I coughed out my baby
I had a miscarriage in early November. It was also my first pregnancy. Aaron and I wanted to start trying to conceive after our 2 year wedding anniversary in November but we received a big surprise in September, a few months ahead of schedule. The due date was May 21. We were shocked but excited to be parents when we found out.
My sister had to confirm the pregnancy because we weren’t sure how to read the test. The first test was taken on a Sunday morning and I asked Aaron,
“Can I show you something?”
“Wait a minute, let me finish the dishes.”
We stared at the strip with one faint pink line and one red control line, took a photo of it, and sent it to my sister. 30 minutes later, she called back screaming, “YOU’RE TOTALLY PREGNANT!” I smiled and laughed, hardly able to believe this unexpected yet joyful miracle.
The next 4 weeks were filled with conversations about our near future and new family. We revealed the good news to our immediate families and close friends. Everyone was shocked, like we were, yet very happy for us.
Just as we acclimated to the idea of being pregnant and having a baby on the way, we received bad news. Our first scan at 8 weeks showed the baby measuring 7mm with a low heartbeat of 80 bpm when it should’ve been well over 100 bpm. Aaron and I saw the flicker of light on the ultrasound screen that was our baby’s heartbeat, but it was too faint to hear through the machine. Dr. Z said to return in one week to check again. I was scared and cried in Aaron’s arm as we sat in the clinic’s chic lobby after the appointment. We weren’t expecting bad news, and we didn’t really know what this meant. Was I doomed to miscarry? Was there hope for the baby to survive?
Being an optimist, I decided not to research the statistics of low heartbeat in the first trimester. I resolved to pray and hope that the baby would survive healthily, and enlisted all our family and friends whom we told as prayer warriors to petition for this little life. The week went by rather quickly as I was sick and nauseous for two days, then felt better on the third day. I believe that was the day his feeble heart stopped beating and we lost our son.
Three days later, the scan showed no growth and no heartbeat. Missed miscarriage. I couldn’t believe it, again. I was so sure we were going to see a healthy baby with a strong heartbeat on the screen. Our dreams were crushed, we would never know this child. May 21 would pass, our family would remain the same number, and our lives wouldn’t change forever.
Tears, so many tears. I never knew I could cry so much. The heartbreak was gut-wrenching, like getting dumped by the love of your life then watching him die slowly in your arms. The sobbing was vomit-inducing as I hyperventilated and couldn’t catch my breath. My eyes swollen shut and burned with dryness, yet somehow still produced tears. My life stood still from the moment Dr. Z delivered the diagnosis.
We waited three weeks for the miscarriage to happen naturally, but it wasn’t clearing so the route of medical management was recommended to us. I was ready for it. I had three weeks to fully understand what happened, make sense of it and start the grieving process. I felt lonely, angry, and numb. I talked to friends who have gone through miscarriages before, and watched horror films to feel fear instead of sorrow. I gave into junk food cravings that satisfied me mentally while hurt my body physically. My mind raced at night dipped in insomnia while I zombied around the house in a daytime fog. I was emotionally unhealthy and wanted to move on with my life but remained stuck in a pregnant-but-not limbo.
The miscarriage started on a Monday; I picked up Misoprostol pills at Dr. Z’s clinic and her nurse explained that it would take 1–2 days to complete, with the first 4–7 hours being the worst of the bleeding. Upon arriving home, I inserted the pills at 11am, and laid on the couch waiting for Aaron to come home. Before he arrived at noon, I was already cramping and bleeding heavily. For the next 5 hours, we commuted between the couch and the bathroom as my uterus contracted and emptied its contents. Aaron was vigilant and caring, observing my needs and helping in practical ways. The bleeding eased up around dinner time and we were exhausted. As Aaron rested on our bed, I fell asleep on the couch but woke up an hour later in a pool of blood that soaked through my pad, pants, and doggie pee pad onto the couch. After loading soiled underwear, clothes, and the couch covers into the washing machine, we sat down and Aaron noticed my lips and face were pale from all the blood loss. Finally, it was over…or so we thought.
Tuesday was uneventful as my weary body and spirit rested. The bleeding was manageable like a normal period and I started to feel closure. No tears were shed and time seemed to move forward again. I had brunch with a girlfriend on Wednesday morning and rested in the afternoon as the bleeding increased. Aaron came home early from work and his dad dropped off dinner for us: baked salmon and boiled potatoes.
I was low on maxi pads and the hot pack broke so my sweet Aaron went to the store for more. A few minutes after he left, indigestion pain hit my stomach and I went to the bathroom to sort it out. With a fresh pad, I sat down on the couch again when the cramps returned, quickly and severely. A gush of blood dropped down and I was soiled again, with both my bowels and uterus crying out in discomfort. After another bout of upset stomach, I took a shower to wash everything clean, then noticed a perpetual red flow circling the drain. On the toilet again, I couldn’t believe my eyes as a constant stream of blood poured out of me. I was scared, light-headed and didn’t know what to do. Panicking, I messaged Dr. Z and called Aaron to hurry him home. I reached down and felt something solid, then I knew exactly what it was and what was happening. The end was near…again.
The most heart-wrenching howls emerged from the depths of my being. Never in my life had I made those foreign sounds. I felt tragically empty and forlorn as tears cascaded down my face quicker than the blood flowing out of me. I wailed on the phone with Aaron while he raced back from the store.
“It’s the sac. The sac is coming out. Come home now!!!” I exclaimed between sobs. I was too terrified to push and deliver it without him next to me.
Aaron rushed through the front door and into the bathroom, grabbed my face in his hands and brought our foreheads together after he saw my anguish. I hyperventilated and started coughing, which pushed the pregnancy sac out of my body into my hand.
I coughed out my baby.
The truth was here and I held it in my hand. My miscarriage stared at me, face to face, and dried my tears. It wasn’t scary and mysterious anymore, it was beautiful and wonderful to behold what Aaron and I created and what grew inside my body.
We held a funeral ceremony for our angel baby in the living room. We put him in a decorative box with a written letter to him and our tear-stained tissues. We prayed and sang a worship song. We said “I love you” and “goodbye”.
I wish that was the end of this story, but there is no end to my miscarriage. It will always stay alive and with me as part of my story…even when I attend our weekly grief support group, even when I’m healthy again and start a new career, and especially when I give birth and hold a fully-formed baby in my arms, fearfully and wonderfully made.
