M is for Matriarchs

“You’re gonna feel a pinch and then pressure on three, ok?”

I laid on my back lifelessly. I’d heard what the doctor said over the blood rushing and pounding in my ears, but I couldn’t summon the strength for a response. She slid her head out from behind my leg to make sure I was still awake. Loss of consciousness was one of the symptoms she rambled off pre-procedure like a prescription medication infomercial where all the people are smiling while doing everyday tasks in a slowed motion. Seeing me stare blankly at the ceiling, she swiveled her chair back into position, hiding again beneath the exam sheet spread between my legs. I tried to lose myself counting the dots like stars on the foam drop-tile boards above me. I made it up to around a dozen before I winced at the sharp sting.

“You’ve got it, Mama”, the sweet southern nurse said as she squeezed my hand and rubbed the inside of my forearm.
The doctor slapped a gloved hand on her thigh, and sat fully up to give the nurse a dirty look above her glasses. She tsked and gave a slow head shake before descending between the stirrups once more. Without uttering a word, we both got the message loud and clear.

‘How could you possibly call her Mama when she’s just lost her baby?’

Though I knew in my heart it was a harmless, even endearing sobriquet, I understood why the doctor was upset. If I were one of the countless women she’d assist in that same room desperately trying to hold onto motherhood, that small four lettered word would land like a bullet. But on that same exam table, I laid there only desperate to make it through the next half hour.

Just then, I felt a blunt heavy pain somewhere deep inside me I didn’t know existed. I curled my toes and felt my knees begin to shake violently in revolt. I looked to the nurse for comfort and found it immediately. She sympathetically looked down at me with a familiar concern all mothers have when their children aren’t well, and mouthed silently once more while dabbing the sweat and tears rolling from my cheeks, ‘You’ve got this.’

 

Amanda Izzo is a writer, artist, and entrepreneur who splits her time between Boston, MA and Rochester, NH. She enjoys recapturing her life and youth in the form of creative nonfiction. She also explores different genres and literary mediums, relishing in blurring the dividing lines between them. Recently, her pieces titled “Tell Me Where it Hurts” and “Consent Defined” were published through Levitate Magazine, Issue #9.