law followed suit somewhere around my wife's birthday. (Having been trying for their own kids for many, many years meant steeling ourselves to tell them. To paint a picture, I was holding my crying wife before her birthday brunch outside of the restaurant telling her that we just had to take the band-aid off and tell them. Little did we know they had an announcement to make of their own shortly after, and hey... We've been loving up my niece now for the last five months as I type this. Things were just that crazy.)
We even had a hilarious Spring Break trip to South Padre Island where my wife lightly kvetched that she wasn't able to drink the entire time. That's one...I mean, that's not relevant to this story, but we'll tell you about it sometime because the trip was a hilarious cautionary tale. TL:DR, I'm old and people need to cover up their naked buns.
In spite of mentally committing to being dry for the duration of her pregnancy, I got tipsy at a party and before I knew it we were telling our entire friend group of our upcoming pampie party, along with a lot of "WOO!!!" and hugs and telling people that I have the BEST support group and the most AMAZING group of friends to raise our kid around... I mean, I'm a superstitious fella by nature, and even though we were a little premature in announcing it, this was my friend framily- many of whom had kids of their own and we love them and wanted to share. Ok?
Ironically, it was at the follow-up visit when we chatted with the weird, heavily-accented German Ob.Gyn that we had previously met at our 1st appointment (Who *I* thought was hilarious and my wife didn't really care for much.) who also acted like... she... had... never met us? Not like we're perfect, hilarious, and memorable....not even a big deal, but then she started asking the same questions as our initial visit like we had just found out we were pregnant and we're like "Noooooooo, we were here a few weeks ago" and she's like "Huh, and what are you here for again?" My wife was squeezing my hand as if to say this is the most absent-minded doc around, but we finally told her:
"We're here to hear her heartbeat".
Oh yeah. We were positive it was a girl. The name we picked out almost effortlessly, and figured if we were wrong about the sex, we'd burn that bridge when we came to it. New parents are weird. And after reading the last few of these chapters- you might've gotten the impression I didn't want kids and was fist-pumping any time my wife menstruated, but at this point mentally? I was committed to seeing it happen. We were going to have a girl. She was prrrrrobably going to be born on my late mother's birthday in an ironic twist of fate. She was going to smash the patriarchy and take names. My wife- who wasn't even showing yet- was already doing that mom-tummy caress. And as soon as Doctor German-Funny Lady started acting perplexed, my Spider-Sense started going off the chain the same way you just know a phone call is going to let you know some bad news.
The wand ultra-sound didn't show anything. So they scheduled a follow up with my wife with an actual "ultra-sound ultra-sound" at another clinic. My job being my job, meant I couldn't take the time off to be with my wife for that one, but she assured me she'd call as soon as it was over. And like I said- mentally, I was already preparing myself for not great news but decided to keep that to myself in the hope that I'm wrong. And the shitty impotent feeling as I stood in a meeting room taking a phone call from my wife made me wish I was home right then and there.
I held my wife all night long that night. After we finally went to sleep and after she told me she needed me here to help her through this, I called work and said I wouldn't be in the rest of the week- almost guaranteeing I'd be out of the job. In order to make sure my wife had a clean slate to attempt having a kid, we had to go in for something I had never heard of called a D & C procedure.
So-
If you have a faint memory of your biology classes from high school, you know that once insemination occurs it's a matter of attachment to the uterine lining and then magical mitosis starts the process of all those microscopic cells dividing and sub-dividing before becoming an infant. A presumption is that miscarriage means being farther along/closer to full term and something goes terribly wrong. In our case, the cells just...stopped changing. And their hanging out and not doing anything is bad for you. And they have to be removed before you resume follow up attempts. And to give a lot of credit where it's due, I just want to point out that the incredibly kind and sensitive manner with which the Ob/Gyn who performed the procedure that explained it to us- who (I may add) even asked if we wanted to have a "service" for the cells... made her our Ob/Gyn for (SPOILER ALERT!) my wife's pregnancy later .
So it was on a really beautiful and sunny day, March 28th, that my wife was placed in a Bear warming gown which she comically said made her look like Grimace, then placed under general sedation as I held her hand and joked with the doctor's about their colorful footwear, and was then led out into the waiting room for what I anticipated was going to be a insufferably long and anxiety-riddled affair as my wife had surgery for her miscarriage...only to have the doctor come out before I could even put my ear buds in to tell me the procedure was wholly unremarkable and fine, and led me back to a recovery room while my wife came out from general anesthesia.
I helped her get dressed as she started rousing, realizing that I found myself moving sort of mechanically and dispassionately the whole time- taking in details like the overhead ceiling light having a tropical picture superimposed on it to help people as the woke up. I found myself dressing my wife, the object of my affection, the one who I love and whose body I adore, in the most clinical but gentle way I can.
Before you leave, they give you a prescription and some instructions. You need to wait several weeks before making any attempt at procreation, and to wait until after you've had a full menstrual cycle so that you know your body is ready to try again. Any attempt at intercourse within 3 weeks is not-advised, and you should wear a condom. (A condom. A CONDOM? It's weird, right? Just hearing them say you need to wrap it up. Suddenly I'm 14 and back in health class.)
This all meant more time constraints. And doing the math, after a year of trying it'd be another 2-3 months before biologically she was prepared to become a sacred vessel. No more Mommy/Granddaughter matching birthday. Tick tock. Would I be fifty before I had a kid?
Mentally, the hurdles were more challenging than even the surgical procedure. For what felt like many months, my wife struggled to even get up and go to work and in spite of having a crappy job*, I found myself being the one to get her up and going in. The self-blame she experienced was exhausting for her, and there were many nights where I would just hold her while she cried before she went to sleep. Surprise...I didn't have the same issue, but still felt awful not only because my wife was suffering but because in the big picture- what had happened didn't feel like it was even real. Like...was she ever even "really" pregnant? Like the pee stick lied, and our baby didn't even make it out of the gate, much less have a chance to be "proven" (to crib a line from the "Great British Baking Show".)
In her grief, and having admitted these feelings to her- my wise wife reminded me that it was "real to her". I was 43 years old, and still getting schooled on sensitivity.
There was one night shortly after the D & C where we tucked into a magnum of wine, and fueled by tears and emotion we tore the TV room apart and slurred on about making changes and fresh starts. What ended up happening was waking up with a Costco membership, and a vacation to Rome for our 3 year anniversary. We figured if we don't have a kid, then we'd spend our money on a little culture and travel.
Also, in spite of doctor's orders and emotionally not feeling like we were ready yet- we disregarded the post-surgery instructions and risked intimacy sooner rather than later.
*I did have a meeting with my boss after I came back to work, btw. They forgave any and all missed work. At that point, and feeling how I did, I was skeptical and almost angry that I wasn't fired for having missed so many days. Moreover, having struggled with my role there, I was even angrier that they showed that much sensitivity toward what I was going through. Like I said, things were really weird.
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