I very much did not think I was going to write about this in my whimsically-titled newsletter. But yesterday I found myself writing an email to the comedian Katherine Ryan, to say thank you for a podcast she recorded about her recent pregnancy loss. She and I don’t know each other (a friend of mine has the same agent, and kindly passed on my message), but I wanted her to know that it reached someone at exactly the moment they needed to hear it.
And then I thought.. Well. Okay.
When I first started this newsletter, I shared a small poem by Emily Dickinson that had nudged me to start writing it:
They might not need me; but they might.
I'll let my head be just in sight;
A smile as small as mine might be
Precisely their necessity.
Last month I had a miscarriage at 12 weeks. So I’m writing this to say ‘Hey. If this horrible thing happens, it happened to me too, and I’m here for you.’
Thanks for the prompt, Notes App. But weirdly accurate, in that it was a period of unprecedented Google searching.
I had what’s called a ‘missed miscarriage’, which means that there aren’t any clear symptoms. Essentially, the pregnancy is no longer viable (not a great phrase, but the best of a bad bunch), but your body has missed the memo. Here are a couple of things that happened:
In my case there was a little bit of bleeding, and I made a few nervous calls to the hospital. After being advised by two midwives that it was probably normal*, a sleepless night, and what felt like an infinite amount of time on hold, hot phone pressed against hot face, the third said I could come in for a scan.
(*I say this with no ill-will whatsoever - they advised me as best they could based on their wealth of experience, and I was just unlucky that it didn’t line up with my situation. Nothing they said would’ve changed the outcome.)
The scan was very much like the ones you see in films and the later seasons of most sit-coms. Except that I was wearing a face-mask that was slowly and irrevocably filling up with snot. The scan technician did the looking and looking again bit, I think I spent that time mostly just wishing that Ben had been allowed to come in with me. After telling me that she couldn’t find a heartbeat, she tried to reassure me by saying that I was the third miscarriage she’d seen that day. It was possibly not as helpful as she’d hoped.
But I do take her point. It is so common. So common and yet often experienced so quietly.
Ben and I walked home in the sunshine. It was the furthest we’d been out of our house in weeks, and everything felt impossibly different.
We stopped off for various supplies on our way. To be honest, I didn’t expect for the third human I’d interact with in over a month to be the guy at Boots who, upon taking in the sheer volume of maxi pads I was plonking on the counter, said - and this is verbatim - ‘Woah.’
Woah is right, friend.
In fairness, I hadn’t realised that in my haste, among the varying sizes of pads, I’d also slammed down two packs of adult incontinence nappies. But you know what? They got the job done. 5 stars.
Here are a couple of things I knew nothing about, beforehand:
If you have a missed miscarriage, you have three options. You can choose to wait it out, which can take up to three weeks. Sitting there in the hospital, that seemed - even at the bizarro-pace time seems to be passing under lockdown - like too long to comprehend. Option Two is surgical removal, but because of COVID they weren’t able to offer a general anaesthetic, and given that in the past I’ve been weirdly unresponsive to local anaesthetic (a fun discovery that led me to have four teeth removed with no pain relief whatsoever, an experience I’m loathe to recommend) I decided that surgery wasn’t the one for me. So I went for Door Number Three: a course of pills taken over three days. Possible side effects included fevers, vomiting, and diarrhoea. I sometimes wonder if my refusal to learn how to spell diarrhoea is guided by a feverish but misguided hope that I’ll never need to spell it again. Well, feverish is right because Ding Ding Ding! I got all three. Honestly, just a beautiful time to be locked down in a one-bed flat.
But this is the bit that really knocked me for six:
I had to take nine pills in total. The first pill taken on day one, at the hospital, is - as you might expect - taken orally. Absolutely fine. Then you wait 48 hours? Why not. Throw in a high-grade temperature, chills, debilitating pain and some V&D (note I’m not spelling it out), just to pass the time.
The last six pills? Same system, friend. No need to stir the pot.
But for pills Two and Three - unlike any medicine I’ve ever taken in my entire life - you have to hold one in each cheek like a hamster. For an HOUR.
Excuse me????? Why is this very weird time in my life being compounded by this entirely novel, and absolutely MAD experience?
‘You have to let them dissolve,’ the nurse had said, ‘but they never usually fully dissolve in an hour, so then you just swallow the remainder with water after an hour’s gone by.’
WHAT!? Why is that now the system for the first time ever?
Fine, I’ll spend sixty minutes of my one human life looking like a bewildered and - let’s be honest - quite mournful hamster for no apparent reason, only to have to swallow these powdery pill-dregs, along with my pride.
I’m just kidding, of course. After the first 48 hours, my pride was but a beautiful memory.
Anyway, through my 48 hours of unbridled hell, a week of fairly abject misery, and then three weeks of gentle, tentative healing, I have at least gleaned a little bit of knowledge, which I hope will be helpful for absolutely none of you. Not even your friend’s friend’s friend. But I’ll let my head be just in sight. Just in case.
- The painkillers might barely make a dent, so buy a hot water bottle. And if you already have one, buy a second hot water bottle. I was extremely lucky to have a partner trapped in the flat with me who took his hot water bottle duties very seriously. But even then, the time spent waiting for the kettle to boil was teetering on the edge of unbearable. And as I mentioned, I’ve had FOUR teeth removed without successful anaesthetic. I like (love) to think of myself as a tough cookie, but having an extra hot water bottle to add to the rotation still would’ve been a galaxy brain move.
- Likewise pyjamas. Get that two-three pair rotation going. Having a fresh pair ready to go every day made me feel a little more human. Or at least it shifted the Human:Orc ratio a little in my favour.
- Buy more pads than you can fit in your bag. The guy at Boots can handle it. Even if he then gets annoyed with you for thinking you could fit them all in one bag, only to soon discover that you absolutely cannot, and he has to charge you 7p for a new bag, but he’s already closed the transaction, so it’ll have to be put through as a new payment, and if you think I’m going to write it off because you’re clearly going through something? Then you are sorely mistaken.
- I found it helpful to sleep on the sofa for a few nights so I could watch TV, and not have to contain my wriggling and writhing. I also watched The Vicar of Dibley for almost 12 hours, wriggling away to my heart’s content.
For almost a week, Ben slept on the floor next to me, wrapped in a blanket like a burrito. Because he said our bedroom felt too far away. Some days I would wake up and say ‘I think I must’ve slept a little last night!’ And he would reply ‘You totally did. I think between 2-3am, and 5-7.’ I know this isn’t a helpful tidbit, I just wanted to mention what a beautiful man he is. Thanks Ben.
The above I would take as mandatory, with the possible exception of The Vicar of Dibley, and my shameless showing-off about kind Ben. But these next bits should all be preceded by a big red sign that adds ‘If it feels right for you.’
- If you can, take more time off work than you think you might need. I emailed my manager as soon as I got home (post-Boots, pre-Hamster), to tell her what had happened, and to ask if I could take Monday off to recuperate. She emailed me back straight away, firmly telling me to take as much time as I needed, and that she wouldn’t expect to hear from me until I was ready to come back to work. I will forever be grateful to her, not just for her (consistent) kindness and compassion, but also because she somehow knew exactly what I needed way before I did. The following Thursday, the idea that I’d thought I could’ve gone back to work any sooner was entirely bananas. I could barely sit up! I thought I only needed a day, but oh ho ho did my body have different ideas. A full week was what it took for me to feel like a human again, as opposed to (as I kept charmingly saying to my husband) ‘a sack of raw meat.’
- It was also annoyingly helpful to spend some time just feeling my feelings, and sitting with whatever came my way. I really really didn’t want to, but I will grudgingly admit that it helped.
- Vanquish the Malgorithm! This is an excellent word for all the targeted ads for maternity clothes and baby toys that suddenly pop up after you Google ‘miscarriage symptoms???’ for the millionth time. There’s a great how-to page on The Uterus Monologues, a blog written by a woman called Jennie Agg, which is crystal clear and really helpful.
- On that subject, I feel quite ashamed to write this but that makes me think I should plough on: I think it’s okay to mute your pregnant/parent friends on social media, at least for a while. If that’s you, I’m so sorry. I’m desperate to see your beautiful babies, and whatever adorable and hilarious things they’re up to, but my social media is solely for dumb memes, earnest cartoons, and Ron Swanson GIFs right now, and that’s just how it has to be.
- It was important for me to do something to take ownership of my body as soon as it felt remotely possible. So after a week of being on the sofa 24/7, I started a Couch to 5K. Quite literally. Before I found out I was pregnant, I was training for my third half marathon. I’m now on Week 4 (with Michael Johnson as my guide) running for 5 minutes at a time, and I’ve never felt more proud of myself.
- Find people who know what you’re going through. People who will say ‘You did nothing wrong. I did nothing wrong. It’s just one of those things.’ In the first few days I found it darkly comforting to hoover up blog posts and articles, but I was also enormously grateful to the people who reached out to say ‘I’ve been there’, or ‘I’m there right now and it SUCKS.’ This includes the hard-won perspective of a friend who also recently suffered a pregnancy loss, although at a later stage than me which is an experience likely incomparable to my own. He’s said lots of wise and moving things over the past few weeks, but - unfairly - I found the most helpful was his description of 2020 as ‘a real thumbs down’. For some reason it rendered both Ben and me prostrate on the floor with laughter. Aching sadness can imbue everything with that slo-mo, rainy window effect, where each feeling is made sharp, pronounced and overly large. And when everything feels cosmic and unwieldy, there’s something quite valuable about someone flomping you back to earth by lending a traumatic experience the soundtrack of a raspberry.
- 2020 HAS been a thumbs down! I hadn’t told any of my friends or family that I was pregnant. Because - what? I was scared of jinxing it? Or maybe I was scared of getting people’s hopes up, or more likely my own. Maybe thought if it didn’t work out it then it would be easier to go through it quietly. But the very best thing I did was to reach out and tell people I was hurting. If that doesn’t feel right for you, then it’s nobody else’s business, but for me it made the difference between night and day.
- This isn’t to say that I found the reaching out bit easy. I did not! Experiencing a miscarriage is a strange beast, etiquette-wise. On the one hand, it felt weird and melodramatic to share with anyone unprompted. On the other, I felt completely fraudulent for saying anything other than OW! MY WOMB! in response to every text I received, for about two weeks. Maybe I should’ve just set up an auto-reply and be done with it.
Either way, I shouldn’t have worried because I was entirely unprepared for the outpouring of love and support that came next. To quote my dear friend from Boots - woah. We were the (infinitely grateful, entirely undeserving) recipients of enormous care packages dropped on our doorstep, and shipped from far-flung places, day after day. It got to a point where we had to divide up our haul into category bags: sweets, chocolate and biscuits; fruit, cured meats, and soft cheeses; crisps, crackers, spreads and sundries. It still beggars belief. There were beautiful hand-made cards, and printed-out photos of happier times, with promises of happy ones to come. Lotions and potions that smell like heaven. Vats of medicinal chicken soup and lamb stew from my Ma. Infinite treats from my sister, including bolognese, with a carton of orange juice (vitamin C helps to absorb iron, she says! I didn’t know that), a box of Coco Pops and a bottle of blue-top milk. Enough jars of honey to make me suspect that my kinship with Winnie the Pooh has become baldly apparent. A giant box of glazed donuts with sprinkles. A giant box of Pom Bears. A giant box of books wrapped up in brown paper from my friends Kate and Ella, who had decided to join forces and send me the most comforting books they could think of. But apparently in the end they had irreconcilable views on what constitutes a comfort read so they had to go their separate ways. “It became clear that she and I cannot recommend books in tandem”, wrote Ella:
So they sent both, and I’m shamelessly thrilled to have benefited from their rancour. There was stewed rhubarb and home-made sweet potato soup in an enormous Tupperware left on our doorstep by a friend who works as a doctor and lives on the opposite side of London. There were candles and beautiful, sweet smelling flowers that filled our flat with colour and light even when the shutters were very firmly closed. There was a homemade pineapple upside-down cake.
It’s an odd feeling to hope that I never have to show the people I love the exact same kind of love and care they’ve shown me, but also to feel an acute need to pay it back somehow. Or to show just how much it meant, and have them understand. Of course I might think to send out that love even during the good times. But what am I, made of thoughtful, unbelievably perfect care packages?
My friend Rachel dropped round a package of two Twix bars, two cans of Diet Coke, a badge in the shape of a warm yellow sun, and a pineapple. Amazing. But best of all, she texted me a photo of her beautiful smiling face, with the message ‘Here I am. Just in case. I got you.’
This - typical her - is a much more eloquent version of what I’ve been trying to say this whole time.
Here I am. Just in case. I got you.
A Poem
Small Kindnesses
I’ve been thinking about the way, when you walk
down a crowded aisle, people pull in their legs
to let you by. Or how strangers still say “bless you”
when someone sneezes, a leftover
from the Bubonic plague. “Don’t die,” we are saying.
And sometimes, when you spill lemons
from your grocery bag, someone else will help you
pick them up. Mostly, we don’t want to harm each other.
We want to be handed our cup of coffee hot,
and to say thank you to the person handing it. To smile
at them and for them to smile back. For the waitress
to call us honey when she sets down the bowl of clam chowder,
and for the driver in the red pick-up truck to let us pass.
We have so little of each other, now. So far
from tribe and fire. Only these brief moments of exchange.
What if they are the true dwelling of the holy, these
fleeting temples we make together when we say, “Here,
have my seat,” “Go ahead—you first,” “I like your hat.”
Some music
I have three playlists for you this week!
#1: For sadness and for wallowing, just in case. It’s good and long, too. Note: this is not a ‘pick yourself up and dust yourself off’ playlist, this is strictly for wallowing only.
I’ll send a makeover montage playlist next time.
#2: For staying at home. I made it in the first week of lockdown, when I knew nothing of the world. But I still find the first track particularly useful when I have to go on a tidying up rampage.
#3: This is a practical one I made for myself. It’s called Computer Working and it’s for ploughing through seemingly endless admin. I find this music doesn’t get in the way, but helps me to sit down with a bulging to-do list, and make it feel doable.
Links!
I got a work email informing me that Chester Zoo has its own livestream YouTube page now, and that it was available to stream on the hospital TVs. I now realise they were telling me so I could pass it on to the children. Anyway, Punk Rocker Pigs 🐷🎸is a recent favourite.
(This GIF isn’t from the livestream, but my god I wish it was.)
I love this song, and I find Chris’ performance in this video utterly hypnotic.
I know I’ve shared Nick Cave’s newsletter - The Red Hand Files - before, but this month’s was beautiful (as always) and really cut to the heart of things.
Màiri and Jenna flew across the ocean to play this song at my wedding and I love them - and this song - so very much. I’m not sure if what I just pasted in below will work as a link so click this if not.
Also, today (as I’m writing this) is Màiri’s birthday! Happy Birthday Màiri!!! (But don’t worry - I didn’t solely wish her a happy birthday through the medium of my personal newsletter.)
The best $104 I ever spent: a rose gold trash can. This is for anyone else whose online shopping habits have taken on the velocity of The Tasmanian Devil.
So fuck it, I bought the trash can. The future I’d be saving for seems increasingly unlikely, and putting little bits of money aside seems like an increasingly futile way to deal with the future that is coming, but garbage day never ends.
Cleaning Checklists are a Good Thing when feeling overwhelmed. Or even just whelmed.
I have turned to this article from Unfuck Your Habitat more than once over the years, when I know my home is starting to look like the fireswamp from the Princess Bride. And yes, in this analogy Ben is Buttercup, and I am one of the Rodents of Unusual Size (R.O.U.S.)
And that’s it!
Love,
Katya