Disaster?

The past few weeks have put me on the brink of sanity. I have been repeatedly sick this pregnancy, missing days and days of work, exhausted, running a fever, throwing up, etc. etc. Through into the mix a major car accident requiring that we buy a new car and the stress of wondering whether my husband was going to be out of work again due to the sequestration and life already felt barely manageable.



On Friday at the 16 week ultrasound, I waited patiently as the technician made all of her measurements, sitting in the dark and quietly let tears run down my face because it is usually in the silence of the ultrasound room that the loss of my other baby really hits me. It is the place where I learned of the baby. It is the place where I lost the baby. I always ask the technician to turn off the monitor so that I don’t have to see what remains of the second baby. I am usually too fearful to say anything. At the end of the ultrasound, I asked the technician if my cervix was closed and she said yes. That was my big concern…given that loss of a twin can result in premature birth of the other twin. I mentioned that this baby didn’t seem as active as my other children and the technician said that she could see the baby moving around. She said that I should leave the gel on my stomach as the doctor may want to look at a few things. It seemed innocuous enough, but I should have known.


The doctor came in and did some scans and then told me that she couldn’t get a good view of the baby’s feet and legs as it was in the breech position and she had some definite concerns that the baby had club feet, which is associated with a host of neurological and spinal issues, such as spina bifida, cerebral palsy, and others. I tried to process what she was saying. I tried to tell myself that this was similar to the concerns doctors expressed about the size of Nugget’s head that lead to a month of hand-wringing and crying for the last month of my pregnancy with him. I told myself that I wasn’t going to let myself think about all the horrible things this could mean for our baby boy. That night, my husband and I woke up several times crying. This pregnancy has been so rife with angst and pain and sadness that sometimes I just want to end it all so that I don’t have to live in agony like this waiting any more.


We have to wait two more weeks before we can get another ultrasound to check on baby and see if he indeed has club feet or spina bifida, or any of the other horrible things that a genetically normal baby could suffer. Each day is an eternity and I can help but feel that both of us assume that it is a foregone conclusion that this is not a healthy baby and this pregnancy is only going to end in disaster.

What Happened

It was more than I could process and it certainly something I didn't feel comfortable processing out loud...particularly in our ALI community.  I didn't want to hurt any one's feelings.  I didn't want to say the terrible things I was thinking.  I was scared.

When we went in for our first ultrasound, there were two sacs.

Two.

After 6 (of our 8 total) cycles of transferring 2-3 embryos....we ended up with two sacs NOW.  We were bereft.  Why couldn't this have happened when we were trying for #1 or #2 when I was 29/31/32?  How on earth would we handle 3 kids under 19 months (or younger if they came early)?  There are so many risks with twins.  What would happen if there was something seriously wrong with them because they were born too early?  How would we afford this?  Where would we put them?  We'd have to move, hire help, get a new car, etc., etc., etc.  I cried for weeks.

And, then....one of them stopped progressing.  We lost her.  I think of the baby as my girl.

I felt relief.  At first.

I refuse to accept the pregnancy.  I assume it won't work out.  And, when we made it to twelve weeks and got the news that the remaining fetus was a healthy boy, I cried.  I've been crying off and on for the past three weeks.  I am trying not to tell people that I am pregnant because this pregnancy is so twinged with pain.  People expect you to be happy, excited when you tell them that you are pregnant.  But, I am just sad.  I feel like we pushed too much.  We should have been thankful for our two beautiful children and now we are going to be punished.  Something bad will happen. We were too greedy.

I am also deeply afraid that I won't be able to give my children the love and attention they deserve.  I wake up in the middle of the night worrying about it.  My parents, though well meaning, are deeply practical people that never paid much attention to my personality or interests.  They were so overwhelmed with managing four children that they just didn't have the emotional bandwidth to really look at me as an individual.  They still don't.  Every year for Christmas, I get the exact same sweater or dish-dryer or vacuum or WHATEVER....because my parents can't be bothered to figure out who I am and what interests me.  I don't fault them for it.  But, I know that isn't the type of parent that I want to be to my children and....I feel so overwhelmed managing work and speech therapy appointments for my son and keeping up with the house and trying to plan special activities for my kids and keeping up with photo albums and doing all the things that my whiny brat self didn't think I got as a kid.  How am I going to manage with three kids?  Will I be able to have a career or anything for myself if my utmost value is to provide my kids with love and specialized attention?

I am sorry I left with out so much as a good bye. It was just more than I could handle.