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Just Need to Talk to Someone
Female/27
I just found out some terrible news. My sister just had a miscarriage. This sucks! There aren't words bad enough to express how much this sucks! I didn't even know she was pregnant and apparently she and her husband were planning on telling everyone Thanksgiving.
I feel sooooooo bad. Since my sister's the first born, I feel like she's always been the golden child while I'm the family f<€# up. My mom's always been closer to me and my maternal grandparents were too, but everyone else (my dad included) just obsesses over my sister and ignores me.
I thought the only way my dad would care as much about my kids as he did about my sister's was if I gave him his first grandchild(ren). My sister's kids would have points already just for being HER kids. I actually HOPED that I would have children before she did. Then I realized how stupid that was, that I shouldn't turn it into a race, and that I should be happy for her if she got pregnant. Believe me, I know how stupid and petty I was being now, but I feel bad for having EVER felt that way.
I realized that her getting pregnant would be an amazing thing. She'd be a great mom, I'd LOVE being an aunt, and I've recently grown to appreciate babies a lot more than I used to. My cousins each have babies (a ten month old and a one month old) and they're adorable.
I don't even know what to say right now. My paternal grandmother's going to be at thanksgiving and she's a horrible, horrible grandmother and kind of a cold hearted person. She's got her grandkids listed from favorite to least favorite and my sister and I are at the bottom of the list. Every time she gets a new great grandchild, we move down one space. She's always peeing all over everything we do, rubbing it in our face when something bad happens to us, and comparing us to our cousins. She's mean enough to say something very cruel about the miscarriage. She'll bring it up during dinner, blame it on my sister somehow, or talk about how my cousins managed to have the families they wanted without having a miscarriage.
My maternal granddad has no idea. We haven't told him because we haven't had a chance, but we might never tell him because he's old, in bad health, and might not be able to handle it. My aunt and uncle had a miscarriage when he was a lot younger and healthier and my mom says that it was the only time she ever saw him cry.
My dad's gonna be crazy upset. He doesn't know yet and my sister doesn't know that I know. She told my mom and my mom told me. I was in the room when my mom got the call and I could tell what happened from what was being said. She told me to act surprised when my sister told me and I don't know if I can do that. What I'm I gonna say? We're a Christian family and some people find it comforting to hear that their loved ones are in a better place, while others find it to be a slap in that face. I understand either way. When my maternal grandmother died, it helped to hear that she was in Heaven, but she was old, had a good life, and had been sick for quite a while. When it's a child, I understand people not liking hearing that their child's in Heaven because they'd rather have them here.
Now I'm afraid to have kids before she does. I was thinking about starting a family very, very soon. I'm a little older than some are when they have their first child and there are reasons I may not want to be pregnant many times, but yet I want a big family. Because of that, I was considering using fertility drugs and trying for twins. I would protect my children with my life, but I'd feel REALLY sorry for my sister if I ended up with two healthy kids before she had one. Especially if this happened to her again. I was starting to pick out names, thinking about everything they'd need, wondering if it'd be a good idea to hire a nanny, and now this.
This makes me realize how lucky some people are. My parents had two healthy kids, my grandparents had three healthy kids, my cousin just had a second child, no one in my family other than my sister and aunt has had a miscarriage that I know of. Some people are a LOT luckier than they know. I've heard of people who WANTED children and who KNEW what they were getting themselves into whining about their baby after it was born. They all like, "I love my baby, but I resent him for ruining my social life." Or "I love my baby, but I resent him for intruding on my time with his older sister." I actually hear that one a lot and as a second born, it deeply offends me. People call their second born child as an intruder in the family and one man contemplated leaving his family out of resentment towards his baby. Now it offends me for an entirely different reason. Those people have NO, absolutely NOT ONE SHRED OF AN IDEA of how lucky they are.
Any advice on how to deal with my first niece or nephew being miscarried or, most importantly, how to help my sister through this? I need to help my parents through it as well. My mom's very upset and my dad will be when he finds out (he hasn't been home since we got the news). One more thing, I should probably add that my sister tried to call me first, but I felt like s#!± this afternoon and put my phone on silent so I could rest. How do I apologize for this? Also, I'm sorry about the length of this question. I didn't realize how much I needed to vent.
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Here's something that is practical, go to your local bookstore and ask if they have any books to help with grieving. Grieving has a step by step process that every human has to go through, no matter what they are grieving, loss of a loved one, unborn baby, loss of job, etc...
If a person stays stuck in one place or tries to skip over any one of the parts, they will not heal. With your family being Christian, I can see not wanting to go through the anger stage because one may feel guilty like they are being angry at God. Just remember there is a place for anger, Jesus had a couple of occasions where he showed it, like with money changers at the temple. Even if you all have dealt well without the help of a book in the past when grandma died, it's different for the loss of a child for a parent. Support for sister can be as simple as simply hanging out with her and being company. All the comforting words you can think of will likely make no difference in taking away their pain. So suggesting they plan a trip to get away as a diversion was a good suggestion. If they can't afford a long fancy trip to some exotic location, even a bed and breakfast somewhere near enough to your area would be a good idea. Perhaps all the rest of family pitching in, contacting a place, paying for a gift card for a 2 or 3 day stay and giving it to them to go do when they're ready might be nice. And no matter what, just keep asking God to help their hearts heal.
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I'm sorry that your sister had age miscarriage. While it is hard to hear and even harder to justify; there are times that a miscarriage is better than some of the alternatives. It is generally accepted that a miscarriage happens because there is something wrong with the embryo and to carry the embryo to term is wrong as it will be horribly malformed and may not live outside the womb. So the body rejects it. IT is not your sisters’ fault or her husbands and it is not as your grandmother might say Gods punishment for something she may have done wrong. Science says otherwise.
If she miscarried and she did so in a hospital then pathology was done; standard procedure for all human tissue coming from an OR. If you really want to know why the miscarriage happened the pathologist might have the reason. My advice is to stay ignorant of the science as it will not help. It happened, the next step is for your sister is to see her GYN and have a complete physical. Wait until the doctors says okay to try again and then do so. She needs to keep her wait up and to eat properly, stop smoking if she is a smoker and no coffee or tea while pregnant.
As for what you can do. You need to be her best support. You could head of grandma and her vile comments before she has a chance to say anything to your sister. In this instance it is okay to make whatever type threat needed to protect your sister. As you put you can't be held in any less esteem by her than you already are so if a threat is needed to keep grandma in line by all means use an appropriate one, just not one that would be of physical harm to her.
Be there to supportive of your parents too. As you will find out when you have children of your own; when your child or children hurt you hurt. You want to take the pain away even if it means being in pain yourself. This is parenting.
Being supportive means helping them get past this, your sister included. It could mean maybe a girls say out somewhere like a day spa for the three of you. Maybe a shopping trip for three with a nice lunch thrown in, anything that helps them take their mind of this and you two. You would be surprised how doing some normal things help ease the pain. The object is to get them out of the house where they sit around feeling sorry for themselves and you too.
You might recommend to your sister and brother in-law to take a vacation if affordable. A nice change of scenery is also helpful. It might be nice to do so when the doctor says it is okay to start trying to have a baby. A nice relaxing vacation may just be the key to a quick conception.
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