Trigger Warning: This content contains descriptions of miscarriage and infertility.
Miscarriage has been salient in the news lately. Celebrities like Megan Markle and Chrissy Teigen have ripped the cover off the taboo subject, revealing their intimate anguish for the world to see. When I heard, I nodded in recognition.
I've been through what they have but sadly several times over. I suffered seven total miscarriages and barely made it out with my sanity and spirit. I connected deeply to their pain. I desperately hoped they had good friends to lean on in such a devastating time like I did. However, when my friends got pregnant, one after the other, I suddenly wondered if I'd lose them.
Tara and I met in elementary school in a suburb of Baltimore, Maryland.
She was 3 inches taller than me and wore pink and white glasses. We socialized within the same orbit throughout middle school, sometimes we were closer than others but we always shared the understanding that we were friends no matter what. Later, she helped me with my algebra homework, and I helped her on the field hockey field, the Goose to her Maverick. When I pushed the ball into the shooting circle, she'd know just how to crack it into the back of the goal.
In high school, we'd both ride in cars with older boys, two white Catholic girls reveling in curfew-pushing trouble. She was a die-hard Biggie fan and I couldn't get enough of The Fugees. We both wore our hair in perky ponytails that would swish similarly when we walked the windowless halls of our high school.
Our friendship was easy, undemanding.
We went to different colleges. When she'd visit, we'd hold hands as we squeezed into bar bathrooms, sharing coveted lip gloss and trading gossip. When I traveled to her, we'd share a conspiratorial snicker as her sorority sisters fell in the snow like baby giraffes in their pointed heels.
When we both had toxic breakups with unworthy guys, we leaned on each other, taking comfort that while others were exiting our lives, we remained constant. There was only one time I worried I would lose Tara.
I'd spent my 30s going in and out of uterine surgery, enduring endometrial lining therapy and grieving my miscarriages. I'd spiral into depressive episodes as friends posted ultrasound pics to Facebook, and Tara was one of the few childless friends I had left. I breathed knowing I still had a partner in crime.
Until I didn't.
She called on a weekday before an upcoming bachelorette trip. My heart skipped a beat when she said she had news.
"I'm pregnant," she said.
Pause.
"I wanted to tell you before the trip because I can't drink, and I didn't want you to suspect I was hiding something."
The sting of tears formed and I gulped. "That's great news," I muttered and I meant it. I wanted her to have the world.
"Are you upset? I'm so sorry." It was like her to apologize for something she shouldn't.
"No, no, I am truly happy for you. Honestly. I just worry that I will lose you."
"What do you mean? I'm right here."
"I worry that you will join the Mommy Club, and I never will. Or that your life will evolve while I'm here, wishing I could evolve with you." I was terrified that my carefully tended garden of friends would move on to the magical world of motherhood while I … didn't.
"The baby will be yours too, B. She will know and love you. Nothing will change," she contended.
I thought about it. Perhaps it was true. I could still be Goose to her Mommy-Maverick. I could love and nurture her child along with her. Our friendship would grow in a different, unexpected way.
"OK, but," I said, my voice breaking. "You won't think it's weird when I am the random lady at the baby's soccer games? Or the strange woman that's always drinking a cocktail and cursing?"
"Of course. I would expect that," Tara laughed.
As Tara's life changed irrevocably, she didn't leave me behind.
I cried tears of joy when I got the message that the baby was born.
When she sent a picture of Ava, I cried again, thinking, my God, I love this baby. At the hospital, I climbed into the tiny bed with her as she held her child. As Ava grew, she referred to me as Aunt Bethany. When I finally had my daughter, Charlotte, at age 36 and barely standing, Tara was in my hospital bed, too. I dubbed her Aunt Tara and named her as Charlotte's godmother. In so many ways, she was already Charlotte's family.
One night, we sipped drinks on the deck, watching Ava and Charlotte play together in the yard. Tara's carefully arranged charcuterie board sat on the table in front of us. I watched Ava take Char's hand to guide her to the swing.
"You know I meant to tell you this," Tara said. "Every night Ava and I say her prayers. We ask God to watch over each member of the family, naming them one by one. Last week, as I was closing the door she stopped me and said, 'Mama?' I said, 'Yes, Ava?' She replied, 'We forgot Charlotte and Aunt Bethany. They're family, too.'" And, we are.
