What Happened?!

Amy Pectol
dayzegrl@aol.com

Date: 5/19/99

March 30, 1999, I found out that I was pregnant which was a big shock to me and my husband. We were only 21 years old and hadn't even been married 2 years and thought that children was way out of our league. I had been on the pill for 4 years and messed up on one cycle and got pregnant. After lots of coaching from a lot of people, we thought "We can do this" We started planning our future for our baby to come. People started buying items for the baby. We started preparing the nursery. Our relationship took on a whole new meaning.

On May 3rd, in my 9th week, I was at work and noticed some blood. I immediately called my doctor and they told me that some spotting is normal in pregnancy. Especially after sexual intercourse which we had partaken to the day before. I went on with my day thinking everything was normal. My practitioner gave me some warning signs to look for. The next morning when I woke up, I had all of those signs. Cramping with heavy bleeding which turned the toilet water red, and some tissue fragments. I went to the ER that day. A vaginal ultrasound detected that the baby had no heartbeat and I was told that my body was trying to miscarry. One week later, after severe cramping and contracting, I passed what would have been my baby. It was about 2.5 to 3 inches long. It didn't have the form of a baby, but was developing certain parts of the body. My husband and I saw 2 little black coal dots which were the eyes, and we saw a paddle shaped arm with fingers beginning to form. It was all over. My baby was gone.

The hardest part for me, was to deal with the fact that I wasn't pregnant anymore and had nothing to show for it. Every coarse of action that I took seemed not to even matter anymore. I used to wake up and think about that little life growing inside me. The thought got more and more exciting as the days went on. I kept up with how the baby was developing inside of me. I did everything I was supposed to, down to not drinking caffeine. What went wrong? I know that I will never be able to find out the reason and that is what scares me the most.

It has now been almost 3 weeks since it all began and is still hard to face the facts. I am still getting blood work to test for my HCG levels to make sure they go down. My husband and I want to try again as soon as possible, but when is that? When I think about getting pregnant again, I have mixed emotions. My heart tells me to go home and try tonight, but my mind tells me that maybe I should wait for some reason. I am so afraid that something is wrong with me physically that prevents me from being able to carry a baby. I have read about so many women who have had multiple miscarriages and later find out there was a certain reason why. I couldn't handle to go through the physical or the emotional pain again.

The only good thing that has come out of this is it has brought me and my husband so much closer. The thought of sharing that kind of bond with your soul mate is something that make me love him even more. You know that saying "You don't know what you've got until it's gone" is so true in our case.

Amy Pectol
dayzegrl@aol.com