Just like that

I was pregnant. And now I’m not.

Just like that.

I suppose I should back up and start at the beginning. Because I write about adoption, not pregnancy. Bridgette is the BBB author who can get pregnant. I have a 1% chance. Apparently I am the 1%.

Because of my premature (or incipient) ovarian failure my doctor (reproductive endocrinologist) said that my ovaries would go through peaks and valleys, sometimes they’d work, sometimes they wouldn’t, and there’s really no telling why or when that would occur. Every ultrasound I ever got with him, my left ovary did all of the work while my right one was lazy producing no follicles or anything. He suggested I chart my periods and take a pregnancy test every time I missed one, you know, just in case. He even told me “it’ll most likely be negative, but take one anyway.”

So, for the past four months or so I’d been getting regular periods…well, basically regular – they’d range in days from a 20 day cycle to a 35 day cycle, but my period always came…for the past four months. When I completely missed my period at the beginning of December, I took a test like the doctor said. I turned on the shower, and stole a glance at the test before getting in.

Two. Pink. Lines.

What. The. Hell.

I woke up Husband who had worked the previous night, and we both were in disbelief. The pregnancy test I took was 2 months expired, so I went out to the store to buy another one. I had to be sure. I bought the tests that say “pregnant” or “not pregnant” because I needed words. I needed to see and read the word “pregnant” before I would believe anything. I came home and took another test, sure enough it read “pregnant” with the numbers 2-3 below as an estimated weeks since conception. Wow.

It was Saturday, so I couldn’t call my doctor until Monday. I was freaking out. I have an 8 month old son, and now I’m going a have another baby due in August. I’ve always wanted a big family, so why not add a biological child to my beautiful, blended family! I called my doctor and we got blood work done. My number was great, so I called my RE and set up an appointment for an ultrasound. He saw a gestational sac and a yolk sac, no baby, but that was ok because it was too early to detect a baby. I came back in a week and we saw a baby with a heartbeat. At 6 weeks pregnant, I had a baby with a heartbeat. What a miracle. My RE told me he didn’t need to see me for three more weeks because everything looked so good.

I was shocked. I couldn’t bring myself to form the words. I was carrying life. I was pregnant.

Here’s where the not so good part comes in. I started spotting. Nothing earth shattering, but terrifying to the first time pregnant girl who had a 1% chance of getting pregnant. This could be my only shot. Who knows if the fates will align again like this? And how could God allow me to get pregnant after at least 3 doctors declared me infertile and then take the baby away? It just wasn’t possible.

I called my RE and talked to the nurses who said if it gets worse or continues with cramping to call back. It continued, but without cramping, for about 2 weeks. It was never enough to justify calling again though, but every time it worried me.

Then this past weekend came. I was 8 weeks, 3 days pregnant on Saturday when I woke up with significantly more spotting than I’d had before. I knew somewhere deep inside of me that this wasn’t good. It still wasn’t enough to call, but I just got this feeling that things weren’t going to end well. However, Husband hates when I get even a little bit negative, so I kept on trying to be positive. Sunday was more significant spotting, and Sunday night the cramps hit.

I always had bad menstrual cramps, but this pain was almost unbearable. I took Tylenol (the only pain reliever you’re allowed when you’re pregnant) which does NOTHING for cramps, and when I went to the bathroom, there was the first small clot. I barely slept that night my pain was so bad. At 1:00am I called the on-call doctor at my RE’s office. She told me to wait until the morning and only go to the ER if I was soaking through a pad an hour or I felt my life was in danger. None of those were true, so I stayed home, sleeping only from 3:00am-4:30am and again briefly from 5:45am-6:15am. Every time I went to the bathroom, I passed more clots, each one bigger than the next. The time when I knew it had officially happened, I sobbed. I didn’t look. I didn’t want to see. I wanted the pain to be gone.

The diagnosis at the RE’s office was an incomplete miscarriage. The baby was gone, but there’s still some tissue that needs to be passed. My doctor didn’t think a D & C would be necessary and thinks I’ll continue the miscarriage the next few days. So, I’m expected to have a lot of pain and a lot of bleeding for the next few days. I go back to see him on Friday to make sure my levels are back to zero.

And there you have it. I was pregnant, and now I’m not.

I mourned my infertility already. I did that. I reconciled not ever being pregnant, and I was ok with it. So why? Why make me pregnant only to take it away? Why do I have to mourn this again? Why let me beat the 1% odds only to become another statistic of first time pregnancy miscarriage? Why tease me with the possibility of conceiving, carrying, and birthing a child, only to have it taken away before 9 weeks? I don’t get it. I probably won’t ever get the answers, but that doesn’t mean I can’t ask the questions.

For my friends and family that are finding out about either my pregnancy or miscarriage through this blog, I apologize, but I told very few people that I was pregnant, and I actually called and told even fewer people that I’m having a miscarriage. I can’t say the words out loud, but ironically I can write about it and put it out there on the internet for anyone to see.

I haven’t processed the weight of this yet that’s why this whole blog has a sort of clinical feel to it. Stay tuned. I’ll write more as I try to process everything. For now, I’m going to take a Percocet for my pain and hopefully sleep.

Of course, ending on a positive is one of my M.O.s, so here’s my positive: Vincent. If it weren’t for this beautiful ray of sunshine, I would be a crumbling mess with very little will to wake up in the morning. Thank you beautiful baby for giving me a purpose.