Radlab0's recent node made me remember and cry once more 22 years later but that's a good thing. I like to remember him. At the time I was already the happy mommy of a healthy toddler and I remember thinking how much worse this would feel if I lost not only my baby but my role, my new persona of "mother". We wanted more children but this pregnancy was a tad earlier than "ideal". Still, it was welcomed if not planned.
Son L. was a nursing toddler and despite my knowledge that this was nonsense I went on to wean him against his wishes fearing my next effort at pregnancy might end the same way if I was "still" breastfeeding. I STILL regret that mistake. We also had a vacation planned and I feared I would miscarry during but didn't quite. The signs of trouble had been building. There was a horrible flight across country with a toddler in my lap while bleeding and cramping but the toilet flush happened in my own home.
Speaking of degraded tissues...I'd "known" on some level that this pregnancy had problems all along. The doctor and the tests said I was NOT pregnant far longer than seemed reasonable to me. I knew I was and insisted on repeat tests until I got the confirmation.
This, by the way, set me up I think for a 10 year habit of not trusting my own knowledge about what was happening in my body. Strange, since I was actually correct all along. I was pregnant again in 3 months. This time totally intentionally. Son J. was the precious product of that.
But Son D. was his own little self. I never felt J. was a replacement of D. I did however feel J.'s pregnancy lasted a year or more! I might have felt that way anyhow...his birth was mid August and in Washington humidity while 9 months pregnant one's sense of time warps.
He came to me once in a dream and I knew his name was David.