PgAL anxiety is different than normal worrying

Warning: parts of this blog post are graphic. You might want to skip the paragraph that begins, "while I am absolutely sure..."
 
I have to write about PgAL anxiety. Because I have been feeling it very strongly over the past 4 to 5 days, and I know it's only going to get worse leading up to the moment when we (hopefully) hear/see the heartbeat on Friday.

There have been three people over the past 10 days who I have found to be very condescending about what it feels like to be pregnant after a loss. (My mother, a friend of nearly 30 years, and my primary care doctor.) All three of them have at least one child, but have never suffered a loss. When I have tried to talk to them about how anxious I am right now, they have said something similar to "wait until you have the baby, you never stop worrying."

While I am absolutely sure that is true, it is such a patronizing comment. Especially coming from people who have never experienced a loss. Never been sitting in doctor's offices while nurses and techs search and search for a heartbeat, and then tell you that your dates might be off, you might not be far along as you think you are -- which by the way, is physically impossible unless you can get a positive pregnancy test a week BEFORE you are pregnant. Never had to argue with them and pull out your ovulation calendar and point out when you went into their office to have the pregnancy confirmed. Never had a doctor give your husband false hope that it might turn out ok, when you absolutely know for certain that it's not ok. And then wait two agonizing days, knowing that your baby is no longer alive inside of you, just to prove to him and to the doctors that you are not wrong about your dates. They have never had to shove pills up their vaginas to cause the physical part of the miscarriage. They have never caught a gestational sac and tiny baby in their hands as they miscarry. And then have to go through the agonizing decision of what to do with what you've just caught. How can you possibly flush it down the toilet?

They might have had normal worries related to pregnancy, childbirth, parenting, ones that I am sure I will have. Will my baby be healthy? Happy? Etc. But they were never stripped of the joy of the first weeks of pregnancy, unable to be happy or celebrate until they hear that heartbeat. Feeling emotionally detached for 3.5 weeks after finding out that they were pregnant.

Normal feelings of worry are not the same as PgAL anxiety.  

I know that I do not know yet what it feels like to actually have a child. But to say that to me, knowing that my first child was supposed to be born in August, does not make me feel better. Do I really have to tell you how insensitive it is to say that? And I am certain that I will find a whole new set of things to worry about later on. But for now, I am living in this place of intense anxiety, every single minute of every single day. Sometimes I think I am literally going to go crazy.

If you haven't been here, please don't patronize people who have been.