A Story

Unnamed

by A.K.

I found out that I was pregnant with the second one in October 2008. My parents happened to be visiting us in Honolulu, so I was thrilled to break that news when they landed. My partner and I were excited to have a sibling for Isato, our son, and everything felt right.

But one Friday as I was preparing to go to a meeting, I noticed that I was bleeding. First I thought nothing about it, but then started to freak out. In panic, I called my OB/GYN whom I just met for the first time several weeks before. She called back and told me casually that "well, there is nothing we can do about it. When it passes, you'll know" and told me to come on Monday if bleeding continues and then hang up. I was left to myself, trying to understand what she meant by "passing," and shuddered when realized that she meant a miscarriage. How could she be so unsympathetic?

I spent next two days not knowing what to do. Bleeding continued, and the slightest change in the amount of blood in the pad made me hopeful in one moment devastated in the next. I googled the web looking for information and tips, and found that 15-25 % of all pregnancies end up in what doctors call "spontaneous miscarriage." I could not believe how high the ratio was, and thought back about my oblivious carelessness during the first pregnancy when I did not even think about a possibility of losing the fetus I was carrying.

Monday, I called and demanded the appointment with the doctor. She squeezed me in and my partner and I were in the room by 8:30. She pulled out the ultrasound machined and looked for the heartbeat, but it was not there. My miscarriage was confirmed. She then went on to talk about three options of removing the "pregnancy." (1) wait until it naturally "passes," (2) surgery, and (3) off-the label use of pills. She did not recommend (1) and suggested (3) to which I simply nodded. But I decided to wait to take the pills until after I go home, as I was warned of possible side effects.

I had to teach a course two hours after that bad news. I am not sure how I lectured, but students seemed not to notice my swollen eyes, and I managed until the last 5 minutes of class. As I was showing a clip from a video to demonstrate some points I was making earlier, I felt a strong contraction in my lower abdomen. It brought back the memory of my first son's birth-- painful, but powerful urge that I had forgotten. After several seconds, I felt the gush between my legs.

I somehow managed to finish my lecture as if nothing happened, ran out of the classroom hoping that the pad was able to hold for a while. In a lavatory, I saw the tiny pink object on the pad. It was so small, shining like a creature from the sea. The doctor instructed me to put the "pregnancy" in the plastic container to bring it to the lab, so I put my little dead fetus in it.

After crying while in my office, I walked down the University Avenue to the lab with my container. The bright sunshine of Hawai'i made me even sadder and the walk felt terribly long. When I finally found the lab, I was glad that I was wearing sunglasses to hide behind it and simply wanted to get the business done without bursting into tears again in front of strangers. I wanted to do a minimum conversation, so I handed one of the receptionists the paper work from my doctor and the container in a brown bag. The woman took the form but then yelled "what is this? I don't understand this order form. What did your doctor say?" and summoned another woman in the office "can you read this? I don't understand..."

As I tried to utter the word "miscarriage,"another woman grabbed my brown bag from the other, opened it, took out the container, and (I swear she said this) "yikes! It's a baby!" At that point, I had no use of these insensitive people and ran out of the door crying.

After that incident, I dreamed about my pink fetus. I did not understand why I was able to leave it with those people. I wanted to bury it properly, and I regretted not thinking through what I was told by the doctor. At the next appointment I asked whether I could take it back, but the doctor did not think so. I needed some closure, a tangible evidence that it was there, even for a brief moment, for us. I took crayons, wrote the pink creature from the sea, and burnt with flowers in the back of our yard. The unknown lavender flowers were blooming and it felt like a perfect place for the fetus to rest.

I had told some of my students about my pregnancy, and hearing the news, Laura lent me a book by a midwife and one section of the book was about miscarriage. I was glad to see that among many stories of happy births in the book, miscarriage was given a space.

When I told people that I had a miscarriage, it was surprising how many said "oh you know, I did too." Miscarriage is an unspoken, yet a natural part of pregnancy. With baby magazines and advertisements emphasizing rosy and cheerful sides of childbirth, we do not have words to talk about it. Yet birth and death are together and inseparable. Life is sacred, yes, but fragile.

Now I am pregnant again. I approach this pregnancy with more acute awareness about possibility of going wrong and greater appreciation of normalcy. I am going to Japan in a week, and there I plan to visit a temple famous as the guardian for the unborn and aborted babies. My mother had gotten me a small jizo (small Buddha) after the miscarriage. The thought of my small one among thousands of cute jizos comforts me-- at least it is not alone. I will be praying for it and the safe arrival of the one that I am carrying.