A Lack of Compassion

I wanted to respond to one of the comments on the post about my first visit with the RE. I was stunned by the truth in her statement:

The angry part of me is that we feel surprised by being treated as human beings. So often in this world of infertility, miscarriage, and treatment, we are made to feel responsible, to feel like a patient, and to feel as though we are wasting others' time. Your experience should be the norm, not the exception.

I have to admit that I feel a little stupid that this didn't occur to me before. I have had some terrible experiences with doctors and medical professionals in connection with my three miscarriages. When that RE walked into the room and was so honest and compassionate and recognized what we've been through instead of skirting around it, I was just amazed and so glad that we found a doctor who really seemed to care and understand. I didn't even think about the fact that the care I received should be normal, not a rare event and cause for celebration. Sadly there are other women going through losses and infertility who do not have the support of a caring medical professional, at least not one that treats them as a human being instead of another medical puzzle or an insignificant patient.

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Aurelia is the contributing editor for Early Pregnancy Loss. She writes daily at Aurelia Ann. She provides "thoughts-written-out-loud" in words and pictures.

So You Know Someone Who Had a Miscarriage

A few days ago I was asked in the comments to talk more about what people can do or say when someone they know experiences a miscarriage or a similar situation. It has been really hard for me to answer that question because I know that ultimately I can only speak for myself. While so many of us share the same thread of miscarriage in our lives, we all deal with the experience differently. Some things that were comforting or helpful to me might be painful for another person. I know I've had people share quotes with me that they found comforting and it only made me want to gag, cry, and scream in an everlasting rotation.

So with that in mind, here I go: What to do when someone you know experiences a miscarriage...

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Aurelia is the contributing editor for Early Pregnancy Loss. She writes daily at Aurelia Ann. She provides "thoughts-written-out-loud" in words and pictures.

Grief

It comes unexpectedly. A few days ago I was moody, irritable, snapping at everyone for no reason--and then I realized that it had been exactly four weeks since we lost Lucky. No wonder I was feeling that way. It is like the grief and sadness can eat away at you from the inside even while you are completely unaware of it.

The next day I got my first post-miscarriage period. Damn. There is nothing like menstruation to remind you that you are not pregnant. Nothing like cramps and headaches to be a dull reminder of what you have lost and what you don't have and to make you feel simply crappy all the way around.

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Aurelia is the contributing editor for Early Pregnancy Loss. She writes daily at Aurelia Ann. She provides "thoughts-written-out-loud" in words and pictures.

One Thing I Learned From Miscarriage

Don't ask someone when they are going to have children (or another child for that matter).

I learned this a few days after my first miscarriage. We had flown home to see family and friends, a trip that had been planned for quite a while and was actually delayed for a few days because of my impending miscarriage (thank God we did not get on that plane as scheduled or I would have miscarried right around when my plane was landing in my hometown).

I was in the grocery store and a high school girl came over to say hi. I knew her from my days working with the youth group. We hugged, she asked how I was, how married life was, and then she started with the baby questions. So, are you going to have kids soon? When are you going to start having babies? You should have kids! My sister just had a baby, you should have a baby! She was happy and excited and she had absolutely no clue.

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Aurelia is the contributing editor for Early Pregnancy Loss. She writes daily at Aurelia Ann. She provides "thoughts-written-out-loud" in words and pictures.

Aurelia's Story

It’s hard to know where to start. I am so much more than my losses, my pain, my grief. I am young, 26 years old, relatively newly married (4 years), and a stay at home mom. I’m a reader, a writer, a bit of a photographer, and I dabble in crafts like sewing and knitting. But I do have three lost babies and that is how I found my way here.

It started with my mom really. She had two miscarriages and I remember her telling me about them as a child. I always knew in some sense that being pregnant does not equal a baby in the end. A year into our marriage I found myself unexpectedly pregnant (yes, I am one of /those/ people), happy, excited, scared, and nervous. And two weeks later I wasn’t pregnant anymore. Everyone told me to try again, as if the loss of my first baby wasn’t important and there was no reason for me to worry about future babies.

I guess they were right, at first (although I worried anyway). Two months later I conceived my son (he’s 2 ½ now). I worried about losing him a lot in the early weeks, but my pregnancy was fine, no spotting, plenty of morning sickness well into the second trimester to confirm that I was indeed still pregnant. Nine months later I had a healthy baby boy in my arms.

When my baby was transitioning to toddlerhood I found myself pregnant again. I was scared, obsessively checking for spotting, agonizing over my lack of symptoms. I had my first appointment with my midwife at 10 weeks and later that day I started spotting. By the end of the week I was mother to two lost babies, one living. I started to wonder if something was wrong with me, but jumped into trying to conceive again anyway. I got my positive test just two cycles later. Instead of being happy and joyful and dreaming about this little one, pregnancy was full of constant anxiety. Just before I hit the twelve week mark I founds myself mother to three lost babies and one living child.

This time I demanded testing. My doctor told me there was no point because I had one healthy baby there was no reason I couldn’t have another--it was just bad luck. Try again, he said. I demanded the testing anyway. A few weeks later I found out I was compound heterozygous for MTHFR, a genetic blood clotting disorder that is linked to recurrent miscarriage. That’s where I am at now, a genetic mutant waiting to see a specialist and find more answers, hoping that there isn’t any more bad news about my body killing my babies, hoping that my next pregnancy won’t end with a lost baby.