Category Archives: Grief

For those interested in our birds, they left the nest sometime late last week, and I’m relieved that the saga is over.

We took Eleanor to the birthday party of a classmate yesterday. Eleanor is the odd child out in her class, the only one without a sibling at home, and many of her friends are from families of three or four children. Inevitably, the talk at school functions turns to how these moms can’t squeeze one more soccer game or birthday party into their crammed days.

None of the parents knows my history, and so yesterday, I sat through many of these conversations. Then, one of the moms asked me, “So, is Eleanor just going to stay an only child?”

“Well, we’re hoping not,” I said. “I’m going through fertility treatments now.”

Awkward pause. “Oh, did you do that with Eleanor too?” she asked.

“Nope,” I said.

For me, etiquette dictates that you should not ask a stranger about anything related to reproduction. No “When are you starting a family?” or “Don’t you want more kids?” If you do ask, you might find yourself listening to some poor woman shout about her stillborn daughter over the blaring music at the birthday party of a 4-year-old. Though that is not what I did. I stayed quiet in an effort at tact. And because even though I sometimes do want to wallop people with my words for asking such questions, I love Genevieve too much to treat her story that way.

Strangers ask me about my family plans all the time, and I’m always thrown off-guard. Much of my work now is focused on stillbirth, infertility, and other reproductive problems. So during the week, I’m often reading about these topics, and though they are sad topics, I find it immensely rewarding to use the knowledge I’ve gained to help other families. I sometimes forget that reproduction isn’t such an ordeal for most people.

That’s why it’s so jarring when I’m out in the world and get these questions. Most people are coming from a place where reproduction appears to be largely in their control. I’m coming from a place where you try and try and try to get pregnant and then hope and hope and hope to have a healthy baby. I’m sure I’d be happier in that other place. I have no way to get back there. I like to think that we all have our purposes in life, and so I console myself with the notion that I might be an oddball mom by night, but I’m a stillbirth survivor superhero by day.

I had to go in for a blood test this morning, and I stopped in the bathroom when I arrived. The woman in the stall next to me vomited. After a minute, she called “Sorry!” to me.

“Morning sickness,” she said.

“That’s OK,” I said. “I’ve been there.”

“At least we get something out of it, right?” she said.

I said nothing.

After having Eleanor, I had an instant connection to every other woman who had given birth. With the women I met in my neighborhood playgroup, I got to endlessly rehash the pregnancy, the delivery, the efforts to get the baby to sleep through the night. And then there was potty-training and preschool and the debate about the ideal spacing for the second child. I knew all the language of parenthood.

Then my life was hijacked and I ended up in a different world. I learned the language of this place, with its nuanced descriptions of grief and uncertainty. In this world, people speak of “if,” not “when.” If I can get pregnant. If the baby is born alive. And no one has a baby shower before bringing home the baby.

I no longer speak the language of the innocent. I can’t participate in the daily conversations that pepper playgrounds and libraries. I can’t understand the stories about how hard it is to care for two or three healthy children. I don’t think that unmedicated labor is the most difficult thing a woman can go through. If I responded though, I would look like a bitter, angry woman, when really I’m just sad to be left out. Left out of the conversation. Left out of a world in which people simply decide to have a baby and then do.

I don’t mean to throw myself a pity party. My life has so many other wonderful components — writing, editing, cooking, dancing — that help blunt the pain. And I have a healthy daughter, who every day looks a little more like a miracle to me. And a husband who stands by me no matter how crazy I become. But sometimes I wish I could take my family for granted just a little bit, like everyone else does.