Day 48: The silver boots

Hello LBC-ers.

After I left you on my last post on Saturday, I braved the cold, cold weather and went out into Liverpool to meet my friend from work and to showcase my new short fringe on the mean streets. We had a lovely time actually apart from that none of my clothes fitted me and were tight across my back. I realised that I had stealth put on some timber and everything was straining across my arse, chest and waist. Can’t even lose weight in grief!

Liverpool has some fantastic restaurants and nightlife but we settled for some cosy, lo-fi pubs such as The Shipping Forecast, The Grapes (which has stopped doing coconut chocolate stout-gutted!) and we then went to a Vietnamese restaurant on Bold Street called Pho and I had a tofu curry which was really lovely actually. We met a ‘precision hairdresser’ (what even is that?) who complimented my haircut but told me he could “see the flaws” on my “flyaway” hair. Ooh what a charmer! His friends were clearly pissed off with him as he was talking to everyone and not them. We finished in the Jacaranda and I did my usual run for the last train home. I fell over in Liverpool Central station onto my knees (I wasn’t that drunk and I was wearing flat biker boots), however once the laughter subsided of the passers by, a nice man picked me up off the floor and I managed to sound incredibly drunk by saying “‘I’m schorry, I’m just so schurprised Islchlipped over”.  Seriously, I’d only had 1 pint of Oatmeal stout and a couple of bottles of lager. On the way home, I had a lovely email from a blog reader about life, recovery and the ACES. That really lifted my spirits. My husband came to pick me up at the train station and I fell soundly asleep on the settee. There were no baby tears today.

I woke on Sunday with no hangover and thoughts of precision hairdressing. It was snowing!

I had an e-mail telling me I had a delivery from M&S of some clothes and boots I had bought.  I nipped out, picked it up, went to the shops to pick up some things for dinner and then to the gym. I had finished watching Chewing Gum (loved it, by the way) and was watching Catterick, a BBC sitcom by Vic Reeves and Bob Mortimer  whilst on the cross trainer. At our gym, we have a body scanner that measures how fat or how muscly you are. It had been a week since I weighed myself and I had put on 1 kilo (2.2lbs) in a week. No wonder my clothes were tight. I had lost muscle mass and had gained a cubic centimeter of fat in a week. FFS.

I tried on the clothes. One of the things I bought was that M&S dress that everyone is banging on about at the moment, with moons and stars on it, and a red dress. I tried them on. I looked horrendous. In the M&S ‘it’ dress, I looked like a middle aged witch. Thankfully, the silver boots were amazing. The silver boots of redemption. Silver boots don’t care how fat your arse is. The love you unconditionally, like a dog. I put them on with my gym kit and walked around the house. My husband thought I had finally lost it. I put my foot up on his knee on the couch and forced him to look at the boots. I felt he wasn’t impressed as he should be, and so kept them there, until he acknowledged them fully. He was delighted, let me assure you.

The rest of the evening was spent watching Xmas movies, wrapping presents, writing cards and generally getting festive. Burning nice candles and piping hot mugs of lapsang souchong as the ground was freezing outside. I had fulfilled a lot of my ACES today:

Achievement: gym, food shopping, wrapping presents and writing cards

Connection: whatsapping a friend (could have done more to be honest)

Enjoyment: Xmas Movies and watching Catterick

Self Care: smoothie

Today, my ACES haven’t been bad

Achievement: Body pump, cleaned the house, did a wash, had the car cleaned, finished Xmas shopping and writing the blog.

Connection: went to see my mum and dad for tea.

Enjoyment:Judge Judy, cup of lavazza decaff coffee, KIND bar

Self care: charting food consumption with Noom App, smoothie.

Today I received my very first compliment on my skin. The doctor told me they’d be rolling in soon, but I didn’t believe him. I’ll let you know how the Profhilo goes.

 

 

Day 14: The lost days round up

Hey LBC readers

Those eagle of eyed of you will have noticed that I haven’t updated daily like I usually do. This is because I have thrown myself out of the house into the world. It’s not been easy, let me tell you, but what is the alternative? Sitting in the house, thinking about the baby, how I’m crap at everything and wondering how I’m going to get on with my life. That’s the alternative. I know that no amount of hiding in the house is going to make this better. I actually need to start being in life again.

The day after the hospital was a shaky one. I went into Wigan town centre (it’s a smallish local town and a lot more manageable than going into Liverpool city centre to take back a maternity style dress I had bought. I asked my mum to come with me and she and my dad tagged along. I also wanted to buy a nice winter coat, hoping that it would make me feel nice and smart and presentable again. Mum and dad acted like personal shoppers and even though they are in their late sixties-early seventies, they chose a rather nice tan coloured crombie that was actually rather beautiful.

As it was during the day, there were so many young mums out with their infants. I swear I’m being stalked by them. I managed to keep my shit together though and actually not run away from them although I noticed I would stop talking when I saw one.

Mum and Dad tolerated the shopping trip but they seemed desperate to go home. I tried to entreat them to a coffee out but they just wanted to get off. I went home and went to the gym and just did a half hour hill walk watching the last Toast of London. Shit, what comedy am I going to watch now. Suggestions please in the comments section (no I haven’t got Netflix but I do have Sky). Some horrid bitch from school was in the gym so I didn’t stay long.

On the Saturday a lovely friend of mine came to see me. She had a similar experience to me. She found out at the 12 week scan that the baby had died but she had her miscarriage induced by medication whereas mine happened a few days after the scan. It was so lovely to find compassion and understanding in another human who aches like you do. She brought me artisan doughnuts, wrote me a lovely poem in a card and bought me a glass angel to put up in my house to remember the baby by. She is amazing. We went out for lunch and laughed and cried. We called ourselves ‘the miscarriage club’ and looked angrily at the babies and mothers who came into the coffee shop. Unwelcome reminders of our stolen futures.

My friend said she was amazed at how well I seemed to be doing and that at this stage, she still had been unable to leave the house. She expressed concern about me going back to work on Tuesday (am I mad?). We talked about how the loss of a baby leaves you in limbo in so many ways. You don’t know what decisions to make…where will you be? What processes will you be going through? Will a baby ever be in the future, and if not, does that affect what decisions you make now?

Whilst it was so wonderful to see her and feel the warmth of camaraderie, the talk awoke a dormant feeling that I had managed to bury for a few days and once the warmth of her company faded as she drove off, a gnawing ache replaced it. Some of her fears that she spoke of had become my fears. I had lots of complicated feelings. I started pining for the baby again. We both talked about the physical ache in your heart of losing a baby and mine was back with a vengeance. I was in bits again. I sat down with my husband and watched a film. Moonlight Kingdom if you’re wondering. I felt so sad. Sad and lost. I went to bed with podcasts in my ears to try and escape the horrible thoughts.

Sunday morning brought back bad feelings sitting on my chest once more. That horrible feeling that nothing in my life goes right. I lay there for hours. Thinking and thinking and thinking. No good ever comes of this thinking. Why do I still do it? I decided enough was enough and got up and went to the gym. I ran a mile. Probably nothing to some of you but it’s something to me. It was good to be out of the house. It did definitely lift my mood. I watched a comedy called ‘The end of the F***ing world”. Aptly titled. I’m not sure whether I like it. I will persevere. It’s quite dark and I’m not sure lingering in the shadows is good for me at the moment.

When I got home, I put a nice dress on and me and the husband decided to go out for a pub tea. We went to a country pub that have recently been refurbished that neither of us had been to before. When we walked in, I immediately spied Titanic cappuccino stout on draught and that cheered me up. The food had finished, but it was nice to be in a new place that we might come back to. We went to another pub and had some tea and came back and watched Louis Theroux’s film on Scientology and that programme where the engineers have to escape the scene of a disaster. I was tired and slept well. The ache had gone for now. It will be back, I have no doubt.

So today I have been for a facial treatment called Profhilo. It’s meant to take years off you and I feel like that’s what I need at the moment. It was expensive mind. I’m not sure I should be spending like this but I just want to feel better about myself in some way and my face is looking a bit sad and shit. I’m going to go to bodypump for the first time tonight (weights and stuff) which will be hard as I haven’t been there for ages. People will remark upon it and I don’t want to say “well I was pregnant and didn’t want to miscarry, that’s why I didn’t come but I miscarried anyway, so I’m back, mother fuckers!” because it would be a) rude, b) inappropriate and c) too much information. However, I also don’t want to deny what has happened to me, betraying the memory of my baby. “oh I was ill” or “Yeah I went away”. I am changed as a person.

Tomorrow I go back to work. Wish me tons of luck. I will most definitely need it.

P.s Thank you so much for the emails and likes on the blog. You don’t know how much it means to this little lost soul!