"Just relax."
"Stop trying so hard."
"It'll happen when it's supposed to happen."
That's what lots of people said when they found out that we were trying to have a baby. Even some of my dearest friends uttered these words to me. I know they meant well, but telling me this is not a good way quell me. Nope, it comes off as condescending. Heartless even. Especially if the wise sage of a friend already has a kid at home.
Yeah, great. You want me to relax. Have you met me before? Relaxing makes me nervous. Going with the flow isn't something I enjoy. I'm one of those people that plan and prepare and get everything in line so that things go as they're supposed to.
But then I feel guilty. Guilty because a lot of the people telling me this don't know what happened to us last fall. See, last August we found out we were pregnant. We were both over the moon. Ok, I was a bit anxious and daddy was downright nervous, but we knew it was just jitters. This wasn't an accident--this was a planned baby-making attempt that had been successful. We anxiously awaited our first OBGYN appointment at about 12 weeks along to see if the baby was good and make sure my belly was ok.
But things weren't ok. As Dr. Goist, an ultrasound technician, daddy and I sat looking at the screen (daddy on his iPhone filming) we got the bad news. The baby wasn't alive. Really, the baby never really got going. There was no heartbeat. There was no baby really. Just a black spot in on the screen with a small yolk sack.
We were devastated. Instead of getting to tell Grandma Walton to get started on a quilt for her first grand baby, Grandmpa Walton to update his genealogy and Grandparents Combs to get ready for their first grandchild, we had to tell them about the miscarriage and the surgery. Instead of getting to buy baby stuff, I packed up everything remotely related to babies and put it away in a closet upstairs.
Everyone says that denial is the first stage of grief. But that's not how it worked for me. It made sense. I'd never had any morning sickness and hadn't gained a pound in the first trimester. No, my first stage was embarrassment. How had I not known something was wrong? How could I have been so naive to think that I was just luckily missing the nasty preggo side effects?
So when people told me to "relax" or "just let it happen" I would just stare at them. When they had the gull to say "it just wasn't meant to be" or "it wasn't that baby's time" I just wanted to smack them or shake them. How could you possibly think that would make me feel any better about anything?
Do you know what you say to someone who has lost a baby? You tell them you're sorry. You hug them. Oddly enough, you tell them if you've lost one. I know it sounds awful, but when I found out how many of my friends had lost babies, I took comfort in that. Not because I was relieved, but because I knew that they knew how I felt. There was peace in knowing that I was a part of a silent majority, rather than a broken minority.
We didn't tell many people at first. Parents, siblings, best friends, bosses and some coworkers. Eventually I told some more friends from school and work. But this isn't something you post on Facebook. It's not a status update. This isn't something that a social network is prepared to handle. It's a weird combination of a death, medical condition and emotional crisis.
But this blog isn't about unintentionally hurtful words from dear friends. It isn't about the baby that we lost. It's about you, Baby Combs, and me and your dad. It's about how we wanted you and how hopefully things will be alright. Today I am 6 weeks pregnant. That means that you're about a month old and the size of a pea. We'll go to the doctor on Tuesday and hopefully see your little heart beating away. Hopefully things will be right on schedule and we can give grandparents some good news. Hopefully I'm going to keep getting bigger and you're going to keep growing big and strong. Hopefully we'll get to meet in you in December.
