The first time - part 2

I thought that, once the bleeding stopped in December, I would be free to try to conceive again. I was convinced that it was the only way out of my funk. My blood draws in December were not encouraging. The plummet in HCG that I anticipated did not happen. My levels continued their painfully slow decline. My OB continued to apologize to me. I was nearly on a first name basis with the lab tech. It didn't make it any easier that my blood was being drawn at the same hospital where I would have delivered this baby. I hated every pregnant woman I saw, and it seemed to me that every woman I saw was pregnant. My coworker's sister, unmarried and living very much a single lifestyle, accidentally became pregnant. The irony and cruelty of that was stinging. My best friend continued on with her pregnancy, as did my neighbor, whose due date had been two days before mine. My brother and his wife learned they were expecting their second. And all this while, according to blood tests, I was still pregnant. My womb was empty, my morning sickness gone, but my blood tests were telling us each week that I was, technically, not "unpregnant". Granted, each week I was a bit less pregnant. But not enough to be truly not pregnant. And until that happened, I could not try to get truly pregnant again. This continued until sometime in mid-February, when I was officially declared chemically, hormonally non-pregnant. It had been four months. I had been sure when it all began that within four months I'd be pregnant again. I thought that, for sure, it would be a month, maybe two and it would happen. I began religiously taking and charting my basal temperature each morning so that I would know for sure when I did conceive. I had a history of irregular cycles, and this would make things more clear. The clearest thing of all was that our first, "accidental" pregnancy, had been a fluke. Winter became spring, and I was still not pregnant. My neighbor had her baby, and Mother's Day arrived. The day before my due date. I was in pure agony. Primal pain I never knew was possible. By summer's start, I was hitting the bottom, certain I would never, ever be a mother. I called my doctor and admitted that I was no better than I had been back in October when it began, or in December, when he had offered me anti-depressants and I had declined, certain I would be through this in short order. And really, perhaps, I was worse. I asked for a referral for counseling. He complied with my request and gave me the drugs as well. I had never wanted to take them, but I knew I needed something, so I accepted. I had been so totally unprepared for the depth and intensity of the pain I would experience over this loss.