Going back to work

kayham12

Im a high school teacher and have been out all week with my miscarriage. 

monday: ultrasound, no heartbeat. I'm 16 weeks baby measured 8.5
tuesday: process death, begin recovering emotionally, scheduled D&C
wednesday: 1:45AM water breaks, contractions start, heavy bleeding, passing tissue, it's over. 
Back to the doctor, another ultrasound. Medication to pass retained tissue. Take medicine, cramps bleeding tissue passes
Thursday: begin healing physically, I finally feel better. 

Now here we are Friday and it's time to start what will be my new normal. I chose to only come in half a day since my afternoon is easy. Many of my students knew I was pregnant and will be sad for my loss. I don't want to be treated as broken. I know they miss me and I have missed them, but I can't help but feel and overwhelming anxiety about walking back in to my classroom this afternoon. Any advice for going back to work? 

chloe97

@kayham12 I'm so sorry for your loss. I found out that I lost my baby at 10 week, baby stopped developing at 8 weeks, 5 days. My coworker did not know I was pregnant until I told my boss I had to leave early when I started spotting. There are 6 of us who I work closely with and since my coworkers wife was pregnant and shared my due date, I wanted people to know. It was both a good and bad thing. All 5 of them came up to me and expressed condolences and I cried. A few times. People are going to say things to you that may not be helpful, just know that it's coming from a good place usually. I found this board to be a great ppac the vent about the comments. 

Take me care of yourself and come back and fill us in on how everything went!

valleric

I don't have any advice since only 2 of my coworkers knew about my mc at 8w just wanted to say hang in there. The more time that passes the easier it gets to live your life again.

BornReady

I'm so sorry for your loss. I was only 9 weeks when I miscarried, so nobody knew of my pregnancy. I did email my administrative staff when I had to call out and told them what was going on as they had to call my patients to cancel my appointments for a few days. My first day back I was praying nobody would have flowers, a card etc. I just couldn't handle it. The women who I had emailed all stopped by my office and said something short and sweet to let me know they were thinking of me. One came up to me and said, "I'd hug you, but I know you'll cry, and then I'll cry and it'll be messy". That alone almost made me cry. Like you, I just wanted to go back to "normal" and do my job as best as possible. For me that meant not having to talk about it, but I'm guessing for you that might not be an option.

My sister lost her baby at when he was born early at 28 weeks. She was a teacher during that time and was out for her maternity leave for 12 weeks. During that time the class sent her a card and the school guidance counselor met with the class and prepared them for her return, answered questions etc. 

I'm not sure what your situation is, age of your students etc., but is there someone at work who could guide you on how to proceed here? Any other teachers that have been through something similar? 

I wish I had more words of wisdom, wishing you well...

kayham12

It went okay. I did have the guidance counselor come in and tell them/answer questions. My students are 17 and 18 and some of them are parents themselves. The class I taught was great and talked to me about their field trip and what their sub was like while I was gone. Which is normal for them, they also had to gossip about all the hot drama happening in their lives. They did do their work and were awesome. My teacher friends were the only ones that said anything to me about it and they were all sweet condolences or that they missed me and that they were happy I was back. I am also a coach and my athletics girls were awesome. We worked out like we have any other day. They also said how happy they were to see me and had to tell me about how some of the other kids were bad for the sub. I was exhausted when I got home though. I'm glad I only went for half a day and have the weekend to rest. I haven't been taking the iron supplements I was given because iron wrecks my stomach, I've had a change of heart after today. Thank you for those that offered support. I'm hoping that this post will be able to help someone in the future. 

BooksForMe23

Glad it went okay for you!  I had my MC at 7 weeks, and I teach Kindergarten, so clearly I'm in a completely different situation.  But I will say that returning to my kiddos was about the only thing that made me feel better emotionally.  Nothing like teaching to completely take over your brain and make you (at least a little bit) forget your own troubles!  

kayham12

Teaching is a unique job because you do have an emotional connection to those kids. They're my kids. This group I have this year is also unique because I had them as freshman. They were in my class when I got married and many of them were excited for me to have DD and now we have been through this together also. 

valleric

I teach k too. WhenI had my mc in April going back to work made me feel sane. Even now, I am much too busy at work to think about the mc, it is when I am not at work that my mind wanders back to it and I'm sad.

yolandamunoz

Today I was wondering how many days off I would need after a D&C... I have Wednesday and Thursday already off, maybe I should arrange for Friday too and rest for the weekend as well...

im glad you are feeling better @kayham12 and thank you all ladies for sharing your experiences.

briannef90

I had my miscarriage at 7 weeks on a Friday, and I went back to work on a Wednesday. My coworkers knew I was pregnant so they knew I had a miscarriage. What helped me was telling one of my coworkers to let the others know I didn't want to talk about it. I didn't even want hugs. I am not good with people asking me if I'm okay, etc, so when I went back to work everything was as if nothing had happened, which is exactly what I wanted.