Holding My Breath: The Anatomy Scan After Loss

The anatomy scan was scheduled for noon, but the morning felt like it stretched on forever. Time didn’t move the way it should have. It dragged and hovered all at once, like the day itself was holding something heavy alongside me. I woke up already bracing, already carrying that tight, familiar feeling in my chest—the one that makes it hard to take a full breath.

That morning, my midwives’ student reached out about picking up a placenta for encapsulation. On any other day, it would have just been part of my work. But that day, it felt like a gift. It gave me somewhere to place my energy, something steady to hold onto when everything inside me felt unsteady. It grounded me in the rhythm of what I do—the quiet, sacred continuity of birth, of care, of life moving forward even after loss.

And still, underneath it all, there was that knowing.

Because I have been here before.

It was at an anatomy scan that I learned we had lost our daughter, Iris. And once your body has lived through something like that, it doesn’t forget. It carries the memory in ways that don’t always have words.

The drive to the appointment felt heavy, like every mile brought me closer to something I wasn’t sure I could survive hearing again. I kept thinking, this could be the day everything changes. That thought sat with me, quiet but constant.

I got there early—too early. Sitting still wasn’t an option, so I paced the parking lot of my midwives’ office, back and forth, trying to move some of the nervous energy out of my body. There was a moment where I almost left, where the urge to turn around and avoid it altogether felt overwhelming. To not know felt safer than the possibility of knowing.

Then I saw the ultrasound tech. The machine. The doorway into the room where everything had once shifted. My body recognized it before my mind could catch up, memory rising up in a way that felt immediate and physical.

But I walked in anyway.

Not because I felt brave, but because this kind of pregnancy asks you to keep showing up, even when every part of you wants to run.

Inside the room, I wasn’t alone. The student midwife there was my friend, and she has known loss too. There is something deeply comforting about being in the presence of someone who understands without needing an explanation. As I laid there waiting for the scan to begin, she rested her hand on my foot. It was such a small gesture, but it brought me back into my body. It reminded me that I was here, that I was supported, that I didn’t have to hold all of this by myself.

When the scan started, I felt myself slip back into that familiar space of waiting. Each image, each measurement, each pause carried weight. I found myself watching closely, listening carefully, holding my breath through every moment. It felt like standing at the edge of something, waiting for it to tip one way or the other.

I knew the signs. I knew the silence. I knew the subtle shifts that could change everything.

But this time, they didn’t come.

At one point, the ultrasound tech mentioned that she remembered me. Not in the way you hope to be remembered, but from my scream—the one that came from a place of deep, primal grief the last time I was in a room like that. It struck me then how our bodies leave echoes in these spaces, how moments like that don’t just pass through us, they imprint.

But this time, there was another kind of release waiting for me.

When it was all over, I finally exhaled.

He was healthy.

And then, layered into that relief, came something else I hadn’t fully let myself feel until that moment. I felt it rise up all at once—joy, gratitude, something almost sacred in its weight. I wept when I realized I would get to give my husband a son, that the Martinkas name would be carried forward once more. It felt tender and meaningful in a way that reached beyond just this moment, like something being restored, something continuing on.

The relief that followed wasn’t quiet or gentle. It was overwhelming in its own way, moving through me in waves that felt almost as powerful as the fear I had carried in. It softened something inside of me, even if just a little. It gave me space to breathe again.

Pregnancy after loss lives in that in-between space. It is not just joy, and it is not just fear. It is both, existing side by side. It is memory held in the body, love that stretches across time, grief that lingers, and hope that continues to rise anyway.

If you have ever walked into an appointment holding your breath, if your body remembers things you wish it didn’t, if you have had to choose to stay when everything in you wanted to run—you are not alone in that.

This kind of strength is quiet. It is soft. It doesn’t always look like bravery, but it is.

And sometimes, it looks like walking into a room you never wanted to return to… and allowing yourself, finally, to breathe again.