On The Big Bang Theory, Melissa Rauch plays Bernadette, who is married to Howard. In real life, Melissa is married to Winston Rauch. The couple recently announced that Melissa is pregnant, which is very exciting news. Unfortunately, it is also terrifying news to Melissa because her last pregnancy ended in miscarriage. Melissa wrote a very thoughtful essay for Glamour discussing all of her heartache surrounding her miscarriage and how it has not only affected her feelings about this pregnancy but also how she sees pregnancy announcements and baby questions in general. The essay is quite long, gut-wrenching and tender with moments of humor. It’s worth reading in it’s entirety but I have excepted a few parts below:
Here is the only statement regarding my pregnancy that doesn’t make me feel like a complete fraud: “Melissa is expecting her first child. She is extremely overjoyed, but if she’s being honest, due to the fact that she had a miscarriage the last time she was pregnant, she’s pretty much terrified at the moment that it will happen again. She feels weird even announcing this at all, and would rather wait until her child heads off to college to tell anyone, but she figures she should probably share this news before someone sees her waddling around with her mid-section protruding and announces it first.”
The miscarriage I experienced was one of the most profound sorrows I have ever felt in my life. It kickstarted a primal depression that lingered in me. The image of our baby on the ultrasound monitor—without movement, without a heartbeat—after we had seen that same little heart healthy and flickering just two weeks prior completely blindsided us and haunts me to this day. I kept waiting for the sadness to lift…but it didn’t. Sure, I had happy moments and life went on, but the heartbreak was always lurking. Inescapable reminders, like the unfulfilled due date, came around like a heavy cloud. A day I had once marked on my calendar with such excitement was now a memorial of a crushed dream. I was constantly wishing that the feeling of being desperately lonely in my own body would dissipate. It didn’t help that I was also fighting against these feelings with thoughts like, “You should be over this by now,” and “People go through a heck of a lot worse, you miserable sad-sack!” (Can you tell that I am awesome at self-compassion?) What I realized, though, is that because this kind of loss is not openly talked about nearly as much as it should be, there really is no template for how to process these emotions. You’re not necessarily going to a funeral or taking time off from work to mourn, but that doesn’t change the fact that something precious has been unexpectedly taken from your life.
“Miscarriage” by the way, deserves to be ranked as one of the worst, most blame-inducing medical terms ever. To me, it immediately conjures up an implication that it was the woman’s fault, like she somehow “mishandled the carrying of this baby.” F that so hard, right in its patriarchal nut-sack. It’s not that a better name would make it less awful to go through. But for a while, my husband and I just started saying to each other—without any judgment or acrimony to the baby, of course—that the baby “bailed” instead.
One of the perks to sadness is the time it gives you to think when you’re somberly staring at a wall. Something that kept coming to mind is how arbitrarily we all talk about baby-making. I know I’ve asked women about their reproducing situation in the past (as most of us unintentionally have at some point or another). It comes from a well-meaning, good place. My hope is that if we as a society become more aware of how common fertility struggles are, perhaps we won’t be so cavalier in questioning females about what’s on their baby agenda. There are so many other things to ask women about other than procreating…ya know, like what we’re wearing. I kid!
Many times in my life I’ve been able to get through difficult situations by reminding myself of the classic adage: “Everything happens for a reason.” But as it turns out—for me, anyway—miscarriage was more of a “this straight-up f*cking sucks” situation. Some things just are. The simple acceptance of this reality actually proved to be the most helpful course of action for me. This was a below sea-level moment amongst the proverbial peaks and valleys of life. There was something very healing about simply acknowledging where I was, rather than trying to completely make sense of it or wrap my head around some cookie-cutter rationale. We all process grief differently. If you are dealing with prenatal loss, I hope you find something, anything, to bring you comfort (whether it’s planting a tree, having a small ceremony, or giving a big double middle finger to the universe). The unknown is a scary place, but it’s also where hope and possibility live. I’m trying as much as I can to embrace the reality of that uncertainty.
I cannot stress enough that I’m doing the essay a disservice but only pulling portions of it. If you are a person who has experienced the pain of a miscarriage, Melissa really does walk through every emotion. They may not be the same that you or someone you know felt, but she hits all the stages. In addition, I think she does a good job illustrating how asking after a person’s “baby-making agenda” could be not just annoying to the couple, but devastating if they are having fertility issues.
I’ve mentioned that I miscarried between my two live births. Melissa’s essay brought up many emotions for me. Because I got pregnant soon after I lost the other baby, there was overlap – as in, I was carrying my daughter during what would have been the third trimester of my lost child. It took passing the due date of the one we lost to overcome the gripping fear that I would lose my daughter as well. Even though we all process differently, there is a comfort in numbers. I think Melissa ends her essay beautifully by saying, “So, to all the women out there who are dealing with fertility issues, have gone through a miscarriage or are going through the pain of it currently, allow me to leave you with this message: You are not alone. And, it is perfectly OK to not be OK right now.” Congratulations to Melissa and Winton. I wish them nothing but the best on this new chapter.
Photo credit: WENN Photos and Instagram
Hecate, thank you so much for this. It will help so many. My daughter, now 24, was the only baby I carried to term. My first baby, my son, I lost when I was 5 months pregnant. He died on the night of a day when I had just heard his heartbeat. I tried again, miscarried at 7 weeks. At 40, after a high risk pregnancy and emergency C-section, I had our daughter, the light of our lives. Although many years have passed and we have been very lucky, I am still sensitive to these issues. It is very hard to enjoy a pregnancy after such events. Those really do rob parents of so many things. I have to say, support groups can be great. My best wishes to anyone experiencing this pain.
I miscarried my first child. I was devastated and so angry. It took a year of trying to finally conceive my daughter, and the range of emotions from the hopefulness of the trying, to the devastation of the failed pregnancy test and then period, to the anger at why it wasn’t happening, the loneliness and isolation of why my body was failing me to the extreme anger at the friends that were announcing their pregnancy are things I will never forgot. Even when we conceived our daughter, at every dr’s apt, my blood pressure would be sky high until I heard the heartbeat. I would tell the doctor to take my BP after because it would go down because my anxiety would be over. I would make deals, I’ll stop being anxious after 12 weeks, then after I feel the baby move, then after 3rd trimester. We also have a good friend that lost a baby when she was 7 months pregnant, so I know of the worst case scenario and lived in fear of that happening. I’ve learned the worry and anxiety never leave, they just take different forms when you are a parent.
Congratulations to Melissa and her family, and big ((hugs)) to all that can relate personally to her story.
My sister in law after struggling for years and several rounds of IVF got pregnant with triplets. She went into labor early and the doctors tried to do everything possible to stop it but she ended up needing an emergency C-section. Two little girls were born prematurely so small they fit in their fathers hand and a little boy was born stillborn. Every year as she celebrates her daughters birthday she also has to deal with the aniverery of her sons death and is heartbreaking to see. She blames herself and I don’t think she will ever fully be okay because as she watches her daughters grow up thier brother will never reach any of those milestones. People also were so heartless telling her that it was good that it happen before she got to know him or at least she has two other children.
A miscarriage is a very sad occurrence. It really can be nature’s way of eliminating a defective pregnancy at least in the first three months. Between 50 and 70 percent of first-trimester miscarriages are thought to be random events caused by chromosomal abnormalities in the fertilized egg. Most often, this means that the egg or sperm had the wrong number of chromosomes, and as a result, the fertilized egg can’t develop normally.
While this is true, please don’t use this explanation as a way to comfort parents who are coping with a miscarriage. It can come across as cold and implies “better dead than disabled”. A simple “I’m sorry ” is best.
*To clarify, I’m not implying that Sabrine is doing this. *
Yes. Another one is “at least you did not really get to know the baby.” There are different types of tragedy, to be sure, but everyone deserves to grieve and have that grief respected.
I know someone whose mother had 7 miscarriages before her. She’s an only child. Miscarriages are devastating, but very common.
This is a topic that needs to be discussed more and I am so glad she wrote it. I too have had issues with loss and infertility with having 2 miscarriages, 1 stillborn at 39 weeks and a failed IVF attempt. It takes a toll on you and I have felt alone. I went on to have twin boys after my second IVF attempt but there isn’t a day that goes by that I don’t think about my miscarriages or the daughter that I lost, she would be 3.5 right now. My heart breaks for anyone that has gone through this.
I miscarried my first baby just as I entered my second trimester. I’ll never forget the fear and sadness we felt. My second pregnancy was nerve wracking, to say the least. Every little twinge sent me into panic mode. That was over thirty years ago. I wish her the very best.
My mum miscarried 3 times before she had me – at 1 month, at 5 months and at 9 months (this last one almost killed her, in every sense of the word). She remembers all of them, particularly what she was doing at the moment it happened. I wish the best to everyone going through this.
Not seeing the heartbeat on the fetal monitor is heartbreaking. It just makes you so scared, that you question everything when pregnant again.
Thank you for covering this. My mother had 2 before successfully having me and I myself have some illnesses that will likely prevent ever having a child, if my pituitary problem hasn’t already made me infertile. Even though I believe I don’t want children, the mere concept of choosing between essentially my life or a child devastated me because I lost the choice. It still hurts me to hear friends talk about how in a few years everyone will start having kids because I won’t be able to.
Few people even know about the problem, even my family doesn’t, so it hurts to be asked when kids will happen or told I will change my mind about it. Reading this mirrored a lot of my grief over my loss of choice.
My best wishes to you.
I have miscarried too, just reading these posts is making me tear up.
the german word is “fehlgeburt”, which means mis-birth. a birth that went horribly wrong, so to say. i hate the word miscarriage, for the reasons mentioned above.
I miscarried my first on my 26th birthday. Gave birth to my only child a week after my 27th birthday. Because my mother miscarried 7 times between my brother and I, we did not tell anyone I was pregnant the second time until I was 6 months along. Started vomiting about 5 minutes after conception with the second, which was a give away to many I worked with, but they never said anything out loud, until I did. The depression was bad and my heart still breaks for anyone who went thru this.