The numbers are seared into my memory like a blinding light that you see when you look into the sun too long—97.7. Oh no! I bolt up out of bed and immediately feel the sides of my breasts for the familiar aching, burning and fullness. Gone. Oh no. I run to the bathroom and immediately perch myself on the toilet saying inside “Please, no blood. Please, no blood.” Thank goodness, the toilet water is the same as it was one minute ago—nothing but clear water. What is going on I wonder. Let me think … I am taken back to similar conversations I have had while on this same spot—what if I am? Could it really be? As I wait for the “after three minutes have elapsed but do not read results after ten minutes or you may get a false positive”. Funny how this same spot in the house can be one of life-changing exhilaration and gut wrenching sorrow.
I plan my next move. Since I know I am at day twenty-three in the luteal phase and have taken ten plus pregnancy tests that show “positive” I know I am indeed pregnant. But I now know at 4:58 a.m. on Friday June 3rd that I am not. I am by no means an expert, but I have read my prescribed books on fertility and the bible on trying to conceive and was successful in using the knowledge to achieve pregnancy two other times. So, there is no doubt as to what I was a few minutes, hours, days ago—but what am I now and what do I do?
I am up early this AM to continue my three times per week ritual of running. Soothing to the mind, body and spirit are my morning runs and adhering to my workout regimen is food for my soul. I am up to six miles every other day—sometimes I am winded after two, sometimes I have runner’s high and can’t stop after I hit my end mark. But today, what do I do? I vacillate between waiting to tell my husband until confirmation of something more concrete and waking him from his slumber and tell him our baby is not to be. Information like this can break a person and I have to choose my words with care—as in choosing how to break up with your love or tell someone you have fallen out of love with them and you should see other people. The words will live forever and cannot be taken back, no matter how much you want them to be. I walk into the bedroom and sit on the edge farthest away from my love—I don’t want to scare him by hovering over him like some ominous figure in the night. “Buttercup … time to get up” I say trying to deliver the words with no hint of panic or fear. He rustles out of his sleep and opens his eyes, wondering why I am sitting on the bed instead of putting on my socks and lacing up my shoes to attack the trails covered with morning dew. I think about what to say, trying to choose the right words and I am outside of my body now and hope that my brain does what it should. “My temperature dropped and my boobs don’t feel sore, I think little one is not going to make it.” I don’t cry but rather look down to avoid meeting his eyes, yet want to look to connect and feel the hurt together. “Oh no …” that is all he can muster. Ironically, the same words I said not even five minutes ago when I realized we were still a family of four and not five. I always say my husband and I were destined to meet—he from Singapore and me from a small town in CT—meeting up in IL—how does that happen? It is times like this that prove to me God had a plan and sent us out the world to meet each other and become “Us”.
