A letter of loss

I've been debating whether or not to share this here; the vulnerability of these words exposing my fears and ultimately, my reality. But it's a reality that too many women experience, and too few share, so here goes...

Thursday 12 January, 2012, 7.20am

Despite that niggling feeling I had that you wouldn’t be there, today was to be the day we’d tell the world about you. My boss would know and we’d talk about maternity leave, the rest of Marcus’ family would know and I’d send my friends the happy message that all was on track.

But it wasn’t to be.

The biggest fear I’d had all along – a missed miscarriage – happened. All along I wasn’t concerned about the NT results or problems with the pregnancy, all I worried about was seeing that heartbeat and your wriggly web-like fingers and toes at the 12 week scan - the safe point. Increasingly at times I didn’t feel like this pregnancy was real, but I and others tried to brush it off as negative talk – and that’s not healthy for the baby. Maybe I need to give into my intuition a bit more; I think subconsciously I must have known you were no longer there.

As I read about miscarriage – a topic I tried to avoid because it scared the crap out of me – more spiritual people than me talk about losing a child. For us it’s the loss of what could have been; what was meant to be. Science tells me you were just a bunch of cells and on the ultrasound screen, that’s all you looked like. But you brought the promise of so much more and now it’s gone.

We tried to be pragmatic and not get ahead of ourselves, we didn’t buy anything for you or the nursery for fearing of ‘jinxing’ it. But we did imagine you in my swelling belly at upcoming weddings, beach days and housewarmings, gushingly telling people about you and the hopes we had. Those days are gone for now, but hopefully not forever.