This essay is published at The B(e)aring All Project.
I push my 7-year-old and my 1-year-old sons on our swing set, as the sun sets and the feeling hits me. I look at our two sons and I see them all.
Nine years ago this week, my husband and I ended a wanted pregnancy. According to our doctors, we were hit with two strokes of bad luck, back to back. We faced the same heart-wrenching decision six months after the first, terminating another pregnancy, due almost exactly one year later.
In addition to these anniversaries, October is Pregnancy and Infant Loss Awareness Month; celebs are sharing their grief over painful pregnancies and infant loss via social media and subsequently being shamed and attacked for oversharing an experience that so desperately needs to be normalized. And to dig the knife in a bit deeper, Amy Coney Barrett, by all accounts determined to overturn Roe v Wade, is awaiting her Supreme Court confirmation. To put it simply: I feel like I’m at a breaking point.
When I look at that viral photo of Chrissy Teigen and John Legend in the hospital, I feel it. That feeling of loss, that feeling of brokenness, that feeling of wanting, that feeling of not believing it to be real life. Teigen and Legend have referred to this painful loss as a “loss” — not as a stillbirth, not as a termination, not as a miscarriage. Loss. And in my experience, that’s the only word that fits when you’ve been growing a baby inside of your body and then, he or she is no longer physically alive inside of you. Or alive, outside of you. It’s the most surreal void.
Unfortunately, my husband and I faced pregnancy loss a total of four times. We terminated two very wanted pregnancies — one at 14 weeks and one at 18 weeks. And years after delivering our living son, I miscarried twice. While still stigmatized, miscarriage is the more palatable kind of pregnancy loss that might generate sympathy and condolences. However, termination for medical reasons (TFMR) usually carries stigma and shame that run so deep, you have to either whisper it or justify your choice.
And as our government tries to calculatedly strip us of our reproductive rights with our new pending Supreme Court at the helm, I am reminded how lucky I am to have the financial means and to live in a state where laws didn’t prevent me from accessing the healthcare I needed. In other words, I had access to second trimester abortions. And, yes, my abortions left me forever changed and heartbroken. But those are choices I’d still make today.
I honor these babies by sharing our story.
*
I became pregnant on our first try, in the summer of 2011. In September, I went in for the routine 13-week NT scan where we answered an extensive list of routine questions about our genetic history and Ashkenazi Jewish background. We had naively only considered this appointment to be an opportunity to see our baby in 3-D and find out the sex; little did we know, this was our necessary primer on karyotypes, statistics and horrifying conditions.
Once in the exam room, I stared at our baby’s 3-D image on a giant flat screen. After the perinatologist, Dr. S, and I chatted about our mutual love of theater, he looked closely at the monitor and his tone shifted. Dr. S’s light disposition grew somber as he called out measurements to the lab tech. Those minutes post ultrasound exist as a haze in my memory, only colored by the words, “risk,” “statistics,” “tests” and “I’m so sorry.” Moments later, I let out a blood curdling scream as a needle was stabbing me in the belly for further chromosome testing. My husband and I then continued to wait in the exam room, in total shock and confusion, to learn of next steps, follow-up appointments and second opinions. We began to break as we learned more and more about further tests and chromosomes and abnormalities and risks and possible termination.
*
“We can’t think of it as a baby,” my level-headed, even tempered husband said, through his stifled tears as we drove home.
“Please, stop,” I pleaded. My attachment had already begun. I understood where he was coming from but there was no undoing the relationship for me.
Test results confirmed that our baby had a significant likelihood of having some kind of abnormality that would likely cause him to suffer. We consulted doctors. We got second opinions. We endured more testing. We were candidly, though not casually, advised by doctors to terminate and try again. And at fourteen weeks, October 7, 2011, that’s what we did.
I grieved, I processed, I sat on the couch in therapy and tried to find meaning in my experience. I planted a letter under an olive tree that I had written to our son, explaining that our choice was made from the deepest love within us, for him.
Many months later, we were ready to try again. And I got pregnant right away. Again. This baby’s due date was October 3, 2012 — one year and four days after we terminated the previous pregnancy. I found solace in that kind of synchronicity.
*
I went into the routine 13-week NT scan with obvious anxiety that only grew as my husband and I sat in the waiting room and were forced to listen to Eric Clapton 90’s hit, Tears in Heaven, play on the speakers overhead.
As I lay on the exam bed in the examination room, facing a flat screen monitor with just my statistics (name, DOB, estimated due date, etc.) the lab tech asked, “Would you like me to turn the monitor off after you confirm the information is correct?,”
“No, please leave it on. I want to see my baby.” I knew what I was risking.
And I stared and did not take my eyes off my baby’s picture. Moments later, as the exam continued, the mood in the room shifted. Again. Dr. S didn’t need to say a word. My husband and I had become pros at reading doctors’ faces as they interpreted ultrasounds.
“It’s measuring 6.8,” Dr. S called out.
We knew what this meant.
We were faced with the same godawful, painful decision. How was this happening?
This time around our baby’s NT scan measured twice the size, putting his life even more at risk. My husband and I searched for a medical explanation or any scientific data that could give us an understanding as to why this happened to us not once, but twice. I scoured medical journal articles and reached what felt like the end of the internet looking for affirmations that I could carry my baby to term and not feel like I was putting my child at a significantly abnormal great risk by bringing him into this world. We sat with the facts, the data, the experts’ opinions and second and third and fourth opinions. I had a CVS, a microarray, a full council of recessive testing. We had ultrasounds with specialists at both Cedars Sinai and UCLA. We made it our job for almost a full month to find an answer and reached out to various genetic and prenatal and neonatal specialists before surrendering to the doctor’s words that it was just “two strokes of bad luck.” We made our choice. Again.
I made the most of each day with our son, while I carried him in my body. We went to the beach. I showed him the ocean and the sand. We ate Indian food, Italian food, Mexican food, Mediterranean food. I read to him. I talked to him. I sang to him. We listened to a lot of music. Joni Mitchell, The Beatles, Florence and the Machine. I explained everything that was happening to us as best as I could, as we went into each ultrasound appointment. We watched him a lot. We watched him move. We took the ultrasound pictures home with us after every appointment. I memorized his profile. I wrote him letters daily.
He was eighteen weeks when we terminated. The heartache ran deep. To my core. There was a literal void inside of me. My husband and I grieved together but I felt alone. I had pain and cramps and bleeding and pregnancy weight gain and hormones racing through my body that were all visceral reminders of our baby.
I spoke to intuitive healers. I wanted to know where to put his cremated ashes. Until we came up with the right spot, I carried him around with me. I couldn’t fathom leaving Baby W home alone with the dogs or leaving him in the heat in my car, and so he came with me to my appointments, errands and auditions.
It wasn’t long before we found Baby W’s spot. We bought two shovels at the hardware store to dig a hole for our son’s remains. We buried him. Next to a tree by a playground we would later take our living sons.
We tried to escape our feelings. My husband dove into his work, taking breaks to divert his attention by emailing me YouTube videos of pet raccoons and pet foxes and pet squirrels and their odd domestic antics. I escaped at night with prescribed painkillers, wine, and Bravo.
Seven months later, we dug deep and found the will, desire and strength to try again. I quickly became pregnant. I had an ordinary pregnancy. And I gave birth to our son, now 7 years old.
*
I think about what our story would have looked like under different circumstances. In a different state. With fewer means. Fewer resources. What that trajectory could have looked like in a parallel universe.
And now with Amy Coney Barrett, a woman who has been very vocal regarding her anti-choice stance, being on the precipice of filling RBG’s seat, I think about what that trajectory will look like in that plausible post-Roe world. Where abortion rights will no longer be protected in 25 states — abortion care will go dark in almost all of the South and Midwest. And it makes me realize that while others might not agree with our choice — and I certainly can understand why — it was our choice to make, not our government’s. It was philosophical, it was personal, and it was ours.
*
While it may seem like what the Republican Party wants to do first and foremost with their priority to overturn Roe is prevent women from getting abortions, that motive is only secondary. Women aren’t going to stop choosing to have abortions under strict laws — they’ll find other, unsafe means to terminate their pregnancies that could put their own lives in danger. And when women are forced to carry babies that are either incompatible with life or destined for a life of suffering, the government will not be there to hold their hands or babysit while the parents are working three jobs to pay for said sick child’s treatments. Nor will the government pay their medical bills.
At its core, these laws are about controlling women and perpetuating feelings of shame and guilt for making choices over their own bodies.
Women have long lived with the burdens of shame; nevertheless, we have persisted. We do not shut down after making the choice to have an abortion. We do not go through with the procedure and never feel again. I have never felt so much pain, anger, sadness, grief, and confusion as I did after choosing to end my pregnancies.
*
Years later when we decided to try again to give our son a brother, we were met with more loss. But it’s the kind that’s more a little more socially acceptable to talk about, though often still with a whisper. I had two miscarriages. As far as miscarriages go, while entirely devastating and heartbreaking, they were relatively ordinary. I found out in the OB’s office during routine ultrasounds. I texted my inner circle the same text.
No heartbeat.
No heartbeat.
No heartbeat.
I had consciously told my family/chosen family that I was pregnant, more or less when my husband and I got the news from our RE specialist. I knew better than to wait until we were in the clear. I knew what might lay ahead; I told them so that they would be able to show up. And they did.
*
When we finally conceived again via IVF, our baby couldn’t wait the full 40 weeks. He made his escape 2 months early as my water broke at 30 weeks at my 5-year-old’s preschool drop off. A healthy 4-lb, 4-oz boy.
I often see all of my babies when I look at my living sons. They are all a part of my fabric — our two sons are here because of all of them…and one day, I plan on telling them about their brothers, their sister, and our life-changing journey. A journey for which I will forever be grateful and a journey that has left me no choice but to fight for women’s reproductive rights.
~Jessica Weinstock
