New & Gold co-founder Jane Adler ('13) shares a window into her unexpected stint on bedrest during her recent pregnancy with daughter Ava.
I’m like a shark, if I stop swimming – I die. I know that data has since been debunked but for the sake of this metaphor, let’s go with it. I am someone who looks at my day as either a success or failure based on how much I accomplished, how tangibly productive I was. I am constantly living life in the fast lane, only stopping when absolutely necessary to change a tire, heed a traffic sign, or shut off the engines for the night. I love it, I thrive off of overcommitting myself and running from one thing to the next. It has kept me sane through highs and lows, through my transition into motherhood, through personal woes and when life gets weird. So when my routine came to a screeching halt in August 2021, I found the stillness eerie and unwelcomed.
Let’s rewind a bit. In September of 2018 I found out I was pregnant with my first baby. I had a pretty textbook pregnancy and I loved those 9+ months. I was one of those annoying pregnant woman who truly enjoyed the process from start to finish, monthly bump photos and all. It was a relatively uneventful pregnancy and a routine birth – nothing to see here, folks. That’s why when I found out I was pregnant again in June 2021, I just assumed it would be more of the same. Sure, maybe my bump would pop a little quicker – cute, right? Oh how I was woefully mistaken. On July 31st, at 12 weeks 2 days pregnant we had a little gender reveal for just family and found out…it’s another girl. “Sisters!” I thought, “how cute!” Mere hours after popping a balloon on the beach with pink biodegradable confetti flying everywhere, I started bleeding. My first thought was “oh, I’m miscarrying” and my second was “how embarrassing because I just posted a photo announcing I’m pregnant on social media.” The vanity of it all. Optics aside, I hopped in my car and, because it was Saturday, drove to my hospital’s ER to wait for someone with a medical degree to confirm my suspicions that Elle was no longer going to be a big sister. But to my surprise and disbelief, there appeared to be a very active baby floating around the ultrasound screen. It was the ominous dark clouds around our little girl that were concerning. It looked like she was in the eye of a storm – and as it turns out, she kind of was.
I was bleeding internally. It’s called a subchorionic hemorrhage. I could try to explain it here but really Google will do a better job outlining what that means. At that moment sitting on the cold antiseptic hospital bed, our baby was fine but we were warned that could change at any time. My discharge papers called it a “threatened abortion” which was a term that felt extreme and untrue. Hey, I wanted this baby - I planned for this baby. I was sent home to be on bedrest for 24 hours followed by a week of pelvic rest. Then I talked to my OB and that 24 hours turned into 72 hours. Then I had a follow-up ultrasound and my 24 hours of bedrest quickly morphed into 1 week, then 2 weeks, then 3 weeks as my blood clot remained alarmingly large in size and showed little signs of shrinking. Every pain or weird sensation I had put me into a tailspin. “This is it,” I thought “the miscarriage they’ve been warning me about.” When I first went on bedrest, it was actually kind of a welcomed reprieve. My in-laws took my 2 year old for a sleepover and my husband actually brought me dinner in bed – something he hasn’t done since we first started dating. My job was just to relax and do as little as possible, how hard could that be? Circling back to the shark metaphor, it was harder than I ever could’ve imagined.
Sure, there were things that were worse than being on bedrest because of a potentially miscarriage-inducing internal bleed. There were also a lot better things that I could think of doing. My husband just kept saying things like “you’re always mentioning how you want a break” or “enjoy the chance to just chill out” like bedrest to save our baby was some sort of glorified staycation. I knew he meant well but the words still sparked a little pocket of rage inside of me like how could he ever understand the mixed emotions I was feeling. The only way he knew how to show his support was asking me if I wanted a sandwich from our favorite local sandwich shop every other day. He couldn’t truly understand the immense pressure I was feeling for my body to not fail me and keep this baby alive, the depression that was creeping in because I couldn’t move my body or do anything to take the edge off. Then there was the resentment that was building against everyone who had the free will to just live their active, everyday lives. Followed by the anger towards friends who failed to check in. Capped off with the pity party I would throw for myself which was always cut short after I started feeling terrible for playing such a victim role. “It could be so much worse” I would tell myself as I flipped on the local news to see just how much worse it could be.
My friends were pretty good about helping me through it, some much better than others. I got a lot of “let me know if you need anything” which is such a funny phrase. I get that it is a compassionate gesture meant to convey “I’m here for you” but it’s not like me, Jane Adler, who has never asked anyone for help in her life would suddenly send over my grocery list and ask you to shop it for me like my own personal Instacart assistant. That’s not how I roll. Maybe that’s a personal issue I need to unpack with a licensed therapist but these friends should know that by now if they really knew me. It would’ve made way more of an impact if these friends just swung by unannounced or dropped a little goodie at the door – doesn’t even matter what it was. I go to the same coffee shop every day and order the same thing – they should know that. A latte would’ve gone a long way. But, hey, I’ll remember that the next time one of my friends is in a similar scenario – don’t ask what they might need in an empty offer kind of way, just do something…anything. Drop flowers off. Take the initiative to stop by and organize their closet while they give yes’s and no’s from bed. Do a basic grocery run for things you know they need. Give them the passcodes to your streaming accounts so they can binge watch anything they want. Bring them pre-stamped postcards that they can fill out and swing by to drop them in the mail once they are complete. Send them a Cameo featuring one of their favorite people. Send them coffee. Send them lunch. Send them dinner. We live in a world where we can make things happen at the touch of a button. It’s the gesture that matters, too. The ask is empty without the gesture.
Maybe I was just bitter. Yeah, that’s probably it. Man, I could’ve really used something to take the edge off. I had to delete my Instagram because it was too hard for me to watch people enjoying their lives – seething with envy from behind a screen while I teeter tottered between “fuck it” and “I’m so worried I could throw up” waiting for the next person to tell me I shouldn’t do this or that or elevate my legs, no, wait, straighten them, no wait I read you’re supposed to put them up a wall actually you really shouldn’t be drinking coffee but maybe matcha or maybe you should see a healer, or a specialist, or pray it away…yeah pray it away. “Ok, I’ll do that,” I would comply with a hint of annoyance in my voice every time someone told me what was best for me. I know they meant well, these people care about me. But they didn’t understand that I was a shark who couldn't swim. I wanted to warn people to approach with caution because my bite was just as bad as my bark during those dark days. But here I am, 2 months postpartum staring at this very tiny miracle who almost didn’t come to be. I am one of the lucky ones. The gratitude I feel is immeasurable and those bedrest days feels like a mere blip on the radar at this point. But reading this back, I can still remember those mixed emotions. A bubble of anxiety about the days when I was warned to keep my showers to 2-3 minutes maximum…or else. Pregnancy is exciting and exhausting and terrifying and intriguing. So many people have been through it, yet, still, when you are going through it yourself it feels like a completely unique experience. And as the brain tends to do with unfavorable experiences, I remember it as “not that bad” when I know, in reality, I struggled so intensely during those 7 weeks I was a prisoner to my body. So to all of my bedrest warriors and those who have to endure the pain and isolation of bedrest in the future, I understand and I am here to commiserate.
Sidebar:
Things I Did To Keep Myself Sane:
finally wrote all of those positive Yelp reviews I promised the businesses I love I would write
set a daily schedule for myself so I didn’t lose track of time
scheduled visits with friends and Facetimes for when I was feeling up for it
binged all of the shows I’d been wanting to watch (who wants to talk about Game of Thrones?)
kept a journal of all of my feelings and emotions – writing is cathartic for me
organized my closet with the help of my mom and sister
read and listened to books on audible
did simple mindless projects using kits from Etsy (bracelet making, needlepoint kits, paint by numbers)
optimized any aspect of my life I could: unsubscribed from all the junk emails that clogged up my inbox, took a look at my finances and got a budgeting plan in place, canceled subscriptions I wasn’t using etc.
prayer, meditation, and breathwork for some mental exercise