Revisiting Miscarriage

Grief over losing children started for me long before I lost Zane. In 2002, I experienced two miscarriages (one in March, the other in September), which were absolutely devastating. I wrote about the first one in an essay called Dead Dobie Wall, which was published by Cliterature Journal in 2011. I thought about tearing snippets from it to paste into this blog post, but it’s interesting, curious, maybe disturbing how much the trauma rushes back up to meet me when I reread the words I wrote back then. I don’t want to revisit that time. Though I probably should. 

My grief counselor (when I had one) told me I must do the grief work. I needed to sit with it, take days to mourn, allow myself to cry, and let the pain envelop me. If that meant going to work the next day with puffy eyes, so be it. If it meant losing a whole day of productivity, who cares. Instead of heeding her advice, I would read, write, swim, paint rocks, really do anything else so I didn’t have to face the reality of loss. 

When you delve into the past, back into those moments that were just the worst of the worst, it reignites the pain. The logical part of me knows that’s the way through. Yet, there’s something ominously comforting about holding on. If I find my way through the fog of grief, then where does that leave me? Alone. Without my unborn babies. Without Zane. I cannot leave them in the past. I need to carry them with me always. 

So I admit, I’m not good at doing the grief work. However, I’ve learned over the last three years that there are ways to walk with grief as a constant companion (I think of Zane daily), honor my lost loved ones, and still carry on. If not for myself, then for Zane and for my living son. 

I don’t know that I’ll ever get past having moments of panic or dark nights of the soul where I drop into some existential crisis that makes me feel like I’m suffocating. But I do know that right now I can continue to live moment to moment. Sometimes it feels like I’m merely existing. Sometimes I wonder what the point is. Other times, I experience happiness and joy. If there’s an afterlife—if Zane and my other babies can see into my life right now—then I know they’d want me to carry on. Even attempt to thrive.