Pregnancy after loss has shown me that love doesn’t end – it just changes shape | Lauren Farrugia

Being pregnant after loss is filled with contradictions. It’s hope that feels cautious, prefer it may dissolve in case you breathe too exhausting. It’s studying to dwell once more inside a physique that remembers grief.I’m now formally in my third trimester, and every day brings small indicators of life: a flutter, a roll, a hiccup, the regular rhythm of his coronary heart. I’m rising a child I’ll meet, maintain and lift. However I’ve additionally carried a child I by no means obtained to satisfy. For 13 weeks, my physique held her. It nurtured her, protected her, grew her placenta, nonetheless believing she was protected. And in a manner, she was. My husband informed me then: “She solely ever knew love and heat”, and that has by no means left me.That first being pregnant made me a mom. It modified how I moved via the world, my sense of self, and the way I understood love; the type that expands quietly and invisibly into areas of your coronary heart that you simply didn’t know have been there earlier than. After we discovered her coronary heart had stopped, it was as if mine did too, no less than for some time. My physique continued to carry her, to like her, even in dying. It’s known as a “missed miscarriage”: the physique holds on to and continues to nurture a child whose coronary heart has stopped beating. There was each cruelty and luxury in that: that my physique didn’t fail her, however couldn’t save her both.Being pregnant after loss means dwelling in parallel timelines; one the place life was interrupted, and one other the place it continuesThe day I introduced her into the world was in contrast to something I’d recognized. As a part of the medical administration of a “missed miscarriage”, I selected to take medicine to assist my physique carry my child into the world. I used to be at residence with simply my husband, guided solely by waves of intense ache that rose and fell till they broke. It felt like labour, although nobody known as it that, and it feels unfair to take action. The world would mark this as a miscarriage; a medical phrase for one thing that felt each sacred and insufferable. I introduced her into the world via ache and love. She got here quietly, and the world moved on. However I didn’t.In the present day, a 12 months later, I’ll stroll via the identical hospital corridors, this time carrying a child whose coronary heart beats robust. I’ll carry him into the world surrounded by help, recognition and celebration. It will likely be known as my “first start”, although that doesn’t really feel fully true. I’ve already laboured as soon as earlier than, simply with out witnesses, and in a manner that has no title and isn’t spoken about in society. This being pregnant feels each acquainted and international; my physique is aware of the trail, however it additionally remembers the place it led final time.There’s a unusual dissonance to carrying new life when you may have recognized loss. Each appointment appears like each a promise and a take a look at. Each heartbeat heard via the Doppler appears like a small miracle and a reminder of how fragile miracles may be. Love is not easy; it’s layered with reminiscence, stitched with what-ifs and almosts.Individuals say issues like “it was meant to be” however I can’t maintain that thought comfortably. She was meant to be. And so is he. One doesn’t erase or justify the opposite. Each have which means. Each are mine. I’ve discovered that grief and love can coexist, not as opposites however as two currents working in the identical river.Typically I take into consideration how love modifications form. My love for her hasn’t pale; it’s deepened into one thing quieter, a pulse beneath all the pieces. As my love for him grows, I discover myself wanting to guard the house that belongs to her. They aren’t the identical, and but they’re eternally related; two tales written throughout the identical physique.Being pregnant after loss means dwelling in parallel timelines; one the place life was interrupted, and one other the place it continues. It means pleasure tinged with worry, gratitude tangled with guilt, and hope that feels hard-won. It means understanding that love just isn’t measured by end result.Each of my infants have modified me. One taught me love with out certainty. The opposite teaches me hope once more. I carry them each – one in reminiscence, one in motion – and so they each belong fully to me. Lauren Farrugia is a medical psychologist with a PhD in psychology