Not a Celebratory Anniversary

I’m coming up on an Anniversary. It isn’t one I’ll celebrate, but it is one that I’ll always hold in my heart. November 26th is the one year Anniversary of my one and only lost (as in no longer pregnant) baby.

I was 12 weeks along and was going in for a diagnostic sonogram because I was measuring 4 wks. larger than my gestational period. This was normal for me ever since I became pregnant with baby #2 when I developed a fibroid. Fibroids will enlarge due to hormones during pregnancy, and shrink back down after birth. For me, it never caused any problems except the oh-look-she’s-4 months-pregnant (when in reality I was only 3) stares, and necessary early maternity clothes. To top it all off I carry big anyway. Go ahead, laugh.

So to me this was just another sonogram to see how large the fibroid was, and make sure everything was fine. I had had a previous sonogram the month before, just to date the pregnancy officially, and due to my AMA (advanced maternal age), see how everything looked.

Yes, just 4 weeks prior, the baby’s heartbeat was “strong” and we looked good to go!! But, on November 26th after I hop up on the table, and she turned the machine on – with sound- I saw and heard a flat-line, under the picture of the baby. I can’t explain it but even though I knew what it meant, I instantaneously pushed that thought away and rationalized that she was checking the blood flow in the cord, or something like that. I didn’t say anything. She didn’t say anything. I didn’t look at her. She quickly turned the sound off. But I knew. I waited. I waited for her to tell me everything was fine. I waited for her to start taking measurements. I waited for something, anything.

After about 3 minutes I just looked at her and said “There’s no heartbeat is there?” She said “No Sweetie, there isn’t.”

I laid there quietly. Still. Hardly breathing. I still thought the baby would suddenly move around…like it had been holding it’s breath. Not dead. It couldn’t be. I’ve never lost a baby. 4 pregnancies…4 babies. This was number 5, why would it be any different? But it was.

I managed to hold it together, throught the measuring and chronicling of the baby. All I really wanted to do was run out of there screaming No, No, No.

Luckily my preferred Dr. was in that office on that day. I got to see him, which was some comfort since we have a history. We talked about the options of what to do, why it happened and how to proceed.

Mind you, I’m still holding it together. My Dr. handles everything, and I am free to go. Until I see him in another 2 days for the DNC. I get in the parking lot, pull out my cell and call hubby. Instantly, this is when I lose it. Completely. I’m amazed he understood anything I said. Although, when your wife is calling you after a sonogram appt. and she’s hysterical, you pretty much know it’s not good.

Come back as I share more of the details on what went wrong…so very wrong.