One is obvious: this blog. However, I went through a little journey before deciding to start a new blog. I thought about it right away, but didn't think I would start one. But if you refer to my first post, the impetus was finding out about the uterine anomaly. A lovely side-effect was feeling compelled to tell the entire story from the beginning, which has been cathartic beyond words.
My first outlet I have also mentioned before: the Nest. It's been the best grief-support group I could hope for. I was on the Pregnancy Loss community almost nonstop for the first two days. I don't spend quite as much time on it now. For one, a lot of the ladies there are in the "trying again" phase (predicting ovulation, figuring out their fertility charts, waiting to POAS), and I'm not there yet. Also, it gets to be depressing after several weeks, seeing all the new people posting about their recent miscarriages. It starts to feel like everyone has a miscarriage/stillbirth, when really it's just everyone on this particular message board.
The Friday after the bad news, I went out to breakfast with my mom. We went to Barnes & Noble afterward. I scoured the store for any books on miscarriage and found NONE. That was surprising and disappointing. No worries though; I had already ordered one from Amazon. My main goal was to get a new journal. I had actually just been looking for a journal the week before to document the pregnancy (ooh, I should add that to the list), but I didn't really like any of them. But as the goal was different this time, I thought I might have some luck. Indeed, I did. It was a very nice little journal that I never would have considered before, but it just grabbed me when I spotted it.
The artist is Laurel Burch and it's her "1999 Self Portrait." On the spine it reads, "The soul would have no rainbow if the eyes had no tears." Again, not something that would normally appeal to me, but I'm a different person now. And I had to have this journal. I've already filled up about a fifth of the pages. It remains a good complement to this blog, as I can pour my unrefined thoughts into it. No worrying about grammar and comprehensibility!That Friday night, Erich and I knew we were going to want to get out of the house again. Wednesday and Thursday we had gone to my parents' house. Friday we went out. We had dinner at Stir Crazy and were going to see a late showing of Juno. ("A movie about a pregnant girl right after having a miscarriage? What were you thinking??" I don't know.) But during dinner the bleeding ramped up, and we were both kind of tired anyway. We stopped at Target on the way home so I could get some big ugly maxi pads, and I decided I wanted some crayons and a fun coloring book. I splurged on the box of 120. I thought about 64 or 96, but really, when it comes to getting a ton of crayons, why not just go for 120?
(The surprise inside is a crayon sharpener.) And there are crayon colors I'd never seen before. Wonderful, beautiful colors with great names like "fuzzy wuzzy" and "purple mountain's majesty." When we got to the coloring books, the announcement came that the store was closing in 15 minutes, so I settled on this one:
I think it was a good choice. And with 120 crayons, I can be really true to color. Very fun.The next night, Erich and I went out again to a very nice Argentinean restaurant in downtown Naperville. We got a fruit/ice cream/champagne drink concoction for dessert, which was delicious and fun, but it was deflating at the same time. Alcohol is one thing I can enjoy at most times, but it's harder to enjoy now--I would gladly keep giving it up entirely. But I digress. After dinner, we headed to Barnes & Noble and I checked out the coloring book selection and came across this gem:
I've since learned that a "mandala" is a repetitive design within a circle. It's very fun and relaxing to color these. The intro to the book begins: "We often forget that children need a way to relieve stress, too. Coloring mandalas is perfect way to help them to relax and focus, while also fostering a love of art." And I'm here to attest that they also work for 24-year-olds. I've filled the majority of the book. I may soon have to get Kid's Flower Mandalas!In addition to coloring and journaling, I've also been reading. Sunday, the day before D&C, I picked up a book from the library, Miscarriage: Why It Happens and How Best to Reduce Your Risk. It was one of only two books on miscarriage the library had. It felt good at first to just read a book. Something in-depth, written by a doctor, with no distracting animated ads all around it and no scrolling, unlike many Google search results. But as a book, it was pretty dry and merely listed all the reasons that people have miscarriages. The best thing that came out of skimming the whole thing was a basic knowledge of Müllerian anomalies, which I was very glad to know when the doctor said "septum" and "bicornuate" without further explanation.
The book I had already ordered on Amazon and received last Tuesday was recommended by someone on the Nest. It's called Avoiding Miscarriage: Everything You Need to Know to Feel More Confident in Pregnancy. It's good. It goes through all the reasons that miscarriages happen like the other book, but it goes a step further by helping the reader discern what may have caused her own miscarriage(s) and whether/when to pursue treatment as well as what treatment entails. It also touches upon emotional aspects, includes true stories/testimonials, and is very sympathetic, as the author wrote and published the book herself after four miscarriages of her own. I read a lot of it in the few days after I got it (which was my worst time, emotionally), but have put it down for the time being. Since the book is about miscarriage, most of the real pregnancies mentioned in the book end in miscarriage. And 100% of my pregnancies have ended in miscarriage! (Yes, it's only one, but still.) So I started taking a break from this book and vowed not to ever read it at bedtime--one night I woke Erich up because I couldn't stop crying! I felt so helpless and hopeless. But do I recommend this book to anyone who's experienced a miscarriage? Yes, I do. Just don't read it within a week of a first miscarriage, and don't read it at bedtime, when you might spend too much time reflecting on sad stories and all the things that could possibly go wrong.
My latest distraction is getting back into normal life. I'm teaching my choir and piano lessons again. And it's easier than I thought it would be. Next week, I'm going to start exercising with Erich again like I did before I got pregnant, and I'm really looking forward to it. Life will never be the same, but I will heal.
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