Thursday the 8th July 2021 is the day my baby was due to come into this world. Who knows if they would have been early or late and, to be honest, it wouldn’t have mattered? They just would have been here…
Miscarriage is a complex type of grief and a unique experience to go through. Each person who is affected by the loss of a baby is impacted in different ways. There is no one right or wrong way to move through this experience.
What I do think is really important is that it is shared with others and I want to touch on the important reason why, but I’ll get to that in a bit. To start I wanted to share with you what my experience from losing our baby to our baby’s due date has been like.
If you missed my story on losing our baby you can find the start of it here…
December 2020 was a big month. We were told we might lose our baby, then we did, our baby was gone, I went in for surgery and bled for the next couple of weeks. A constant reminder that my 2020 wasn’t finishing the way I had hoped. In fact, nothing else in 2020 would be such a disappointment as this. As I bled into the new year, I set my sights on a fresh year, a fresh start at my fertility treatments and a wavering hope that it wouldn’t be long until we could add to our family.
In January about 5-6 weeks post miscarriage while on our extended family holidays I started my fertility treatment again. Although the pain was still there mentally and emotionally, I didn’t want to waste any time to ‘try’ again. I remember speaking to a friend in early February about how I was feeling. She mentioned that it seemed like I was in need of a win and I couldn’t agree more. Having a random back spasm that left me partially limping on my birthday and an appointment with my eating disorder therapist which showed me just how far recovery was away for me, I put a lot of pressure and hope onto my results coming back with good news from my fertility medication.
I wasn’t even putting the expectation out there that I would fall pregnant, I simply wanted my body to ovulate. That was the goal. I was hopeful with the highest dose of meds that this would happen. I got my results back and they were heartbreaking. Nothing, not even a flicker of my body responding. This is when I got angry. I am the type of person that if I see a problem, I want to do all I can to fix, improve, alleviate or change it. I don’t like to sit in situations where I have an opportunity to change for the better. It just doesn’t make sense to my brain not to try….
So, when I got my results what I was reading was basically. YOU HAVE NO CONTROL OVER THIS. IT DOESN’T MATTER HOW MUCH YOU WANT THIS, YOU WILL WAIT. Yeahhhh, let’s just say that didn’t sit well with me. Although, as usual, I picked myself up and told myself, hey, it’s just the first month, let’s give it some more time. Then March came and I did another round of meds and got the same results. NOTHING. My body wasn’t responding at all. I met with my fertility specialist and she said that it looks like IVF is our only option moving forward if it doesn’t work the next month or two.
And this is the part where we hit, Sarah doesn’t write a blog for 4 months because she is blatantly angry and didn’t feel like her readers would love to read week after week of Sarah’s angry blogs. Seems fair, I don’t think it would have had the positive effect I hope my blogs have on people. So, yeah. March was MAD MARCH. I just got so angry. I couldn’t improve my back very much, I couldn’t get into recovery, I couldn’t even have the chance at trying for a baby. It felt like I had no control over my life. It felt like I was just being told to wake up, take care of kids, and deal with whatever was given to me whether I wanted it or not. All the goals, dreams, self-care that I wanted was not in my reach. It wasn’t for me. I felt a bit like an imposter. Living a life that I felt had no control over. It wasn’t a pleasant month. Anyway, I digress.
Knowing that I couldn’t keep continuing life this way I made some choices to try and gain some control back over my life. This included some drastic changes to my health. As the weeks ticked by, I hoped that the results I was seeing in my health would help with my fertility but at this point, I’m no longer holding my breath. I’ve got one more blood test this week and that will determine our fertility future.
While all of this is going on, I am mentally ticking the weeks off in my head. Halfway, I would have been finding out the gender, 28 weeks, I would have been in my third trimester, 37 weeks baby would have been full term, 38, 39 and now 40. I think this is a fairly common thing that happens with miscarriages. You picture what life would have been like. How a new baby would have changed your family and how your weeks would be spent if you knew you were going to be sleep-deprived, sore and drowning in happy, crazy children.
What took those thoughts from being a fleeting and temporary weekly update in my mind to a crushing and painful reminder is when you see all those around you that are STILL pregnant and due at a similar time. Now I get it, you go to buy a new car and then all of a sudden you notice every single car of that type everywhere you drive. That’s how the brain works. This has been different though.
The only people that I follow on social media that are pregnant have been due 2x end of June (one being an old work colleague who announced their pregnancy on Christmas just as we had planned on doing), 2x July (also both old work colleagues due with their first), 1x Aug (having their first after being married a short time) and my bestie in Nov (who wasn’t trying). Then at church, there are only 2x people I know of that are pregnant both due in July (one with their 8th or 9th child and the other also, not trying). As well as someone I connected with when I first found out I was pregnant as we had the same due date. These are all the pregnant people I know of…
So, over the past couple of weeks/months I have had to watch them go on babymoons, have baby showers, have maternity pictures, gender reveals, birth announcements, name reveals, newborn photos etc etc etc.
Now please don’t misunderstand me. I am SO happy for all of these beautiful people. They deserve every bit of joy that comes their way. I’m also not saying that they have had it easy. You can never tell how much effort has gone into trying for a baby or carrying a baby, nor does it matter. This is their time to be happy and enjoy these precious moments.
But let’s just count those numbers, within about a 6-week period there are 8 of them. Now the statistics are that 1 in 5 women will miscarry before 20 weeks and that 1 in 4 pregnancies will end in miscarriage. This says to me ‘statistically’ there is another one of you out there that was expecting, with a due date around the same time as me. This statistic says to me that I am not alone but when I look on social media and see my circle of friends around me, I am alone. I don’t know who you are….
I have wished many times during the past few weeks and months that as I see others sharing their good news that there would have been someone sharing their sad news. Someone in my social influence whether online or in-person that was open about their loss too. Their gender reveal they never got, their hole in their heart and their empty arms come their due date.
This is why I think it is SO important for us to share all the things that happen in life. Not just the highlight reels but the hard times too. Knowing what I know now I wish I had of been more vocal on here about my thoughts and feelings as the week went on.
I was recently sharing with a friend’s mum about my loss. She was wonderful in allowing me to feel my grief and validating it. We were at church where another old friend had their 6-week-old baby that others were lovingly doting on. It was wonderful to meet her but I shared with my friend’s mum that just 6 months ago just about everyone at church knew I had lost my baby but it seemed like now everyone had moved on and forgotten about it. No one there knew I would have been 39 weeks pregnant. No one knew the pain that was searing on the inside and the twisted knot in my stomach at my great loss.
Now, I don’t expect everyone to know and remember, I certainly don’t remember myself all the sad moments in other’s lives and what dates they fall on, but I was grateful that I had the courage to share how I was feeling with someone and they were able to hold the space I needed to be upset.
So many people, not just those that have had a miscarriage but those that have lost someone have shared how they feel like life moves on and people forget. The messages stop coming, the flowers or dinners stop, the regular catch up’s die down and you are left there with your grief that is very much still consuming you.
I think the expectation isn’t that people will continue to care and love at a high intensity. I don’t think that’s really doable or that it’s healthily maintainable. I think where I would love to see the shift is from those experiencing it speaking up. Continuing to share their grief with the world. Making it a regular topic of conversation and those listening holding the space needed to sit in the suck with them.
I wear a necklace with a small pink gem that a beautiful friend gave me that represents my baby so that they are always close to me. Whenever I wear it, Annabelle always says “That’s your baby that’s gone, how sad for you mum”. When she had a friend over the other day, she shared with her friend what happened and we got to speak about it for a minute. I shared that my belly would have been SO big.
So please know that when you share, you help others to grow and help yourself to be reminded that this is a part of your life you don’t need to be ashamed of, you don’t need to hide, you don’t need to forget or move on. It will take time for others to feel less uncomfortable when you do share but it’s a change that the world needs.
There are also so many out there that need to know they are not alone. Where are you other mother that lost their baby due in July? I want to know who you are so we can cry together, the way we were designed to grieve…. together.
To my darling angel baby, I miss you. I think of you all the time. I know your big sisters would have loved to meet you this month. You are still loved every bit as much as when we found out you existed. Thank you for giving me this opportunity to grow as a person. Every day I go through is another day closer to meeting you. Keep guiding us, baby.
Thank you to all of you who have held space for me to feel my grief.
I don’t know what my fertility future looks like, I don’t know if I will ever have another baby. I don’t know how many more angry, hurt, frustrated and sad moments await me in my journey but I know one thing….I want to share it all with you guys so that others don’t have to feel like they are alone…because YOU ARE NOT ALONE.
Love always,
Love, Sarah Kay, xx
What if Image – sourced from confessions0fahotmess.com
Joanne Caccitore Image – sourced from www.motherandbaby.co.uk
