Love and Loss

As many of you know, my husband and I have one daughter, and our plans were to keep it that way for awhile. Last May, we had a little surprise when we found out we were pregnant again. Lots of different thoughts went through my head....are we ready for 2? Is Emery ready to be a big sister? How am I going to work and take care of two babies? I was excited, don't get me wrong, but nervous and stressed. I was still unhappy with my post baby body from Emery so that was another stress. 

We went in for a confirmation check up and they said that yes we were in fact pregnant. And then the morning sickness started. It was horrible when I had it being pregnant with Emery but now having to take care of her and deal with being sick, I didn't think I was going to make it. The day after Emery's first birthday we went in for my first ultrasound. We were so excited to see and hear our baby. We'd accepted the fact that our kids would be only 19 months apart and we were okay with it! 

Then it happened...the tech started the ultrasound and there was just an empty sack on the screen. No baby, no little heart beat beeping on the screen...nothing. My heart dropped, I didn't experience this at all with my first. She did a vaginal ultrasound and the same thing happened...she tried reassuring me saying maybe I wasn't as far as I thought but I knew I was. She couldn't really tell me anything though and I had to wait for my doctor to officially give me the news. 

As soon as she walked in I could tell it wouldn't be good. She said the baby hadn't grown and that there wasn't anything in the sac at all. She said I would miscarry and told me exactly how it would happen. I would have to go in for blood work twice a week to measure my hormone levels and make sure that they were going down, otherwise I would have to have surgery. 

Even though this baby was not planned, I was still completely devastated. What did I do wrong? Would I be able to have more children? I always wanted 3 but would 1 be all I could have? I had no clue what to do...we'd already told our families that we were expecting and now she had to go back and say never mind, there's no baby. It was horrible. 

After all the crying, sadness and feelings of inadequacy, came the waiting. When was 'it' going to happen? I hated the waiting...my husband had to go out of state for work the week of my birthday and I just KNEW it was going to happen then. Sure enough, on my birthday I started having some cramping. I went to the bathroom and didn't leave for over two hours...I won't go into details but it was horrible. 

     

My point in sharing this is not to get sympathy from you or to have you feeling sorry for me...it's to let women know that this is a much more common occurrence than people realize. It's not the end of the world either, you learn so much about yourself, your husband and your children. I appreciate my daughter so much more, I appreciate my husband so much more...when I become pregnant again I will appreciate that pregnancy so much more too. 

My miscarriage happened for a reason, I'm not sure what that reason was but I know God has a plan and that's how we've been able to get through this. I hope sharing my story helps someone else to get through any pregnancy hardships they may be going through. 

Thank you <3

Randi