I sob as Dex fills out paperwork. Hiccup and wail as he somehow completes all the medical questionnaires about me correctly without having to ask me for any of the answers. I can’t even see past my own tears to hold the pen.And how the fuck does he know that I’m allergic to penicillin?
Then some blurry figure takes us through a door to a room full of soft colors and music, where Therapist Kathleen Swanson introduces herself in an easy, compassion-filled tone. I want to walk right back out, but I don’t. I just whirl around and stare at Dex and Dex stares back at me. And then this thought comes slamming into my head. Most of my life Karma has whipped my ass but sometimes it has brought people into my life who seem to know just what I need at the very moment I need it, but in this very instant I’m the one that’s actually standing between the person and what Ineedto do to help myself. It’s like I’m cockblocking myself from happiness.
“I’m right beside you. You’re not alone,” Dex says, bringing my hand up to his lips to kiss my knuckles softly. “This isn’t going to be pretty or perfect. This is going to be a struggle, so let’s figure this out together.”
I slowly spin back around and find a comfortable spot on the couch across from this Kathleen Swanson person. I clasp my hands together on my lap, my back pin straight. Dex sits next to me.
“Let’s have you start today by telling us how you feel,” Kathleen says. And I want to scream and tear at my hair and rip it all out. My heart constricts and my lungs pinch and there’s so much inside me that I choke on all the words and they come out in silent gut-wrenching tears.
Kathleen nods and waits.
“There’s more sadness inside me than I ever thought possible,” I whisper. Next to me, Dex grabs one of my hands and entwines his fingers through mine. His touch warms my skin and I think,this was his baby too. We both lost something and then we lost each other.
And then it’s like a dam breaks open inside my chest and I just spill everything that I’d been holding in and away from him since it happened. “Why am I breathing and my baby isn’t? Why did it have to happen? What did I do wrong? There’s a roller coaster of emotions running through me at all times. Numbness. Disbelief. Anger. Guilt. Sadness. I can’t concentrate. I can’t do anything really,” I sniffle. “Yes, the pregnancy ended early, and yes I had no idea there was a little living life inside me. But for the split second before the doctor told me I lost the baby, there was this future I saw. One with me and Dex and this precious little baby in our arms. Then he ripped the image out of head,” I make a violent ripping gesture with my hands. “And he left an open bleeding hole in my chest. Then he poured salt all over it by telling me because of what my body did, I’d now only have a fifty percent chance of having a living, breathing child.”
I turn my body toward Dex and squeeze his hands tightly. “And that entire time you were grieving over a baby that wasn’t even yours. When I told you I didn’t feel well when I saw you and Stephanie at dinner, you came to me and told me not to tell you I was pregnant too. And then I woke up in a fucking hospital.” I’m crying so hard, snot runs down my face. “At first I was in denial. Shock. I thought, this couldn’t be happening to me. I wasn’t pregnant. They made a mistake. Then I thought maybe, maybe the baby is still inside me and it could be healthy, and then I got angry. Not just mad, but full of fury and rage. I was so angry at…” I swallow back the words.
“At who?” Kathleen asks.
“At Dex. I felt like he let it happen. I know saying it out loud right now it doesn’t make any sense. But,” I turn my head to Dex and hiccup, “I lost your baby.”
The rest of the hour was intense and emotional. I cried and screamed and so did Dex. I’d never seen a man as strong and tough as Dex break down so fully before. Something about our shared anguish made me feel less alone. Less hopeless.
At the end of our hour, Kathleen spoke softly to the both of us. “It’s neither your fault nor his. As hard as it is to hear, losing a baby to miscarriage is a natural occurrence. And when something goes wrong, we as humans all stretch to find someone or something to blame it on. But with your miscarriage, there’s no fault there. Now you’re left grasping for some way to get it to make sense to you and you just end up feeling confused with misplaced anger and guilt.”
She talks about healing and taking the time we need. She schedules us to come in three times a week to talk with her, and I’m okay with that. I think I do need it. I think Dex was right. I have been mentally pissing green.
When the session is over, we walk back to my apartment in silence. He even rides the elevator up with me and brings me to my door. “What about us, Jane? Me and you?” he asks, before he says goodbye.
“You just did that all for me,” I whisper, more to myself than to him.
“Of course I did. You’re hurting.” He takes a step closer to me and swipes a strand of hair off my forehead and tucks it behind my ear. “I can’t deal with you thinking I don’t want you any longer or that I stopped loving you. Asking me to stop loving you is like asking if I can stop breathing. I can’t. And I’ve been wracking my brain on how to bring you back to yourself, how I could help you get through this.”
“Can we take things slow? I’m a bit terrified.”
“As slow as you want,” he says, leaning forward to kiss my forehead. “Call me when you want to talk, it’s okay if you don’t. I’ll let you figure out the right pace, okay? But, I’ll definitely see you Tuesday night for our next session with Kathleen?”
“Yeah, Dex. Absolutely.”
I spend the next twenty-four hours on my couch writing the story of the last few months of my life starting from that warm day last fall at a baseball game where a kiss cam made me fall in love with the wrong man. Gail calls me twenty-seven times and I ignore every voicemail and text she leaves. I email a sample column of the story to Metro, and fifty-six minutes after I pressed send, their editor-in-chief calls me up himself offering me a job.
Twenty thousand more a year than I made atUPCLOSE, and complete artistic control over all my columns and articles. And a heck of a lot more benefits than I’ve ever had before.
After an entire day without Dex, I pick up my phone and reopen the Misanthrope app and visit Match 1’s profile. His bio picture is finally clear. It’s one I took of him when we first started dating; he’s wearing a white T-shirt and jeans, flexing his muscles.
Jane:Wow. Your picture is finally clear.
Match 1: Yours is clear as well.
Jane: There’s just one problem.
Match 1: What’s that?
Jane: You can’t really tell what I’m wearing in my picture.
Match 1: Why? What are you wearing?
Jane: Just an old college jersey.
