when We became Three (part one)

I have a lot of initial posting to do, since this is my motherhood blog, it seems appropriate that I start the relatively long story about when I became a mother.  (isn't it always a long story?  As mothers, even if it isn't, we will make it a long story, won't we?)

Mark and I always knew we wanted children.  We were married one year to the day of our first date, on a beautiful island with only the native birds, lizards and sea turtles as wedding guests.  Not even our families knew.  It was the happiest days of my life, we had so much fun.

We talked about starting a family right away.  I had a very happy childhood and couldn't wait to replicate that with my own children.  Mark's reasons were very different.  His entire childhood, and most of adulthood, was severely stifled by the one person who should have loved him most.  Unfortunately, his mother was and is a very toxic and cruel human being who really never deserved the privilege of having such a wonderful person, people really, in her life.  I think Mark wanted to create the loving family he was never allowed to have.  And while it certainly isn't an ideal motivator, he truly is the most amazing father to our girls I could have ever asked for.  All the love he was denied by his mother, he has multiplied infinitely and bestowed on our family.  I'll never know how he found the strength to do that, or if it was just in his nature all along.

I joined a motherhood forum I am still a part of today.  I love the women I have met there, but they will get their own tribute soon enough.  We started diets, supplements.  I took my temperature, peed on several sticks a day, charted everything I could to prepare.  Our first try...nothing.  Our second try.....

Mark was at work, it was Christmas Eve.  I called Mark to yell at him.  Why had he made caffeinated coffee this morning for me, he knew we had given it up months ago.  I was shakey and wired and my heart was pounding.  I can't believe he mixed up the coffees.  I am prepared to rip him a new one (I'm in a great mood).  He assures me he is 100% positive that he made decaf, we don't even have caffeinated in our house.  Hmmmm.  I think.  I pee. I see it.  The faint, but definitely there double pink line.  My knees buckle.  My legs feel like rubber.  I can barely walk over to the phone.  I call Mark again, all I can say when he answers is "I'm pregnant".  He laughs, as Mark does when he gets really good news.  We go to our family party that night.  I can't stop smiling.  I am pregnant and its Christmas and I am so happy.  I drink ginger ale in a wine glass and we smile all night at our littlest, biggest secret.  The next day is Christmas and I show my parents and sisters my pregnancy test.  I drink cranberry juice out of a wine glass at another family party and can barely open my presents I am so happy.  Its Christmas...and I'm pregnant...

New Year's Eve I wake up sweating, upset.  I had an awful dream where I am bleeding and have lost the baby.  I am shaken up.  I go to work.  I still feel awful...something isn't right.  Halfway through the day my awful nightmare came true, I am bleeding, just like in my dream.  And just as in my dream, I lose my pregnancy.  Blood tests confirm I'm pregnant, and losing it.  All the excitement, all the happiness, ripped away.  Stolen.  This is a sadness I have never felt.  I mourn my loss of motherhood, and am convinced now that my body is incapable of carrying a pregnancy as it should.  I start the long, tedious process of searching the web for international adoption.  The rules are so strict, the expense is exorbitant.  I start paperwork anyway.

I lost my pregnancy on December 31st....by January 16th, we had conceived again.  On January 26th, I had that familiar feeling as if Mark had made the regular coffee.  Only this time, I'm not angry at him.  I freeze when my heart starts to pound.  No way.  I just had a miscarriage.  I can not be pregnant.  It is impossible, right?  I go online, I search and search.  Not impossible.  The internet, and my motherhood forum, is just chock full of stories like mine....I pee again.  That familiar, light but definitely there double pink line.  I am, for the second time in 3 weeks, pregnant.

I'm only happy for a moment, and all my happiness quickly turns to fear.  I can't go through this again.  I tell Mark, I tell my mom this is it.  If I lose this baby, we will not be having biological children.  Mark is adopted, so we are both very open to raising children that don't share our genetics.  I continue the application process, though it will be many years before we can afford to take home our baby.

6 weeks pregnant, and I am bleeding.  I am not too surprised.  I call my doctor in tears.  I have a consult. She is a beautiful woman, looks like Barbie.  I want her to help me, to tell me its ok, to do an exam, anything...but she is so cold.  She is not interested in me or my pregnancy.  She tells me my previous miscarriage is common.  30 percent or more of pregnancies actually end in miscarriage, she tells me.  How comforting, thanks.  I am crying hard now.  She callously hands me a tissue box and I feel ashamed.  She proceeds to tell me that years ago women didn't have home pregnancy tests, so I would have never even know I was pregnant back then.  Great, I feel much better, thanks.  She doesn't even know I am pregnant again.  She didn't bother to look at my chart.  When I explain I am again pregnant, her only advice was "well, thats pretty fast, you should have waited".  She tells me, a woman who just lost a baby and may be losing another, that she just had her own baby, so that if my baby makes it, she won't deliver it anyway because she stays home with her baby at night.  She points to a picture on her desk.  She tells me that if I am losing this baby there is nothing anyone can do.  I am sent home to wait for it to end.  I am devastated, heartbroken, defeated.

The next day I have pain and more bleeding.  The Barbie bitch I had seen yesterday is unavailable, I have to go to another hospital, but the OB there wants to do an ultrasound.  I go.  I have the wand inside me and I turn my head.  I don't want to look at it, I know what is happening.  The tech turns the screen and tells me to look.  What type of terrible, sick person forces a person to look at her own dead baby?  I look at her...then the screen.  I cant stop myself.  I see a large black circle, and inside, a tiny little seahorse holding a volley ball.  The tech points out a faint flicker.  "That's the heartbeat".   I am shocked.  A heartbeat?  I'm still pregnant?  But its the same thing that just happened, the bleeding, the pain.  They can't explain it, but I am pregnant.  I am told to wait, the OB who ordered the ultrasound wants to see me, but she is in surgery. She comes down still dressed in her OR gear.  She is much different than Barbie bitch.  She is kind. She is patient.  She talks to me, reassures me, comforts me. She tells me she does not know why I am bleeding.  She tells me if I lose this pregnancy, she will make sure I never lose another one.  I instantly adore her, she cares, like really cares.


She became my new doctor that day.  And I became a mother.