I have been really down lately and most of you know why. Just when I think I have dug myself out of my hole something happens that puts me right back in it. Well the truth is I lost a baby recently. This is such a hard thing for me to say out loud and I am hoping that by writing about it it might help me. As many of you know this isn't the first time this kind of thing has happened. In fact, from what I am hearing now from my doctor, it most likely will not be the last.
This is truly a heartbreaking thing to face and I have unfortunately done it somewhat publicly. When I say "publicly" it is because we had just started telling people about our little bundle of joy. We were careful in the beginning and thought that by keeping it a secret we would be protecting ourselves and our feelings from becoming something that others feel they could be a part of. Having a baby, of course, is usually such a wonderful experience that originally people truly want to be a part of it. Well in our case we are now 1 for 3 so it hasn't proven to be such a great thing quite yet for our family.
While many people tend to loose their babies early on I seem to loose mine rather late in the first trimester. Because of this I am now considered "High Risk" by my doctor. For example in this case I had already gone in 4 times and had 2 sonograms done before I found out my baby was no longer living. (To those who may not know, I lost this one and the other one around 11 weeks). In fact, we had already seen our baby's heartbeat and confirmed that it was alive and healthy. I had no indications that anything was wrong in the beginning and neither did my doctor. I was still incredibly tired and very very
nauseous more days than not. I don't know about you but I have always heard that it is a good sign when you have these symptoms so of course I had no idea anything was wrong.
Since this is a public blog I don't want to go into too much detail about the things that happened to me in the last two and a half weeks. They are still personal and incredibly heartbreaking and because of that I cannot bring myself to talk about them. What I can share with everyone is a couple of experiences that came out of no where but will never be forgotten.
To start I must explain that my husband and I were in a store shopping recently with my son. We had just decided on a gift and were making our way to the front when we stopped to look at a display. While we were both discussing whether or not we should buy this particular product I got a tap on my shoulder. When I turned around there was an older woman standing there. When I looked at her she simply pointed her finger at my son and said, "Good job", then walked away. Now I know that to most people this is nothing; but to me- at this time in my life-it was everything. How is it that this stranger who knows nothing about me can come up to me at such a time in my life and tell me the one thing I needed to hear? Was she an angel sent from above? I will never know. All I do know is that she came just in time. She didn't try to talk to me about her own life or try to delve into mine she simply stated what she wanted to then went about with her shopping. I was able to hold my composure until I left the store and when I got to the car I started crying so so hard.
These are things I deal with daily. I know that each day will get easier as it usually does for most people and I find comfort in the normal parts of my life. I like being able to go places where people don't feel awkward around me and no one asks me how I am feeling (FYI- this is quite possibly the worst thing you could do). In fact, when I was at work last Friday I got a huge shock from a random customer who came into my store. This man came in 2o minutes before we close and asked me to match up a listello (an intricate tile border) from a picture he had in his phone. Well as you can guess there are tons and tons of different designs for tiles out there and matching up this exact one was going to be very diffucult. He had no information to help me with regarding where the original tile had come from or what it was made out of. The only thing he could tell me was that he thought it was a natural stone. (This clue in itself really wasn't that great for those of you who don't know about natural stone v. porcelain/ceramic.) Anyway, long story short I was able to match up his tile for him and get it to him rather quickly. While I was working on completing the order the man stepped closer to me and told me I had made his day. Well since it was Friday I kind of made a joke about it to a colleague of mine and kept on typing. When the man stepped closer and said, "No, when I said you truly made my day what I meant was I lost my 8 month old daughter yesterday. I own my own company so I couldn't afford to not work today. Because you helped me find this so quickly I can now go back to the hospital to be with my wife." He then proceeded to tell me that he had anticipated an afternoon full of driving from store to store until he found his match. I don't know about you but I am guessing he was still in shock which is how and why he was still working when he so obviously should have been with his family.
I'm not quite sure why he felt comfortable telling me about his lose. I mean, he and I were complete strangers. If anything it made me realize that there might be some comfort in telling my story- to either a friend or a stranger. While I would never wish my misfortune on anyone else at the very least maybe I could give someone comfort in knowing they are not alone in their troubles.
I posted this for many reasons but pity is not one of them. Please don't comment on how sorry you are for me. Obviously by my postw there are many other situations out there that are equal or worse to mine. This is an outlet for me and I don't wish to have people take pity on me. I only want for people to be able to relate to me in one way or another.
