Semantics

Subtle differences in the way two people might say a thing when they (think they) both mean the same thing can make a world of difference. Warning -- this post is not about food.

Losing a pregnancy could, I'm convinced, break just about anyone. Having a miscarriage when you don't yet have any children is, from the mouths of many psychologists, on a whole other level. Having the pretty rare experience of miscarrying after the 12th week of pregnancy brings it to yet another level, especially if you've already "seen" the baby kicking and waving and swimming around on an ultrasound, and been told that it looks "just fine". A whole new form of debilitating grief is introduced if you've had unusual family losses before.

What I didn't need, in other words, was for the handling of my miscarriage in the emergency room to become a case study for Linköping's university hospital's doctors, nurses and students on how not to treat a patient.

During our meeting with the head of the emergency clinic, we were assured that nothing was acceptable about the way I was treated when I came in in the middle of the night, 17 weeks pregnant, in excruciating pain and dripping with blood. I shouldn't have been told to wait, I shouldn't have had to pass a dead child out into a toilet because no one was helping me, I shouldn't have been treated rudely, as though I was disrupting someone's otherwise peaceful night, and my husband and I definitely shouldn't have had to see our baby flushed down a toilet, in front of our eyes.

We should have been helped immediately, we were assured, without waiting or taking a damn queue number. We should have been treated delicately, with regard shown to the loss that still had us in shock. We should have been asked if we wanted to hold our baby, know what sex it was, give it a name and a burial, and been asked if we wanted an autopsy done.

These assurances, I assume, are meant to make me feel better. They show me that they agree with me about my treatment being unacceptable. They tell me that it's good that I wrote letters to all the essential persons, because now they can prevent this sort of thing from happening again. They insist that I shouldn't for a moment expect that this would happen again the next time I'm pregnant and if, god forbid, I come in to the ER for a similar reason. They tell me that my story is so shocking that they can barely believe their ears and they are ashamed. We do not accept this kind of behavior from our staff, and only a fraction of a percent of the time do things go wrong. The ER's resident gynecologist was there as well, also assuring me that I should see my late miscarriage as a freak coincidence; it happened "for no reason" and "next time everything will most likely go just fine."

I sit there in the office of the ER chief, shaking and sobbing and hyperventilating from having to return to "the scene of the crime," staring at the little paper cups and juice that she's set out for our little meeting. I hear these assurances and reassurances and assistances that the behavior of one of her employees is shockingly unacceptable, but I am not reassured. What I hear is this:

"The vast majority of our patients are treated with care and professionalism. The vast majority of pregnancies go to term. The vast majority of miscarriages are the result of random chromosomal errors and happen before the 12th week. For some reason, you are in none of these cases in the vast majority."

And I wonder what that reason is. I feel worthless and wonder what it is about me that puts me among the chosen one tenth of one percent.

---

Today Fredrik and I drove to the grocery store. I was driving, as I'm practicing to get my license. I made a mistake entering a roundabout, Fredrik freaked out a bit, and I, already on the emotional edge the last few days, burst into tears. We sat in the parking lot for a good deal of time, me totally broken down and taking choppy breaths through uncontrollable sobbing. Fredrik held me and said:

"You don't deserve the things that have happened to you."

And I agree. I feel just a little proud and strong and give the universe, and that nurse, the finger.