I knew I was pregnant instantly – as soon as conception happened. Impossible, you say. But I knew.
Over the next few weeks, I was so sick. A smell could set off a bout of nausea. Scents, in particular, onion and cumin, disgusted me. An image of food on Facebook, my husband mentioning a recipe, anything, everything, became intolerable. I couldn’t bend at the waist or brush my teeth without wanting to vomit.
Common wisdom has it that morning sickness means a strong, healthy, viable pregnancy. It isn’t just wishful thinking, either. High HcG levels (the pregnancy hormone that gives you the little blue plus on an at-home test) correlates with morning sickness; low HcG levels, and little sickness, can indicate a non-viable pregnancy. It’s not always exactly correlated, though, and many women never suffer from morning sickness.
I was so tired. So, so tired. I could not remember being this tired—not with my last pregnancy, not since I’d been seven and had scarlet fever. I passed through each day in a haze. I struggled against falling asleep at work. I made stupid mistakes. I could barely walk in a straight line, sometimes. I staggered through each day, only to collapse on the couch. I couldn’t clean my house, play with my little boy, or do anything. After work, I waited for night to fall, each day to end. I told myself it would pass.
Fatigue is also a pregnancy symptom. Normal, right? It’s on the bulleted list, mamas!
On my first ultrasound at the OBGYN, to be taken at nine weeks, I’m excited. Finally, some pay off.
The sonographer can’t find anything. Her little captions have all these question marks on them. Fetal pole? She leaves the room quietly. We know something is wrong. We should’ve seen the curl of a developing fetus.
The nurses, a full-timer and a trainee, escort us to a normal exam room. They’re nervous. It’s easy to tell if someone is scared of being around you. They won’t look you in the eye. Their movements are quick, birdlike. Their shoulders tighten upwards. They gesticulate abruptly, remember themselves, and their hands slam back down on their laps.
Any spotting or bleeding?
No.
Any cramping or pain?
No.
The lead nurse asks me the questions two more times before I finally snap: Look. I’ve been pregnant before, so I know what it feels like. And no, I didn’t experience any of that, okay?
It’s possible we overlooked something. Could you have gotten the dates wrong?
No.
The nurses leave. I look over at my husband and my one-and-a-half-year-old son.
I’m not dumb, I say. It’s not what I mean.
I know, he says.
The doctor comes in. She does a good job. About ten to twenty percent of women have non-viable pregnancies. About half those miscarry naturally. She’s quiet, thorough, professional, and kind. I cry. I can’t help it. It’s embarrassing. She leaves, and I lean my head on my husband’s shoulder.
My son pokes me in the eye. He’s never seen a grown up cry before. He examines the tear on the tip of his finger. He pats me on the back, three soft little pats.
The next day is the election. The country is awash in blood red. It rolls toward us, slams against the mountains, stops. So much country, inundated. It feels like the world is ending. History, before us.
Selfishly, all I want to think about is the dead embryo inside of me, the baby-that-never-was.
I take blood tests, to confirm what we already know.
I still feel pregnant, but I know I’m not. Not really. My body feels like a betrayal, my breasts heavy, my tummy round. My fatigue and morning sickness are a lie. No bleeding, cramping, or pain. I wish I had miscarried. I can’t trust my body to do its job. I want it to be over.
On my birthday, a nurse calls me with the test result confirm that the embryo is dead. She tells me my options. I already know what I want to do.
The doctor goes over the procedure, the consequences, next Monday. He will not say one word, the a-word, as he describes the procedure. I understand what a “dilate and curette” is, what vacuum-suction means in this context. I try to get him to say the a-word. I want to hear it. I want him to tell me this is a normal procedure that many women undergo, the most common surgical procedure for women of child-bearing age, in fact. I want him to say it, aloud: You are having an abortion for medical reasons. You are having an abortion because your embryo is dead, and we need to do some tests to make sure you can have a normal pregnancy next time. You chose to have an abortion by surgery, because you hate hormonal pills. You’re afraid of waiting for a miscarriage, that it would be incomplete, that it would start at work. You don’t want to feel pregnant when you’re not. You want the chance to start again.
He never says the word. Disappointing.
I agree to a D & C, because there’s a slim chance this is a molar pregnancy, aka, that my placenta has become a tumor. The doctor would like to test it. They schedule the appointment on for Wednesday.
Tuesday, I prepare everything at work for my unexpected absence. It’s annoying. I pick up prescriptions from the store, and shower that night with a fresh bar of soap. My skin feels like a stranger’s. I eat a second dinner at 10 p.m., because I’ll have to miss breakfast in the morning. I sleep easily, exhausted.
On Wednesday, I wake up to drink juice at 7:00 a.m., the last time I’m allowed to have fluids. I shower again, with fresh soap. I don’t wear make up. I dress in loose, comfortable clothes. I forego a bra. Why bother, when they’ll just ask me to take it off? I choose slip-on shoes, so that I won’t have to bend over or ask for help to slide them on.
We drop our son off at my mothers’ house. He is so excited about being there in the morning.
At the surgery center, we check-in. My husband signs papers saying he’ll drive me home and keep me from doing anything stupid for the next 24 hours while I’m under the influence of anesthesia. An older woman who’s knitting looks up to glare disapprovingly at me. Does she know why I’m here? I think she hates my knee socks.
They call us back. I stare at a calming forest scene mural while a nurse takes my blood pressure. The mural is ever so slightly crooked. I ask the nurse if it bothers her. She says not really.
The nurse takes me back to a bathroom to undress. I slide on a surgical gown – it ties at the side – and then I sling brown robe over my shoulders. The socks have little sticky anti-slip marks on the bottom. The nurse brings me over the pre-op room. All the pre-op rooms are like little changing booths in a boutique, little cubbies with curtains. They have sheet-draped chairs gigantic enough to hold Frankenstein’s monster. My husband waits in a tiny plastic chair nearby.
He nods at my hospital gown. Sexy, he says.
Hospital gown or not, I tell him, I can bring it.
Once I’m in the chair, the nurse sets me up with an IV. She even gets my vein the first time (most nurses can’t—I’ve been told I have “tough” or “squirrelly” veins). She swaps the needle for a tube so I’ll be able to bend my arm. She leaves, and salty water drips into my arm. Soon the infusion of cold water suffuses me. I’m shivering violently.
The anesthesiologist chats with me. The doctor chats with me.
My husband and I talk about Black Mirror. We lament, for the millionth time, about the end of the Great British Bake Off. We talk about politics. I’m glad he’s here. Not because I’m nervous, though I am, but because without him it would be so boring.
A nurse tells me the procedure is delayed (we noticed) and she gets me a heater.
“The least they could do is be on time,” my husband says.
“You know,” I say, “if there were complications and I was on the table, I think the least they could do would be to take all the time they need to get it right.”
More patients filter in. A woman in a wheelchair, a man with a prosthetic leg. There are older people here receiving new joints. I am dizzy, headachy, hungry, but otherwise okay.
An hour and a half we were supposed to begin, they come to get me. I pad along the corridors in my sock feet, IV bag in hand. The anesthesiologist and several nurses wait for me in the operating room, filled with devices, a padded table with arms, multiple movable lights.
Seeing all those people in masks makes me feel like I was invited to a costume ball, and someone forgot to tell me it had a theme. I feel a little lonely, the only one dressed in the sad-sack patient costume.
I take off the robe, they rearrange the gown, and I settle myself on the table. They hang up the IV. The anesthesiologist explains how they will monitor my blood oxygen levels by shooting lasers at my finger.
Okay, I admit. That’s pretty cool.
The last thing I remember is a nurse asking me to move my arm.
Then I’m in the little curtain alcove again, with my husband, and the nurse asks me if I’m taking any prescribed medications. I tell her pre-natal vitamins. Her face falls. She knew what procedure I was in for, but not why.
We wait until I can stand up long enough to sit in a wheelchair. The nurse explains she likes wheeling people out. There’s no windows in the facility, so she likes the chance to go outside. Even if it’s cold. My husband meets us in the parcade with a car. She loads me in, and off we go.
The rest of the day I watch movies, and I take ibuprofen in the evening. The next day, I’m already feeling more energetic. The second day after surgery, the cramps start – it’s like a period, except with the same aches and soreness I now associate with childbirth. It’s intense. I can tell an internal organ has been abraded. The third day: same, now with a headache stabbing me.
Even so, I feel more energetic than I have been in recent memory. I play with my son for the first time in three weeks, tickling his feet.
On the fifth day after the surgery, not including the day of, I’m back at work. I feel fine.
Now to wait for the test results.
They’re normal – no infection, no molar pregnancy. The diagnosis of blighted ovum and missed miscarriage stands. The doctor gives me a pep talk.
It’s now December 6th. It’s been almost a month since I learned I had a non-viable pregnancy. Some days, I feel like I’m back to normal. On other days, this deep grief presses down on me. Today’s one of those days. Is it hormones, or something else? I didn’t really expect it, that I’d continue to be sad.
I don’t know if I’ll ever “get over it” in the same way I can get over a skinned knee. I expect that all of this will be one of those events in my life that will always hurt but become less relevant day by day. It’ll become like an old, sad advent calendar, stashed away in my closet, each memory a little paper door I don’t often pop open to look behind. Why would I, when I already know what’s there?
I’m writing this up—and posting it—because even though this is an event that affects many women, few choose to talk about it, and even fewer choose to do so publicly. Even with all the support around me, with my husband and my family and my friends, I still felt alone. I hope this will help others feel a little less lonely, at least for a little while.