Stepping Stone

Leigh Hunt

“There is not a more unthinking way of talking than to say such and such pains and pleasures are only imaginary, and therefore to be got rid of or under-valued accordingly.” — Leigh Hunt

Everyone’s heard the phrase: it’s okay, just forget about it. Just don’t think about it. It really isn’t that big a deal. For me, the phrase spoken was: “It wasn’t even really a baby yet, just a pea.” From what I’ve gathered, miscarriages aren’t that uncommon, on the contrary, they happen more often than not. Doctor’s will tell you that it isn’t a problem until you’ve had two in a row. I discovered I was a little over two months pregnant three weeks prior to a major training exercise, one that “no one is exempt from.” I was in the process of moving from Georgia to Texas, had been married for a couple months, and my younger sister was having a major spinal surgery, one I wouldn’t be able to make.

A day before we left for the exercise, I had some heavy bleeding and began vomiting. By the time we arrived at the location for training, I couldn’t keep anything down: water, a granola bar, tea, nothing. Everything went out or up, ten pounds in three days. My NCOIC was aware of what was going on, he had thought I was pregnant before it had even occurred to me. He had been the person to send me to have a test done. But now, it wasn’t good news. A chaplain and a panic attack later, I found myself in an ER room with a male nurse telling me I’d miscarried. Complications had occurred. Infection was bad. I’d be on major antibiotics and anti-nausea pills for three weeks on top of two shots I’d get then and a week into the pills. Suddenly, I was seen as a suicide risk. I looked healthy enough, nothing was broken. I was placed in a bunk next to a kid that had snapped his spine and another that had broken his knee.

Despite requesting to not speak to a mental health specialist, she talked at me anyway. It’s not a real baby, you know. You could’ve gotten abortion. Just a pea.

I’d never been happier to see a Catholic chaplain until that moment.

The mental health specialists always assume they’re smarter than you. After all, they have degrees, you know. Their job requires one. They won’t ask you about that. They have no patience for patients. Would you like some water?

Chaplains, most of them anyway, know soldiers. They are soldiers. They deploy with us, keep correspondence. Encourage. Don’t pretend your pain has no weight.

I wasn’t even able to tell my husband until two days later. I wouldn’t be sent home. I’d do four hours of errands a day for a sergeant first class and then sit in my bunk mindlessly going over what had happened. My family would tell me that I shouldn’t be upset. I shouldn’t have told my NCOIC in the first place. I shouldn’t have to talk to anyone. Then, my mother-in-law was calling me to ask if I needed anything. Telling me it was alright for me to be upset. My husband’s unit asked if I wanted them to send him out to me. It seemed the army had more care for me than anyone else, and that upset me. I’ve seen the army dismiss injuries. Change your socks. Drink water. I’d been on that side of the fence too until it turned out that my pelvis was broken in twelve places, my femur split, knee fractured, and a big toe broken. Due to the assumed amount of “butt-hurt” soldiers, leadership many times dismisses all parties. I’ve been lucky to have had decent leadership at every unit I’ve been a part of.

There was no apology for my having been brought to the exercise. After all, I still was a number and on the board, that mattered. They made sure that I was on one of the first buses to go home. I was home two days before my husband was pulled away from gunnery.

I don’t write this as some excuse or some odd rant about the medical systems of the Army. They took excellent care of me. I never had any suicidal thoughts, though I know many going through the same have had such thoughts. It’s not absurd. I’ve always leaned on God in times of hardships, and I know He has his reasons. My faith and my stance on abortion doesn’t matter. In the end, what matters is that I had had a complicated miscarriage and that a woman had the gall to look me in the eye and tell me I shouldn’t be upset. Pain is real: physical and mental. It isn’t dismissable. I write this to say, no one’s pain in inconsequential.

Yours truly,

Estelle Noire