40, Secondary Infertility, 2nd Miscarriage, Miscarriage at 18 weeks, IVF, TTC

One mom’s journey to have a 3rd child despite everyone telling her she should just be happy with two. She shares the trials of TTC, multiple IVF rounds, the devastating experience of losing a child at 18 weeks of pregnancy (her 2nd miscarriage), what got her through it, and what she should have done differently.

Kelly’s Story Part III

I hadn’t conceived my two little boys easily and I was open about my struggles with close friends and family. So whenever I mentioned I’d love to have a third child, many people were incredulous and asked me, “Why?” It often took me off guard but my answer was that for as long as I can remember, I wanted three children. I was one of three, as were each of my parents and grandparents — my Grandma B was an only child but her mom lost two children in utero. Even my husband, Jay, was one of three. It bothered me that some of those same people never said anything similar to friends who’d had two children easily and expressed wanting a third. I thought it was kind of B.S.

I conceived my first son after a miscarriage and my second was the product of one successful round of IVF after three failed IUIs — a year and a half of TTC (“Trying to conceive”). I was 38 years old when our second child, Charlie, was born, I don’t remember actively trying or not trying to get pregnant. I was hoping for that miracle: “Oh my gosh. We were not even trying to get pregnant! After all of that hard work to have our second and then poof! Easy peasy.” Alas, that’s not how this story goes.

I was 40 when we started trying for a 3rd in earnest, i.e., going back to our fertility clinic. My second son was two, which I thought was old enough not to feel jilted out of my attention as I dove back down the fertility rabbit hole. I had two embryos frozen in storage somewhere in the city for which I paid an annual fee. I chose the expensive route to store them nearby versus sending them to Colorado because laugh as you well should, I couldn’t handle the idea of potential babies being shipped back and forth in an airplane without me.

We scheduled a consult with our fertility doctor, Dr. Gordon to discuss a plan of action. I’d continued all of my old treatments and habits: acupuncture, fertility yoga, little coffee, little alcohol, regular flossing, moderate exercise and 60 oz of water a day but no seltzer water (long story of someone telling me it somehow reduces fertility, probably a myth but I took no chances). Transferring frozen eggs meant less needle jabs to inject hormones and I knew the drill on transfer day.

A few years back when I did my first IVF, my fertility center had graded eggs and my frozen ones were “A” grade ones that my son, Charlie, leapfrogged in growth when he was a 4-day old “B” embryo.  I was hopeful that god would take it easy on me — and our pocket book — by helping at least one of these little “A” embryos to grow. Nope.

I didn’t take a home pregnancy test as the Clinic told me not to do so and I hadn’t with Charlie. Being superstitious, I wanted to do everything exactly as I had done with his successful IVF: doing post-transfer acupuncture, resting at home watching light comedies, and eating the EXACT same meal on transfer day — Korean Bibimbap, if you’re inquisitive. I went in for the clinic’s blood test and waited for a call later that day. I remember exactly where I stood and what I was doing when the nurse called to tell me I wasn’t pregnant. I hung up and burst into tears.

Turns out that Bibimbap wasn’t the secret sauce. Go figure. My tears gave way to fury. Fury at that nurse’s tone of voice. Fury that I wasn’t pregnant. Fury that I had to break the news to Jay. Fury at whatever things he said trying to reassure me. In hindsight, I was just sad.

I once saw this list of human emotions where blissful was at the very top, and sadness at the very bottom with the gamut of other emotions in between. The teacher pointed out that the list was in this order because as you climbed up toward bliss from sadness, you felt better. When I saw anger two rungs up from the bottom just above depression and thought, “OH! That’s why so many people who are actually sad, get angry and try to blame other people. It feels better than being sad or depressed because it’s closer to bliss even if you’ve got miles and miles to go.”

Personally, I hate tarrying long on those lower rungs so I used my anger to come up with a plan to climb out and so I did. We started our second IVF cycle that Fall with all of its accompaniments: the appointments, blood draws, nervousness, anxiety, and monetary hemorrhaging.   

I got lucky in the sense that my ovaries responded to the meds and I had eggs to harvest, but not many. Three years before I had harvested north of 15 eggs, this time was less than 10 and then by Day 5 I only had two embryos to transfer. Just to add to the pressure of my third transfer day, it ended up being the exact same day as my brother-in-law’s engagement party an hour away. If I had a personal Thesaurus, I’d put a cocktail party with strangers as the antonym for “relaxation”. I didn’t know what to do. I didn’t have the heart to share my struggle with the world. So I did the next best thing to baring my soul to people who are not my best friends … I said I had the flu.

We got a sitter to help with the kids and my husband went to the engagement party. I was stressed missing a family event, knowing I might be judged for it. So, it was hilarious to learn that one of Jay’s relatives tried to convince him to stay the night rather than come home.  He came back but I remember thinking, “Wait. So they thought I was at home with the flu but wanted you to stay over to get drunk with them rather than come home to make sure I’m okay and don’t have to wake up at dawn by myself with a fever and two young kids?” Ouch. LOL. I guess that’s what I get for telling white lies!

Then came the waiting and then the phone call, the tears, and fury. But something quickly clicked. I realized this was like everything in my life. Yes, I had fallen on my face but I needed to pick myself up and start all over again. Only if I succumbed to defeat would I be defeated in this endeavor. It was just mental.

Only this next cycle, it wasn’t mental. My ovaries didn’t respond. Dr. Gordon didn’t even know if I would be able to do a retrieval let alone a transfer. I kept my hopes up. I was weirdly looking forward to another transfer beyond hoping to get pregnant. They gave me Propofol for the procedure and right when I went under was a solitary moment of weightlessness without worry. I knew it was pathetic but that one second was a welcome respite. Like the feeling you have when you’re in the middle of a journey with a blister and you stop to put a band-aid on it. It still hurts but in that moment where you first stop walking and the pain stops for one second, it is bliss.

I didn’t end up making it to transfer. I got the depressing call that there were no viable embryos. No sadness, no fury. I was in full panic. What if this was it? What if I had no more good eggs? Why was my body not responding even though it had just responded?  I was almost 41. I could hear the biological alarm clock audibly quicken. No, I told myself. It was just bad luck. I’d start immediately. Like a gambler who lost a blackjack hand, I was back at it without even pausing.

During my follow-up appointment with Dr. Gordon, he said he wanted me to take a couple of months off to give my body a break to reboot. I couldn’t even fathom doing so. It was right before Christmas and I knew I’d be unable to enjoy the holidays with my family if I wasn’t taking some action toward reaching my goal of completing my family. It would feel as if I’d given up on my dream.

Adulthood was starting to seem like an exercise in confirming that I was an idiot as a child to have thought all of my dreams could come true one day: I hadn’t married Duran Duran’s Nick Rhodes nor Prince Edward, never built that pedal operated go-cart for sleepovers nor played football for the Cleveland Browns and wouldn’t have three kids. I heeded Dr. Gordon’s advice to give my body a rest because I had no recourse really.  

I decided to use my two-month sabbatical proactively to interview other fertility clinics and doctors. Maybe Dr. Gordon wasn’t so amazing after all. Maybe I got super lucky with Charlie. If my OB-GYN was right that fertility doctors were like French chefs, perhaps Dr. Gordon was only a one star Michelin chef and I needed a new chef, one with two Michelin stars. I requested my medical records and embarked on finding another center to make my dream a reality.

During my consults, I met with other fertility doctors in their well-heeled offices. They looked at my charts and suggested different protocols, which was reassuring. All hope wasn’t lost. But then each appointment ended with me dipping my toe into their clinic’s jarring waters. They felt like factories. Women all lined up in a row out in the open giving blood. They were so different than Dr. Gordon’s clinic. No awe-inspiring Nelson Mandela posters. No Danish sugar cookies. Dr. Gordon’s clinic might have had as many patients giving blood but I didn’t see them laying on gurneys as if it were some M.A.S.H. unit. 

With Christmas swooping in, I had to wait until January to start up with a new place so I decided to book one more consult, this time back with Dr. Gordon who had a few ideas to change up my protocol. I also started using logic again. The difference between this past IVF attempt and my previous ones seemed to be follicle growth and egg quality. Conclusion? I needed to find something to improve egg quality since my alternative treatments didn’t seem to be as impactful in this department as I needed.

I did some online research because what else is a desperate insomniac looking for answers going to do? I discovered that a clinic in Manhattan focused on improving egg quality for their advanced age patients using the supplements, Ovoenergen and Fertinatal. Despite hearing from multiple doctors that there was nothing one could do about your egg quality, I decided that I had nothing to lose. I ordered some. They were $200 for a month’s supply! Even if logic had returned to my brain, practicality had long since left the building. I was singularly focused. 

Dr. Gordon kindly took me back as a patient — despite me admitting I got 2nd and 3rd opinions during my sabbatical — and we embarked on cycle #4. My life was eat, sleep, work, take hormone shots, do every living alternative fertility treatment and then repeat all while taking care of two pretty darn adorable little boys in between. Oh yeah, and I was writing my first book at the time — Organize Your Way (Yes, that’s a shameless plug but I’m an organizer and writer by trade. It’s what I was doing in the background of this story). But I got lucky.

Everything went well. I had ample follicles with eggs to harvest, ample fertilized eggs, ample growing embryos, and then transferrable embryos. On transfer day, there were two and we decided to go ahead and do both. Once again, I had a conflict on transfer day, my godson’s baptism. But I lucked out as it was a small crowd and these folks, would go in my Thesaurus as a synonym for relaxing. So passing the morning seated at a brunch with them followed by praying in a beautiful church with my cherubic godson was the opposite of stressful.

Then after all of that worrying and hard work, I was pregnant. I almost couldn’t believe my good fortune. Until one morning when I was about 12 weeks along, I awoke at 5 am to massive blood clots coming out of me. It was like when I had my miscarriage. All of those worries I’d had during my two subsequent healthy pregnancies were confirmed as not that of an insane person, but a wise woman.

Too early to phone my doctor, I emailed him, got the boys ready for school, dropped them off, and then obsessively checked my phone for a reply from him. I remember seeing one of my friends at school. She took one look at me and knew something was wrong. She asked if I was okay and I mouthed “No, I think I might be having a miscarriage.” She knew about my journey because she’d had her own travails before getting pregnant with twins via IVF.

I remember praying the entire way to the ER even though I feared the worst. During the ultrasound, I felt a wave of relief as I heard the baby’s heartbeat. I could barely believe it. The technician couldn’t find the cause of the bleeding. I went home, got in bed, and had my sitter pick up the boys.

With my first pregnancy, by the time I learned of my miscarriage, it was a fait accompli. Before I had even bled, I knew the baby was dead. With this pregnancy, I had thought I miscarried, learned I hadn’t but I couldn’t let go of that worry. It was disquieting. I tried to go about life as normal. Everything is fine here, folks. There’s nothing to see. So, I forged ahead converting the boys’ playroom into a nursery.

Another month went by and eventually, I talked Jay into coming to an OB-GYN appointment. He had been oddly distracted and distanced from this pregnancy and I should have cared more about his feelings but I didn’t because he was so focused on the expense of, not the IVF, but of the cost of raising a third child. No amount of “We will find a way,” soothed him. He was a broken record right up until his business partner said, “An old family friend told me once that when you’re young, you worry about how much each child costs but when you’re old, nobody ever regrets having an additional child sitting around the table at Thanksgiving.”

We were at week 17, almost halfway to the finish line. At the appointment, we watched a 3D video of our baby as he was sucking his thumb. No signs of bleeding or harm. We couldn’t get over it. It was real! We decided that it was safe to tell the boys our exciting news. I found some clever way to make the announcement. The boys had to unravel a small piece of paper and in it, I had written that they were going to be big brothers. They were elated. But we told them to keep it quiet for now because we hadn’t told all of our family or friends yet. The boys immediately announced it to anyone they encountered. Turns out my children are horrible secret keepers. I tried to take it in stride and find the humor in it, even if I was still on edge.

 Before I had my first son, I had a vivid dream. We hadn’t found out his gender, but I secretly hoped I was having a girl. In the dream, I encountered my younger brother’s four-year-old self and thought, “Oh, I’d forgotten how incredibly sweet little boys are.” I woke up and knew that I was having a boy. With my second son, I didn’t have a dream but the moment I first saw his face, I knew he was a boy who we’d call Charlie. This time, I had a dream that I was with my cousin, Sarah, who was also pregnant. In it, we were under attack. I managed to survive but my baby died. Sarah and her baby survived. I awoke distraught and while relieved it was a nightmare, couldn’t shake my unease.

A few days after our appointment and my dream, I was looking for something in the future baby’s room, which wasn’t finished yet so a bit of a mess with stacks of books and toy bins. I’ve no idea how it happened. But I remember the fall precisely. I tripped over some books, reached to grab something, lost my balance, and fell hard on my butt with a thud. It hurt. I immediately grasped the gravity of a bad fall whilst pregnant, called my OB-GYN. He called me right back, asked if there was bleeding. There wasn’t. He told me not to worry that if I hadn’t fallen on my stomach, there was little chance anything happened to the baby. I tried to let it go as I had with the nightmare.

I traveled to a cousin’s wedding in Alabama. I was sitting on a hotel bed when I recognized that I rarely cradled my growing stomach as I had with my two sons. I was purposefully keeping a distance from this baby to protect myself. I sat there on the hotel bed consciously let my guard down and for the first time whispered aloud how much I loved the baby and cradled my stomach. I posed for pictures at the wedding with Sarah and my sister-in-law who was due a month before me. I told people we were pregnant. It was cathartic.

A few days after getting back, I was doing the usual school run walking home with my two boys about a block from our house, chatting about their day in school when I felt myself spot. I’ve no idea why I thought I was spotting blood other than ingrained Irish pessimism, Murphy’s Law or that I’ve had a 99% accuracy rate with menstrual bleeding predictions ever since getting my period at age 11 and mortified by even the slightest chance I might accidentally stain my pants in school. I was correct. I was bleeding and starting to do so heavily. 

I couldn’t even get it together to pretend everything was okay in front of the boys. I think Jay got his brother and his fiancée to babysit as they lived nearby. I can’t remember. I just know that they were there when we got back from the hospital. I remember the taxi ride, thinking, “I’m just panicking like the last time. Everything’s going to be okay.” And that thought eased my mind momentarily. I prayed to God to make sure this baby was okay and begged my baby to hold on. I waited forever in my hospital’s maternity ER’s waiting room watching women in labor waiting for a bed. I envied them.

Eventually, I got a bed and they hooked me up to it. No heartbeat. I remember lying there texting people that the baby died. I remember doing it rather coldly because I wanted other people to feel an ounce of the shock I felt. I was heartbroken. The pain made the agony I thought I’d felt being dumped by youthful boyfriends feel like a childhood, skinned knee. I just kept thinking of our baby sucking his thumb and now he was dead. I’d never see that face again. I was a horrible mother who hadn’t cradled her stomach enough.

My husband must have arrived at some point because I remember leaving the hospital with him. My brain grasped for something to pull me up but there was nothing to grab and so it kept swimming and searching on an endless loop. I didn’t know how I’d ever fall asleep. I got up the nerve to ask the doctor for a sleeping pill or a sedative — something to relieve my anguish even if only for a few hours. They didn’t have anything for me on hand. I was kind of incredulous. Why in the hell wouldn’t hospitals have sedatives on hand? In movies, people are always getting sedatives by doctors to chill out after a trauma. We finally found a 24-hour CVS near Columbus Circle and the doctor prescribed me ONE Ambien. I remember every detail of the store’s layout, waiting forever and crying.

When we got home, my eyes hurt from all of the crying. It was not quite the middle of the night but close. I thanked my brother and future sister-in-law, kissed my sleeping boys, collapsed into bed, and started crying again.

I’m not sure what happened next but regardless before I drifted off to a merciful slumber, Jay started his usual bedtime routine which at the time was to pop open his computer to read sports articles. Only this time, the moment he opened his laptop, Handel’s Messiah burst on playing “Worthy Is the Lamb that Was Slain”. It was crazy loud and Jay fumbled to turn it off but couldn’t and so we sat there listening to what felt like angels comforting us. We couldn’t figure out how it happened. The computer was hidden away, untouched as it is every day. If you knew my husband, you’d know he most certainly hadn’t been listening to the Messiah on any device ever. He didn’t even know he owned it. But, it is one of my absolute favorite pieces of music. I finally took a deep breath. My brain had found a buoy and I fell asleep sans Ambien.

The next morning, I started taking my egg quality supplements again. I wasn’t giving up. I would sometimes feel as if I could feel the baby moving and it was the baby floating but not alive. I couldn’t wrap my head around the notion that in my uterus was a dead baby, no heartbeat. My brain was like a computer program glitching. My mom came to help take care of the boys and me. My eldest son’s Kindergarten graduation the day after I had to get a D&E — essentially the same as a D&C that many women get after a miscarriage but with greater risk. In particular, I could lose or permanently damage my uterus and/or die. Like I didn’t have enough to worry about on my plate. I imagine I chose a D&E procedure as the safest option but I truly don’t recall. The days blurred together.

True story: the day before the D&E I had to go in to have my cervix forcibly dilated by the doctor doing the procedure using … wait for it … sterilized sea grass that expanded with the moisture around it and in doing so dilated one’s cervix. SO there I was walking around modern Manhattan with sea grass up my nether regions. The next day, Jay went with me to this new hospital, which was one of the few spots left in America where one could still obtain a D&E as it’s essentially a late-term abortion. 

They removed the seaweed and then prepared me for the procedure. I would have some light anesthesia etc. We waited in a small doctor’s room before going to the pre-op spot. The whole operation was tiny. Average-sized family rooms in Ohio are bigger than the entire setup for this surgery.   

The procedure before me was taking forever or at least longer than they anticipated. I started going into labor. I was in so much pain that I started humming. They gave me Tramadol but it did nothing. It was labor pains and my body wasn’t going to be placated by some synthetic opiate. My husband was there but he seemed confused. We both were because nobody warned us that I might go into labor while waiting for the procedure. My water broke and I felt the baby drop toward my cervix.

Finally, it was my turn and when I got on the operating table the doctor told me the baby was right there and asked if I could just push twice, the baby would come out. I couldn’t. I couldn’t push a baby out and then listen to the sound of silence. I was alone and nobody prepared me that there was a risk I’d go into labor and give birth. Over and over and over, I begged for them to please just put me to sleep. I wanted the pain in my body and my heart to stop even if only for a few minutes. Someone took pity on me and the anesthesiologist knocked me out. Maybe my screaming was scaring the other patients. Nobody was at this office happily awaiting a joyous event.

In recovery, the doctor told me that the baby was born intact and she had simply assisted in the birth. She didn’t use any tools so my uterus was fine. Earlier, I had requested that they conduct whatever post-mortem tests on offer to divine what had gone wrong. Then I requested they send the body to the funeral home near our apartment. I couldn’t bear thinking of our dead child being thrown in the trash or used for science. I knew I was supposed to be grander but I just wanted to protect our baby even in death.

It is my profound regret in life and biggest failure as a parent that I was too afraid to birth and hold our dead child. It wasn’t given to me as an option ahead of time since clearly my labor was a surprise to even the staff. I was too filled with pain, fear & grief to ask if I pushed if I could hold the baby, and then there was the matter of begging them to knock me out. Even with the passage of 5 years, I still can’t grade myself that day with anything but an F and cry thinking about it.

The next morning, my milk came in and I went to my eldest’s Kindergarten graduation. Nobody warned me that my milk would come in and I’d have no baby to feed. I decided to break out my breast pump and pump. I knew breastfeeding releases happy hormones and I needed some chemical mood uppers. I’d had a horrible hormone let down after my first miscarriage and another after abruptly ending breastfeeding with my eldest. I didn’t know if I could survive another hormonal drop like those just then. And I wasn’t going to take any chances. I can’t be sure but I think that decision saved me from the abyss.

As I cried during my son’s ceremony, I was able to see how special it was to have my mom there and focused on the day. Friends in the community and at my son’s school were so supportive and lovely. It really does help to be surrounded by good people. At some point, I let the Clinic and Dr. Gordon know that I lost the baby. They were so incredibly kind and thoughtful with their response. Dr. Gordon’s heartfelt email reply really helped me.

We set up that I’d get started again after the summer. I didn’t want to steal my sons’ summer from them doing IVF treatments. But I was nearing 42 and starting to panic. I spent the summer trying to grieve. I just couldn’t find out how to let go without hoping for another baby. Hoping for it all to somehow make sense. I prayed. I worked with energy healers (yes, plural) and I continued every living alternative and western fertility treatment on the planet.

Where I failed at giving birth, I succeeded in having ritual and closure by cremating my son. At some point, I had learned the baby was a boy. I went to the funeral home with my mom and we made arrangements. The funeral home talked about him as if he was my child because he was to me. I got to put his name down on an official document, John McMenamin, J.M.. But since there were already two Johns in our family, we’d call him “Jamie”. It felt right that he should be named. He was loved.

Despite wanting to crawl under a rock and be left alone, I muddled through with a pressing mixture of anguish, failure, and fear weighing on my chest making it tough to breathe. Two weeks after losing Jamie, I hosted a bridal shower for my future sister-in-law at our home. Four weeks after I went to her bachelorette weekend where there were a couple of pregnant gals. Eight weeks after, I was a bridesmaid in their wedding.

In hindsight, my post-miscarriage activity level sounds insane. Maybe it was. But, I already felt horrible enough. What would me dropping my obligations do save disappoint a bride & groom and cement bad in-law relationships from the get-go. They wouldn’t really understand. Not many people do unless you’ve lost a pregnancy.

As we pulled up to the hotel before the rehearsal dinner, Dr. Noiret called with the results of Jamie’s exam. He was a healthy boy. Nothing abnormal. I was devastated. “It must have been my fall. I killed my baby.” And then I had to pretend I was okay throughout a joyous wedding weekend. But I couldn’t. Thankfully my parents had been invited to this wedding, Jay was off being a dutiful brother and best man all weekend, which I mostly understood.

Where Jay lacked sensitivity that weekend, however, his eldest aunt and uncle made up for it. They showed me one of the kindest acts of support that I received throughout my ordeal. The night we arrived, his Aunt Olivia jokingly greeted me by shouting across the hotel lobby demanding to know when I was going to try to get pregnant with a girl. I laughed in the spirit in which it was meant. I didn’t have the heart to tell her. Later, we were at an after-party for the rehearsal dinner and someone had clearly told her what had happened. Out of nowhere this woman in her 70s, spry but in her 70s, knelt by my side at a crowded bar, burst into tears, and told me how sorry she was to hear about my loss. It was a life lesson in what sympathy should look like. I still cry thinking about how kind she was.

When I visited Dr. Gordon mid-summer, I realized that if I wanted to do IVF first thing in the fall, it would mean canceling our annual trip to the beach. I knew this would devastate my boys. Going to the beach and spending time with extended family is something they look forward to all year. I thought it would be selfish of me to cancel it because I was anxious to get pregnant. Then one day, I was reading the NY Post and there was an article about the pioneer of IVF who had a clinic in Norfolk, VA about 2 hours from the beach we drive to every year. I asked Dr. Gordon. if it would be possible to have my initial blood draws and ovary scans done at that VA clinic and so I could get started. And voila, I could!

This cycle was one of the smoothest in my five IVF attempts, notwithstanding driving back and forth two hours each way a couple of times over vacation to get my blood drawn and ovaries scanned. By the time everything was said and done, I had three viable embryos on transfer day. The only hiccup was that Jay was away on business on transfer day. But, he’d already played his role.  So on transfer day, I got a sitter, went to the hospital to hold my newborn nephew, and then as I gave him back to his maternal grandmother said to her and my sister-in-law, “Well, I’m off to my clinic. I’ve got to go get myself pregnant!” And I did.

During the transfer, I called Jay because Dr. Gordon recommended transferring all three embryos to have the best odds of getting pregnant. I was worried about a twins or triplets scenario. But Jay concurred with Dr. Gordon that from an odds perspective, it just boosted chances of pregnancy. So, we did all three and away we went.

Before I even got the call, I felt pregnant. It was almost too good to be true. I spent the next 10 weeks dutifully following every protocol, including no sex. I graduated from the clinic and was in my OB-GYN’s care almost at the 12-week mark when I had a heavy bleed while working at a client’s house. It was a Friday and my oldest friend was visiting from out of town. I quickly finished up at my client’s, returned home, and produced these massive blood clumps.

I didn’t know if the baby was somewhere in these massive, massive clots of blood so I picked them up, put them in a Ziploc, and then deposited them in my fridge. Yep, my fridge. In my 8 years of trying to conceive, I went from “I can’t touch that!” when I passed an actual placenta during my first miscarriage to being too afraid to hold my dead pre-term child to scooping out a blood clot from my toilet and storing it in my fridge WHEN I had a guest staying with me. 

With a maxi pad in place, my oldest friend, Megan, came with me downtown to see Dr. Noiret. I was positive I’d lost the baby. I’d seen this movie before. Meg tried to distract me as we waited and finally I was ushered in to see the doctor. God, waiting to hear a heartbeat never gets easier. And there it was. A heartbeat. He couldn’t see where the bleeding was. There were no signs of bleeding on the sonogram. We took the subway home but decided to stay in that night. Then more bleeding. So, I went to some weekend sonogram place to get another ultrasound and the sonographer could see where the bleeding had come from but it was nothing near the baby and the baby was still there.

My best friend’s trip to NYC ended up being just a trip to sit in my apartment on the Upper West Side of Manhattan and watch movies with one dinner a block from my house. I put myself on medical house arrest and we made the best of it, as two old friends are wont to do. Her presence and ability to make me laugh were the right medicine for me. I needed to forget and she managed to do that for me for hours on end that weekend. Thank you, best friend.

The bleeding went away, I resumed my life per doctor’s orders but perhaps no exercise. Got it. So I flew home to Cleveland for Thanksgiving and later that same day had another massive bleed. “Oh god, I thought. THIS was it. Just like last time.” My mom took me to the local ER attached to a maternity hospital where I was born. We waited for hours and then eventually in some subbasement I got to do an ultrasound with tears streaming down my face for I knew how this story went. I was prepared to hear the technician say nothing to me and then say, “I’ll go get the doctor” and fetch the doctor to tell me the awful news that I already knew. This technician, seeing me in tears, let me hear the heartbeat. A wave of relief flushed over me. But then dread set in again.

Nobody could figure out why I was bleeding. Was the bleeding why the baby died Dr. Noiret told said, “No”. Then he said, “I know you’re going to ignore me but don’t Google everything.” So I did exactly that. I ignored him and I Googled everything.

I found women who said they thought air travel was why they lost the baby post bleed. I was stuck in Cleveland and didn’t know what to do. Make my family drive back to NYC? Have a miscarriage halfway through Pennsylvania on an 8 hours drive with a cranky, unsympathetic husband? I sat in my room the entire Thanksgiving holiday. I never understood the phrase “frozen with fear” until then. I was almost afraid to walk and I was inside the one place on this earth — my childhood home —that is a true place of refuge for me. It was filled with family I adore who are nothing but sweet and supportive. 

I lay on my childhood bed listening to soothing whale songs on repeat and some angel hypnosis, praying over and over and over. If you knew me you’d realize this was bananas. I have never before or since willingly listened to whale song music. I’m the definition of tightly wound even after a 2-hour massage.

At Thanksgiving dinner, when it was my turn to say what I was thankful for, I said I was so thankful for all of these people around the table that I pray for every day and then I burst into tears. I was a wreck. I just couldn’t handle it anymore. I decided I would take the flight home to NYC and risk it. Then I would put myself on bedrest. I wanted this baby.

Back in NY, Dr. Noiret had me see a second high-risk OBGYN. I saw her throughout the pregnancy in addition to Dr. Noiret. It was there at the high-risk place somewhere halfway through my pregnancy that I first saw my baby’s profile. Until that moment, I refused to look at any image of the baby. I couldn’t bear becoming attached as I had with our son Jamie after his last sonogram. The technician left the room and this baby’s profile was frozen up on a large TV screen. I glanced at it and instantly fell in love. I sat in the waiting room softly crying. Now that I’d seen this profile, I wanted so desperately to meet this baby one day and see who this child becomes. I was utterly devastated that despite my best efforts, I was attached so soon.

I was a wreck on myself, imposed bed rest. I decided I would stay there for two weeks post any bleeding. Every visit to the bathroom brought a wave of fear. I rarely left my bed except to drive the boys to school despite only living 10 city blocks. I had my part-time sitter pick them up. I stayed on bed rest for 6 weeks with Christmas Day as an exception where I actually got up and moved around. I missed my niece’s baptism, meeting my newest nephew in hospital, our annual Macy’s visit to Santa, my parent’s Christmas party, our friend’s New Year’s Wedding in California. I was not losing this baby.

I continued to take progesterone shots — they prevent contractions and help the uterus grow — well after IVF protocol called for it and even after my own OB-GYN told me I didn’t have to do them anymore. But, he was comfortable letting me continue. The more complicated one’s pregnancy, the more you realize there’s only so much we know about pregnancy, miscarriage, and stillbirths even still today. I think I started to relax when I could start to regularly feel the baby move. I would poke him throughout the day, eat M&Ms, and do other things to get things moving. My kids were probably the only newborns ever excited to be out of the womb, no longer forced to endure my near-constant pokes and prods.

During the 9th month, I woke up multiple times per night unable to breathe out. Something I’d never had with my other pregnancies. I’d done a sleep study in my twenties. They told me that I didn’t have sleep apnea because I only stopped breathing 4-5x a night but if I gained twenty pounds I could easily have it. I inquired if that held true for pregnancy and they said yes. They were wrong. For me, apparently, it was 35 lbs. I was now 10 pounds heavier than I had been for my other pregnancies because I hadn’t lost 10 pounds from the miscarriage. Yet, it never dawned on me that I had sleep apnea since I could breathe in just not out. I’ll blame pregnancy brain and an inability to complain about physical ailments on why I didn’t share this with my doctor. I just told him I wasn’t able to sleep well, which is what every pregnant woman says. Meanwhile, my blood pressure kept rising. Some swelling of extremities was starting. It wasn’t until after this pregnancy that I read there might be a link between sleep apnea and preeclampsia.

Toward the end, I went into the hospital because I was having pains but not labor pains. The baby wasn’t moving. I had been in so many heart-stopping moments like these. It was almost rote. I lay on the gurney poking my baby to make him or her move. I finally got what I felt like was something and then the heartbeat. Relief.

Not even a few weeks later, we were good to go. My mom came into town. I lay on the hospital bed and have never been so excited in my life. It must be what adventurers feel like after scaling Mount Everest. I had no idea that my blood pressure was steadily rising. I knew it was high but I could see the finish line. I put everything out of my mind, I was going to meet this baby and see that profile in person. Jay was running to and fro while I lie in my hospital bed doing nothing but poking my baby and waiting to go into surgery for 8+ hours after getting bumped by multiple emergency C-sections.  

After I get bumped yet again, Jay came back into prep room and tells me how he met the sister of a woman who had been rushed to the hospital in her 5th month as her amniotic fluid had burst and she had to have a C-section. Jay was in tears. The baby survived birth but then we never found out what happened. I said a prayer for her, her baby, and the baby’s father. Worrying about a child’s safety and health isn’t something I would wish on my worst enemy if I were to have one.

Finally, it was our turn. Jay got to don the traditional hospital surgery garb so many new parents experience these days. I remember him starting to unbuckle his pants in a communal room as the nurse looked on puzzled. It still makes me laugh thinking of this experienced, intelligent man having been through two C-sections still frazzled by the notion that he was about to have a baby that he almost removed his pants. The nurse reminded him he could keep his clothes on under the scrubs.

We didn’t have a name picked out. We had a girl’s name, Margaret/Maggie but were having a devil of a time finding a traditional boy’s name to mirror his older brothers. It’s difficult when your last name for some odd reason has become a euphemism for penis. Peter Wang, No. Richard Wang. No, clearly it would become Dick Wang. We were leaning toward John again with “Jack” as a nickname for a boy but then there was Jay Jr and William in the mix — despite the possibility of Willy Wang happening. It was hard picking out. But the moment I heard he was a boy and then after a brief terrifying pause his cry, a wave of relief rushed over me and I thought, “William McMenamin. William McMenamin Wang,” was my thought. Billy not Willy though for obvious reasons.

My mom and our sitter brought my boys to meet their baby brother. He was alive. Everybody left and I was by myself holding this little guy in a shared hospital room almost in disbelief. At some point, I realized he had my dad’s cleft chin. I was in such shock to see such an itty bitty cleft chin.  I didn’t realize one was born with one and that it could be that small. Chevy Chase’s mom probably had the same moment in hospital like I did.

Later I got my own room and my sister-in-law, Diana, visited me. She cradled William in her arms whilst I chatted away and then she exclaimed, “Your back! I haven’t seen you you for 5 years!” and she was right. I was back.

And that’s it. That’s my happy ending. Okay, fine, I was totally weird his first year of life and made him wear some device that measured his breathing on his stomach and then another one under his mattress — no SIDS happening here. But beyond poor William having a complete nut as a mom, it was a pretty happy ending.

Advice:

Take care of yourself after a miscarriage. Don’t be a martyr. Say “No” to things that are too much and explain why. My first few months after losing Jamie were immeasurably harder than they could have been because I didn’t protect myself from the demands and obligations of life. I hate disappointing people. But in pleasing others, I wasn’t being very kind to myself. Do things that will help you heal and to hell with what others think. If you can afford it, take a vacation. Five weeks after losing Jamie, my husband, two kids, and I still went to Spain on a vacation with close friends. It was a once-in-a-lifetime type trip we’d started planning almost 2 years before and was a sunk cost at that point. I’m so glad we still went. It was like taking a soothing bath —therapeutic from every angle. 

People say a lot of dumb things and you’ll be furious or hurt by those comments. Ignore them and channel those feeling into taking action. I was once at a plastic surgeon’s office a few months after I’d lost Jamie because my son, Charlie, had to have stitches taken out. In our casual banter, I said something about trying to have another child after a miscarriage. He said, “Why? You have two kids. You should count yourself lucky.” I said, “I guess I just want a happier ending.” And he said, “These two kids seem like a happy ending to me.” I mean, whose business was it of this guy what my happen ending looked like? LOL. I’ll never forget that conversation. It wasn’t a happy ending for me. Maybe it would’ve been to someone else. I shook off his rude, “Quit while you’re ahead” comment and used my anger to propel me to keep going to fulfill my dream. That doctor and his comment were like that person who waves the “Go” flag at a car race. It was the signal to put my foot on the accelerator and focus. I did.

Read Kelly’s Story Part I and Kelly’s Story Part II