The Last Day: I'm Okay

Let me start by saying that I'm okay. I'm sad, and a little thrown for loop, but I'm not breaking down or cursing God or dwelling on what could have been. What I am doing is assessing and then continuing to function. The reason, if it's not obvious, is that I've had a miscarriage. Miscarriage is one of those words that almost seems vulgar to say in a public forum... cold, clinical, and maybe too much information. I said it differently on Facebook. I said, "Shannon thinks Facebook is a fun venue for sharing good news, but a terrible one for bad news. Sadly, she has the latter. She's not pregnant anymore. :(." But Facebook is a different forum, isn't it? It's vastly public, and it's about lots of people, not just about me. Somehow, even though I have an open blog, it seems a lot more right to talk about the experience here; where if someone's reading this, they've made a choice to find out more. They aren't just having the information thrown at them on a news feed.

Without falling into the too-much-information trap, I realized it was very likely I was miscarrying on Sunday morning. I was pretty upset, naturally. Confused. Not quite sure what was happening. Sad. I called an Advice Nurse, who suggested I go into an Urgent Care to make sure I wasn't having an ectopic pregnancy. I didn't go. I wasn't in pain, wasn't light-headed, having chills, or anything suggesting it was anything more than an early miscarriage. So I ignored the advice of the advice nurse. I slept for a big chunk of the day. I sat around. I wondered.

Monday was my birthday. I turned 32. I woke up to decaf coffee one button away from brewed with a note from my husband saying Happy Birthday. He'd done the dishes for me, too, and he'd taken the dog to work with him. I'm sure I've mentioned before that he's a keeper. I spent the morning on the phone with an advice nurse again, this time in order to make an appointment with my doctor for an ultrasound. I dropped Wyatt off with my friend Lesa, (thank you so much for the last-minute help, Lesa!) and met Ryan at the OB's office. The ultrasound showed an empty uterus. No evidence of pregnancy. So I got a blood test to measure my hcg levels. I'll have another blood test on Thursday, just to confirm that my levels are going down, but the doctor said that's it's highly unlikely that I'm still pregnant. Maybe a 5-10% chance at most, and I think that's being generous. I know in my heart that I'm not in that 5-10%. So, I spent the rest of the day having already come to terms with the loss. That evening, Ryan and I went out to eat for my birthday. Then I dragged him to the chickiest chick flick I could find. (Bride Wars. Have I mentioned that he's a keeper?) It was a very pleasant evening, despite the bittersweet tones of the day.

Today is just another day in the Kuhns house. I've had some very nice quality time with the munchkin, and I've already completed 9 out of the 15 things on my To Do list. I'm functioning. I'm peaceful. I'm okay.