Last night a story aired here in Australia about a comedian Mary Coustas and her infertility fight. She discussed miscariage, selective reduction, stillbirth and now a miracle pregnancy - her rainbow baby. Her episode is here and I really urge people to watch it (linked here).
Her bravery at talking out loud about what happened to her, has taken facebook and the media by storm. This morning on the radio they were talking about miscarriage and stillbirth. I hope this helps people understand how devastating these losses are. She describes how after her miscarriage she howled every night and how hard nights have become.
For me this is what my life is like post miscarriage (3.5 weeks since we found out, 2.5 since D&C) :
- I wake every night around 4am. I am tired and exhausted because of this.
- I have dreams, some good most heartbreaking.
- I have a sadness I try and fight and some days it is just too much and gets the better of me.
- I want to scream about my loss, when people ask me how things have been, instead I just smile and say good.
- People notice little things - thicker hair, longer nails, great skin - I get asked what did you do? Some I tell, most I ignore.
- I can't be at large gatherings, I feel stressed and want to run away.
- I don't want to see my friends who don't know, so I don't have to make excuses.
- I suffer headaches 2-4 times a week that last more than 24 hours.
- I am bloated, and want to let people know I am not fat, just bloated from losing a baby.
- I still bleed on and off. A reminder of what has happened.
- I count the days until we can try again and hope my body starts working properly again.
- In the end I really can't get the words out to people who don't know. It is just too hard. And I don't want to hear the opinions some have. Things like it is only mental (hmm, surgery and headaches and bloating, nope not just physical), I already have a child, or it was so early what I am upset about. So I keep quiet.
Maybe the more people understand what it is like - they may understand it was not just a 12.5 week foetus, or a 6 week foetus, or a 4 week implantation that went wrong. It is our children, our babies who we hold in our heart forever more.
thanks for posting this - i watched the link - I couldn't stop crying. I get frustrated at the number of people who refuse to speak out about receiving any fertility help - let alone all the difficulties that often accompany fertility difficulties.
ReplyDeleteI am so sorry for what you have had to go through. I have not had a miscarriage - but i know how hard it is when you go through something that for the most part - people have no idea how bad it is - and there is hardly any way to explain.
hope your sleeping gets better soon - I believe once this improves everything will get better.
thinking of you
I still sit here thinking, I can't have a miscarriage, that wasn't in the books for me. It feels like when I was hit by a car when I was 17 - it happened to someone else, not me. But it did happen, and things do happen to me. It needs to be spoken about - it is just a shame there is so much judgement around! Hopefully the word get outs to the right people, and some people may understand. Just hearing Mary speak about her nights made me feel not so alone xxx
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