The Hardest Day of My Life
People always say that you can recover from anything and that losing something important is only as hard as you make it. Who am kidding no one who has experienced any kind of loss says that.
I'm trying to figure out how much detail to provide on this post. I promised myself to create this blog to document our experiences and for one day to give our child something to read about their parents and their experiences.
Being pregnant for the first time gave us a different purpose in life. We started pre planning for the planning. What I mean by this is that we wanted to register and purchase things for our future baby even though we knew it was still too soon and we needed to realistically wait a bit. We didn't go crazy but we did buy a few things. I'll post pictures later when I can figure out how to do it.
Tiff started to have brown spotting at the onset of week 5. As I took to the internet for confirmation of normalcy I reassured us that this was implantation bleeding and totally expected. She had also been having some very mild cramping but nothing to be concerned with. Get how I say that like I've been getting my period and dealing with cramps for 14 years? Anyway trying to paint a picture here so level with me. The next day I went to work late and decided to call the midwives who had not yet met us to ask about the spotting. Upon talking to the nurse she asked us to come in to do a blood test to confirm progesterone levels which would be compared against tests taken 48 hours later in which time her hcg levels would double. In a normal world that is.
Remember how tiff doesn't like needles ? That's a mild description of her actual phobia. This is the start of my new found admiration for my wive's strength. She went into the office and let them do the draw knowing she would have to come back in two days to do the same thing. She normally passes out when they take blood but she did well this time. We also got to get a sneak peak at one of the midwives and instantly realized we had made the right choice. She told us what to expect in the way of average results and that this was the only way to truly know that things were okay at this stage in the pregnancy. She also said that spotting is fairly common but still something to be watched.
The day after her first test was great. She stopped spotting and the cramping went away. None the less we went back to the doctor the day after and went on about our day at work as normal. We also would not see results until the next day.
That evening, tiff went to a work dinner and mid dinner called me to tell me that she was now having a pinkish spotting. A few hours later it turned into red.
At this point the internet had given me enough information to know that either she was fine and this was a million different things that we wouldn't need to worry about in a few weeks or she was experiencing the start of a loss.
I'm a very positive person and kept thinking this stuff is normal. We are going to be laughing about this in nine months. I still couldn't help the feeling though. When tiff got home that evening we relaxed ( right) and waited to fall asleep. I tried to keep her from the internet and just told her to stay positive.
In the morning of a basically sleepless night we woke up to the same symptoms. Not better not worse. I put a call into the midwives on call and called out of work.
As the morning went on and the bleeding had not stopped we started to realize that this was a very real situation that we didn't expect or knew how to handle. I will not insult my wive by trying to explain her feelings during this time of unknown anxiety.
What the blogs and forums don't tell you is that if this happens, you don't know when it's over and you might never know why it happened. This to someone like me is an impossible situation.
My biggest concern as a man and a husband ( not a father) was my wive's emotional and physical we'll being. I stopped concentrating on knowing what her body was trying to tell us and started to research what to do and not to do to properly support her. Here is an example don't say "it's ok, everything happens for a reason."
I had feelings of my own, but at this moment, my feelings were irrelevant.
We decided to call her mom who had experienced an mc some 20 years ago. She recommended tiff take a pregnancy test. The results were negative which at this point I knew meant her hormone levels were low enough to not be detected by a home pregnancy test. Devastation sets in.
The midwive called to confirm that her hcg levels had gone down and that it was very possible that she was having a loss. This felt as the final confirmation of what we knew was happening.
I didn't know what to say. I didn't know what to do. So I kissed her on the cheek and hugged her. My thoughts were this is not fair. What did we do wrong. Why are you taking away what we wanted most. My heart was broken.
What would happen in the next few hours equated to what you can find online. We never had to go to the hospital as her cramps never got worse and everything happened quickly and naturally. Medically this was a best case scenario. Emotionally this would be the worst thing that would happen to us. we have lived a good life without much loss and sadness. This would be one for the books.
Two things happened as a result of the miscarriage.
We bonded in a way that in the 12 years we have known each other we'd never experienced. I belief experiencing this (and yea her eventually comforting me too because I eventually broke down) changed us as a couple and as people.
The second thing was confirmation that we were not only ready to be parents but also that we wanted this more than anything else in the world. When we found out tiff was pregnant, we were excited but we still had our hesitations about being ready or having a second one eventually. After this, we knew we'd want to have more children and we would never question our level of readiness for parenting.
So with this I say. There is a metric ton of stuffon the internet. If you plan to rely on it, do your best to skim through the trash and rely on real experiences.
I'll never forget our first angel or tiff's incredible strength during those few days.
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