I used to bloody hate scrambled eggs long before going vegan. They’re definitely the worst eggy iteration (poached being best, followed by hard boiled) - I can’t understand why they’re such a brunch institution in this country. My mum loves them on buttery toast, but then again, she also likes spaghetti hoops. Why would you want a milky plate of toddler vom for brunch, please?
In my flat, however, ‘scrambled egg’ means something entirely different. Our scrambled egg isn’t a meal - it was a pregnancy. The day before my birthday, I started bleeding and it just didn’t stop. I knew it was over before the ultrasound confirmed it and while my husband was deep in his feelings about it from the off, I knew it’d take time before any emotion would hit me. I was just concentrating on not bleeding to death in my sleep or dripping live on stage at a big work festival (hardly a good look for the health and fitness ed!).
Five months on and it feels like the whole world has just had a baby or has announced that they’re expecting one. And I’m constantly reminded that our’s became a scrambled egg.
I think of it a bit like a Bake Off technical task. My body had these really vague instructions - take egg, add sperm, release hormones, make baby - but clearly added a bit too much of X or a too little of Y. When it became clear that the cake wasn’t going to rise, it decided to bin the lot and start again. I’m not a baker (who can be arsed with weighing flour? Not me!), so I’m not really surprised that my body isn’t either. The cream curled, the sugar burned, the egg scrambled. Clever old body.
Explaining that to my husband didn’t really make him feel much better. Miscarriages are shit but I do think that they’re especially disempowering for the person who isn’t pregnant. When you’re bleeding and in pain, you sort of understand viscerally what’s happening; watching someone go through that and not having any answers or means of help must be horrid. All you can say to each other is ‘we’ll get through this’. Apparently, saying you’ve failed the technical task isn’t much help. But, as we’ve both realised, talking about the scrambled egg is.
Scrambled egg has its own personality. Scrambled egg fucked us both up a bit but we’re hoping it might reincarnate into a fresh one that eventually goes on to hatch. Scrambled egg is a silly egg. And scrambled egg will forever be a part of the fabric of our relationship.
Couples talk can be icky and baby-ish and that’s fine in private. Heck, I wouldn’t trust anyone who doesn’t have a pet name for their other half. But I’d argue that having childish names for big, scary, distressing things is actually the most adult thing you can do sometimes. It’s certainly offered us a way of talking seriously about pregnancy loss and I think has helped keep a sense of proportion. That one failed but it doesn’t mean future ones will. Good old scrambled!
💕💕