Last Saturday, at eight weeks pregnant, I started to bleed.
For four days, I lived in that limbo, within two contradictory, simultaneous states.
In the end, by the time of my scan, my womb was empty.
Florence Westwood Whitfield,Yellow Rose, 1887
What I am here to tell you is what helped me come through this experience.
I am merely telling you because I am able to.
It was also a place Id been to for dance classes and childrens birthday parties.
It had a library and, in the evening, a bar.
The second thing that helped was the staff.
I could just touch her arm and she would pause.
If anything hurt, we could stop.
I knew she would look after me.
Just reading that, as I peed into a test tube, made my whole body soften.
These people knew what I was going through, and they knew what I needed.
I also had my friend with me.
A friend who had miscarried herself, several times.
My husband could have come, of course, but in that moment, she was my first choice.
She held me like the mother that she isheld me and held me and held me.
She told me to take an iron tablet.
Another thing that helped was that a few people already knew I was pregnant.
When things changed, they were prepared and ready.
Id baked a cake.
I cried, briefly, and listened to the water move.
There were other things that helped, too, of course.
I sewed myself an insane outfit to wear to a book event.
I ate enough bread to sink a duck.
I changed my blood-spotted bedding.
I eventually went for a run and one night slept for 11 hours.
Every message I got on my phone helped.
Every time my husband held me in his arms helped.
Telling my son helped.
And every minute of extra springtime daylight has helped.
I feel very lucky.
I have a data pipe of friends.
I am part of a community.
I speak the same language as the majority of people I live among.
I have a healthy body, and I work with good and kind and thoughtful people.
This is not, I know, how it is for everyone.
I wish it was.
I cannot stop miscarriages happening or tell you how to make them better when they do.
But I do believe that we can make miscarriages better for more people more often.
We can write to our representatives.
We can read the reports and follow the news and stay informed.
But most of all, we can be kind.
