In my book, Child of Mine, the main character, Katie, suffers a devastating miscarriage. During a routine ultrasound, she discovers the baby's heart has stopped beating.
People are always asking how much of my book is true, am I Katie? The answer is, always, no. My infertility experience informed my book, of course. I think it was much easier to write about the medical part having been through some of it myself, though Katie and I had totally different issues, and totally different treatments. But still, there are scenes that are, no way around it, me.
The miscarriage was one of them.
Sixteen years ago today, I was due to give birth. I had become pregnant after months of treatment, on a cycle that didn't even seem to be going that well. I was surprised by the positive pregnancy test, and then elated when, six weeks into the pregnancy, we were able to see a strong, steady heart beat. Two weeks later, the baby was still growing and moving inside me. My infertility specialist, who kept patients until they were ten weeks along, told me to make an appointment with my obstetrician. I was about to be released into her care.
Two weeks later, at nearly eleven weeks along, I was at my OB's office for my first prenatal visit. I was feeling lousy; terribly nauseous and exhausted, but also excited. My doctor did an ultrasound. This was normal, standard procedure, and immediately a baby, bigger than the one I had seen two weeks earlier at my last reproductive endocrinologist ultrasound, popped up on the screen. Even though I had been through one successful pregnancy before, was by now an "old pro," the image still brought a huge smile to my face.
"When was your last ultrasound?" the doctor asked, moving the probe around.
"Last week," I said, still in awe over the baby, unable to stop looking at it.
"The reason why I ask..." the doctor said, still jerking the probe, harder it seemed now. "Is because I don't see a heart beat. I'm trying to wiggle the probe to get the baby to move, but it isn't moving, either."
The baby had died. Sometime in the last few days.
I had been alone at that doctor's appointment. It had never dawned on me that this could happen. I was frantic to reach my husband, who was hours away on business. This couldn't be happening to me. Didn't things like this happen to other people?
The next day I underwent a D&C. A few weeks later, my doctor's office called. It had been a girl, healthy, it appeared. Like I had wanted.
A month later, treatment allowed me to conceive again. Nine months later, I gave birth to my gorgeous daughter, now fifteen. She (and of course, her older sister, who is nineteen) are the loves of my life. I can't help but think, sometimes, that the other baby, the one who died on a cold February day when I was completely unaware, was making room for my younger daughter. But I know that's just my mind, wanting to find a reason in an unreasonable situation. And though I can't imagine ever having any other younger daughter than the one I have, with her smile, her laugh, her zest for life, her creativity...I do think about that other baby sometimes, and feel sad. I couldn't do anything to save her. And yet, as her mother, that's exactly what I was supposed to do.
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