Trigger warning: This post contains references to miscarriage, D&C, and intrusive thoughts. If you are feeling vulnerable, you may want to skip this post for now. 

Last year, I posted about my experience with the emotional aftermath of a missed miscarriage. Quick recap: I was carrying fraternal twins as a gestational surrogate. At my 8w5d ultrasound everything was good. At my first OB appointment a few weeks later, I was told neither one had a heartbeat and they had both stopped growing a couple of weeks prior, shortly after the ultrasound where everything was good. The end result was a D&C.

It was rough. It was REALLY rough. Not only was there the guilt and grief and normal hormonal nonsense of a miscarriage, I had the added emotional complication associated with miscarrying as a surrogate. However, I pushed on and kind of stuffed it all down as my intended parents (IPs) and I moved forwards with the checkups and testing the reproductive endocrinologist (RE) recommended to clear me to try another round of IVF and have a second go at making my IPs parents. Unfortunately, my anti-thyroid antibody labs came back (ridiculously) highly elevated which my RE said could potentially indicate an increased risk of miscarriage so he recommended they find a new surrogate.

As was their right under our contract, my IPs terminated the contract. Unfortunately, they did so in a very abrupt manner that violated trust and hurt me badly. It really ripped the bandaid off the wound from the miscarriage. I told a friend that it felt emotionally like I was experiencing the miscarriage all over along with the sudden and unexpected loss of another relationship I had been assured would last no matter what.

Time went on and I tried to go on with my life since there wasn’t really anything else to do. Unfortunately, I dealt with it by continuing to stuff everything. Really, I didn’t deal with anything. You would think that by now I would know that’s a really bad idea and that not processing things and not getting help just makes things worse, but apparently I have yet to learn that lesson as thoroughly as I would like. As time went on, I wasn’t sleeping well. I was stressed and irritable. I was moody and cried a lot and was really grouchy and short-tempered. I put it all down to stress and normal fatigue from taking 16 credits in college along with dealing with 3 small children, a husband in the military, and a generally full plate.

One night though, it got really bad. It was September 28, 2014. I was driving on a windy road in the hills and suddenly started to have some really nasty and terrifying images and questions/thoughts pop into my head. I beat it back and hightailed it out of there and started to head out to a particularly beautiful scenic area to take some pictures, but the thought of the windy roads along the coast that I was about to encounter had thoughts and pictures in my head again. I turned around and headed home. Suddenly I realized, “These are intrusive thoughts and I am changing my activities and behavior to avoid the trigger. This is familiar… @#%$!!! This is a symptom of postpartum OCD.” Let me tell you, the thought of going through PPOCD again had me terrified. And I do mean terrified. Like, pulled over in a parking lot sobbing and hyperventilating, unable to breathe, having an honest-to-goodness, would-take-an-Ativan-if-I-had-a-prescription-and-one-on-me, panic-attack terrifying. I started pm’ing my short-list of Warrior Mom friends trying to find someone I could talk to and help me get calmed down and worked through it. I got ahold of Lindsay Maloan. I adore her. She talked me through it, helped me formulate and talk out my plan for calling a therapist ASAP, and sent me funny links/pictures to help me laugh until I got ahold of a friend who lives near me (who was kind enough to let me come cry on her couch). Katherine Stone and Lauren Hale were also fantastic over the next few days about helping me talk through things and generally supporting me. All 3 of them kept telling me that it wasn’t my fault and that it was GOOD that I recognized what was happening and got my butt in to see a professional to deal with it.

I was fortunate to find a therapist who has quite a bit of experience and specialization with grief and loss, postpartum adjustment/PPMD, and infertility. It’s been a great combination and nice to not have to explain everything like I would with someone who doesn’t have experience with infertility or PPMD. We’ve done a combination of eye movement desensitization and reprocessing (EMDR) and talk therapy and it’s been working great. At this point, we’re pretty sure that my problem this time isn’t PPOCD or any other type of PPMD so much as it is just straight grief and trauma. She told me that it’s perfectly normal to need help working through what I went through. The official diagnosis for insurance purposes is postpartum adjustment, or needing help adjusting after pregnancy (specifically with the loss of the pregnancy and everything that’s happened since). She also pointed out that lack of sleep can exacerbate or even cause intrusive thoughts, so that combined with some other anniversaries/milestones (such as my due date) may have been the culprit behind that nasty little bugger.

I think there are a couple of main points I hope people take away from this post.

1. Even without postpartum mood and anxiety disorders, it’s perfectly normal to need some help working through thoughts, feelings, and emotions, especially after a miscarriage.
2. Don’t put off seeking help.
3. Have a network of at least a few people you know you can turn to if you start to have a rough time. For women who are postpartum, especially those with a history of PPMD, it can be especially helpful if you have a few women who have experienced PPMD themselves, who are educated and know what’s up, who understand where you’re coming from. Lindsay was my lifeline that night. She got me through a REALLY bad spell where I was having trouble breathing (you know that whole my face is getting tingly and it’s making me panic even more thing? Yeah. I was there). And she, Lauren, and Katherine, and my friend here at home, and another friend who is working on becoming a social worker, gave me support. I can’t even express the value of that in words. I would love to give them all huge hugs.
4. When you seek out a mental health professional, try to find one with experience/training in your situation. Having seen mental health professionals before who were PPMD clueless (it’s disconcerting to be explaining postpartum depression to the person who’s supposed to help you work through it), it has made a HUGE difference to be working with someone who knows her stuff.

I’m still not totally “there” yet, but I’ve made a lot of progress with my therapist, and it’s been a big relief to feel power in actually dealing with things on MY terms instead of just letting it happen to me and not have anything in my arsenal of “what to do.” When I had PPMD after my first baby was born, I felt so helpless and powerless. This time, I took control. That alone has made a difference.

If you are reading this and you’re in a bad place, know that you have a community ready and waiting with open arms, wanting to support you. We send you our love. I send you my thoughts, prayers, warm vibes, crossed fingers, and whatever else helps. There are resources. There are people here to support you. You are not alone. You do not have to go through this by yourself. We are here for you, we want to help you. Let us help you. As we support each other, we learn how to better support and help ourselves.

What advice do you have in how to help yourself or how to help someone else?

Photo credit: Esther Dale