Note for a friend

It was the best of times and the worst of times getting pregnant after my first miscarriage. It was the best, because it gave me hope that in spite of medical statistics about women over 40, i was still capable of conceiving by myself. It was the worst because each time I conceived, i held my breath, hoping and praying that this time it would be different. This time, there would be no bleeding at 5 or 6 or 10 weeks, ending in a miscarriage. Unfortunately, 5 times, it did end in a miscarriage. I can’t begin to tell you how much I second guessed myself, wondered if it was my fault somehow. Was it the antihistamines i took? Was it the antibiotics? Had i trained too hard at the gym? So many questions and no answers. Everytime i went to the hospital, they tried to reassure me, that first trimester miscarriages usually mean there was something wrong and not to worry, but to try again.

Finally, i was referred to the recurrent miscarriage clinic and they told me i had ‘sticky’ blood, which meant the blood flow to the baby wasn’t enough. I was relieved to hear that, but angry that i had to have 3 miscarriages before anyone thought to do that test on me.
I used to wonder if it wouldn’t be better not to get pregnant at all, rather than keep miscarrying, but on reflection, i don’t think that would have been any easier to deal with. I looked at every pregnant woman on the street, wondering how old she was and what she was doing to stay pregnant. I devoured stories of mothers in their forties and held onto them as a lifeline.

In the end, it was a day like any other when i got pregnant again. I held my breath as i passed all the previous checkpoints and felt sure that I would exhale once i hit the 3 month mark. I didn’t! Then i started worrying about the baby dying inside me, because i knew 2 women that it had happened to. But, in the end, my precious one arrived on the 10 August 2010. She is truly special and having her erased all of the pain that had gone before.

I’m not going to tell you that it will all be ok in the end, because I don’t know that. I’m not going to tell you that maybe it was for the best, because the baby might have been disabled, because I don’t know that either. What i will tell you is the pain does get better and you will be able to look back, without feeling the pain like a knife to the heart. I will tell you that you are stronger than you think and you will find a way to deal with this. And finally, I will tell you that you will come out on the other side of this- changed in ways you never imagined, but in ways that will move you forward.

Funmi