Labyrinth
My personal journey continues to unfold as I embark on another pregnancy. Hopeful, John and I decide to take a different approach and we begin telling select people that we are expecting. Prayers, candles, and hugs abound as we joyfully began reorienting our perspective of what our family dynamic will look like come the arrival of this baby. We decide to enter into this pregnancy expecting a live birth. The last three pregnancies were entered into with angst and an expectation of miscarriage, but we are tired of this perspective. We want to be hopeful. We want to live into the joy of being expectant parents of a new life. For two weeks we hope and dream and plan. We parented our toddler and began living into our roles of expectant parents. Wanting proof of this pregnancy, I went in to the midwives to have blood work done. My HCG values came back healthy! This is happening! We will be a family of four! We tell more people widening our radius of support.
Because I have had recurring miscarriages, I also decide to return after two days for a viability test. Joking with the phlebotomist, I gleefully say that I am hopeful for the results as I feel SO pregnant. The next morning, on my way to our daughter’s preschool I miss a call from the midwives. Great, new test results! Except I am put on hold as the nurse pages the on-call midwife to take my phone call. My mind is racing. This cannot be good. They would not call if my numbers were healthy.
My pregnancy is not viable. I am instructed to prepare myself for the ending of my pregnancy.
I suddenly find myself not at the beginning of my pregnancy labyrinth, but nearing the middle; birth, or the separation of baby and mother through delivery. Developed by Pam England I have used this imagery since our daughter’s conception in 2014 and it deeply resonates with me because it places birth (whether term or not, living or not) not at the end of the journey, but at the midpoint. The journey inward is the journey of pregnancy; conceiving, carrying, preparing, hoping, scaffolding. Unlike a maze, when you arrive at the center there is a threshold which you physically, relationally, and emotionally cross. This is the process of birth. Come birth, your journey is not yet over; you must continue through the twists and turns out of the labyrinth. This is the postpartum season which can last weeks to upwards of a year or more. Here, you enter into a new identity which carries a new role within your relationships and your community. Huge hormone shifts occur, and your body must heal during this time. It is important to journey through and out of the labyrinth by emphasizing self-care and transition into new identity.
According to my midwife, my pregnancy will not survive to term. Something is wrong. Whether the placenta isn’t supplying the growing baby enough nutrients or the baby isn’t growing properly, we do not know. But I am here, approaching the last few turns of this labyrinth before it opens to the birth center. I am in a new stage of expectancy. I am expecting a miscarriage.
Preparing
How am I supposed to prepare for miscarriage? I discovered all four of my previous losses at the onset of bleeding; not a phone call. I heard the midwife’s words, “the end of this pregnancy is positively definite,” but I have not seen or felt anything that suggests I am on the brink of the middle of my labyrinth. My body feels very pregnant and my symptoms have not diminished. I have not seen any indication of miscarriage. The midwife’s words are hard to overcome what I am still experiencing.
I have never known that I was about to miscarry; but rather been thrown into the experience before I could prepare myself. I ask myself, “How can I use this information to my advantage?” And then my mind started exploring. This time, I have a head start. This time, I may have a little bit of control. This time, I can have a bigger support group. This time, my husband can have support too.
I am still pregnant as I write this. Still at the brink of the center of my labyrinth. But I know the cliff is closer than I expected. My path is about to open into the center where I will have to then journey outward. I am reorienting myself, my identity, my perspective. I am trying to enjoy the end of this pregnancy and begin planning some comforts from the birth process. Little meaningful acts to mark the event and help the transition to journey out. Here are three which I choose to focus on while I wait to cross the birth threshold.
Empathy: After the 30 minute phone call with the midwife, I thanked her for her time on the phone and reminded her to also take time to recharge herself. As I sat there emotionally drained, I began empathizing with her. Over the last six years, I have learned that empathy for the caregiver is among my initial responses to personal trauma. Their jobs are so draining. So hard.
Compassion: After doing some research on the male experience of miscarriage, I am keenly aware of their journey through their own labyrinth and how different it may look than the female’s. Instead of being so consumed by the physical trauma of miscarriage, another way I am preparing for this miscarriage is by showing compassion to those whom we told about the pregnancy; and showing compassion especially for my husband and our parents.
Centering: Gleaning from how I prepared for the full-term birth of our daughter, I am taking steps to anchor my feet, center myself, and move through the process of separating. One way to do this is through acupuncture. I made an appointment with a fertility acupuncturist to help my body open and let go. I also scheduled a day at Olympus Spa to take advantage of their sand and salt healing rooms. Herbal teas, Sitz Baths, and Intentional Music have all been cued.
Scaffolding and Dismantling
One of the big job’s parents have during pregnancy is what I like to call scaffolding. The concept of scaffolding originated in the twentieth century by Lev Vygotski and built upon by Jerome Brunner who applied it to the role of a teacher in a learning environment. This concept has also been adapted to parenting strategies in the twentieth century. I built upon this idea by asking myself what happens to the concept of scaffolding during pregnancy loss. Though pregnancy, expectant parents build their expected futures by erecting a scaffold around their reality. This is a temporary ‘placeholder’ structure which is put in place until the addition to the building is built. Once the baby is born, the scaffolding begins to slowly be disassembled or dismantled because the new reality is being created. For example, when I was pregnant with Penelope, I had built some scaffolding around the area of sleep. I read literature about sleep training, night waking, and infant sleep cycles. I envisioned the pattern each 24 hours would have if Penelope woke every 5 hours versus every 2 hours. Because our daughter was not yet born, I could only prepare for her sleep cycle and what our reality may look like. Once she was born, my scaffolding helped me navigate my new reality, but we quickly learned that what we had scaffolded was not reality. Reality, or lived experience deconstructs one’s scaffolding. And that’s a good thing. So, with the news that the end of this pregnancy is “positively definite,” my reality has changed and thus the scaffolding I erected to support the arrival of our living child is being deconstructed. Piece by piece, I have begun dismantling what the next year will look like with a preschooler and infant and begin building new scaffolding for the reality of a fifth miscarriage.