This can’t be happening to me…and yet it is. It has.

I think of those I know who’ve had similar losses. I remember thinking “how awful that must feel”. I remember the fear that the experience could be mine.

And now the fear is realized. It is our reality. Your physical body is gone, no longer kicking and moving inside mine although sometimes the gas bubbles trick me into believing you’re still there – just for an instant.

And then I think of how many times over the years I said “I want to give birth to one child, then I’ll consider adopting”. I guess the universe listened.

*****

Sometimes the tears flow like wine at a wedding (or a wake).
Sometimes I sit, checked out, reading or watching televsion, numb.
Sometimes I ache.
Sometimes I feel relief that the fear of what the night would bring is gone. Relief that I am still alive.
Sometimes I hear a baby cry down the hall and am jolted into the realization that I have no baby to take home. That my body will not give life again. That there is no little mouth to take milk from my breast.
Then I ache. Again.

*****

Exhausted. Can’t sleep.

10pm. 11pm. Midnight. Lungs feel like they’re not getting enough air. Heart hurts – it’s working too hard. Back sore from too many days in this bed, too many nights in this position.

1am. 2am. 3am.

Up. I go to the bathroom and cringe at the feel of more blood between my legs. It’s so much less than before but the body memory of fear is strong. Still there. Fear that somehow I haven’t yet survived this. That my body is still vulnerable. That something else will go horribly wrong.

I have much to live for. I wish I had you to live for too.

*****