Jewish girls in the Midwest where I grew up are instructed to wait until the second trimester before announcing their pregnancy. We would be magically protected from loss at twelve weeks. After passing that point, having a live baby seemed assured.
I believed I had earned the right to show my partner and two dogs an early ultrasound photo once I had passed the 12th week of my first pregnancy. I was looking forward to receiving a ton of diapers, support, and guidance. I adhered to this unwritten rule and never once had cause to doubt it, but everything changed when I subsequently miscarried a pregnancy.
I received the five words that no pregnant parent wants to hear on the day before Thanksgiving in 2021: “Your baby has no heartbeat.” I lay on the table, eight months pregnant and unable to move or breathe, after three agonizing ultrasounds to confirm death.
It took all of my energy to phone my husband, who was spending an unusually warm day at a park with my kid. He had no idea that a grief this intense and all-consuming would suddenly also affect his life. My Physician advised me to spend Thanksgiving with my family and let labor begin naturally, but the thought of having a dead baby inside of me for even one more day, let alone one more second, brought me rushing to Triage for help.
I discovered that day that mothers of stillborn children must deliver their dozing infants and leave the hospital holding nothing. Never in a million years would I be my son’s mother. Devastating didn’t seem to adequately express the depth of the anguish.
Only a small group of individuals, including my immediate family, close friends, and the yoga students who had watched me becoming rounder and slower with each passing month, were aware that I was pregnant at the time. Because the pregnancy followed immediately on the heels of a missed miscarriage 10 months earlier, I had made the difficult decision not to disclose it early (it’s difficult to do so).
