Jack's Story

I got pregnant for the second time when Mat was 13 months old  I was terrified, but overjoyed.  After 11 months of trying with Mat, it was like a godsend to get pregnant on one oops.  I remember watching the stick change color, and feeling so excited.  A new baby.

Chris, however, was not excited.  He was upset.  He immediately jumped to getting an abortion.  It was a fight.  I don't get abortions.  We fought for three weeks before I agreed to get one.  He sent me to my therapist, who literally said, "Are you crazy?  Just go check yourself in to Peachford when you're done, and save yourself the ER trip for the attempted suicide."  So I went home and told Chris.  He agreed with her.  For two whole days.  Then the fighting started again.

I couldn't sleep because of Mat nursing, and the stress.  I was slugging back caffeine and anti-nausea homeopathics.  The fighting went on.   He said I couldn't handle it.  I had so much to do.  Money was too tight.  Everything was so rational with him.

I agreed again at 8 weeks to have an abortion.  Every place I called refused to do the pill because I was nursing, even though I had documentation that it was safe.  Planned Parenthood, but the wait was over two weeks.  I didn't want to wait that long.  One place told me not to let anything stop me from what I wanted to do, and I remember wanting to scream at her that killing my baby was the last thing I wanted to do.  Instead, I thanked her.  It was humiliating.  I had to make all the calls, because Chris was too busy.

I finally put my foot down at about 9 weeks, because I wasn't aborting something that looked like a baby.  We decided to keep it.  Midwife appointments ensued.  We couldn't find a heartbeat, but she wasn't worried.  About 11.5 weeks in, I went to Ikea with my friends Mark and Heather.  I had Mat in the Moby so he wouldn't run off.  I was exhausted all the time and queasy.  He wanted to nurse CONSTANTLY.  If he wasn't nursing he was sobbing.

I had to pee, so we trotted off to the bathroom.  I remember wiping, and seeing brown blood.  It was scary, but I knew my stuff.  Red blood bad, brown blood okay.  It didn't stop.  Days of that.  Just a little, though.  I had a 12 week appointment, so I didn't make a faster one.  Besides, I was already feeling a few flutter kicks.  My mom went with me to watch Mat.  We tried a Doppler, because she knew I didn't want ultrasounds.  We couldn't find the heartbeat again, but she wasn't worried.  He was in a weird spot.  I agreed to an ultrasound.

I waited for a while, in this room full of pregnant women.  Big, gorgeous bellies surrounded me.  Soon that would be me again.  I got called back, and mom stayed with Mat again.  They put you in this big room, and coat you in cold jelly.  I got to see my baby, not just on a little screen, but HUGE.  Half a wall.  I was excited.

I saw it right away.  I was 12 weeks pregnant, and that was an 8 week fetus.  I only had an 8 week with Mat, and Jack looked exactly the same.  I didn't even notice there was no heartbeat.  I just knew he was too tiny in my gigantic womb.   I did the math.  He died the day I agreed to the 8 week abortion.  There had been no baby flutters, just my uterus starting contractions to expel my dead baby.

I asked for a picture.  My midwife told me it was really sweet.  I walked back in to the waiting room.  It was still full of bitches.  Hugely pregnant bitches who would be meeting their babies in a few weeks.  Bitches rubbing their tummies.  I could see the kicks through their shirt.  I hated them.  I hated every single goddamn last one of them.  I remember walking to mom and Mat, and I showed Mat the picture, and I remember saying, "This was going to be your baby brother."  Then I lost my fucking shit.  I was screaming and sobbing.  My poor mom looked horrified.

We were going to Thailand in two weeks.  I didn't want to miscarry in a foreign country.  I also hate being sedated and surgery, so I opted for misoprotol.  I took it the next day.  It was a Thursday.  Chris took the day off.  I took the first pill early.  Mom came over.  I ached.  It was early labor.  We went to the library, and it was starting to get very uncomfortable.  I asked him if we could please go, but he kept putting me off, and getting irate that I kept asking.

By the end of 12 hours, I'd made no significant progress, so I took the second pill.  Chris told me he had to go to bed because he needed to work.  Half an hour later, I was nearly screaming in agony.  It was so insanely painful.  Mom stayed with me.  I remember getting up to go to the bathroom, and when I sat down, my water broke.  Did you know you have an amniotic sac at 12 weeks?  I sure as hell didn't.  Then I spent the next four exhausting, excruciating hours pushing out everything I'd grown to nurture my baby.  I passed fist sized clots of tissue.  I bled constantly.  And I was covered in blood.  Covered, because I caught every last thing I passed, to frantically look for my baby.  My mom, bless her, was handed things as I desperately asked her if she thought it was my baby.  She never flinched.  At around 1am, I found Jack.  Tiny, but clearly a baby,  I held him in my hand, and kissed him, and told him I loved him.  Then I gently wrapped him up and put him in the fridge so we could bury him the next day.  By 2:30 or so, it calmed enough so that I could sleep.

Chris went to work like normal.  Mom and I picked out fabric, and made a shroud.  We buried Jack in the back yard when Chris came home.

I was numb.  Patrick and Timmy sent me flowers.  A few days later, I was spiking a fever, and still bleeding and passing clots.  I was worried I had retained placenta.  My parents watched Mat, so we could go to St. Joe's.  I waited for hours, only to be told no one would perform a D&C because I might have had an abortion that went wrong, and they were a Catholic hospital.  After 6 hours, they found a doctor who would.  By that time, they found out I had the flu, and was almost done bleeding out tissue.

But what if I never drank all that Coke Zero.  What if I'd gotten more sleep.   What if we'd wanted the baby.  It took me two years to get over it.  I'm tearing as I write this, but I've taken this out of the box so, so many times that I can do it without sobbing.  I miss Jack.  I was supposed to still be married, and have two wonderful children.  But I don't, and I have to move on from there.  I have a beautiful son, and I have finally stopped blaming myself.

I love you, sweet angel.

Thanks for your input, now shut up.

Everyone has their 2¢ about how it is you should raise your child.  If you have/adopt a child, suddenly a million people will spring out of the woodwork to tell you what you're doing wrong, and most of them don't bother to leave their own box to give you advice.

I have a hard time explaining my son to other people.  He's not fragile, but he's an emotionally delicate kid.  He is easily angered and upset.  Sometimes getting his clothes on will end in a screaming, hysterical melt down.  But he's loving, funny, and really smart.  Seriously, the kid learned the alphabet by 17 months, and has been reading since he was 3.5.  He's got a ridiculously good memory.  And, damn, the kid is just funny.

Given his...unusually volatile temperament, I'm pretty sure I've heard about a million times from friends, family, and random strangers that I'm just too gentle with my son.  I need to let him just scream himself out when things go wrong for him.  I need to spank.   I need to force him to figure things out on his own.  I need to give him time outs.  I need to stop interfering when he melts down.  I need to threaten more.  I do exactly none of those things 99% of the time.  Instead, I assume my son needs help figuring out how to do what's so frustrating to him.  Him having a screaming meltdown does not absolve him of working through the situation.  It doesn't mean he never has to say sorry.  It doesn't mean he gets away with murder.  I talk him through it, we work out a solution, and he learns something.  Sometimes this takes endless repetition, but he's 5 years old.

Yes, I absolutely could let him scream.  I could mock him, or insult him, or call him a whiny baby/brat.  I could tell him that no one likes a whiner.  But as someone who's had adult meltdowns because she couldn't control her feelings, I know how shitty that is.  It took me until I was thirty years old to learn how to deal with things properly.  I couldn't "work myself down" at all.  Letting me have a panic attack about whatever it was going on at the time taught me exactly nothing except how ridiculously powerless I was.  I learned to cope.  Panic attacks could easily be dealt with by a pair of nail scissors, a box cutter, or my nails if I was desperate.  Sometimes it took one cut, sometimes it took a hundred (and I'm not exaggerating about that.)  No one taught me how to handle myself in a thoughtful, reasoned way.  I just knew how to survive the moment.

I want better than that for my son.  I sometimes see him hit and scratch himself when he gets upset.  While this may not be conscious self-mutilating behavior, I know that endorphin high can be habit forming.  When he has a meltdown, we try deep breathing first.  I'm firm about it, because he's out of control, and needs to be guided.  If that doesn't work, I find differently textured things for him to touch, and we discuss that, because it distracts his brain.  Then, once he's calm, we snuggle up and talk.  Yes, I could be stern momma, but I need him to know that although I may not love his behavior one bit, I love him.  Some days, this takes every last ounce of patience I have.  But when I hear him tell me that he knows even if he's bad that I'll love him, I know I've made the right choice.

So please, when you decide to tell me, unsolicited, that my parenting choices are crap, maybe you might want to ask me exactly why it is I do what I do.  Also, nothing personal, but go fuck yourself.  Just a little.