I was told by the midwife that with a late first trimester miscarriage I could expect to go through a labor. I can't remember if she said a "mini labor" or anything like that. I really wasn't taking things in very well at the time. The baby measured 9 weeks and 2 days on the ultrasound when it stopped growing, which equals a fetus about one inch long. So I spent the next week trying to figure out what would happen and being completely helpless to do anything about it. I had no idea what to expect, except for the fact that if nothing happened in a week's time they would try to make me have a surgical procedure called a Dilation & Curettage - basically, they go in through your cervix and vacuum you out. I wanted to avoid that if at all possible, as I had no idea how it might affect my vaginismus. The combination of the news that my baby was dead and the threat of surgery hanging over my head made me very depressed, and around May 8th or so I warned Martin that I was feeling depressed and he should keep an eye on me in case it got noticeably worse.
I kept a diary of symptoms for that week:
Weekend of 5/7 and 5/8: very mild cramping on occasion, similar to feeling of impending period. Occasional feeling of lower-gut "fullness".
Mon 5/9: Slightly stronger cramping. Small mucus discharge which appears tinged with old blood. In the evening, brown spotting.
Tues 5/10: Continued very light brown spotting. Toward noon, cramps getting more painful.
I forgot to document Wednesday and Thursday, but I think it was more of the same. I think I took some motrin on one of the evenings but I don't remember which one.
On Friday May 13th, I woke up in sudden pain at about 2 AM. The pain was sharp and in my lower abdomen. I tried to ignore it for ten minutes but then had to get up and try taking two Motrin. I don't think the Motrin ever had any effect.
I didn't know it at the time, but what I was feeling were contractions. They were different than I’d imagined them. I’d always thought of them like the jarring vibration you get with antilock brakes! But these were like a sharp low stomachache which would come on strongly for a little while and then go away again. It made me feel like I had to use the toilet, so I spent about an hour sitting there and trying to get rid of the feeling, still not really sure what was going on - or perhaps not wanting to know.
I eventually got really cold so I got back into bed, but the pain was worse lying down and I was breathing very shallowly and rapidly. This woke Martin up somewhere between 3 and 3:30 AM. I told him what was going on and I also decided I couldn't lie down anymore, so I went back into the bathroom. Martin turned on the heat in the house (which is off overnight) and got me a sweatshirt to help me keep warm.
The next three and a half hours are a bit of a blur. Pain, release, pain, release. When it ebbed I felt almost normal, but it would be only a few minutes, if that, before it came back. I kept moving around to see if any position would ease the pain. Some were better than others. I remember that I was physically sick a couple of times, but I'm not sure why. Perhaps from the pain, but I doubt it. I think I may have managed to make myself motion sick from all the moving around!
My water broke at 6 AM. I'd heard about this in full term pregnancies but never experienced it before (obviously) and happened to be looking down when it happened. It really was like something had knocked over a glass of water which just splashed straight down. It took me by surprise. It was painless, and my sound effects suddenly switched from sounds of pain to "woah!" By this point I had also discovered my ideal position, and perhaps that encouraged the breakage.
About 15 minutes later an unmistakable fetus came out, also painlessly. It looked about an inch long. It was pale and rounded and there was clearly nothing else that it could be. I called Martin into the bathroom to see. I was relieved that it was out but also extremely sad. This was my baby - born lifeless on a bathroom floor at dawn, and six months too early. We transferred it to a small cup to deal with in the near future, as I knew I didn't want to flush it but I didn't know what else I wanted to do yet.
I was still in a bit of pain but the contractions had stopped, so I laid down in bed for a while. At one point shortly after 6:30 I got up to get the TV remote and the pain intensified suddenly so I laid back down and stayed still. At about 7:30 I called into work and left messages for my manager and coworker explaining why I wasn't coming in that day. They hadn't known about my pregnancy at all, so I think it gave them a shock and neither of them have really mentioned it since. At 9 I got up to use the toilet and I passed a small quantity of fluid blood and then passed the placenta very painlessly. I think the pain I had between 6:30 and 9 may have been it detaching.
Martin added a small amount of water to the cup with the fetus in it to prevent it from drying out. This had the unexpected side effect of letting the fetus uncurl. When I went to look at it, there were areas of damage (almost certainly from the birth process) but also...perfect, minuscule, five-fingered hands. Tiny little hands resting on its chest as if it were sleeping. But it would never wake up.
We happened to have a trip to a town on the coast of Oregon scheduled for later this day - I had booked an afternoon off work as vacation time so we could leave after lunch. We decided to bring the fetus with us and find a quiet spot to bury it in Newport. This was a better option than either flushing, which just seemed wrong, or burying it on our property, which also didn't feel like the right decision.
After we arrived at the coast we decided to look around for a suitable location. Nearby our accommodations was a small park, and in that park was a war memorial. We agreed that this was a wonderful spot. It overlooks the sea and there's a constant quiet sound of crashing waves. It's in a memorial park which is never noisy or overly crowded, but neither does it feel lonely. Most times of the day there is a small but steady stream of respectful people walking serenely through. Even the dogs and children we saw were well behaved. And it's a public place which means we can return any time we like, and there are permanent fixtures there that we can use as landmarks.
At sunset we returned. I had the fetus in a small vial which I held inside my glove as we walked. I knew it didn't matter, but it kept the fetus warm that way. When we got to the spot, Martin used a trowel that we had brought to dig a small hole under a patch of daisies. I emptied the vial into the hole and he replaced the sod and daisies.
This is the view from the site:
Martin observed the poetic nature of a being coming into the world at sunrise and leaving at sunset. We both observed it through a curtain of tears.
A few days ago I decided that I wanted our baby to have a name. Tiny though it was, it was our first born child. We don't know what gender it was so we are collecting some gender-neutral names to choose from.
A friend of ours and his wife recently lost their son at five and a half months into the pregnancy. Due to a medical emergency, he was born prematurely and lived for three hours before he died. Our pain is great, but I can't even begin to imagine how much greater their pain is than ours.
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