Fall Down Seven Times, Stand Up Eight*

It's official. The short but inspiring reign of Cecil I is now over.

As is my wont, I am dealing with this latest loss by thinking thoughts about words. Medical words in particular. The medical world has such a charming way with words. Such creativity, all apparently designed to make us feel like crap about our bodies.

Women who dilate early have an "incompetent cervix," as if their cervixes didn't pay enough attention in cervix school and will be stuck in dead-end jobs for the rest of their lives. Women over 35 are considered of "advanced maternal age." (Watch it, sonny, or I'll clobber you with my gigantic pocketbook!)

And then there's my new favorite: Habitual Aborter. Yes, friends, with this latest doomed embryo I have joined the exclusive club of Hab-Abs, as we like to call ourselves. We mostly hang out in dark alleys swilling rotgut, with torn stockings and bright orange lipstick smeared all over the filters of our Kools. You know, I thought about not having another miscarriage, but I can't help it! It's such a lousy habit! Hmmm. Maybe I'll just start biting my nails instead.

The good news is that it is better, statistically speaking, to have miscarried repeatedly than never to have conceived at all. In his wonderful book, Coming to Term, John Cohen writes that 70% of women who have miscarried three or more times will eventually go on to carry a normal pregnancy to term, even without any medical intervention at all.

I think my body is trying to tell me something: Keep trying!! These fertility treatments have not been failures, strictly speaking. There's some sort of spirit in there, I think, trying desperately to be born. I count these near misses as signals that if we keep at it, something, maybe, will eventually make it to term.



*This is the Japanese version of the proverb. The American version is, "Fall down once, sue the guy who owns the sidewalk."