Tomorrow my pregnancy will start to end, I am in bits

[spilttheteaagain]

I'm about 13 weeks. On Christmas eve my poor baby was diagnosed with anencephaly, a condition incompatible with life. I have a TFMR scheduled this week, the first tablet is tomorrow to suppress the progesterone that supports the pregnancy.

I feel sick thinking that this is probably the last day that this baby will be alive, and I will have to swallow that tablet tomorrow knowing what it means

It all seems so senseless, so sad, so cruel. I think I felt the baby move over the last couple of days. It is so lovely to feel and so desperately sad.

Even though there would be no hope for this poor baby I feel so utterly responsible for what I am about to do and it's weighing very heavily. I wish I could tell it how sorry I am.

[KittyandTeal]

I'm glad you feel peaceful. I remember something similar.

I think when you get a bad scan, then testing, diagnosis, decisions, termination and giving birth you feel a bit like you switch off and get through. I remember feeling like I'd spent weeks just getting through, ricocheting from one medical appointment to another bit of bad news with all the worry and anxiety that goes with it. Once it's all over there is a sense of peace.

I imagine when your baby is stillborn (compared to going through a tfmr) you instantly go from everything being ok to everything falling apart really suddenly.

You've been in my thoughts today

[spilttheteaagain]

I think that's it, you're very perceptive.

With DD1 we went blithely into the 20 week scan having no reason to think anything was other than fine only to have the bombshell out of the blue that there was no heartbeat. Within 2 hours we had been sent up the road to the city hospital and were being talked to about delivery/SANDS/burial/cremation/postmortems... couldn't process any of it. It was our first pregnancy, I was only dimly aware they can occasionally go wrong in the first 12 weeks, nothing else really crossed my mind.
It was absolute shock, the shattering of all our illusions about pregnancy and life in general, empty house, broken dreams, the difference between being parents and not being parents, the fact that I no longer had an out from my much loathed job, so many aspects.
It was a planned, tried for several months pregnancy and the start of something new and amazing - starting a family.
It was my first labour & delivery and I was terrified and felt totally unprepared, we had no idea why she had died, I was guessing and back tracking and trying to figure what I had done, trying to work out when she might have died. We were really scared about seeing her afterwards, just all of it was shocking and terrifying.
Added to that I was pregnant again (huge shock) 6 weeks later and was an utter wreck of grief/anxiety/AND/possible PTSD all through that pg. It took 4 years for me to seek grief counselling and I was also sent for a course of CBT for anxiety. It was a hugely traumatic and difficult few years.

This time is very different. There wasn't much fear, I knew largely what to expect, I knew what the baby would probably look like, what the procedure would be like etc. We already knew how we would want to manage the delivery and burial.
And of course it's been nearly 2 weeks since the first bad scan so there's been a lot more time to get our heads round it all, several days for the idea of there being a problem to sink in before it was confirmed, then nearly a week to savour the pregnancy before it had to end.
And we knew that it was nothing we or anyone had done and there was no hope.
And we had our 4 year old to come home to which made the most tremendous difference, there is still a point to life.

I don't know. It may all fall apart for me in the next few days but I shall enjoy the peace whilst it lasts.

to you kitty you are an amazing woman, your DD2 was lucky to have such a wise and kind mother.

[RubyWoooo]

spilt, you are an amazingly brave woman. Your babies are lucky to have you as their mum.

[ChampagneTastes]

Forgive me for jumping on your thread but just wanted to send love and best wishes. I am hoping for better things to come for you in the rest of 2016.

[Imnotaslimjim]

You are such an incredible woman spit you're coping immensely well. You've been in my thoughts but I've not known what to say. So I decided that saying nothing at all was worse and just popped in to offer and hugs

[KittyandTeal]

How are you feeling today lovely? Hope the peace is still with you x

[spilttheteaagain]

Still ok yes, I had a couple of teary moments yesterday but overall calm.

Anyone who has had a TFMR did you find any poetry or similar that felt appropriate to the loss and the context? I've been looking, sort of thinking about when we lay this one to rest, I'd like to find a verse or something that felt right to read, but I've not quite found it yet. Nothing too twee.

Thank you everyone for all the kind messages.

[KittyandTeal]

I'm guessing you've heard/read 'if a snowdrop doesn't not bloom'? We used this at dd2s service. We also had 'no matter what' read too and the last line is on our dds plaques in the baby garden.

I found a few related to baby loss but nothing specifically contextual to tfmr.

There may be some women on the arc forums that maybe more helpful.

[spilttheteaagain]

Yes we read the Snowdrop poem for DD1 at her burial. At some level I think of it as "hers". No Matter What is Debbie Gliori isn't it, I do like it. I might wander over and look at ARC, my googling isn't quite turning up what I'm looking for, I feel like I'd know it when I saw it.

I do love this verse, but not keen on the rest of the poem:

Those who live long endure sadness and tears
But you'll never suffer the sorrowing years
No betrayal, no anger, no hatred, no fears
Just love - Only love - In your lifetime.

Similarly these I find very powerful:

There is a sacredness in tears,
They are not a mark of weakness,
But of power.
They speak more eloquently,
Than ten thousand tongues.
They are messengers of
overwhelming grief,
Of deep contrition, and
Of unspeakable love.

---

It is not growing like a tree
In bulk, doth make Man better be;
Or standing long as oak, three hundred year,
To fall at last, dry, bald, and sere:

A lily of a day
Is fairer far in May,
Although it fall and die that night—
It was the plant and flower of Light.
In small proportions we just beauties see;
And in short measures life may perfect be.

---

It's not quite the thing for a memorial but as an expression of grief, the following that a MNer wrote I think is incredible:

You hide behind the outside face,
That says your world is fine,
It's looking good, the smile's in place
But inside all the time
The desperation eats away,
A constant, gnawing pain
That chokes you as you go to sleep
And when you wake again.
Some say to talk it over, well
There's nothing much to tell,
For who out there would understand
Your silent, private hell?
So show them all your outside face
That masks the grief and fears
For outside faces seldom scream
Or show their inside tears.

[KittyandTeal]

I had a feeling that you may have used snowdrop. I totally understand it being hers now. You need something different.

That first verse is beautiful. I like them all but that especially somehow conveys the meaning well. The poem by a mn-er had me in floods, it's bang on really. I think I will copy it and save it. I know it sounds odd but I have a note on my phone where I record lovey, moving words.

[spilttheteaagain]

Not odd at all, I have a word document on my computer for the same purpose. Poetry and other written articles etc really helped me process my feelings last time, helped to articulate and make sense of things I couldn't quite work out alone, and helped me cry if that doesn't sound mad. The crying was always really cathartic, a release.

The trouble is I trawled so much last time and so much is very much tied in with my feelings for DD1 that I'm trying to find something that can be specifically this baby's. If I had any skill I'd write something myself but its not my forte!

[spilttheteaagain]

They gave us a tiny memory box in hospital. I've just been sorting it out and going through my pregnancy stuff. Binned all the bounty shite & info leaflets about antenatal classes/yoga/breastfeeding etc etc. I've collected up all my scan pics & reports, my pregnancy tests and my hospital bracelet and put them in the box along with a couple of pics of me DH and DD. It seems so little, but what else is there? I'm uploading the pics of the baby and of my little bump to snapfish to print out and put in too. It just seems such an utter waste

[KittyandTeal]

Oh gosh, I remember filling up her memory box.

I've got scan pics, photos of her when she was born with hand and footprints. (I guess possible because she was a bit bigger)

I kept all the cards and dried some flowers that we were sent. I have a copy of what went in the book of rememberence at the crematorium (added this much later as it too a while to come) I also have a copy of 'no matter what' and copies of the poems read at her service.

I also have a few stones collected from the beach in Crete we were on for my due date. A few people gave me some stones (related to her name) and one friend made me a charm the same as she'd made for dd1 when she was born.

I know my friend buys birthday cards and puts them in her babies memory box but I'm not sure I will.

[spilttheteaagain]

Funnily enough I have no cards at all this time (yet, I suppose, it's still early days in that respect), but loads of texts/emails/FB messages. I will pop in any poems we do use and copies of prayers that will be said but that is later.

The hospital box has a mini copy of Guess how much I love you which is a gorgeous box we bought for DD when she was a baby so feels lovely to have that.

Your friends sound very thoughtful. Those little personal, considered gifts mean so much. It's coming up a year for you now isn't it? I hope you are feeling stronger and more at peace as the months have passed and wish you a very gentle anniversary when it does come round

[KittyandTeal]

Oh that is lovely. Those memory boxes are so thoughtful. They make such a difference.

Yes we are coming up to a year. I'm just hitting that period where we started getting dodgy scans etc so it's goi g to be a hard few weeks. I'm surprisingly ok atm but I'm prepared for that to change very quickly.

I hope you're still feeling peaceful.

[spilttheteaagain]

Hmm, of course when I wrote gorgeous box I did of course mean gorgeous BOOK!

[spilttheteaagain]

I found the first anniversary very hard. It was the build up more than the actual day, I went into full on re-living it all mode and really struggled. I isolated myself from my friends and the world in general and holed up at home crying/rereading poems, memories I had written, posts on here I'd written at the time and going through the memory box over and over again almost obsessively. I hope folk in RL remember you and your DD2 and are there for you through the next few weeks. Happy to listen on here as well if you need to offload or vent or muse aloud.

I'm feeling lower I will admit, and having some emotional wobbles but still functioning fairly well.

[KittyandTeal]

Yeah one of my very good friends lost her first 11ish years ago and she always says the build up is often worse than the day. I think for me, because it was 2ish weeks of scan, tests, uncertainty and then the tfmr it's going to be something new every day from mid Jan.

I have a few very good friends who really pulled me through the beginning stages so I'll be leaning on them quite a bit.

Sorry that you're feeling low, I k ow for me the emotional wobbles always seemed to happen or be triggered by something totally unexpected. Sometimes functioning is the absolute best you can do. And actually, sometimes not functioning and curling up in bed shutting the world out is also the best you can do.

Is it worth looking at counselling? I know it's not for everyone but it worked wonders for helping me cope and process, especially the added factor of the termination. It's often not acknowledged how hard that parties because, even though we all know it was the right/best choice, it's still an active choice that we live with.

[spilttheteaagain]

I agree with your friend. We were told our DD had died on the 7th Oct and she was born on the 9th, buried on the 19th, but tbh it's September &the 1st week of October that is the hard time. I start spiralling down once August is over (our wedding anniversary, DD2's birthday and my birthday are all in late August so I sort of crash after that). I can imagine with all the dates you must be remembering it could be overwhelming. Be gentle with yourself & let your friends in. I'm terrible at that, try and internalise all the pain and should have learnt by now that it Does Not Help!

I've had an emotional catch up today. I think my brain has finally caught up and realised that yes actually something really horrible has just happened, I feel awful, totally zoned out of what's going on in front of me and just blank and tears. It just hurts. And I'm scared too. I'm scared because I know how black and how bleak grief can be and it feels like the top of a slippery slope.

I did have a counsellor last year who helped me a lot, though we only did 3 sessions. We left it open and she was happy to see me again, I think I might phone up.

I'm torturing myself with dates, I'm quite number orientated and so they seem to bother me. I'm "this time last week"-ing. This time last week I was pregnant and the baby was alive. And the baby could still be alive and in me now but I chose to end it. I know it had to be done, it wasn't wrong but I don't feel helped by that, I just feel lost. Everything has changed. The now and the future. On Tuesday it will be a week since I took the first tablet. On Thursday a week since I lost my baby, had my baby, saw my baby, left my baby. They seem to be so far away so quickly and I want to see those little feet and hands again and look longer, but I can't. It's done and it's past.

[KittyandTeal]

Date are an awful, constant reminder I find. I do the same although I'm getting better at simply focusing on the date she was born. Jan will be different though.

It must be very scary knowing how black and deep grief is. I guess the very small consolation is that you also know there is another side that you come out of eventually and learn how to live with it.

Going back to the counsellor sounds like a really good idea. Sometimes having someone right out of it helps.

I hope you're not feeling too bad atm.