Before becoming pregnant, I wasn’t sure if having children was in my future.
It’s not that I didn’t like kids – I did. I just wasn’t sure about a life of domestication and monogamy. I was an artist. A musician. A free spirit. I’d travel. Singin’ in the streets. That sort of thing.
But when I met Eric, ideas about my future started to change.
Slightly at first, and then all at once, everything flipped upside down.
I got (unexpectedly) pregnant. It was Fall, 2007.
It was a shock to my system.
To my whole, (self-written, not inherent) constitution. I was a smoker and a full time coffee drinker. Like, 3 o’clock in the morning at the smokey cafe writing in my journal kind of coffee drinker.
And yet, I rejoiced. I was really excited! Not to mention, surprised that I was excited! Who knew? I didn’t.
Then, just four days or so after finding out, I started bleeding.
Light at first, then more heavily, accompanied by cramping. I had been somewhere between 4-6 weeks along.
The loss hit me hard. Which also surprised me.
I was taken aback for two reasons:
#1: How could I be so upset when just a week prior, having children was nowhere on my radar?
#2: How could I be so upset about this loss when I had only known for less than a week?
Everything had changed.
I began looking at the world in an entirely different way.
Later that week I remember sitting in my car at a traffic light as two teenage parents passed on the cross walk in front of me.
The dad was rollerblading and the mom was pushing the stroller. They looked poor and dirty, and…was I judging them? Hell yes I was.
I felt like the situation was so unfair.
A major injustice had occurred.
Why couldn’t I keep my baby while their’s flourished? I’m a good person. I have a nice car and a clean apartment, a good job, supportive family. Why was this allowed to happen?
I did a lot of writing during that time, trying to manage and cope with my feelings. I’d like to share one with you.
9-26-07
An Understanding: The Unreal Pain
For one brief moment,
I was an aged dandelion.
I was it’s see through white phase:
delicate.
Wind blew stronger
one brief passing moment,
and all my seeds
helicoptered away.
Poof.
Like a soundless picture
of an atom bomb,
it’s destruction all too apparent
even in silence.
Sudden death.
A breeze softly sweeping
like feathers across newborn cheeks.
Like the last exhale that does not return;
stays gone.
And there is nothing I can do.
My heart goes out to all of you who have lost a baby, no matter how far along you were.
In retrospect I can see how valuable an experience my miscarriage was.
I learned a lot from it. I learned how much I wanted to become a mother.
In the Spring of 2008, I rejoiced the coming of a second pregnancy.
I was fearful though that it wouldn’t last, so we told very few people until I was a full three months along.
Today that baby is my beautiful Ella Rose, 3 years old and fit as a fiddle. Her brother is nearly 10 months.
And now, I couldn’t be happier.
When did you realize that you wanted to be a mother? Share your story below!
things were going so well.
