Joelle

The time has come for me to process.

After chatting about it with my friend Christina yesterday and my midwife today . . . the time has come.

I don't know. Many may frown and furl their eyebrows at me and tell me that I am sharing something way to personal.

But I wonder. Is it really too personal?

The fact is that two weeks ago I miscarried. There I said it. Wrote it. And tears are in my eyes.

I wasn't that far along. But it was still a life.

She was a life. Joelle was a life.

Some of you have read my words and not known what to say to me the past two weeks. I did barf on my blog and all.

Others have seen me in person . . . told me to smile, walked away to get something to avoid my melancholy demeanor, and others are speechless. You caught me in the rare moment that I unfolded my heart before your ears.

Still others have bought me gifts, sought to find the right words, babysat my children, folded my laundry, and prayed for me in the wee hours of the morning.

Thank you.

I have tried to figure out why this whole idea of miscarriage carries such secrecy to me. Why, for two weeks, have I only told a handful of people? Why am I embarrassed to share how my heart hurts?

I guess I feel stupid. Joelle, and yes . . . I named my unborn baby (I think it is a healthy response), existed for a short time and is gone. I feel no anger towards God. Guiltily perhaps I feel a little relief? Our home is busy with three boys, homeschooling, AWANA, an addicted blogger, crazy amounts of fermenting, and lots of sewing.

I guess I didn't want to turn my loss into a publicity stunt for attention or awkward conversations. I have been the elephant in the room recently. . . and didn't want to turn into a mammoth. My friends and even people who aren't my friends didn't have to even ask to know that something was seriously wrong with me. There hasn't been any joy on my face for a while now.

And to be honest I still feel silly sharing . . . because she would have been only 4 weeks into her life. Not much time at all.

Heck, I didn't even know that I was pregnant until I was miscarrying. I so don't want to go through that again.

So it seems dumb to me to be upset about Joelle when I didn't even know about her life until her death.

But . . . it happened. I experienced a miscarriage. I had no idea what women went through. I can so understand the emptiness . . . the sadness . . . the loss.

If you see me, just say "Hi" to me. Don't walk on eggshells. Yea, I'm hormonal. My son just gave up nursing and I miscarried all in the same week. That is a lot of adjusting for my body to tackle. My thyroid isn't working at top performance . . . and all I want to do is eat crap food. Not very granola, I know.

Explore with me . . . why do we as a culture keep a miscarriage hush hush? Maybe I can write an article for Mothering Magazine about this.