Friday, February 17, 2012

February 17, 2012 – Fear for Sale

When you have had a miscarriage the fear never goes away.  Every moment there is the worry “am I going to get pregnant again, only to loose it again?”  There is the fear that maybe this time I won’t be able to handle the loss, not that I did a great job with it last time.  The fear is haunting my daily life.  I finally started to talk about this fear more with Doc.  We don’t talk a lot about our previous miscarriage.  It is part of our medical history; we don’t need to discuss it in detail.  But lately we have started talking and I realize that the fear isn’t just mine, it is his.  He lost a baby too.  He lost his wife for a bit to her grief.  He watched his world spin out of control and there was nothing he could do about it.  The fear of that all happening again is nearly paralyzing.  When you are struggling with infertility miscarriage is a very real possibility.  The fact that we may have to face the horror once again sits with us.  It makes us hold our breath each month.  At least now we are sharing it with each other. 

So now the big question becomes how do we avoid becoming paralyzed by the fear?  How do we not allow it to take over and guide our lives?  Is it possible to relax with this kind of fear hanging over head?  I really don’t know.  I think we will spend a lot more time talking about it, and hopefully that will help.  I know that together we will figure out a way to let some of this fear go, because I think we have to.  I don’t think we can have the future we want with this kind of fear in our lives.  I think we have to let ourselves breathe again and have faith that we are in a better place than we were last time.  That our lives are much more settled and that we are better equipped to handle whatever may come.  

Tuesday, February 7, 2012

February 07, 2012 – The Great Debate

Every month Doc and I have the same debate, “if we are pregnant, when do we tell people?”  It seems like an easy question, I mean we’ve been trying for 7 months… we shout it from the mountain tops!  Sadly though, when you have experienced a miscarriage your perspective shifts a bit.  There is a superstition that telling people before 3 months is bad luck.  The reality is that most miscarriages occur during this time, as ours did.  Doc comes down firmly on the side of “don’t tell”.  I on the other hand have a different perspective.  One of the reasons the miscarriage was so hard on me last time was because I hadn’t told.  I hadn’t told anyone and so when it happened, there wasn’t anyone to talk to.  I ended up feeling very lonely and it was just a horrible time, I think not telling made it worse. 

This month we were finally able to come up with a bit of a compromise.  We decided parents should be told first, and then close friends.  After that we would wait to announce it on more public forums, such as Facebook and of course, my blog (sorry guys).  Hopefully we will some day be able to put this plan into action! J