Earlier this year I had a miscarriage. I've written those words over and over again, and yet every time I type them they feel like they belong to someone else. It's such a strange thing to be able to say about yourself.
Miscarriage is a strange sort of tragedy because it happens to so very many of us, and yet when it happens to you it feels like you're the only person in the entire world who has ever or will ever go through it. 1 in 4 pregnancies end in miscarriage. I know this because when you have one people say it over and over again like it's an emotional life raft. It's not. Because what I hear when someone says '1 in 4 pregnancies ends in miscarriage' is 'if you get pregnant again there is still a 25% chance that you'll lose it again.'
Which is why the idea of getting pregnant again terrifies me.
I want a baby. I just don't want to be pregnant again. Unfortunately it's really very difficult to have one without the other.
A friend told me the other day that I'm not afraid of being pregnant, that I'm afraid of having another miscarriage and while she's partly right, I'm afraid it's not all that reasonable.
I didn't like being pregnant. It made me tired and grumpy and it stripped me of my ability to do the things that I loved best - specifically drinking, smoking and sitting outside pubs getting gently pissed. My friendships are based on the freedom to drink and stay up late. My quality time with my husband is sharing a bottle of buttery Chardonnay and talking about nothing in particular.
When I got pregnant before I didn't know what I was letting myself in for. I had no idea how sick and tired and emotional and just desperately heavy I would end up feeling. Now, having done 1/4 of a pregnancy, I have to go back to the drawing board and start all over again if I want to have a baby, only this time I have to do it full in the knowledge that it's going to absolutely fucking suck.
Everything that was good about pregnancy has been suppressed by my memory. I know I told people that I was enjoying it and that I didn't miss drinking or smoking, but now that I have my life right back where it was before two pink lines on one white stick, I can't believe that it was true.
I had a missed miscarriage, which meant the pregnancy stopped developing around 6 weeks and 1 day, but my body continued to produce pregnancy symptoms so I didn't find out until I had a small bleed at 10 weeks. The day that we found out that there would be no baby, my husband and I walked from the hospital to the Waitrose in Kings Cross, which is my favourite shop in London.
He followed behind me slowly while I picked up everything in the shop that I wouldn't have been allowed to consume while pregnant and put it in the trolly. Then we silently paid for soft cheese, pâté, smoked salmon, Champagne, Chardonnay and Malbec. It looked like party food. I cried as I ate and drank, mourning the baby I wasn't going to have and celebrating the freedom that I had regained.
People talk about how emotionally hard miscarriage is, but they don't talk much about how physically horrific it is. I was knocked sideways by the brutality of the process. For weeks afterwards I would dream that I was giving birth to plastic tubing covered in blood and wake up screaming. People told me gently afterwards that that's a sign of PTSD.
Perhaps I've told myself that I hated pregnancy because it didn't stick. Like the fable of the fox and the grapes, where the fox claims he hates grapes because he can't reach any to pick, and subsequently loses out on eating any fruit.
I'm not sure we're ever really able to understand our own motivations for doing things. Do I fear and revile the idea of getting pregnant again because I really do want to focus on my career and enjoy the latter part of my twenties? Or am I just too scared from the experience of passing blood and pregnancy tissue while throwing up, to ever be able to think about doing it again?
If you've tried again after pregnancy loss, especially after multiple losses, you are a superhero. I am in awe of you. You deserve your happy ending.
All of the experts, Tommy's the charity, the NHS, they tell you to wait as long as you need to. Some people want to try again straight away, others need to wait. There's clearly no doubt that I'm in the latter camp. I just can't help hoping that the feeling subsides and I rediscover my desire to become a mum. But most of all I can't stop hoping that if and when I'm ready I don't ever have to hear the '1 in 4' statistic again, that having been the one, I'll get to be the rest of the four.
Today is the final day of pregnancy loss week. People will post pictures of candles with #WaveOfLight to commemorate lost pregnancies, stillborn babies and neonatal deaths.