About two weeks after I first saw blood in San Francisco, Philip and I went back to our doctor’s office for yet another visit. They’d taken some tests the day before, and when I checked in with the receptionist, the nurse asked if I’d seen my lab results. “They’re really good!” she said, sounding quite cheerful. Suddenly I felt more hopeful than ever, giddy, even, about the pregnancy. I snuggled up next to Philip in the waiting room and started chatting about the cute little onesies on display in the clinic’s boutique. When the nurse called my name, I practically skipped down the hall into the ultrasound room. I lay down on the examination table, Philip standing next to me, both of us anxious and excited and hopeful. But it wasn’t long into the ultrasound when I saw the look on my doctor’s face—the look of someone who knows there is no good way to say what has to be said. Our baby had no heartbeat.
In moments like these, it’s a wonder that your body continues to fill your lungs with air when you’ve forgotten how to breathe.
The doctor gently informed us that I needed to have a D&C procedure to remove everything from my uterus, and she gave me the options of being transferred to the hospital, where I’d be put under full anesthesia, or staying at the clinic, where I’d have to be awake during the procedure. I thought about the long drive to the hospital, and the paperwork, and having to sit in another waiting room for hours with this grief and dread, and I couldn’t face it. If this nightmare was really happening, I wanted it to be over as quickly as possible. I elected to stay at the clinic.
“Are you sure?” the doctor asked. “I can numb you a bit, but it’s a very painful procedure.” I didn’t care.
“Do what you need to do. I just want to go home.”
I sat there while they gave me shots and pills to prepare me for the procedure, and I couldn’t stop crying. I kept thinking about how angry I was, how I couldn’t believe this was happening to me. I couldn’t imagine that I’d have to go home and break my kids’ sweet little hearts with this news. Philip and I felt like we were already starting to bond with this child. My daughter had put her mouth right up to my belly button and promised to share her room and her toys. I had gotten myself excited and invested in a future that wouldn’t exist. We all had so many hopes and dreams for this baby. And now those hopes and dreams were gone. I couldn’t wrap my mind around the idea that within an hour, my pregnancy would be officially over. Just like that. Over.
The procedure was excruciatingly painful and traumatic. I felt violated even though I knew this had to happen and everyone involved was only trying to help me. The doctor and nurse kept handing each other strange tools and using medical terms that I didn’t understand. Because it was a surgical procedure that required a sterile environment, Philip wasn’t allowed to be in the room with me. I lay there and tried to be brave, but the pain was so intense and kept getting worse.
“Just breathe, sweetie. You’re doing great. We’re almost done,” the doctor kept saying.
I was in so much physical and emotional anguish that I couldn’t take in any comfort. I wanted to scream at her, “How could you possibly know what I’m going through? Have you had this done?!” But maybe she had.
Tears were streaming down my face and I was grabbing on to the bed as tightly as I could. And then suddenly, instead of focusing on the pain, I chose to start focusing my negative thoughts on something else.
We wanted another child so much. Yeah, but . . . I’m so thankful I have Luka and Matea.
I can’t believe I won’t get to hold these babies. Yeah, but . . . my sweet husband is waiting for me right outside the door, and he can’t wait to hold me.
This hurts like hell. Yeah, but . . . time will make the pain more bearable.
I feel so empty right now. Yeah, but . . . the blessings in my life have always and will always outnumber the losses.
That night, back at home, I lay in bed staring at the list I had kept of all the good things that happened each day that year. I was supposed to write something down for today, but I wanted to skip the exercise just this once. The day had been a nightmare. Telling my older children had been as devastating as I’d predicted: Luka was shocked and angry. Matea was completely inconsolable. I was emotionally drained and I was still bleeding because of the D&C. There was nothing good to report. Nothing! But I had promised myself that I would write down something good, something specific, every single day. After a few hours, I was finally able to find one specific good thing to write down: the way Philip had so sweetly tucked me into bed after bringing me home from the clinic.
I know that sounds really simple and maybe even insignificant to some, but if I hadn’t committed to finding good in each day, I would have fallen asleep that night consumed with negativity, with how much I hated everything about that day. Instead, the last thought I had before I fell asleep was: I am loved. I am so loved.
Eleven
Control Freak
When the midwife handed me my first baby, I felt like such a badass. Just a few hours earlier, I’d been pitifully saying my goodbyes and telling my mom and husband to take good care of the baby because the grapefruit I’d been mentally preparing to push out of my vagina felt more like a giant brick wedged horizontally in my pelvis and I was convinced I was going to die. But then my son Luka popped out, and in a flood of emotions and hormones, I felt myself transformed from a woman who looked like roadkill into Beyoncé strutting onstage in a fierce outfit, or Katharine Hepburn sitting down fabulously and instructing the nearest man to give her a cigarette. I was in complete control . . . for about seven solid minutes. And then my Luka peed all over my bare chest.
Apparently, I could not control his bladder.
Then he started crying, and not only did I not know how to calm him, I didn’t even know what he was crying about. Then he made his own decisions about when he would and would not sleep, which of course never matched up with the “sleep schedule” I’d carefully prepared. I tried every lullaby I knew, in English and in Croatian. I tried everything in every baby book I’d read and put into action all the advice—solicited and unsolicited—anyone gave me. But he never slept until he decided he was ready to.
And then he refused to eat as much as I needed him to. He started losing weight and we had to go to a lactation specialist, which is where you sit on a couch while strangers whip out your boobs and wiggle them into your child’s mouth. I don’t think anyone has ever given my breasts as much attention as those two lactation specialists (who I remember only by the nicknames I gave them: Titty Fairy and Nipple Navigator). But Luka still wouldn’t nurse. Eventually they filled a syringe with milk I’d pumped, connected it to some thin plastic tubing, taped the other end of the tube so it ended right next to my nipple, squirted the milk directly into Luka’s mouth to get him excited, and then slowly moved the tube away until my son was actually sucking on my nipple.