The Joy Sorrow Un-Luck-y Club

I was on client site this week in Salt Lake City (so damn beautiful!) with a coworker of mine, doing some shadowing for the new job. We were talking about going back in December so that we could ski (we’re very devoted to our jobs), and she mentioned that it would be nice because the last time she was there in winter she was pregnant and couldn’t. Then we were talking about things you can’t do when you’re pregnant (I was trying not to seem overly interested in the conversation, because god knows no one at work can know I’m trying), and she mentioned that she blamed her 14th-week miscarriage on a riding lawnmower incident. I was shocked because I’d forgotten that she’d has a miscarriage between her two kids, and then instantly, horribly depressed as it hit me how truly awful that must have been for her. New perspective hurts sometimes.

I realized I was yet another silent uncounted member of a not-so-exclusive Women Only club, one where potential mothers of all ages and races and backgrounds are bonded together in the united grief and guilt of an inexplicable loss that can not ever be fully understood by non-members. As my coworker went on, casually keeping the conversation light with the usual clichés that you hear and repeat (‘It was for the best anyhow, there were probably chromosomal abnormalities, and the kids really would’ve been too close together’), all I wanted to do was put my hand on her arm and very quietly say, ‘I am so deeply sorry for your loss. I understand’. Of course, I would never do that because a.) A miscarriage is a very private and personal thing, and I know I could never understand, and b.) Duh, I can’t let anyone, ANYONE at work know that I am trying to have a baby! Stop calling my boss!

Anyhow, I just thought that was sad. She did end up having another baby (a very precocious daughter), which is nice. Hopefully I will also someday be a member of that other club, The Zealous New Mommies, which has much happier talkative members although you pay slightly more in dues.

p.s. Did I mention Salt Lake City is very, very pretty? I’m still surprised there were mountains. I didn’t look at a map before I went. I’m very geography-dumb.

p.p.s. I forgot that part of my job is to talk to nurses. Nurses work in hospitals. Hospitals have sick babies. I don't want to be in a Neonatal Intensive Care Unit (NICU) again for a long time. University of Utah however has a very cool preemie program where they send a card to the parents 'from the baby' with the little tiny foot prints and a little poem about coming home soon that made me cry in the bathroom.