Boulders And Brews (![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
bouldersandbrews) wrote2009-01-11 02:53 pm
bouldersandbrews) wrote2009-01-11 02:53 pm
Full version.
It's a lovely Saturday afternoon. Everything's feeling fine. Dave and I go out to the hot tub (I only stick my feet in, as I don't want to fry the Raisin). He calls Aunt Bonnie and talks with her, then passes the phone to me and we go back inside.
While taking off my swimsuit, I notice blood in the bikini bottom. I get off the phone real fast, pray for a while, then go out and tell Dave. He suggests calling midwives in the area and asking them what this could be, so I do so, not holding out much hope for getting anyone on a Saturday evening. I finally get a hold of a woman named Celesta, who tells me that this is most likely nothing, but gives me some signs to watch out for that could be bad.
A few minutes after I get off the phone with Celesta, a woman named Vickii calls me back. I talk to her and she tells me that this is most likely related to a garlic incident I'd experienced a few days previously. She also gives me signs to watch out for and tells me that if I need her I can call her.
We sit down to watch a movie. Regardless of the midwives' reassurances, I can't shake the feeling that something's wrong. I start crying. "Honey, I don't want to lose the baby."
I start feeling what amounts to menstrual cramps. At first I think that I, in all of my hypochondriac glory, am manifesting symptoms, but they don't go away. I mention them to Dave, and he tells me that I should call Vickii back.
I do so. She tells me what to do (drink water, take calcium pills), and that, whatever's happening, there's nothing I can do. We finally go to bed, the cramps not subsiding, around 10:30.
Around 12:15 I wake up. The cramps have progressed onward into contractions. I lay there for a few minutes, astounded at the pain these contractions are causing. Finally I come to the conclusion that I have to go to the bathroom, and get up. As I do so, I feel something hot and wet come out of me. I go into the bathroom and discover what it is - at first glance it looks like a giant blood clot, but it's more substantial and, I dunno, tissuey-looking.
I sit there for a few minutes, then hear Dave get up, so go back to bed. "Honey?" I say.
"Yeah, baby?"
"Um. I just passed a large bloody gob of something."
"Oh, honey, I'm so sorry." We lay there for a few minutes. I'm still undergoing contractions, which are getting more and more painful. Finally, after about an hour, we get up. I'm on the internet researching signs of miscarriages. I know exactly what's going on - what else could it possibly be? The contractions are now so painful that they're giving me nausea, and I go throw up.
Finally Dave comes over to my computer and gives me a hug. I say quietly, "There's no way that this isn't a miscarriage."
He hugs me, then goes back to bed. I try to, but these contractions are seriously painful. I know I'll never be able to sleep through them. I get up, exile myself to the futon so Dave'll be able to get some sleep, and lay down. For about five minutes. I'm feeling something else exit my body, so I get up and go into the bathroom again. And sit there. And sit there. And pass more giant blood clots from my body. Time passes. I'm not crying now. I'm in crisis mode. I'm cold, numb, and unfeeling. Well, a little scared, but even that's far diminished from what it normally would be.
I don't wake Dave up. I know that there's nothing he can do, and he needs to sleep. I can do this on my own.
Every time I put a new pad on, try to get up and go back to the futon, possibly maybe get some sleep, the contractions remind me that this is not an option right now, the pad fills right back up with blood and blood-clot-stuff, and I go right back into the bathroom. Finally I say to myself, "That's it. Screw it. I'm not leaving the bathroom till this is done."
So I sit back down on the toilet. And feel an epic contraction. By this time the contractions are so painful that I can do nothing but hold my breath and count my way through them: "One one thousand, two one thousand, three one thousand," until it diminishes. Most start to subside at about forty-nine, but I think this one got up to seventy. During this epic contraction, I feel something I've never felt before and that I can only describe as very queer: something is coming out of me in time to the contractions.
I look down. It's a blob. It's dark red, definitely not a blood clot - it's far more solid that that, more solid than whatever it's been that I've been passing all night. I squirm myself into a position for a closer look. It's definitely tissue, human-making matter, but in no discernible human shape. It's most like a really thick rope. A really thick, dark red, kind of squishy-looking rope with whiteish cords interdispersed through it.
This is my baby. This is what I've talked to, taken care of, sang (badly) to.
A few contractions later, it comes out completely, followed by another delightful period of vomiting, then followed by another rope-looking blob of tissue. And another. I'm looking and I don't recognize any body parts at all.
Finally the rest of it comes out in a gush of dark red blood. The contractions are starting to subside - instead of the epic seventy-count ones, or the more normal(ish) fifty-count ones, they're going down to thirty.
I sit there for a while longer, occasionally passing more blood-clot-whatevers. I change my pad, sit down on the bathroom floor, realize that I'm not done yet, get back on the toilet, wait a while longer, repeat steps two, three, and four a few times, then when the bleeding has started to subside and I'm not passing any more clot-things, I go back to the futon and huddle under the blanket, and finally fall asleep.
Around 7:30, a little less than two hours after I climb into bed, Dave wakes up and gets some water, I roll over, and he says, "Sweetie?"
"Yeah, baby?"
"Come to bed?"
I climb into bed. He asks, "Are you okay?"
I'm silent for a moment. "It's over."
"Oh, sweetie, I'm so sorry." We talk about it, what we have to do, who we have to call. We talk about how we miss a Raisin who never existed.
My best guess as to what happened: Either the sperm in question or the egg in question was defective. The chromosome in either one or the other was mutated, so not enough information remained on it to properly start a human life. The zygote divided, and divided, and divided again, following its programming, and at some point, instead of starting to form a human, it started to form nothing at all. My body believed it was pregnant - it gave me the hCG levels, the hormonal changes, everything. But instead of a tiny baby human, it produced formless tissue.
It makes me feel better to have seen what I was carrying. If I hadn't, I certainly would have imagined it as a tiny baby, my little Raisin, and it would feel far worse, far more like a failure on my part. Knowing that there was nothing I could have done differently to ensure that I had a baby instead of a tissue-blob... it helps. Knowing that I did absolutely everything right and it didn't change anything helps.
It doesn't make this go away, though. It doesn't make me stop mourning the Raisin that I thought I was carrying, the boy that I could watch play basketball with his daddy, the little girl who would ask me to play Final Fantasy 9 so she could see what happened to Princess Garnet, the baby that I would hold and love... the baby I already loved.
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I'm really sorry that this has been so crap, I'm sure I'm just re-iterating what everyone else has said, except mine is poor and rambly xD I'm hoping that you get the general gist of what I'm trying to say though ♥ I don't want to be all cliche and say 'I'm here if you need me' or whatever, but I AM. You can say whatever you want to me - I don't consider anything tmi, or if you just want to get things back to normal, that's cool too. And I really hope you don't think I'm being insensitive when I say this but ... I know you guys weren't ready for this, just like my boyfriend and I but I thought ... if I lost the baby, I think ... well I think I'd try again. I know this is something you probably don't want to think about right now, if ever, but I just wanted to say that you can still keep on trying if you want to. You guys ARE ready - Raisin proved that to you. Sorry again if that's cruel or insensitive, I don't want to upset you or anything, I just wanted to say that when you're ready, you can give another baby as much love as you can hold, if you want to :)
This has been really long, and I'm going to apologise AGAIN for that x_x I really don't know how to explain how much I want to make you feel better, even though I can't. We both met through our pregnancies, and I'm really hoping you still want to read my entries and stuff - I'm putting a pregnancy filter on so you don't have to read any of that stuff unless you want to, if that's okay? ♥ Although my posting is lax anyway, I wouldn't want to remind you in any way *hugs* I really do need to get my butt back to LJ-land though because I've been sucking at that recently even before the computer had to be repaired =[
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You're the second person to tell me how strong I'm being through this, and I honestly am not seeing it. I feel so weak and lost and sad. I haven't gone a day without crying since it happened. Maybe I just have a different definition of strength than most people, though.
We might try again, we haven't completely decided yet. If we do we're going to wait a while - as I'm sure you can imagine, it's been really upsetting to both of us, and we don't think we can emotionally handle trying again just yet.
Thanks again. Your comment meant a lot to me - of course I want to stay friends :-D
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I've had some really low points in my life, and so many people told me how strong I was, and yet I felt so weak. I really couldn't see it, and yet people have just been repeating it for years, so I know what you mean! Just because you cry, doesn't mean you're not strong though. You're still carrying on with your life, you haven't shut yourself away or anything - I think a lot of people would struggle to maintain their lifestyle but you've kept going because you know that you have to. That is strong to me! :)
Waiting a while seems like the best idea, to give you time to mourn and time for you and Dave for yourselves. Only you'll know when you're ready again :) You should try and take it easy though if you can, you've been through a lot and you deserve a little relaxation time :3
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(Anonymous) 2009-01-22 06:43 pm (UTC)(link)Abbie