Abstract
Dear Doctor,
1
I did not choose you.
You were in the office the day my body told me my fetus was dead,
the day the receptionist finally let me past the gate to receive the help the body needed,
not even a band-aide for the soul, left out in the parking lot to pace the black top unceasingly until that time I could grab her hand and flee the sterile premises, and sanctuary for sanitary, sanitized, deliverers of death.
You joke pathologically, pathetically. I am so sick I can merely nod along weakly, while wondering what is this need to joke?
I will be operated on by You, Doctor, who when introduced greets me in falsetto and my husband in a deep fake voice.
“THIS IS THE WAY WE MEN MUST SPEAK TO EACH OTHER,” you say.
Low humor over a woman’s body and a fetus’ corpse by the one charged to recall “there is art to medicine as well as science, . . . warmth, sympathy, and understanding may outweigh the surgeon’s knife . . .”
I hate you, Doctor.
I hope, one day,
I can stop . . .
this month
2
my baby lost life
later I nearly lost mine
this is the story your stories my story
Hi Ladies, I just need to let this out somewhere
infertility journey a rollercoaster of emotions IVF RE PG fighting endometriosis laparoscopic hormonal painful trials Clomid! doctor cautioned chances ectopic pg higher
pregnant SURPRISE! cautious didn’t believe it started to sink in cautiously optimistic so excited
doc ultrasound drs US tech the doc reviewed images
anxiously awaiting heartbeat exhausted vomiting pain none of the joy waited so long
Honey, it hurts; Honey, not tonight; Honey, I need yet another procedure done.
what’s up with this stuff brown discharge nothing too heavy no blood dutifully consulted book again
decided to take myself to ER pelvic exam haunt[s] screamed from pain palpitated whimpering horrible didn’t realize morphine dull ache vaginal ultrasound abnormalities radiologist verdict ultrasound right fallopian tube ruptured belly full of blood
in ER excruciating pain diagnosed ruptured ectopic emergency surgery significant abdominal pain confirmed ectopic rushed into surgery my God rushed to a room surgeon came in blood drawn morphine given through the haze it’s ectopic hemorrhaging badly operate now
incision in my belly button, another small one to the right lower ab. about a 2-inch incision on my pubic bone that is where everything was pulled out of it’s the one that hurts. only removed the tube
Why?
heartache losing my baby loss so beaten down physically weak emotionally broken
I can’t drive I can’t run I can’t lift over 15 lbs
FURIOUS pathology reports hospital tests confirmed baby was ectopic never anything in uterus doc missed it nearly killed me
A Methodological Foot Note on Poetry and Pain
Recently, in an attempt to support a graduate student’s efforts to work for female students’ rights on campus I went to a session she had organized on THE PSYCHOLOGICAL IMPACT OF PREGNANCY. Between the official function form I needed approved to buy refreshments, shopping for paper supplies, and ordering pizza, I somehow neglected to think this topic over or I would never have been there, perched on a loveseat, fingernails piercing the palm of my hand, stiff Southern smile in place, while sweat creeps down my back. While I write in the area of infertility, loss, pregnancy, and mothering (Lahman, 2008, 2009a, 2009b, 2011) I find myself verbally uncomfortable, even inarticulate, around this subject with a room full of beautiful fecund bellies and want to be mothers weighing out their choices. “Shall I get the doctoral degree or have a baby”? “Can I do both?” I pinch myself hard to keep from crying out or maybe crying. My thoughts weigh down on me, an albatross, omen of foreboding perched on my shoulder. I don’t want to share. I am struck by the irony that in the privacy of my office I have been drifting in the nightmare of recollection of ectopic pregnancy for weeks. I have been rewriting, revisioning a series of poems I wrote when I was close to my ectopic pregnancy, now over nine years old. I have been delving into others’ nightmares via the Internet sifting through old stories of pain, death, blood, disbelief, trying to create an archival poem with a collective voice. I want to bring these voices and my voice to the forefront. I dedicate these poems to graduate students considering motherhood and the women whose stories lay in the Internet gathering dust. I hope I have dusted them off in a manner that honors the narratives and the lives of their unborn children.
Footnotes
Declaration of Conflicting Interests
The author(s) declared no potential conflicts of interest with respect to the research, authorship, and/or publication of this article.
Funding
The author(s) received no financial support for the research, authorship, and/or publication of this article.