New York Baby

The last time I was in New York, it was so brief. 

In January, Scott and I went to Chile for three weeks mostly trekking and exploring the Patagonia region. We crossed the border into Argentina’s Tierra del Fuego for a few days and spent another few days in Santiago and Valparaiso. On our flight back to Juneau, we took a long way home, stopping in New York for three nights to see my mom.

She had downsized from a town house to an apartment since the last time we were in New York and I was tasked with moving my stuff, which had accumulated over years and years, out of her space for good. In every imaginable storage space she could find in her home were mementos of practically every stage of my life - report cards from grade school; binders and folders of stories and assignments I’d written in elementary school through college; old programs from Steffi Nossen dance performances; shoeboxes of letters I received at sleep away camp, then letters from friends I met at camp, letters I received in college, in Hong Kong; Leonardo DiCaprio collages; mixed tapes; Absolut Vodka ads; posters that lined my college dorms of Dave Matthews Band, U2, Klimt’s The Kiss; souvenirs from faraway countries. Most I threw away, some went into boxes that Scott took to Goodwill and some I took back with me to Alaska, too precious to part with.

What also went with me to Alaska were items that my mom wanted to give me - scarves she never wore, clothes she had bought me, a nice cooking pan, and a baby.

It’s a stuffed toy baby doll with a plastic head, hands and feet. It was wrapped delicately in a dish towel (that my mom also gave me). As she unwrapped it, she said, “I also want you to take this back with you.”

I had a miscarriage April of last year. It was terrible. I wrote about it only once - a poem that I wrote the night I found out. I knew I had to write something to mark it somehow. Earlier that day, I had gone to the doctor’s office in Juneau to get an ultrasound and the tech had told me at the end - after being silent for most of the process - that the pregnancy wasn’t viable; there was no heartbeat. I had to get on a plane an hour and a half later to attend the Alaska Press Club in Anchorage, which I had been looking forward to. Scott stopped by the airport so I could tell him what happened, and then I boarded the plane with other public radio colleagues who had no idea with had just happened to me. 

For three days I threw myself into workshops and press club events, accepted awards for my work, eased myself back into drinking and didn’t tell anyone about my miscarriage. I was among colleagues, but not good friends; it wouldn’t have been appropriate to have said something. In hindsight, that Press Club was the best thing I could’ve done after what had happened. I was surrounded by people and endless distraction. On the Saturday night of the award ceremony, everyone went out and I danced like I’d never danced before.

I was sad for a few weeks and didn’t start to feel better until I told a friend who I knew had gone through a miscarriage as well. Hearing her story again, years after it happened when I could finally understand it, made mine more bearable.

I had to have a procedure to finish the miscarriage - it wasn't happening on its own. It was my first time missing work for a “medical” reason. It was my first time on prescription painkillers. When the procedure was done and the nurse asked if I wanted to see it - the dead thing that was just inside me - I did, and cried. I was in a haze for the rest of that sunny May day, sitting outside, pulling a few weeds, but mostly useless.

It amazes me that a year has passed since then. I didn't tell my mom at the time that it happened, but several months later.

My mother wanted to give me the baby because she was sure it would bring me good luck. When a cousin had multiple miscarriages, she hung a poster of a baby on her wall, and then had a healthy pregnancy.

When I finally said, “Okay, I’ll take it with me,” my mother beamed, looked at the baby and said, “Isn’t she cute? She kind of looks like Scott.” And she laughed, and I had to laugh as well.

What I didn't tell my mom during that baby exchange was that I was likely pregnant. I had felt feverish for a couple days while trekking in Chile and nauseous on bus rides. When Scott brought up the possibility of being pregnant, I angrily brushed off the idea. But when we got to New York, a month had passed since I last got my period. Pregnancy tests that Scott picked up on his morning walk around my mom’s new neighborhood showed positive results. I was pregnant. But I didn't tell my mom. Instead, I turned away offers of wine at dinner, saying I was feeling sick, which I was.

The baby made the journey from New York to Juneau in a tote and remained packed. Some days after we returned home, I started bleeding. Just like the last time. Scott was away on a work trip. Just like the last time. I was positive I was miscarrying. I went to the doctor the next day and I was shocked when the ultrasound screen revealed a flashing heartbeat, something I have never seen during my first pregnancy. A heart beat.

That night, I unpacked the baby. I needed all the luck I could get.

On Wednesday, I’ll be 20 weeks.