...my mother had two miscarriages in her young life--the first between me and her middle child, the second between the middle and the last...after that birth, she decided to call it quits...and good thing too...how might she have survived with more than three girls? what if she'd had a son? what legacy might she pass along to him? her gut instinct was correct...
...i've known only one friend who's had a miscarriage...her story is not mine to write, but i will say that the incident ruined our friendship...the fact that i had a healthy child, that i tried to console her, encouraged her to try again or adopt if necessary somehow drove a wedge between us...she once admitted to me that seeing me with my daughter was painful to her...admittedly, i didn't understand that pain...but i wanted to be sympathetic, so i left the friendship as she wished...
...yesterday, my husband and i spent four hours in the emergency room of our local hospital...granted i was only 5 weeks along and we'd not told very many people, but i still felt as if i'd somehow disappointed a huge cosmic force...i'm not a religious person, so i don't say things like "god is watching" or "jesus is the man with the plan" but i do think that the universe is a powerful force, that there are reasons for things, that spirits of those we once loved watch over us...
...i was in my car driving home from work the previous day...i'd been spotting blood...nothing to worry about, my doctor said, just implantation bleeding...but i knew...i knew it the way i knew i was pregnant the day after we'd conceived...yes, i'm one of those freaky women who "knows" her body...still, i began to speak to my dead grandmother...she's been gone five years and this coming monday, january 16, would have been her 82nd birthday...the smell of her cigarette smoke and D'ior Poison perfume filled my car and i said, "i think i'm a good mother...do what you can to keep this one safe...i want another baby"...the next morning i was in the e.r. ...and i contemplated the ambiguity of that one-sided conversation...
...we'll try again soon...but i'm hesitant to make trying for a second child my third job (or my first or second if my priorities are a little screwed up for your liking)...my instincts tell me that the one beautiful child i have is more than enough...and i'm hesitant to mourn this loss too deeply...it is not the defining moment of my womanhood...my mother has proven to me that great things can come from tremendous loss, but that listening to our instincts is equally wise...
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