Unbirthday

Milestones after loss are never easy. For friends who have lost loved ones in recent years, I know it was hard to pass Christmas, Mother's Day, Father's Day, the anniversary of the death... Special days. We have recently passed a milestone, too. Yesterday was my due date for the pregnancy that we lost.

On the one hand, I am grateful that my belly is once again swelling with life, and that the date did not find me empty. I know it would have been much more painful to face the day if we still were not expecting. But it was still something. A twinge. A disappointment. An ordinary day where there would have been an exciting one. An unbirthday.

After our miscarriage, I read up a lot on how other couples, and other mothers in particular, find some closure after a miscarriage. There is no funeral, no burial, no memorial service to help you grieve, to commemorate or acknowledge your loss. There is no obituary or eulogy to write. So what did people do? I read a number of lovely ideas. Name a star. Plant a rosebush. Write a poem and frame it.

Then, I found the idea for us. A piece of memorial jewelry. A lot of women opted for necklaces with a symbol of an rosebud, a rose that never bloomed. But I knew what I wanted. A ring with a peridot, the August birthstone. Our neverbirth stone.

The miscarriage happened over late January, early February, so we bought the ring as a Valentine's Day gift. We found the perfect one - a small peridot flanked by two inset tiny diamonds, the birthstones of both my husband and myself. It is a pinky ring, on my right hand, to be worn one day next to a family ring I would like to get for my right ring finger. A family ring I will get when everyone is here. But Baby Never-was gets to go straight to the front of the line, already proudly represented on that same right hand.

Never was. Never forgotten.