A flashback, of sorts

I finished "The Glass Castle" by Jeannette Walls last night (a great read, by the way), and started in on the next book in my "to read" stacks (I have a few now since my MIL has learned I have been turned on to reading again).

The next one up is "Tuesdays with Morrie" by Mitch Albom. It's a shorty, which is why I chose it. I haven't decided yet if I want a "self-help" book next, or another good novel. So, while I am trying to decide that, I figured I would finally get to reading Albom's first of three books (since I have read "The Five People You Meet in Heaven" and "For One More Day" already, I wanted to read this one too). I just started it last night and within the first ten pages, a quote jumped out at me right away (I won't give you what the line is referencing, just in case someone has not read the book yet):

"My old professor, meanwhile, was stunned by the normalcy of the day around him. Shouldn't the world stop? Don't they know what has happened to me?"

This quote really struck me...and I had to put the book down for a brief moment when I read it. But, I am not 100% sure why it struck specifically last night. It has been a long time since I had that similar feeling moment in time, and honestly, I kinda forgot about it until I read those words last night.

To back-track a bit...

When I had my second miscarriage in November 2005, I kinda knew in my heart when I got that + HPT that something just wasn't quite right about the pregnancy. I think my insticts knew because the cycle had been crappy to start with: My follie's weren't responding well to the 100mg Clomid I was on (they never responded at all to the 50 mg the cycle before, which is all it took to get me pregnant with Chris). Thanks to the u/s monitoring, we could see I had too many small follies and none were developing into something we would hope would ovulate or want to trigger. Then, we found out on CD 22 that I had ovulated in between monitoring u/s's on CD 21 without any signs of the ovulation happening (no EWCM, no positive OPK's, nothing!). We were given the choice to either do a natural cycle or wait it out - of course, we went with the natural cycle. And it worked, somehow. But, hind-sight being 20/20, I should have waited the cycle out.

The bleeding started about two weeks after my first + HPT...and the joy of finding out that a crappy cycle turned positive came crashing down on us.

Anyways, here is where the quote fits in: Dr. D sent me for two outside u/s's at the hospital's ambulatory center after the bleeding started. The first was on Halloween day - the day after the bleeding started. I was warned by Dr. D over the phone that since I was not quite six weeks along at that point, the tech might not see anything. When I went in for the emergency appointment, the tech was cold as ice. Now, of course she probably knew why I was there in the first place and probably didn't want to say anything - but, when she started the u/s, she was very rough and only spoke matter-of-factly about what she saw. When she only saw a small sac, she questioned how far along I thought I was. So, I told her that 1) I was already warned we might not see anything and 2) I knew exactly how far along I was. She came back in after showing the scans to the radiologist at the center and said coldly things didn't look good. But, I wasn't that scared yet. Dr. D was the one, I felt, who needed to tell me the truth. When I saw him later that day after the beta draw, he said he couldn't promise anything, but to take it easy, do the repeat betas and u/s's he wanted done and we would see what was happening when I was a little farther along. I was guarded about the pregnancy, but still a little hopeful since it was, in fact, so early.

The second u/s was done the following Monday on November 7, 2005 at the same center. This tech was much nicer and way more sympathetic to what was happening. Hubby missed getting there because of work, so I went in alone. The tech I had was much easier with the equipment and was more informative as she went through the scans. When she was done, she told me that she, too, only saw a small sac and that the radiologist was going to call Dr. D about the scans. Hubby finally showed up after I was told only a small sac was visible at almost seven weeks - that was not good news.

Hubby and I stood outside in the parking deck as I explained what the tech had said - my cell phone rang. I knew it was Dr. D without picking it up to see the caller ID. My cell phone never rings... Hubby answered and he gave me the phone. Dr. D said he was sorry, but he had to tell me that this pregnancy was going to end in a miscarriage. He explained everything to me - why there was an empty sac, why I was bleeding, that he wanted to do one last u/s to confirm everything before I decided if I wanted to miscarry on my own, or medically manage the miscarriage...

As I stood there shaking, crying in Hubby's arms, talking into the cell phone to my doc and learning a life I so wanted - that I never expected to enter into my life in the first place - was leaving me.....the world just kept about their business as if nothing was happening.

Shouldn't the world stop? Don't they know what has happened to me?

In that moment, I felt like the world should have been mourning that loss with me - that time should have stopped and everyone should have felt sad, mad, robbed of a life too short.

What is the point of this post? I don't know... Maybe that, as we look into other people's eyes at any given moment, we should think about what might be happening in someone else's life at that moment in time? Maybe there is hardship behind someone's facade and we should be a little more careful of how we treat one another? Maybe we should not assume that all is well for someone? Maybe we should be a little more caring to people we meet?

And, this applies to most of those pregnant women we see too...bellies sticking out, beaming as they walk through the stores and the parks and the restaurants. I am sure that as I walked around in Spring 2004, some woman might have been jealous of the baby I was carrying... But little did she know how long it took to conceive that baby, and how much that baby would be appreciated once he was born. And, if I am so lucky for that joy to enter our lives again, little will that woman know how hard it was to hold on to that pregnancy, how how much that baby will be loved and appreciated.

I guess these thoughts are kinda like my Paying It Forward post:

What if the person who dropped it (the $30) really needed the cash? What if they didn't have enough to make ends meet - and we used their cash on something frivilous that we could have afforded ourselves? What if the cash meant not being able to feed his/her child?

Maybe I am thinking too much as the idea of TTC again comes closer...and I prepare myself for it. Even though I am ready to try again in a few months, I am still scared of what the future holds. If I have another miscarriage, it is the end of the road because I don't think I can handle another loss... It is hard, even in the best of spirits, to be hopeful...