How Dangling From A Trapeze Helped Me Find Strength After 4 Miscarriages
by Teena Apeles
Warning: This article contains details about miscarriage.
My husband and I had been together for 12 years before we had our daughter, Dominie. And we have truly relished parenthood. But our many, many moments of family bliss have often included a tinge of sadness. I had always hoped for more. And the absence of that more—more children—has haunted me, especially the struggle for it, which started not long after our wedding day.
Just weeks after our September wedding in 2010, we discovered we were expecting, but I miscarried just one month later, which devastated me emotionally and physically. As I imagine many women in similar situations would attest to, I went through a long period of wondering what I did wrong. The treatment by an insensitive doctor didn’t help. Compound that with the physical pain that came with the cramping, the excessive bleeding, and a “D& C” (dilation and curettage procedure) that I was conscious for—the high from celebrating our union with more than 200 of our closest friends and family quickly passed. I spent the months that followed our loss working like a maniac to put the loss behind me. But I had hope for the future.
The second pregnancy came the next summer and through the 41-plus weeks that followed, my husband Charles and I did a lot of chanting the future baby’s name (Buddhist friends had shared with me the calming benefits of this act) as we were scared of miscarrying, and eventually Dominie arrived by C-section at a whopping 10 pounds. She was pulled out in just 11 minutes, and in time she would become the love of my life, and what would come next just heightened that love: I became pregnant again and again, and miscarried each time.
After each loss, I would withdraw from socializing, from work. I actually left jobs after each miscarriage, thinking, If I just left this work environment… maybe the next outcome would be different.
Friends didn’t know how to comfort me, I didn’t know how to comfort myself, nor did my husband—not even my daughter could help me sustain a positive outlook for long periods of time. My family doctor had suggested that I try taking an antidepressant to see if it would help—treat this “disconnect” (as he called it, which I felt was the appropriate term to call it). I waited a few months before I did, as I thought I’d feel better over time, but as another month would pass, and I still couldn’t get through a day without crying, I had to try something. Because it wasn’t just about grief, there was also the internal physical drama of hormones.
When I became pregnant the fourth time, in the spring of 2016, I had just begun to piece my life together again, and was ready to come off the medication after seven months. Then, at 11 weeks, I discovered the baby had stopped growing. And I was, well, numb. Only 1 percent of pregnant women experiences three miscarriages in succession. This last miscarriage started that summer, and took almost five months to complete naturally. (I just couldn’t bear to go back to the hospital again.) My gynecologist at the time, who had been with me for the previous two losses, told me that he had never in his 30-plus years of medicine had a patient who experienced this, nor had he read about anyone who had. My body, or my (dream of another) baby, just couldn’t let go.
“how does one come back from so many losses? ice cream cakes and new jobs weren’t helping.”
How does one come back from so many losses? Ice cream cakes and new jobs weren’t helping. Then Charles surprised me (not something he’s particularly good at) with a gesture that significantly raised my spirits, agreeing to do something we’d never done before: take an exercise class together.
Yeah, lots of couples go to gyms together, you’re thinking. Well, at that point we had been together for 16 years and had not. What’s right and wrong for each other’s bodies had been the topic of many arguments and tears since my body had gone through so much in recent years. Many a relationship can falter after such setbacks, and an exercise date would hardly be the first thing anyone would suggest after multiple miscarriages. At the one and only support group we attended, the kind female doctor and nurse who facilitated it suggested that I go away on a retreat with other women to meditate or talk, while Charles suggested that I go and take a dance class or start some exercise regimen. That is what he would do. The facilitators reminded him that in their experience, men and women generally grieve and heal in very different ways. But didn’t we lose a baby, not just me? Shouldn’t we do something together?
Soon the day came for Charles and I to do something new as a couple, leaving Dominie in the care of a friend, something we don’t often do. And we weren’t going to just any gym, we were going to a circus school to take an aerial class—to suspend from fabric and take to the trapeze. Really, how hard could it be? I had always been obsessed with Cirque du Soleil and our family had gotten addicted to watching Ninja Warrior, so the idea of challenging our bodies was appealing to both of us.
It was a Saturday morning in late September of 2016 that we went to Hollywood for a 10 a.m. class that was full of ridiculously fit and attractive women and men in their twenties. The tagline for Cirque School is “For Anybody with Any Body,” so we expected more any bodies, but none of them had anything on Charles. The fact that he was dressed in a red T-shirt with Animal from the Muppets on it, paired with army-green Bermuda shorts and black socks, entertained me enough against the sea of bodies clad in stylish, body-hugging tank tops and yoga pants. Plus, Charles never took his socks off, despite the instructor’s urging, making him stand out all the more.
No one in the room could have possibly understood how big a deal this class was for us, especially me. We were the only couple in the bunch, and likely the only ones in our forties. I was given a gift certificate for classes at Cirque more than a year ago (after my third miscarriage) but didn’t have the wherewithal to use it. I needed a partner. I needed someone to venture into the unknown with me—at the very least, be the same age and around the same fitness level—so I, fresh from the loss of yet another pregnancy, could be reminded that I was not alone, that I could do this, or humiliate myself with someone I cared for by my side. I never dreamed that that person would be my husband.
In that one-hour span of time, Charles and I watched as our petite, “cut” (as Charles put it), and encouraging 20-something instructor, who we’d later find out was a former competitive gymnast, gave quick demos on each apparatus and the other students easily copy her. Few broke a sweat. Charles and I looked at each other and thought, Oh, shit. Our group moved from balancing on exercise balls (utter embarrassment if you’ve never used one), to suspending ourselves on the flowy (far-from-easy-to-climb) hanging fabric, to sitting and spinning on fabric baskets, to facing the very intimidating trapeze. It was exciting to have so many things to tackle, though I felt like a fraud as I pretended to understand each move required to maneuver myself on the apparatus at hand to just keep up with the class. I struggled with each one, but was motivated by the youth and strength around me.
The millennials carried themselves with such poise and grace, as they’d climb, straddle, hang, and balance. They were things of beauty. Charles and I were the comic relief, those students who held everyone back, the ones the instructor had to spend extra time with. This was supposed to be a beginner class. But instead of being ashamed of our difficulties and stumbles, they actually made us feel closer, became a uniting force, like us against the world (of lithe, young bodies). But admittedly, when I tried and failed to pull off a lift, climb, or balancing act, I wasn’t always laughing. I was ultimately faced with the reality that (or I just convinced myself that) I couldn’t do what everyone else around me in the crowded gym could.
My husband pushed me. The owner, a Cirque du Soleil veteran who helped with the trapeze, pushed me. “I can’t do this, I can’t do this,” I’d say out loud as I strained to lift myself up onto the horizontal bar.
“Just push yourself,” she said to me with no sympathy (she was likely in her forties as well and as strong as anyone 20 years her junior). “Pull yourself up,” she commanded, giving me a slight nudge so I could do an action that was so simple a child could do it: just flipping my legs over my head and throwing them over the horizontal bar to hang upside down.
Charles did it fairly easily. (The hundred pushups a day he started doing the week leading up to our class certainly didn’t hurt.) He’s physically stronger than me, most definitely, but the fact that he was doing this in front of other people—he’s a very private and modest guy, keeping his socks on is just an example of what I mean—I was inspired to force my body to do the same no matter how much it hurt. I wanted to keep up with my partner, someone who also no doubt was affected by our latest miscarriage, though he wouldn’t talk about it. When I finally managed to lift my legs up, curl my toes over the bar (more painful than I though it would be), and then find myself hanging upside down side by side next to my partner for life and finally pulling myself up to sit on the bar, the other students who were watching applauded my effort. They could sense this was a big deal. And I, red-faced and a little dizzy, felt a kind of high I hadn’t felt in ages.
Drenched in sweat and feeling accomplished after following up our first task on the trapeze with Mermaid and Basket poses—the former had us stretched diagonally across the bar with legs together, the latter, hanging from our knees with our torsos completely arched back and our hands clutching our feet—Charles and I gave each other a high-five before immediately proceeding to the reception to sign up for another class.
When we had arrived that morning, we didn’t know what to expect, but we made it to the end in high-flying (well, more like hanging) fashion. We felt alive. I felt so in love with him. I felt such immense pride in myself. I pushed myself physically harder than I had in years. After all that loss, I felt like all my body could do was fail me, as it had been unable to sustain life for a fourth time. But on that day, my body reminded me to feel again.
The next day, we felt it. There was a lot of pain there—I could barely lift myself from bed or hug my daughter that morning—but I also felt so much joy. Our literally hot date (remember, pouring sweat) reminded me how transforming doing something physically strenuous together can be, even if Charles and I failed at it. Plus, for that hour, it was the first time in a very, very long time that no one else mattered except the two of us; parenthood can sometimes make you forget to value that foundation.
“who knew that being the middle-aged folk in an aerial class at a circus school could be so healing?”
Who knew that being the middle-aged folk in an aerial class at a circus school could be so healing? Hanging upside down tweaked my body and perspective just enough to help me see past what I don’t have, and see what I still do.
——
It’s now 2020 and that strength I found in 2016 comes in waves, tested constantly. We had our fifth miscarriage toward the end of 2017. What was different about this loss was the grief my daughter suffered because of it. Dominie, five at the time, was with me at the doctor’s office when I found out, at about 12 weeks, that there was no heartbeat. This sweet girl of mine cried uncontrollably, enough for both of us.
That baby was not just my dream—it was hers as well. And that grief, we relive every time I go to a doctor’s office, every time I pass a hospital where I experienced that loss (three different ones in all), every time someone suggests I have more children.
What also set apart this last miscarriage was that after I passed the sac fairly intact. (I didn't have to undergo a D &C because of this.) It was the first time in all my losses that I had something tangible—not just a doctor’s word or the absence of a heartbeat—to say goodbye to. And I kept it . . . for a while. I put it in a sealed plastic bag that I then placed in an embroidered pouch to “mother” for more than a week after I had passed it, despite the smell and what others might have thought was unsightly. And this mourning period my daughter took part in too. I slept with it on my nightstand, and Dominie and I would greet that sac in the morning and night, and occasionally touch the pouch during the day, just to give us time to say goodbye. And come the 10th day, we buried it in our backyard, to join many beloved family members - a menagerie of animals including a dog, cat, ducks, fish, and other birds - that had passed over the years.
During that time I thought about bringing the sac to my doctor to send to a lab to find out if they could figure out what went wrong. But that wouldn’t bring it back to life. It wouldn’t undo what was done. Dominie and I didn’t want that last dream’s resting place to be in some hazardous materials bin.
A year later, a news item captured the world’s attention that brought me back to that mourning period: an orca carrying its dead calf on its head for an “unprecedented” 17 days before letting her stillborn drift to the ocean’s bottom. Marine biologists also mentioned that the orca’s community helped her carry the calf during that time. Though this mother in the Pacific Northwest, nicknamed Tahlequah, was a whale, I like to believe we shared the same grief. In her case, it was so public. And scientists and news outlets were quick to try to analyze why she carried her dead offspring for so long after it passed. They also worried her mourning could endanger her health. But so many who have had a stillborn or lost a young child, or experienced a miscarriage, need not turn to science for answers. Many mothers want to nurture their young, even after they pass. We will always hold on. We will always need to mourn.
“many mothers want to nurture their young, even after they pass. we will always hold on. we will always need to mourn.”
Occasionally Dominie and I will talk about all her could’ve-been siblings, what we would’ve done with them, what life with six children would be like. After, we always hug each other tight.
Acquaintances still ask me, “She’s your only kid?” or “You only have one?”—as if Dominie is not enough, like my glass is only partially filled. So I tell them about my losses, and then they have no words. While it may make them uncomfortable, these conversations are my new trapeze act: thinking about suffering those multiple losses turns me upside down often, sharing my story with strangers lifts me up, accepting those losses is me striking a pose, and waking up every day to continue to mother my now seven-year-old, is me holding that once unimaginable position.
Teena Apeles is a writer, book editor, and mother to a prolific maker. She founded the LA-based creative collective, Narrated Objects, which produces books and events to support causes close to their hearts. You can find more of her articles here.
