28 days later

It's been four weeks. Incredibly, my period showed up today, almost right on time (usually I have 26-day cycles). I'm surprised only because I thought my body would take longer to kick back into gear. But no, we're back in business, earlier than I'd expected.

Here are a few random thoughts:

1. Overall, I recovered from the D&C very easily. However, my breasts were still really tender for five days afterward, and I didn't feel like myself (read: not pregnant) for about a week.
2. I read and intend to post a review of Rebecca Walker's new book Baby Love: Choosing Motherhood After a Lifetime of Ambivalence. The summary: this book annoyed me. More, hopefully, on that later.
3. I have a few new phrases in my vocabulary. They include, "my first miscarriage," "the second time I was pregnant," "my second D&C," and, my favorite, "I am down two pregnancies and three embryos."
4. Today in Whole Foods I really enjoyed pushing past an extremely fertile woman (two babies under the age of 2) in order to grab three boxes of tampons. Fun!
5. On the bright side, I have lately enjoyed tuna, tequila, and running. I have stopped taking all vitamins. I have painted my toenails with abandon, done a shoulder stand in yoga without caring, and bought clothes without worrying that soon, they may not fit.
6. On the less bright side, I have still not returned to my pre-pregnancy (#2) weight. As I was miscarrying I gained a few pounds, and I have not dropped them. (Lest you think I sound like Bridget Jones: years ago I lost nearly a third of my body weight, and it's important to me to maintain that loss. I do that by trying to vigorously police my weight and dieting when I exceed the maximum weight I can tolerate. I am still not skinny in the least, and as I've said in the past, I'm a girl who enjoys my chocolate cake.)

This has been a difficult and hectic month for me -- aside from the obvious, I've also been dealing with a now-somewhat-abated family health crisis. As a result, I haven't yet adequately mourned my embryos -- I'm sorry, I can't call them babies. Next week I should get the pathology results back from my doctor's office, and that should provide some closure. It seems the results could show a few things:

a) Down Syndrome. This is actually the best scenario, as it explains the cause of the miscarriage and doesn't indicate anything about the prognosis of future pregnancies, theoretically.
b) Genetic translocation. This would indicate something about either my or the donor's genes, in a more permanent way. Since the donor has a number of births, it would probably be me. So not good.
c) Nothing. If the pathology can't explain the miscarriage, that's bad. Either it could mean I have some kind of clotting disorder that prevents blood from getting to the embryo (diagnosed by blood tests, treated by injections that may not be proven to work). Or it could suggest I have a uterine malformation that could explain both the miscarriages and the infertility. (Treatment: surgery.)

Never have I hoped for Down Syndrome more.