A missed miscarriage Pt. 2

Warning: This blog may contain graphic content that might be triggering to some readers

5:00 PM

My day was full of inconsistent cramping, bleeding, and contracting… Another 30-minute conversation with a nurse from urgent care and a warning, if anything became consistent, I should go to emergency immediately. In true nature of being me, I wanted a distraction so my husband and I decided to take our son to a Van Goh exhibit that evening and that’s when the pain and bleeding got to a point where I reached out to a friend that is labor and delivery nurse to tell her what was happening after waiting on hold with urgent care for an hour and not getting through. After sending her photo's of what was coming out of me (everyone needs a friend that happily accepts gross photo's). She urged me to emergency and made sure it happened by texting my husband [send her to the hospital please!]. Apparently when bleeding and clotting like this occurs after a D&C there's a chance there is still retained product of conception or a wound in the uterus that can put you at risk for infection or bleeding out.

I drove myself to the hospital alone, I knew I had a lonely long wait ahead of me and I felt defeated. With the hospitals filling with COVID patients once again, no one was allowed to have support unless you were under the age of 18 or needed a translator. I had already gone through an entire day in the hospital alone and wasn’t looking forward to the wait. After checking myself into triage the nurse let me know the wait was up to four hours and that it was important that I stayed considering my symptoms.

My heart broke during that time, not for myself but for the abundance of families entering the hospital sick with COVID symptoms. It was witnessing all the sick children and being told they were starting to call this the pandemic of the unvaccinated that made me really think about everything happening in our world. Even though I had chosen to get vaccinated I was neither pro-vaccine nor anti-vaccine, I was always pro-choice (knowing that choices can have consequences). However, my experience made me realize that we need to change how we are approaching this whole thing, that it’s not what we are saying to people but how we are saying it. We need to stop making people feel like their rights are being taken away but rather help them see the positive impact this can have on our healthcare system, so it doesn’t constantly look like a burning building with no one to put out the fires.

My heart went out to the families but also to the doctors and nurses who were running on fumes. It reminded me of every restaurant nightmare I ever had, the room keeps filling up with people, there are empty dirty tables everywhere, people with no place to go and not enough staff to take care of things. This is our healthcare system right now, I wasn’t mad at the hospital, I was mad at the world. While my heart was breaking for my body and my loss, I couldn’t help but feel empathy for the people running around trying to manage priority of who to take care of first.

At this point I had been in the ER for 7 hours, more blood was taken, a shot of RhoGAM just in case my body was trying to fight the left-over blood from my once growing fetus (my blood is RH negative and will immediately attack if a different blood type enters my body). A dose of transexamic acid to slow the bleeding and finally discharged at 5:30 AM. I needed to be back at the hospital at 10:30 AM for an ultrasound and to see the Gynecologist that same morning, I was exhausted, and my heart hurt…

September 4th, 2021

11:15 AM

The ultrasound was the fastest part of the whole process, the technician was kind and called me sweetie the entire time. It was nice to be around such a positive light after spending an entire evening/morning with physically sick patients and the mentally drained nurses and doctors attending to them. I was sent back to the ER once again to wait for the radiologist to review my scans. Two hours later it was confirmed there was retained products of conception in my uterus causing the bleeding. Within minutes I was brought into a private room away from the chaos around me while various nurses and med students came in and out asking me the same questions over and over reliving the last week of my life repeatedly. I knew it was for the sake of learning, I knew it was for the OBGYN that was reviewing my file but it kind of made it easier the more I spoke the truth about what had just happened to me a week ago. I was put back in a hospital gown and told I couldn’t eat or drink anything as the nurse hung the IV bag that was ordered for my second D&C later that day. I begged her to wait as I showed her the deep purple bruises that were left in my hands from the IV I’d been given four days prior. Every nurse and doctor that entered the room during my wait I continued to ask…

“Are you sure I need to have another D&C”?

There is something so lonely about going through a miscarriage, it didn’t matter that I knew one in four pregnancy’s ends in miscarriage or the biology behind why a miscarriage occurs. The statistics didn’t make the pain in my heart hurt any less or the fact that I had to be alone through it all due to a virus that was filling up our hospitals once again. I needed someone there with me, but I couldn’t and that was the hardest part.

Six hours had gone by, and I finally got to meet the OBGYN that had been reviewing my scans with the radiologist. I quietly prayed that she was coming with better news than the rest of the doctors and nurses because I couldn’t bear any more bad news that day.

She gave me a choice; she had been told I didn’t want another D&C so she gave me a choice. Thank you, God! I was given the choice to go home and be closely monitored through weekly blood work and ultrasounds, daily temperature checks and keeping an eye on my bleeding and pain. Hopeful that my body would do the work and omit the rest of the tissue on its own without getting an infection. If anything changed or the tests and ultrasounds didn’t come back in my favour, I would need to be scheduled for another D&C. My other choice was to get hooked up to that IV that had been hanging over my head for the past four hours and head into another surgery. No thank you! What a relief! I gave her my word that I would take care of myself, and I headed home to my husband and child who were patiently waiting for my return after being gone for two days.

September 9th, 2021

As I write this, I’m a day away from another blood test and things are looking hopeful. My body is slowly healing and I’m praying that the two nights I had of labor like contractions and bleeding was my body doing what it needed to. I’ve been praying a lot these days, more than usual.

I’ve decided to share my story to heal my heart and move forward with my life. You see, grief is what we go through when we experience a loss. The true healing doesn’t begin until we allow ourselves to mourn, but how do we mourn a loss? When my mother died in 2012 from cancer I didn’t know how to mourn, I was raised in the 80’s so any sort of crying was put to rest by being sent to my room or by someone telling me I was ok and to stop crying. It wasn’t until these past two years that I began my journey of learning how to mourn my mother’s absence and the abundance of loss I’ve experienced throughout my life; it’s been a lot. How am I doing this? Self-realization, therapy and forgiving everything from my past. I’ll forever be grateful for my first born making me a mother, my son Alessio is the reason for this healing because I wanted to be better and do better for him.

So, I write, I’m still horrible at crying in front of people or talking about my pain in person, I’m getting there. I’ve come to realize that I heal best by putting my experiences into words so I can read them repeatedly when I feel the need. The simple thought that my story might help someone else going through the same thing is also a huge help. From my experience hurt people hurt people but healed people want nothing more than to help heal people. This is why I’m in the line of work I am. It’s more than just sleep; it’s about helping families heal and realize that sleep might not be the problem.

This pregnancy was different in so many ways, unlike when I was pregnant with my son. Instead of waiting the customary 12 weeks, I felt the need to share I was pregnant from day one with various people who were close to us. Maybe deep down inside I knew I was going to need them when we lost the baby. If it wasn’t for the love and support of these people, I don’t think I would be ok… I don’t think I would be able to mourn the loss of something so small but so big in our hearts.

We need to normalize sharing early pregnancy, so we can share our pregnancy loss if God forbid it happens. We need to share the hard stuff with the same intention as sharing the joy in our lives. We are so afraid to talk about the hard stuff, the subjects that make us uncomfortable. Its through sharing, talking, writing, and expressing our pain that we can work through things, mourn our loss and learn how to move forward.

In my line of work, I love the theory behind “name it to tame it” when working with small children who are going through a tough time. It’s no different when you are all grown up, you need to name what you’re feeling to work through it. So, if you’re reading this and you’ve experienced something similar, your heart is hurting and you feel alone, I’m here to tell you, you’re not! If you ever need to tell your story, even to a stranger, I’m here to listen. I hope you can find the peace your heart needs when you do. Never hesitate to reach out, I created this community with intention and purpose, and this is one of the many things we might go through in life together. You are not alone.

Much Love,

Lisa Caputo

lisa@littlevillagesleep.com