So, now what?
Three weeks from the miscarriage, and it's largely behind me, on most levels. The first week was hard, physically: not so much emotionally, after the first 48 hours, because I had to keep going, whatever, to help my parents through Mum's surgery. But I did too much, too soon, and didn't give myself long enough physically to get over it. It took ten days or so for the bleeding to reduce from period level to spotting level, and then another week of on-off spotting. I saw the pregnancy clinic nurse one last time, two weeks down the line, and got signed off with a negative pregnancy test. I suppose the second week was mostly spent getting over the first week.
But then, the evening after the clinic signoff, 17 days after the miscarriage, I noticed stringy cervical mucus again, and the last drips of bleeding stopped. Two days of lovely (I suppose) egg white mucus, and now that's stopped, so presumably I am now in a luteal phase again, although my breasts don't feel that sore yet. And, just about as the bleeding finished, I felt my stamina return more or less to normal.
So. No medical intervention, two weeks of recuperation, and here I am. Not bad going, for 41. But what do I do now? Sure, anyone can have a miscarriage, any time. But the older, the more likely. I am one person, not a demographic average, and so I don't know whether this was an unlucky chance, and next time might be fine, or whether this is what I can expect from here on in. And that Down's risk, that I was so worried about, hasn't suddenly gone away.
Some of the google sources say one is more fertile in the few months after a miscarriage (not that fertility, as such, was exactly a problem anyway); but that's not going to do much for my egg quality, if that was an issue. It's quite nice not to be pregnant, in a way, too: all that rare meat and shellfish, and not feeling sick, and fitting through narrow spaces sideways. There are compensations in everything.
But I look at Mizuko's tree, and I wonder. And I worry that I may sideline my real, live, loved children because I'm too busy wondering whether to try again for the hypothetical third child that I may never have.
I don't know what to do.
But then, the evening after the clinic signoff, 17 days after the miscarriage, I noticed stringy cervical mucus again, and the last drips of bleeding stopped. Two days of lovely (I suppose) egg white mucus, and now that's stopped, so presumably I am now in a luteal phase again, although my breasts don't feel that sore yet. And, just about as the bleeding finished, I felt my stamina return more or less to normal.
So. No medical intervention, two weeks of recuperation, and here I am. Not bad going, for 41. But what do I do now? Sure, anyone can have a miscarriage, any time. But the older, the more likely. I am one person, not a demographic average, and so I don't know whether this was an unlucky chance, and next time might be fine, or whether this is what I can expect from here on in. And that Down's risk, that I was so worried about, hasn't suddenly gone away.
Some of the google sources say one is more fertile in the few months after a miscarriage (not that fertility, as such, was exactly a problem anyway); but that's not going to do much for my egg quality, if that was an issue. It's quite nice not to be pregnant, in a way, too: all that rare meat and shellfish, and not feeling sick, and fitting through narrow spaces sideways. There are compensations in everything.
But I look at Mizuko's tree, and I wonder. And I worry that I may sideline my real, live, loved children because I'm too busy wondering whether to try again for the hypothetical third child that I may never have.
I don't know what to do.
posted by Alison at
2:22 PM
1 Comments:
Hi Alison, I arrived at your blog via your comment on Julia's blog. I'm the same age as you, with two girls, the youngest turning 4 in a few weeks. I understand the "irrational desire" for a third child - among many things it's the beauty of creation, the amazing joining of cells that somehow produces an individual, unique and at the same time a reflection of parents and siblings. I think I've accepted that there will be no more children for me but I still occasionally get such an ache when I see a newborn - I wonder when that will stop.
I'm sorry for your recent loss - you posted beautifully about it and the idea of the Mizuko baby is lovely. I will pass that link onto to a friend of mine, the same age as us, who suffered a twins miscarriage and haemorrhaged so badly her husband thought she would die. Four years later she's still waiting for her husband to trust enough that it won't happen again to even start try for another baby.
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angelfeet, at 3:43 PM
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