I slayed the dragon named miscarriage

Come As You Are – Nirvana

“Come as you are, as you were, as I want you to be.”

I have always been a dreamer. Sometimes that has worked in my favor (creativity) and sometimes it has worked against me (time-consuming). As a girl, I dreamt of being a big-shot corporate businesswoman and of finding my soul mate, in that order. Never in my wildest dreams – nightmares is a more appropriate word – did I think I would have a miscarriage. Then, I had one a month ago at 11 weeks pregnant with my second child. I have to say it was dreadful. The moment my better half and I saw the sonogram and saw nothing there we knew. And never did the word empty feel so full.

To the doctors it was a straightforward matter, “There is a yolk sac and a gestational sac measuring 7 weeks, but there is no fetal pole. The sac is empty. Come back for follow-up bloodwork, but prepare yourself to miscarry.”

Au revoir! Have a nice life!

There were no details of what to expect. There wasn’t a hug, an apology, a packet, nothing! I cried. And I cried again when the bleeding began. Again, various times, in the long and painful process. I would never get to hold this baby and for that I cried all the more.

Then, I did what I do best; I picked myself up. I wasn’t going to have a pity party because being a woman who has a miscarriage doesn’t make you a pity. On the contrary, it makes you a bad-ass warrior.

When a woman is pregnant and goes through labor she is a warrior in her own right. She overcomes the physical battle that is the excruciating pain of labor. Her enemy is physically evident and she knows she will end it. She knows at the end of her battle, she will hold the prize she’s had her heart set on: her baby. But, when a woman is pregnant and is told she won’t get to hold her baby she is a whole other category of warrior. She doesn’t get a prize and yet she is brought out to the battlefield regardless of that fact. She fights the physical enemy and the mental one.

Tired from her battles and sometimes proud of what she was able to get through, she then has a strange feeling that she should be quiet about the fight she has just so bravely won. She feels the need to bury the infinite amount of thoughts. Will this happen again? Will it linger forever? Will I have another chance? Riddle me this and riddle me that.

I wasn’t going to be that person who hid or who spent all of her energy questioning the past when it was over. I’m not that person; I never have been. I fought and I won and I’m going to let people know that I did. If you are someone who has also fought and gotten through a miscarriage, don’t be afraid and don’t hide. Come as you are, as a friend. You are brave and I commend you! Stand strong in your womanhood.

As for me today, a month after my miscarriage, the words my hubby told me on that dreadful day still bring me all of the comfort I need, “That just wasn’t our baby. Ours is still out there waiting for us.” I believe that to be 100 percent true because well…

Why are miscarriages such a taboo when they happen so often? Why don’t we speak about them? Have you come to terms with one (or many) you’ve had? Did you feel like less of a woman when you went through it or did you understand that it’s just how it goes sometimes? Were you shocked by what the actual miscarriage did to your body? Did you successfully get pregnant after? If so, how did having a miscarriage change your feelings about being pregnant?