Jealousy

From the beginning of this miscarriage, I just wanted it to be over and past me.  I can handle anything if I can just move on.  I kept trying to push it past me.  Everyday I woke up and said, this is the end; today I’m going to put it behind me.  But everyday, my body would say, no, not today.  It took a full month before my body was quiet and there were no more signs of miscarriage.  So I said, this is behind me and I felt better.  I think all the pushing it away maybe has caught up with me.

A few weeks later, I began my period and the experience sent me into worry and flashbacks of the trauma of my loss.  I also sent in all my insurance claims.  It was a hard week mentally.

The week after that, friends were continuing to announce new pregnancies.  It was upsetting, but these were Facebook posts, so they were distant.  I could lovingly “hide” those posts.

Recently, a close friend announced her pregnancy via email.  I felt a new weight set upon me.  She was one of the first friends I told about my loss.  My heart was angry.  I was angry because I knew the JOY her family was experiencing over this pregnancy.  We had lost that joy. 

We had lost 1,000 laughs and kisses, 1,000 sleepless nights, 1,000 hugs. That was/is my grief.  We lost a person who would bring us joy and unimaginable blessings.  I get it, Mom.  I get why you mourn 30 years later.  I didn’t before, but I do now.

I was going to see my friend the next day after reading her email, but I was planning to respond to her email and congratulate her and explain I could not say it to her in person just yet.  But, I was still upset and angry, so I decided to sleep on it and text her in the morning. 

My sleep was a tempest.  I had nightmares all night about my friend.  Over and over, I dreamt congratulating her and every scenario ended up a mess.  I woke up and affirmed in my mind that I was going to be a big girl and overcome my pettiness.  I was going to look her in the eye and congratulate her.  I could be happy for others.   

As I drove to our meeting, with a car full of kids, I became overcome with grief.  I almost pulled the car over.  But, told myself to stay alert and keep driving.  I was going to suck it up.  Then I saw her and did not make eye contact.  I thought to myself to calm down.  Then a quiet opportunity arose to say the words I so desperately wanted to say.  I wanted to rejoice with her.  Instead I felt the ground drop out from under me and my vision go white.  “Oh! Am I passing out?!”  I took a deep breath.  “Not today, I would not congratulate her today,” more breathing deeply.  Then it was just a struggle all the rest of the morning to keep from crying.

I cried at home.  I wrote the email explaining that I had wanted to be congratulatory; and genuinely, I am happy for their family.  But I was a mess the rest of the day.  It’s no one’s fault but my own.

I cried and cried and cried and tried to push it down.  It seemed there was something evil about it.  I felt I should be able to stop it.  I told myself I could choose to stop it.  I would stop it.  Many times I stopped it, only to have it return.  It was just so painful.  It was probably the most painful day yet.  Every thought hurt. 

I had a little vent session with my husband.  He listened patiently and I felt calmer. 

Later I prepared the presentation for my daughter’s Little Flowers Club and the answer came to me in the reading for the club.  There was a snippet about jealousy.  It was about how jealousy interferes with friendship and the health of one’s soul.  It seemed to hardly fit the piece at all, but it came as the perfect message, sign from God, and answer to my problem of how to make the pain stop. 

I was jealous.  I was insanely jealous of someone else being full of life.  I said that should be me.  I was sinfully jealous.  I did not mean to be jealous, but I wanted what my friend had.  All day long I had tried to find the root of my problem.  I hated myself all day for feeling that way and for not just being able to be happy—anger—why me?  I just wanted to fix myself.  When I read the excerpt on jealousy, I could see myself in it.

So I decided to look up more information on jealousy and more information on grief.  After reading further, everything I was experiencing sounded more like grief than jealousy.  But, I decided maybe grief and jealousy are not so far apart.  While experiencing grief there is deep longing for that someone/something one can never have again, and as a result one experiences a deep sadness.  One desires to have something that is forever lost.  Jealousy is similar in many ways.

It was in identifying the roots of my problem—it was grief wrapped in jealous feelings that someone has what I lost—then I began to feel better.  When I knew what it was that I was experiencing, I was able to address it.  It was this moment of self-understanding that made all the emotions go quiet again. 

As one Little Flower told me today, “If you ever feel jealous of others, you should look at what you have a see the good things that you have.”  Yes, I see the good things I have.  I certainly do not take them for granted.  There’s just one little, good thing that I am longing to hold.   

Maybe this is not the end of grief, but this is the end of jealousy.  I cleared away jealousy, and I cleared away anger.  I’m truly happy for my friends.  I might even be able to say it to them now.  I hope they cherish the joy of their new little lives.  Now, when I feel sad about our loss, I know its just grief.

Sneaky Grief

This week, I have begun to wonder if I need a grief counselor to help me with the loss of this last pregnancy. 

A lot of people have announced pregnancy due dates recently, and every time they do, I feel quite sad and jealous.  I do not think this is a healthy reaction.  I am both happy for my friends and angry I am not in that number.  Many of them are first time moms or second pregnancies.  There's no reason to be jealous, when I have enjoyed four successful pregnancies and four healthy children.  I just longed to hold yet another beautiful new life and stare into his eyes and know this is the fruit of my labors.

There are a lot of little things like other women experiencing healthy pregnancies, that feel like small daggers in my heart.  I reminded myself I needed to make a followup appointment with the midwife and then felt sick and burst into tears. I don't think I will make that appointment.  It only goes on from there--the little things that sneak up on me almost everyday.

However, when I think about going to a grief counselor, I talk myself out of it for the pure fact that this situation just sucks and it takes time.  Part of me feels like I will feel this way until I pass the due date.  But then what? Will I be sad to see children who would be the same age?  Will I still mourn this 30 years from now like my mother.  Or will it pass on like the grief I felt at my brother's death, which took many months, a full year, to feel sound again.

Part of me feels like another pregnancy would heal emotional wounds.  A large family is a blessing.  I have seen it be a blessing.  The children have asked for more siblings.  I would cherish the preciousness of another infant in the house.

On the other hand, there are many reasons why that is not a good idea.  Firstly, by no means do I think one life replaces another.  Thusly, it would not necessarily make things "better." Secondly, it cost me as much to lose this baby as it did to birth a baby.  We need to recover financially.  I also feel like I need time to recover physically.  My body is so depleted after this.  Not to mention, I know I will have to deal with varicose veins again.

Maybe that is why this loss is hard for me to accept and move on, because there are many reasons why pregnancy is not a good idea despite the fact that I would like to expand our family.

I have a lot of life in my own home to focus on.  One child takes a lot of effort.  Four children take even more effort.  They all need some sort of special attention. 

So I bide, hoping that one day the grief will pass like the memory of labor pains.  I remember laboring and what happened, but I can't remember the pain.  Something tells me emotional pain is never really gone.  It can be called up from one's mental depths by triggers.  It's for me to manage and put it where its appropriate.

My Miscarriage Story

 The things people do not tell you could kill you.  The things they do tell you could heal you.

The Natural Disaster

I feel like my doctor’s office should have sent me home with some reading material on what a miscarriage should and should not be like.   I was left to the internet, which was very vague.  Everywhere websites said it would be like a heavy period, which might last one to two weeks.  This is how I had prepared myself.  It seemed to be going that way. 

The third day, to put it politely, I started bleeding a lot.  I thought, “I don’t know maybe this is what it’s like.”  Maybe this is the big event that happens.  I had very strong, labor-like, cramping, and a lot of bleeding.  It ran down my pants and seemed to be getting stronger.  Finally, I called on a friend who is a nurse practitioner.  I was calling more because I wanted more knowledge about what was going to happen.  I asked her how much bleeding was too much.  But by then it was getting scary.  She informed me I needed to get to an ER quickly.

My mom was visiting so she drove me to the ER and a friend took my children.  The ER was able to help me quickly enough.  I received IV fluids and went home.  I was wiped out for the next few days.  I still tire easily.  But, if I had not had a friend with medical training and whom I felt comfortable calling, things could have gone very badly.  I feel totally abandoned by those who were supposed to care for my health.  My doctor’s office is difficult to even get on the phone.  If only there had been a pamphlet for me to take home to help me know what’s normal, what’s not and explain my options.

So my takeaway for other women facing miscarriage is to ask for reading material, because you probably will not know what questions to even ask.  Then read it right away and call your doctor with any questions you might have.  Do not be afraid to be a bother?  Do not be afraid to ask dumb questions?

The Miscarriage Sisterhood 

In the past when I have met women who experienced miscarriages I have given my condolences, but I never linger on the topic.  I know it is painful and I wish not to trouble them.  For me it was the same.  I told my friends and immediately told them I did not want to talk about it.  It just made me feel too raw to talk about it.

But a funny thing happened this week.  Women started sharing with me about their own miscarriages.  For some reason while talking to these women I did not feel so terrible.  Likewise, they did not seem to struggle with it either.  Another friend shared that every time she shares with a woman facing miscarriage she feels a small sense of healing in herself.  I felt as strong as ever talking to these women.  It was very comforting and healing to see life and strength after loss.

I think it is healing to share with someone you know has gone through it.  Every story is different, with the same end--loss and grief.  Sharing the miscarriage stories is a little bit like sharing birth stories.  I think women feel solace in sharing birth stories as well.  It is something deeply connected to who we are and our womanhood.  Unfortunately, now I am a part of a new sisterhood.

 Looking for Sense in the Senseless 

Lately, I am the saddest (distraught and pained beyond measure), when I try to make sense of it.  I keep asking God why this happened.  I keep searching for signs why He would not want us to have a child now.  I’m always looking for signs from God.  My own answers make no sense.  There is no sense in this.  It all just feels like happenstance--like there is no hand of God.  That is why this is all so troubling. 

I pray a prayer every morning that says, “In unforeseen events, let me not forget that all are sent by You.”  There are no accidents; God makes no mistakes.  Then I remember that God is good.  So what awful thing did He protect us from in this event?  I keep searching to find God’s hand and I only become sadder, because I neither see Him nor want God to have brought this upon us.

Perhaps this event was bound to happen in this fallen world, yet He cared for me through my loss in ways that cannot be quantified.  I look at the timing of our loss.  I see how fortunate it was that it happened last week and not in the coming week when I would be traveling.  I see how fortunate I am in my friends and family, in the love and care they have given to us.  I see a lot of silver linings. 

I have to stop asking why.  I have to stop searching for meaning, because miscarriage is senseless.  I can only move forward and live.

Goodbye

Our fifth baby has passed on.  I immediately told myself that this baby was never really mine.  All of us belong to the Creator.  "The Lord giveth and the Lord taketh away."  I wanted to be okay about it, and for the most part I am.  But, I was surprised by grief.

When my brother died my grief was present and overpowering all the time for weeks.  Then it began to subside.  Especially as I gained closure.

I tried to be stoic.  I wanted to be stoic, but with the loss of this child, grief came in waves.  All the time for the first couple days.  But after I scheduled a D & C, I felt a great sense of peace and closure (fortunately, I don't have to have the D&C after all).  Now grief only sneaks up on me in my solitude.

At first I did not feel like eating all day.  Then when I finally did eat, it was like the food had no flavor at all.   That was the same when my brother died.  As soon as I tasted the food and it had no flavor, I realized this must be grief.  It tastes the same--flavorless and bitter.

I told the children. Alex and Kristiana immediately burst into tears.  They really wanted a new sibling.  Fortunately, I think children can process their grief quickly because they live in the moment.  Andrew and I really wanted this baby too.  We wanted this baby more than we realized.

I went through all the emotions denial (I was in denial that I was in denial), grief, anger, acceptance.  I was pretty angry for two reasons.  I felt like Nature's fool.  I only learned of the loss at my first prenatal appointment.  It was supposed to be an appointment full of joy.  I had prepared myself to see a little figure with a beautiful little heart beat.  I felt like I should have known it wasn't going as planned.  I also thought that miscarriage was usually associated with signs like cramping and bleeding.  There were no signs.  My hope in this child was great.  (But I feel like that is needed.  A child needs his mother to believe in him and hope for him.)

There was one sign.  Do you ever get the feeling like something you expect in the future will not happen?  Part of me did have that feeling this time.  Anytime I have trouble envisioning the future, I worry that it's because God has not ordained it to happen.  I had that feeling about my brother.  He was to go to a new university in the fall, but I had a feeling it wasn't going to happen.  I had trouble envisioning him there.  I immediately connected my feelings once he died.  In later years though, I told myself that I felt that way because no one can predict the future.  Technically, no one has a future until one gets there and then it is already your present.  Now that it has happened to me again in much the same way.  Perhaps there is something to it.

The second way I felt angry was that everyday I prayed and told the baby to grow, and he did not.  The child did not obey his mama.  They never do, do they?  So we had to say goodbye.  Alex had given the baby a name.  So that is the name he will pass away with--goodbye, Xavier Thomas Clayton.