This may be the hardest thing I will ever write. I keep putting off writing it because when I think about it, I worry that I will re-open the wound that will never heal. It is one of those wounds that scar you for life. The scar tingles, and aches every time I see lilies growing in a garden, bows in hair, and ruffles on dresses. I have come to realize though, that wound IS healing…more and more every day. The reason for that healing is a beautiful little boy with ringlets in his toe head blonde hair and a contagious smile. He brought me back to life when I thought all was lost. He was the unexpected dawn that took me out of darkness.
I should start from the beginning.
After my husband and I had 2 amazing sons we decided we were done. Two was plenty, we had our hands full, and they brought so much joy to my life. I still yearned for a girl with all my heart, but it seems like our X’s and Y’s were only cut out for making boys. Don’t get me wrong, I ADORE my kids, but who doesn’t want a cute little girl to be your best buddy and confidant? I would braid her hair and buy her purple and blue dresses and climb trees with her. I thought about my relationship with my mom, and how much I would love to have a relationship like that with my daughter.
My husband and I never enjoyed birth control and we learned that certain methods of contraception just don’t work reliably, so we figured that the smart thing to do would be to get him “fixed”. I was getting close to 40 but still was quite fertile and we didn’t want to have any surprises….oh boy…. Of course these things take time. Surgery. First you have to find a general doctor, make an appointment, have an initial visit, get a referral, make an appointment again, have another initial visit, schedule surgery……and you get the picture.
These things take time.
He eventually had the surgery but the thing is, that all this time passed, and somewhere between all the appointments and doctors visits and referrals…well……lets just say we kept using our preferred method of contraception and….what do you think happened?
The thing is, I wasn’t even ovulating. I was on my moon cycle at the time, and who gets pregnant on their moon cycle? Apparently Miss Fertile Myrtle over here. So here we go, flipping out about having another baby. But part of me is yearning for it to be a girl. We are in the midst of the turmoil of knowing that we weren’t planning on having another baby, and couldn’t really afford it, and yet fate, higher power, God, the entity that makes these things happen so that they change your life forever…blessed us with a surprise. We were struggling with the idea of having another baby, it just wasn’t what we had planned. The stress, fear, and anxiety was all consuming.
And then….
I went in to get an early ultrasound because, being almost 40 we thought it would be a good idea to check and make sure the baby was healthy. My husband was at work and so I went in by myself, thinking that I would hear the heartbeat and get some photos and bring them home.
I laid down on the table and the nurse put the Doppler on my stomach. The cold jelly substance bringing back memories of the excitement from my other ultrasounds…but this time I was more afraid and nervous then excited. The nurse moved the Doppler around, searching for the familiar whooshing sound. We hear it, and look at the monitor. There’s that strange alien looking amber colored figure on the monitor. My heart warms a little, seeing the heart beating. Then the nurse gets a puzzled look on her face as she starts moving the Doppler around again. Whoosh, whoosh, whoosh. There’s another heartbeat. Two placental sacs, each with one baby inside them. Laying side by side with a thin barrier between them, they look like they are cuddling. Even though different umbilical chords are nourishing them, they came from two different eggs, were fertilized by two different sperm cells, they still look like they are connected. They look like their spirits or souls are communicating with one another.
Two.
There are two babies. We are having twins. WTF???? Oh my gosh. I am filled with surprise, shock, fear, confusion, curiosity, and excitement? Maybe. Every emotion you can imagine all at the same time. I am in complete disbelief.
Apparently when you are in Peri-menopause your body just starts spitting out eggs left and right, every which way, at random points in your cycle, or at least that is the only explanation I could come up with, as to how a woman with no history of twins in her family could conceive twins…while menstruating.
I drive home after calling my mom. I am flipping out because now I need to tell my husband that we are having TWO babies. I walk in the door and he is already in the hallway ready to hear how it went.
“Two”
Confusion crosses over his face.
“There are two babies, we are having twins.” The color washes out of his face, shock, and disbelief replace the color in his cheeks. “Are you kidding?” He is completely floored, shocked, stressed - understandably. I am pretty sure when we told the kids about it they were excited. But they weren't worried about how we would all fit in our house, how to afford 4 children, how stressful it would be, or how we would ever have time for ourselves or each other again. Our kids were just excited to have more buddies to play with. Our oldest wondered if one of them would be a girl. Maybe.
In the weeks ahead I did research on fraternal twins and discovered that indeed, most fraternal twins are one boy and one girl. When I read this, excitement and anticipation started to replace the fear and anxiety that I had been feeling. My husband started to come around to the idea too. We both started to feel more at ease, or at least trusting that this was the path, this was what was supposed to happen.
We continued on with our lives, I ramped up my vitamins and ate healthy, used my essential oils, and stopped drinking alcohol. I was the picture perfect pregnant woman, just like always. I began my research on raising twins, asking friends with twins for advice, and I even figured out how to fit 3 car seats in the back of the car.
I went to an ultrasound at around 14 weeks and everything looked great, baby A and baby B were doing just fine. I asked the nurse if one of them was a girl and she said that it looked like baby A was, but she couldn’t say for sure. Excitement filled me up again, would I finally have my baby girl? Baby boy was healthy and strong in my uterus but all I could think about was that girl. I will love them both.
At 20 weeks I went into the ultrasound with excitement. Again I was alone…but no big deal, I would just call when I knew for sure what the genders were. I laid down on the table again and waited in anticipation for the sound of the whooshing heartbeats.
One.
Only One.
She told me how sorry she was. That something must have been wrong with her brain and she just didn’t make it. “It was the girl, wasn’t it?”
“Yes, it was. I’m so sorry.” Heart breaking, crushing despair fills me. Then fear. “Is the other baby okay?”
“Baby B is doing fine. His heart is strong and luckily he is fraternal, so it is likely that whatever was wrong with Baby A, will not effect Baby B.”
I am completely lost, I honestly don’t know if any pain has ever felt like this. Loving and wanting something for your whole life, before it ever existed, and then its gone. But deep down inside me, my motherhood instinct is reaching out of the pain, and pulling me out of the impending depression. I have to be strong for him. He just lost his sister…his twin. He needs me to be strong, so that he can keep growing and being healthy.
When people found out that I lost her, all of the frustration or unhappiness that they had about us having an unplanned pregnancy during a time of financial stress…went away. Compassion, forgiveness, sorrow, for the loss of something they knew that I had wanted for a long time replaced any judgment that they had. My husband saw how much I was hurting, knew how much it had meant to me, the idea of having a girl. I know that despite the stress having twins had caused him, he loved them both already and the thought of losing one was hard…losing both would be crushing.