After the horrific earthquake in Nepal, the world was shocked and rushed to the country's aid. I am not diminishing the significance of this terrible disaster, but I just received a shock, a temblor from my past, when I read of the proposed legislation from Texas forcing women to carry dead fetuses to term. This is written in response to the DK diary by Leslie Salzillo of May 3, 2015, and was intended to be a comment, but what could be more a "diary" than a very personal response and unexpected shock from this article?
This diary is very difficult to write, but I could not let my truth remain unspoken. Perhaps as recently as ten years ago, I would not have been able to write it. The emotional pain has been huge, random, and devastating for more than 20 years. I attribute a career change, remarriage and geographical relocation to two events of pregnancy loss.
I had a deceased fetus whose heart stopped beating on Mother's Day at the end of the first trimester. I didn't have the ultrasound until a few days later, but my body knew. Things were just...different. Please tell me what would have been the purpose of carrying a dead baby to term? BTW, I was advised that I could wait until I would spontaneously miscarry, so chances are one cannot carry a dead fetus to full term. Since men know so much about women's bodies, ask Mr. Schaefer how he would be able to carry a dead cluster of cells that would have been a human being around with him for an indefinite period of time. I was so shaken that the period of time between the ultrasound and the subsequent medical procedure and after is a blur.
A second instance, a miscarriage this time, occurred the day of the World Series earthquake in the San Francisco Bay area in 1989. I was restless, pregnant for only a few weeks. I took a walk into the Berkeley hills, but I didn't feel right, so I cut the walk short. Five minutes later the house began to shake; so did my body, and the bleeding started. I was numb throughout all the destruction of the Bay Bridge and freeways collapse, fires, and the uncertain whereabouts of my then husband who was taking BART home instead of driving.
I know the legislation did not pass, but my own world is still shaking, and I dare Mr. Schaefer to accept experiencing a similar tragedy. My world was never the same, and the fault lines are still there. There were earthquakes centered in Concord CA this past weekend. I would have felt them. I still do.