i like tv

Last night was the first time I've seen an accurate, heartfelt portrayal of miscarriage on television. Usually, when the unthinkable happens, the victim takes a spill down the stairs, or some other very obvious unrealistic thing happens to cause the loss. (Remember Gabby on Desperate Housewives? Stairs = falling = miscarriage. Ask any soap viewer or my grandmother.) Anyway, then the mother-not-to-be mourns for 2.5 seconds and is back to normal. Last night, on Brothers & Sisters, they showed a loss that hit all too close to home. One of the main characters, Kitty, found out last week that she was pregnant. She was excited, she immediately started planning, and her whole family knew in minutes. Silently I cursed her, rolling my eyes at yet another overly simplistic pregnancy plot in the making and making a mental note to remove B&S from the DVR recording list. I'll pass on another super-authentic TV pregnancy - positive test, bulging belly, and a newborn in time for finale season. Bing bang boom! It's that easy! The more realistic-minded TV writers add in a puking scene or two, and that's it. Everything else must be sunshine, happiness, and tacky shower games. Last night, I watched Kitty go through exactly what I (and so many of my newfound friends) did back in May. Laid back on that table, big old smile, with high hopes her ultrasound begins......and suddenly the doctor is shutting off the machine and looking sadly at her patient as she prepares to smash her happy little world to pieces. Her baby had no heartbeat. She was devastated, her family was devastated. As I wailed on the couch, hurting for this lady in pretend-land, I felt very thankful to whoever came up with this storyline. I really feel like people don't realize how common this is, and how achingly tragic it is, until they or someone they love experiences a miscarriage. I think so many women take pregnancy for granted. They think miscarriage is something that happens to other people. Good example- a work aquaintance who told me how happy she is that she doesn't have "those problems". Mind you, the aquaintance in question has had one healthy pregnancy and apparently has a crystal ball stashed in her closet (right next to the bottle full of ignorance) to make her oh so sure that she'll never experience this. And before this happend to ME, before it became MY reality...I probably didn't get it, either. I didn't go so far as to exlude myself from the realm of possibility, but it wasn't something I sincerely worried about or spent more than a moment considering. And don't get me wrong- never in a zillion years would I wish this upon anyone. Not even Britney Feed-The-Baby-Coca Cola Spears or Nicole-Smoke-While-Pregnant Richie. Not for a minute. All I'm trying to say here is that I applaud whoever came up with the "Kitty has a miscarriage" story and brought a very common occurance to light in a very public way. As tough as it was to watch, it made me feel less like a circus sideshow to watch someone on primetime TV go through nearly exactly what I did. No stairs involved.

Off to work. Here's hoping it's a stroller-free kind of day.