CHEMICAL MISCARRIAGES AND THINGS PERTAINING TO SUCH

over the weekend i suffered a miscarriage.

i suppose it wasn't a *real* miscarriage. it was a chemical miscarriage. but no, i mean, no, it was a real miscarriage. it was a real miscarriage and it's been mildly awful.

a chemical pregnancy is when you have a fertilized egg that doesn't get the chance to become an embryo. if you weren't looking for it, you'd probably never know it happened at all. your period comes on just a little bit later than normal, and just a little bit . . . different than normal. sometimes you'll get an faint positive on a pregnancy test first, and sometimes you'll feel a rush of early first trimester hormones, but always your period shows up anyway, usually less than seven days past due. nearly 70% of pregnancies end in chemical miscarriages like this, most of the time completely unnoticed.

we'd been planning to throw a fat wad of cash at my uterus in the fall and suddenly it looked like we wouldn't have to. maybe we could take a vacation instead! i could call my little sister, who was due with her second baby any day, and tell her that we were pregnant at the same time again. but by sunday morning my hormones had perceptibly shifted and i knew what was happening. this has happened four times in the three cumulative years we've been trying for a baby, and i could recognize that familiar feeling of sudden, stark absence even in a tornado. by sunday evening, a few hours after my sister went into labor, it started. all there was left to do at that point was let it take its course.  

i haven't written about trying to get pregnant much lately, because the truth is we haven't really been trying to get pregnant much lately. it's feels pointless to. i can't get and stay pregnant on my own, so why put myself through it? the natural remedies i've tried for my luteal phase defect haven't worked, and with brandon's busy season in full swing, now is a terrible time for fertility treatments. i thought i could maybe play the "let's just see" game, but it turns out, i can't. i really hate counting days and wondering and at this point i'd much rather live my life and love up my two-year-old and just throw chemicals at it when the time seems right. so, we're back to waiting. i'm okay with it. 

the worst of it is over, but i'm not feeling 100% yet. every chemical miscarriage is different, but it always surprises me how much it can take out of a person. it hurts. my energy is zapped. i feel a little bit like a zombie. i've been trying to be generous to my sore body and not expect too much of it, but it's hard. it's hard to give myself permission to feel too sad about it, too. a chemical miscarriage is kind of a vague loss. but i've been trying to be kind to my emotions, too. brandon grilled me up a fat steak the other night and all that red meat made me feel better. henry's given plenty of sweet kisses. and i'm grateful to know that my body is doing its best. it can't stay pregnant maybe, but at least it can get there. 

i've been listening to the staves a lot. they're kind of my spirit animal. this one's been a favorite lately.

be kind to yourselves this week and know that you're in my thoughts. and i mean that in a very weird, very anne of green gables, very over-exaggerated type of way. wonderfully, i feel connected to all of the sadness in the world this week, sadness of every kind! and now i shall go and lie myself down in a sad, tragical heap on my bed. that kind of thing. ;)

xo and good vibes to all the uteruses out there. (uteri?)
nat the infertile, over and out.