About a year after Jeff and I got married we decided it was time to make a baby. Mandy was ten. I was working at a daycare center. Jeff was a Staff Sargent and we were living in Italy. I told all the girls at work, Jeff told everyone at his work. We were so very excited. It was around Christmas time, I remember that my secret Santa at work gave me a bottle of wine and some candles to help with the conception. It all worked out and we got pregnant on our first try. Jeff was so very proud of his potency.
After taking the at home pregnancy test, I went and had the pregnancy confirmed by the doctor. I went to the lab and left my deposit, and then went on to work. That day I was working in the atrium with a group of pre-school children. This atrium was a room in the center of the daycare facility, there was a circular hallways that wrapped around the atrium and all of the other classrooms doors and front windows look toward the atrium. While you were in this glass enclosed room, sky light on the ceiling you could been seen by every single person in the daycare center. It was a room where we would take the kids on rainy days so they could have a place to run and ride bikes etc. This has no bearing on the story I just always thought the atrium was so cool.
For some strange reason, I will call it the military, the doctor called my husband with my test results instead of calling me. There are rules against this, but they were friends who worked together... After receiving the confirmation of my pregnancy from the doctor Jeff called me at work. In order to receive a phone call at work, someone has to come into the room where I was working and relieve me, to ensure the kiddies always have the proper amount of adult supervision. It is a very difficult task, because the person at the front desk who answers the phone is also not allowed to leave their post. It is also difficult to pee as a daycare provider. Jeff was left on hold for awhile while all the details were worked out, he had actually never called me at work before and I was very worried. I get to the phone, and all eyes were on me, my co-workers from the atrium, the front desk, the person relieving me, they could all see me from the glass room atrium where they were watching the kiddies. And Jeff informs me that I am indeed pregnant. I am thinking, I know dude, why are you causing all this ruckus at my work and why did the doctor not call me, the patient??? I am very excited as is Jeff, tears, a little screaming etc.
Everyone wants to know what is going on so I tell EVERYONE, and so does Jeff. When I get off work I pick up Mandy at her after school youth center place and I tell her the news. We are going to have a baby. We immediately go to the store and buy an outfit and a book. The world's dumbest book. It shows day by day or week by week what is growing and developing on the baby. We count it all out figure out the conception date and the due date, we read through the book and find out that growing inside of me is a baby, that has arms, legs, fingers, toes, finger nails, toe nails, eye lashes, heart. Jeff comes home from work and we tell him all the news. We are all so very excited. I am certain that it is important to share this with Mandy so that she doesn't feel left out.
The very next day I start to spot. I am at work, I use the restroom, there is blood. I ask to go home. I try to call Jeff, he is not at that office. I had a panic attack. No idea what to do. Jeff had recently changed my doctor from being at an office at the hospital to being at an office on a different part of the base. No idea where that is. No idea how to find out. So I drove to Jeff's work. I go into his office and he is still not there. They have no idea where he is and they all congratulate me on being pregnant. I start to cry hysterically, I try to explain why. They take me across the street to my new doctor, explain for me what is going on and get me into an exam room within about 30 seconds. The doctor is such a lovely man, his wife had had a miscarriage a couple of weeks earlier and he explained about blood tests and about how these things sometimes happen, nothing you can do, not your fault.
Finally Jeff shows up in the exam room, I guess they found him. His presence is all I need, I finally am able to calm down. I feel that Jeff's soul touches mine. I was in such a state, like a train coming toward me and I am frozen in fear. I literally couldn't think. Jeff came in and the mental block disappeared and I was normal again. Still having a miscarriage, but at least my brain started to function. Over the course of the next few days the bleeding intensified, blood test confirmed it, the baby we had so anticipated was no longer a reality.
I cried and cried. I was not at all prepared for this, I cannot remember ever being that devastated. It was very selfish of me, but I fell apart. All this right in front of a 10 year old Mandy. She had a bit of a nervous breakdown at school. She couldn't find a pencil and dumped her entire backpack on the floor in the middle of the classroom and started crying hysterically in the middle of the classroom while the teacher was talking. We got a call, we went down to the school and we were reprimanded by the teacher for burdening our child with all of this.
Jeff decided we needed a trip. This is Jeff's solution to all that ailes you, go on a trip. We went to Pompeii. We traveled there by train, we stayed at a fabulous hotel, ate in wondrous restaurants. It was very soothing. We waited three months per the doctors instructions, got pregnant again, another loss, another trip. Egypt, a cruise down the Nile, a five star hotel in Cairo, camel rides, climbing to the center of the Pyramids, etc. Another three months, another loss, another trip. This one to France: Paris, Normandy, beautiful hotels, museums, war memorials. Still no one knew just Jeff and I. The losses were easier to handle being prepared. I no longer cried in front of Mandy. I did quit my job, I was not a very pleasant person to be around. I slept till noon everyday, etc.
It was then time to try again, another three months had passed. Only we saw a fabulous trip to Kenya and decided to take the trip before trying for the baby. We had to take a powerful antibiotic as a malaria medication and our doctor specifically told us not to get pregnant while on the ciprolioxacin. This is of course when I got preggers with Lily, during the forbidden taking of the ciprolioxacin. Totally freaked me out. But, she was born and is our little miracle. We didn't tell anyone until I was 12 weeks pregnant. But, Jeff works at the hospital and everyone in his office knew we were pregnant because our doctor told them. So I was pretending to not be pregnant and they were pretending to not know I was pregnant. It was hilarious. I kept feeling like screaming, I am pregnant. We moved from Italy to Japan while I was pregnant with Lily which also caused me so much anxiety my eyes nearly popped out of my head. Let us just say that during my pregnancy I was not the nicest person to be around. This I think is the main reason Jeff is unwilling to have anymore kids. After Lily was born and healthy I was just so relieved I was finally able to put it all behind me and I became my normal self again.
Last night I was reading The Memory Keepers Daughter, it was late at night and everyone was asleep. I couldn't sleep so I was reading. The wife is told that she had twins and that the baby girl died while the baby boy survived. Which isn't true the girl actually survived. But, the mom was grieving for her lost little baby, that she never saw, and wow. It brought all those feelings back to me. There I was sitting on the couch bawling my eyes out like it was just yesterday.
After taking the at home pregnancy test, I went and had the pregnancy confirmed by the doctor. I went to the lab and left my deposit, and then went on to work. That day I was working in the atrium with a group of pre-school children. This atrium was a room in the center of the daycare facility, there was a circular hallways that wrapped around the atrium and all of the other classrooms doors and front windows look toward the atrium. While you were in this glass enclosed room, sky light on the ceiling you could been seen by every single person in the daycare center. It was a room where we would take the kids on rainy days so they could have a place to run and ride bikes etc. This has no bearing on the story I just always thought the atrium was so cool.
For some strange reason, I will call it the military, the doctor called my husband with my test results instead of calling me. There are rules against this, but they were friends who worked together... After receiving the confirmation of my pregnancy from the doctor Jeff called me at work. In order to receive a phone call at work, someone has to come into the room where I was working and relieve me, to ensure the kiddies always have the proper amount of adult supervision. It is a very difficult task, because the person at the front desk who answers the phone is also not allowed to leave their post. It is also difficult to pee as a daycare provider. Jeff was left on hold for awhile while all the details were worked out, he had actually never called me at work before and I was very worried. I get to the phone, and all eyes were on me, my co-workers from the atrium, the front desk, the person relieving me, they could all see me from the glass room atrium where they were watching the kiddies. And Jeff informs me that I am indeed pregnant. I am thinking, I know dude, why are you causing all this ruckus at my work and why did the doctor not call me, the patient??? I am very excited as is Jeff, tears, a little screaming etc.
Everyone wants to know what is going on so I tell EVERYONE, and so does Jeff. When I get off work I pick up Mandy at her after school youth center place and I tell her the news. We are going to have a baby. We immediately go to the store and buy an outfit and a book. The world's dumbest book. It shows day by day or week by week what is growing and developing on the baby. We count it all out figure out the conception date and the due date, we read through the book and find out that growing inside of me is a baby, that has arms, legs, fingers, toes, finger nails, toe nails, eye lashes, heart. Jeff comes home from work and we tell him all the news. We are all so very excited. I am certain that it is important to share this with Mandy so that she doesn't feel left out.
The very next day I start to spot. I am at work, I use the restroom, there is blood. I ask to go home. I try to call Jeff, he is not at that office. I had a panic attack. No idea what to do. Jeff had recently changed my doctor from being at an office at the hospital to being at an office on a different part of the base. No idea where that is. No idea how to find out. So I drove to Jeff's work. I go into his office and he is still not there. They have no idea where he is and they all congratulate me on being pregnant. I start to cry hysterically, I try to explain why. They take me across the street to my new doctor, explain for me what is going on and get me into an exam room within about 30 seconds. The doctor is such a lovely man, his wife had had a miscarriage a couple of weeks earlier and he explained about blood tests and about how these things sometimes happen, nothing you can do, not your fault.
Finally Jeff shows up in the exam room, I guess they found him. His presence is all I need, I finally am able to calm down. I feel that Jeff's soul touches mine. I was in such a state, like a train coming toward me and I am frozen in fear. I literally couldn't think. Jeff came in and the mental block disappeared and I was normal again. Still having a miscarriage, but at least my brain started to function. Over the course of the next few days the bleeding intensified, blood test confirmed it, the baby we had so anticipated was no longer a reality.
I cried and cried. I was not at all prepared for this, I cannot remember ever being that devastated. It was very selfish of me, but I fell apart. All this right in front of a 10 year old Mandy. She had a bit of a nervous breakdown at school. She couldn't find a pencil and dumped her entire backpack on the floor in the middle of the classroom and started crying hysterically in the middle of the classroom while the teacher was talking. We got a call, we went down to the school and we were reprimanded by the teacher for burdening our child with all of this.
Jeff decided we needed a trip. This is Jeff's solution to all that ailes you, go on a trip. We went to Pompeii. We traveled there by train, we stayed at a fabulous hotel, ate in wondrous restaurants. It was very soothing. We waited three months per the doctors instructions, got pregnant again, another loss, another trip. Egypt, a cruise down the Nile, a five star hotel in Cairo, camel rides, climbing to the center of the Pyramids, etc. Another three months, another loss, another trip. This one to France: Paris, Normandy, beautiful hotels, museums, war memorials. Still no one knew just Jeff and I. The losses were easier to handle being prepared. I no longer cried in front of Mandy. I did quit my job, I was not a very pleasant person to be around. I slept till noon everyday, etc.
It was then time to try again, another three months had passed. Only we saw a fabulous trip to Kenya and decided to take the trip before trying for the baby. We had to take a powerful antibiotic as a malaria medication and our doctor specifically told us not to get pregnant while on the ciprolioxacin. This is of course when I got preggers with Lily, during the forbidden taking of the ciprolioxacin. Totally freaked me out. But, she was born and is our little miracle. We didn't tell anyone until I was 12 weeks pregnant. But, Jeff works at the hospital and everyone in his office knew we were pregnant because our doctor told them. So I was pretending to not be pregnant and they were pretending to not know I was pregnant. It was hilarious. I kept feeling like screaming, I am pregnant. We moved from Italy to Japan while I was pregnant with Lily which also caused me so much anxiety my eyes nearly popped out of my head. Let us just say that during my pregnancy I was not the nicest person to be around. This I think is the main reason Jeff is unwilling to have anymore kids. After Lily was born and healthy I was just so relieved I was finally able to put it all behind me and I became my normal self again.
Last night I was reading The Memory Keepers Daughter, it was late at night and everyone was asleep. I couldn't sleep so I was reading. The wife is told that she had twins and that the baby girl died while the baby boy survived. Which isn't true the girl actually survived. But, the mom was grieving for her lost little baby, that she never saw, and wow. It brought all those feelings back to me. There I was sitting on the couch bawling my eyes out like it was just yesterday.
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7 comments:
Oh dear, and here I had told you it wasn't "that" sad! I'm sorry. I went through a horrendous loss of my own at 9 weeks -- after telling DS (who was 5 1/2 at the time), and buying the baby book and the teddy bear (which I still have), and telling my entire family. We didn't have any more losses after that, but we also never had a successful pregnancy either. Even though you had to suffer through all those terrible losses, you are still incredibly lucky that you were able to end up with Lily. You will never forget, though, all the ones lost. I still think of our baby each October, when he/she would have been born. This year would have marked his/her 10th birthday.
I completely understand your feeling of loss. I too have been through this. But your not being selfish. It was something you wanted so strongly and the loss is so unexplainable. When I had my miscarriage, I did not realize how many other women have had one. Huge surprise to me and that is because we keep this painful event inside. Kinda sad isn't it.
We conceived Jake on a trip too! Funny huh, all it took was relaxing after 7 years of trying. Who knew. Lily(and Mandy) are beautiful blessings. Your very lucky to have such wonderful daughters.
Now I do not have to read that book! Thanks! LOL
Isn't it amazing that a story can trigger all the hurt, pain, grief, and sadness from the loss...not just of the loss of your babies, but of the hopes, wishes and dreams that you had for each of them. ((hugs))
I can't even pretend to know how you must feel. I'm so sorry. My daughter had cancer as a baby -- she fine now -- but I've read stories with similar plot lines and all those feelings are right there again, like she's still one month instead of 13 years old.
That is an amazing story! Thanks for sharing it with us!!!! :-)
How even more precious must Lily be. I know how much I worried before my two sons were born, but I can only imagine how sad it would be to struggle through this time, losing the babies.
Thanks for all your kind words. It is amazing how so many of us have shared in this experience but keep it to ourselves. Grief comes in many forms, something we all share/endure. I was trying to say that I don't think about those miscarriages anymore, and to have been reading and have such a reaction shocked me. Thought it was all done and over. I am enjoying the book very much and excited to be reading it.
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