Grief

When loss jumps in, we forget to eat.
Why fuel our bodies when mortality has pushed its way into our daily lives?
What use are recipes, feather dusters, and soup when there is a huge hole where there once was a warm and loving person?
We do keep trudging though. There is chocolate, a glass of wine, and happiness far, far down the road, when the wound has healed enough that you can smile again, with your eyes as well as your mouth.

The Language of Loss

The word "miscarriage" implies that somehow the carrier fucked up. The woman's body wasn't effective in "carrying" the fetus to a healthy end: a live birth. "They" say early miscarriage, that is, before about 10 weeks, happens in around 15% of all pregnancies, but I don't know how you could really tell since many very early pregnancy losses would be interpreted as a heavy period.

Anyway, this word "miscarriage" started to be used in the context of pregnancy loss in the 1500s. A more useful word is abortion: "ab" is a prefix that indicates that something didn't happen; "-ortion" comes from "oriri": I rise, get up. I appear, become visible. I am born, come to exist, originate. So, an abortion doesn't place blame on the carrier, it just names what happened, that the baby didn't come to exist.

Many women who suffer pregnancy loss keep it to themselves. They don't tell their stories, either because they feel ashamed that they lost the baby, or because they're worried about what other people will say, or because they don't know how to express the grief they feel. Women who decide to have therapeutic abortions, also, keep their decisions private, don't know how people will react, and don't know how to express the real emotional fact that although they decided to end the pregnancy, they still feel grief.

The reasons for early pregnancy loss are mostly unknown. Some causes could be a lack of progesterone, an embryo with chromosomal malformations,  an ectopic or abdominal pregnancy, and other reasons that remain a mystery to us. Later pregnancy loss is even more of an unknown and usually the result of an abnormality that would be incompatible with life. Unfortunately, intimate partner abuse is a recognized cause of pregnancy loss up to and including the late third trimester, as are other forms of trauma.

There are studies and statistics that talk about all of these things, but basically when it happens to you, your statistic boils down to 100%. If you've never had a pregnancy loss, it shoots down to 0%. Most women during a normal reproductive life will be pregnant a few times, have a live baby or two, and lose a couple of pregnancies, either on purpose or not. 

But the reality of losing a pregnancy, especially a later one, is something that women don't talk about much, and that means that when it does happen to you, you feel like you have nowhere to turn. People don't know how to react: they'll suggest that you should've taken certain vitamins, seen a different care provider, or done yoga. They won't know how to deal with your grief. As a whole, this society is awful at coping with any kind of pain, whether it be physical or emotional. So losing a baby is just one of those things it's best not to talk about.

Baby Magic, the podcast, is a place where women tell their stories. This week I spoke to Laura about her son's birth during her second trimester, and about how she and her family coped with the loss, learned from his birth, and what she believes women need during this difficult unfolding of the childbearing year.

Baby Magic Podcast

Stuff and Memories

My mother died almost five years ago, and when that happened my sisters spent a weekend sorting through the house and sending me a Pod full of stuff. Well, no, a lot more happened of course. My sisters and I buried my mother, and we grieved and fought and made up again and grieved some more... but one big thing that also happened was that this Pod landed in my driveway.

It was full: antique furniture; bedding; medical equipment; books. Lots and lots of books. Kitchen stuff; art; stuff from Botswana; more books; some clothes; knick knacks. Every single one of those things - every book, and piece of art, and small tea strainer, was a vessel full of memory. Some of the stuff was ugly and old and had no sentimental value for me. Other things were part of my life since I could remember. An old carved stool that someone in Uganda had carved for my parents back in the Colonial times when I was tiny: they brought it to Calgary and I remember how comfy my feet felt fitting so snugly on to the seat of the stool.

We got rid of some of the stuff and filled our house with most of it. I put some of the stuff in my cafe. 

There's a thing going around these days about the "spark". Pick something up, if you feel the spark you keep it, if not you chuck it. Nah, not for me. I love to keep stuff, especially if it is the stuff of memories. 

What is the stuff of memories? 

I love to remember different times in my life by using my senses to bring me back. The taste of a papaya brings me back to Uganda when I was tiny. My mother's purple cardigan gives me comfort. Her paintings give me joy. Her art journal gives me sadness.

When I'm running, I listen to music. If I hear a certain song in a different context, I am drawn back to that bend at 16 k when the song played during my first half marathon. My medals remind me of each race - the triumphs and the struggles. All of my books give me memories; my clothes are all from here and there and usually connected to a good friend or a sister or someone who gave me a gift.

Part of life is enjoying the process of making memories. Take a look around you, right now, as you read, and remember this moment.