The Gravity of Loss

Then what? I didn’t know and I didn’t want to think about it. I didn’t think about lost Baby Mic or any other baby because it was too much. Predictably, not thinking about it wasn’t an option. As is my nature, I silently fixated. I slipped on a tight fitting low cut dress for a friend’s wedding, put a drink in my hand, and tried to live outside of my thoughts for a while. Tried to not wish I were donning a maternity dress. Tried to not think I would be nineteen weeks along. Tried to not want to talk about such a morbid thing during such a celebratory weekend. I packed for our family trip to Disney, trying to relish my family and the opportunity to get away, without constantly thinking about the fact that I would have been twenty weeks along and would have given Baby Mic a proper name by now, consistent with his or her gender. When asked by people in the park – “what are you having?” I would have been able to tell them this little one’s name.

By this point, I began to think of little else. Every action or reaction was centered on a baby – the lost baby and the thought that there may never be another. The feeling that I may have missed my chance forever. I honed in on pregnant bellies with resentment and newborns with longing. What I wouldn’t give to have never miscarried and what I wouldn’t give to not be in the position of making this decision all over again. I shouldn’t have to make this decision all over again. I should be twenty two weeks pregnant now. It’s unfair and I’m profoundly depressed and feeling wildly unsettled. I’m without reigns – without an anchor – just desperately trying to make sense of things again.