I’m not healed- How can I do this?
“I fucking love kids. But hoping for a miscarriage is not how I want a child to enter this world.”
Writing this down frees the power it has from the haunting feeling of keeping it inside. When I see the ump-teenth pregnancy post on social media, I’m triggered. When I see pictures of my friends’ babies I’m so happy for them, but am so curious what would have happened if we kept the pregnancy?
I just knew something was off in my body. I have been keeping track of my cycles for almost a decade (on my app) and even with an IUD, they were shockingly consistent. My periods were at least, I wouldn’t use the word consistent as an adjective to describe myself as a person.
The weekend before I found out I was pregnant, I was getting a Brazilian wax and I was talking with the cerologist about how much she hated her IUD and she was currently pregnant despite using IUD as protection. We had such an in-depth conversation about it, which honestly is not abnormal for a naturally curious person like me. Sometimes people open up to me and find me easy to talk to. Sometimes I’m as awkward as a stick.
I remember saying to my beloved that same weekend, hey I missed my period, I should get a pregnancy test.
My boyfriend was so confused about getting a test because we have the IUD and we were fine. With an IUD, we were not practicing withdrawal, which became a recurring conversation because I don’t want to be on birth control forever, so we would need to get used to withdrawal at a minimum in order to avoid pregnancy in the future.
On February 25, as I was taking a shower in the morning, I had to sit down because of the nausea that I was feeling. I knew something was off. I felt that stomach pain all throughout my long day at work. I pushed through and kept all my appointments. I asked my boyfriend to please stop and get a pregnancy test for us after he got off work. In the past with pregnancy tests, I’ve taken them cavalierly and immediately without overthinking it (maybe with 1-2 exceptions). This one, however, I wanted to wait until the next day because avoidance generally dictates my life choices.
Speaking of avoidance, I decided to take the pregnancy test as I was rushing out the door for work the next morning. I forgot to check the results of the pregnancy test, and just left it on the sink top (gross probably), and ran out the door to my car to head for work.
Thankfully, I remembered that maybe I should actually check the results of the said test and sprinted back inside with the car running, garage door open (yes, I’ll reiterate both myself and my life are a mess). When the test told me it was positive, I freaked out, but somehow remained calm. I told my partner while he was using the other restroom and he yelled “Um what? Are you fucking kidding me?” Maybe not those exact words, but something to that effect.
I had to calm him down and say “hey there’s really nothing that either of us can do about this. We just gotta keep going. I’m going to call my doctor and figure out where to go from there.”
Then I started freaking out and googling intensely what it means to be pregnant with an IUD and the fear was taking over. Many questions arose: was it an ectopic pregnancy? Was the pregnancy even viable? and How determined this little fetus was wanting to come into my uterus?
Before calling the doctor, I texted my best friend who was pregnant. She still thinks I should let the IUD company know so they can get their shit together and know the real failure rate (99% doesn’t seem too accurate if you ask me).
My doctor’s kind nurse got me an appointment the next day. I had the sonogram first, and then the doctor met with me after. The sonogram revealed that the fetus made it into the right place and I was about six weeks along. Either way, the doctor had to remove the IUD in order to make sure everything is healthy, since the IUD wasn’t serving its intended purpose, it should be out of my body.
The nurse who triaged me uttered a loud “Congratulations!” to me and I was thinking in my head how insensitive such a well-intended comment can be. I uttered “thanks” and realized how scared I was.
My doctor, who is so unbelievably comical and hilarious, came in and just stared at me. I said to her “What the fuck?? Is this common?” And she replied with a funny anecdote that was validating but also frightening. She said this might have been her fault because the day before I called in, she was thinking to herself that she hadn’t had a failed IUD in a while. She said it’s generally 1 in a 100 that fails for her and she was curious when it would happen next. And then my ass calls her office the next day.
She non-judgmentally asked for my age and was relieved when I replied that I’m 30. She said “Oh, you’re 30, you can do this! And you have a partner! You’ll be fine!” But we were not ready for this and weren’t expecting it.
She said if you’re going to get an abortion, go to this organization, it is the best place to go in our area. She said this, but also countered that “having kids was the greatest thing ever but she hasn’t slept in 10 years.” She told me that no matter what happens, she wants to see me again in 8 weeks. If I decided to keep it, or not. I shared I had some guilt since I never got a sonogram to make sure the IUD was placed correctly back the previous summer of 2019. She told me some comforting anecdotes of other patients whose IUD had failed as well. She had patients who had a properly inserted and verified IUD, and the next month the patient came back into her office pregnant.
With my legs in the stirrups, she removed the IUD and I cannot accurately describe my view, but the picture of her reaction remains implanted in my mind until this day. My doctor holding my tilted-ass IUD between my knees and legs in stirrups is priceless. She had the most adorably confused look on her face. She even let me take a picture and said she wanted to keep or frame the IUD and show her staff because she had never seen one so tilted.
When I called the clinic for the abortion, we had to wait a week and a half before scheduling an appointment. That time leading up to the first consultation appointment felt like YEARS. Without realizing it, the Monday after our appointment the stay-at-home orders went into effect.
I think part of me was mad at my boyfriend for not withdrawing. Part of me was mad that he changed his mind from June of 2018 when we were new in our relationship and on vacation (in paradise), saying he wouldn’t be able to abort our child. I don’t think he knew how much that meant to me and how much a potential fetus meant for us.
It took the night before the appointment of me being unsure about what to do that he realized how much I just needed support. When I said I was unsure about wanting to keep this baby, I meant it. Every time I tried to talk to him about my honest uncertainty, he would be upset and shocked and overwhelmed that I wanted to keep it. And he kept wondering how we would do it financially and how we were not emotionally ready. Pretty much all the reasons why we shouldn’t have a baby. And that just became so fucking old and I was so mad at him. I don’t want to convince him to have this child with me. I wanted to be honest about my experience.
I wanted this child, and I want to say I’m sorry to this baby. I wanted you so badly but I am nowhere near I need to be healing the intergenerational trauma in my body so I can raise a baby well.
After talking extensively with my partner about my uncertainty as well as my frustration with his responses about all the barriers to having a child, he finally came around and made a bath for me to be calm and get ready for the next day. After journaling trying to find out what I feel, I realized a thought that led me to feel a little more certain about my decision:
I didn’t want an abortion but I had been hoping for a miscarriage; this is not how i want to bring a child into this world. The sentence alone carries so many emotions: hurtful, overwhelming, honest, shameful, and guilt-ridden.
The appt was Saturday- I’m already indecisive as hell because I don’t know what to do with my emotions MOST of the time. But not being able to connect to those emotions and more importantly, the decision that needed to be made was too overwhelming for my own good. I am a caretaker for my parents, I live with my partner, and somehow I already make all the decisions in my life. But for real, do I?
If I do make my own decisions, then the concerns came up:
When can I trust my intuition?
It was tough not having my partner’s support. I need to know we’ll be okay before bringing a baby into this world
I feel a connection to individuals who are pregnant
I feel guilty because my best friend was pregnant and supporting me through this
Seeing her kids is a reminder of how I didn’t want one but love them so much all at the same time
Knowing that I love kids make processing this so hard
Shout your abortion helped me know that I wasn’t alone in my experience. Finding and connecting to stories that were similar to mine.
Being with a perfect man whom you want to marry and not wanting to keep the child fetus that you created unintentionally is a story ne’er been told.
Since age 18, several of my little cousins on separate occasions and in their own ways tell me “you’re like a little girl… but you’re big.” Since I was little I’ve always been the one who took care of kids, entertain them. Hell, I’m still a kid.
I light up when kids enter the room.
Adorable, innocent, silly, constantly learning, developing, hilarious, squishy, cuddly.
They’re fucking great.
I’m just not ready for one.
And that statement in itself holds so much power for me. It included many thoughts:
These were the words my partner repeatedly and continuously said.
It’s the reason I had an (albeit bent) IUD inside of me. *insert the confused and eyebrow-ed look on my doctor’s face holding the crooked contraceptive in forceps in between my thighs*
It means I was secretly praying for this NOT to be my decision.
It means at 31 and 30, respectfully, my partner and I don’t feel stable enough to do this.
It means I have to make this decision
It highlighted my uncertainty with motherhood
It brought up my own mother-daughter wounds
It may mean a baby was supposed to come through-am I messing with fate?
What consequences arise if I do this? If I don’t?
I’m not healed- How can I do this?
I want to do it right- do what’s right.
I have no sense of self; how can I instill that in a growing child?
I can act without thinking & live on guilt and regret.
My Mom can’t take care of herself- she’s a toddler in her own right.
I don’t have a routine. How can I instill a schedule in someone else? Someone who is completely dependent on me for everything and someone who is in the most important developmental stage of life
I’m with the person whom I want to live the rest of my life with- how can I not be ready? How can he not want this?
How can I not bring the result of our love into the world?
I’m a mental health professional; I should know better.
I work with people who had really hard childhoods and experienced the impacts of long-term unresolved trauma- I see the devastating effects of unresolved healing
I am starting to face my own childhood experience.
I’ve had an abortion before. I should have known better- but BITCH I was on an IUD- was tryna prevent that.
My kind, considerate, thoughtful doctor in response to hearing that I’m 30 and am with the love of my life saying “oh?! You can do this”. Her assuring me “motherhood is great, I haven’t slept in 10 years, but it’s great.” Telling me in uncertain words- It’s not what “I’m supposed to do at my age.”
I didn’t want to be in a place to make this decision. I REALLY DIDN’T WANT TO MAKE THIS FUCKING DECISION. THIS WAS A TOUGH DECISION FOR ME. IT INFURIATES ME that PEOPLE create laws and movements about the idea that this is a hedonistic decision. This is something that can bring pain, unhealed wounds, reality checks, everything that I was not wanting to think about came right up to the surface.
A year and a half later I realize it is possible to be with someone who is the love of my life and at the same time not feel ready to raise a child and choose to terminate the fetus that made its way through an IUD. It’s possible that this was the most difficult, yet responsible decision I could have made. Of course, the pain lingers with me, but as more time passes, I become more and more sure that I made the best decision I could. I’m still working on healing and I’m thankful for the space that this decision created for me and my family.
