October is Pregnancy and Infant Loss Awareness month, something I did not know existed prior to 2018. Some years, October has not felt heavy, it has been a time where I get to remember my babies and know that there are other women doing the same. Other years it does feel harder and there is sadness knowing how old those babies would be, thinking about them going to school with their siblings, or wondering what their personalities would have been like. It has always been a month of reflecting on how God worked in that period of our lives though, he used loss and grief to remind me of how He sees me and He used it to remind me that He chose me to be the mom for my kids; that it was no accident and it is not a performance where he has unrealistic expectations. He does not give and take away based on how He thinks you are doing. Although, these were things I believed yet didn’t realize until walking through my grief.
Miscarriage was something that I knew happened, and quite often. I also knew that most women do not share the news of their pregnancies until after twelve weeks because that is when your chance of loss is the highest, and when I was younger I had seen family members experience miscarriage. Prior to 2018 however, it was not something I had really walked through first hand; I did not have friends who had experienced one and I had already had two healthy pregnancies and babies.
In December of 2017 however, we found out we were pregnant! I was terrified, Eva was eleven months old so this was certainly sooner than we had expected. And this baby’s due date was around August 21 which would mean we would have three kids ages three and under, I felt completely overwhelmed. I believe that all babies are a blessing though, and I am one of the weird people that love being pregnant and just love the newborn stage (you can read my blog post about that here), so there was a big part of me that trusted God’s timing. We made cute Christmas sugar cookies announcing baby number three to our parents and the overwhelmed feeling became excitement pretty quickly. We went in for our first ultra sound around nine weeks and I could tell something was off. The tech kept asking me to take a deep breath and hold it because she was having a hard time counting the baby’s heartbeat and didn’t want to accidentally count mine. She explained to us that the heartbeat was very slow and after talking to a doctor decided to have us come back in a week. They explained that sometimes the baby will go onto to be totally healthy but more often this was an early sign of loss.
That week felt so long, we just focused on praying for our baby and hoping that we’d go back to the next ultra sound and see a healthy baby. Unfortunately we went back and very quickly they found that there was no heartbeat. We have one photo from the first ultrasound and I do cherish that we have that little memory of our baby. I was told that I had three options; take medicine to start the miscarriage and passing of the baby, I could schedule a D&C, or let the baby pass naturally. I decided to let it happen naturally and waiting for that to happen felt so painful. I still had two other little ones who needed my attention and going about each day waiting to see if the actual passing would start felt unbearable. I leaned into my community. God knows what we need before we do, he had led me to join a women’s Bible study about five months prior to this and those ladies carried me through. They practiced the ministry of presence and just sat with me while our kids played, they were supportive of talking about it or not. It felt so comforting to have that around me.
Everything did start on the 19th of January and I passed the baby on the 20th; the day before Eva’s first birthday. That day felt so painful on many levels, but I still remember thinking “last year on this day I was being induced to deliver a baby, and now I am here losing a baby one year later”. Recovery took a long time and I bled for a long time. It was pretty tough emotionally and physically. I had about an hour a day where Jack and Eva’s naps overlapped and I really just let myself rest and feel the pain in that hour. I still leaned on family, especially my mom and mother in law. And my community at church, the ladies in my Bible study were an actual God send in that time.
I felt a great sense of guilt after we lost the baby because my initial feelings had been a combination worry and overwhelmed. I felt so guilty that I was worried about having three kids three and under and then did not end up having a third child. At the same time I logically knew that loss was relatively common, they say that one in four women will experience a loss so I thought that was my one time. It was me becoming that one in four. A miscarriage can leave a profound sense of emptiness and longing for the child that was lost and one of the women in my Bible study had experienced her own loss a few years prior. Her strength and empathy helped me grieve, and made me feel less empty. It’s the kind of support where you don’t have to say anything to know that you have someone with you and you are not alone.
I eventually did heal physically and the pain of the loss felt less present. I think that when you have little kids in your home, it can feel like things find a sense of normalcy relatively quick because their needs do not stop. While the emotional pain did not leave suddenly I focused on the joy that Jack and Eva brough and continued to lean into my Bible Study group.
I have decided to make two blog posts out of this story, we did go on to have another miscarriage about six months later, God worked so many miracles from that time in our lives and it’d be too long to write in one long post. My prayer would be that if you are walking through a loss or grieving loss that you have community you can lean on. If you don’t have one with you in person there are wonderful resources online. One thing that has always comforted me is knowing that my babies are in Heaven with Jesus; one day we will experience a beautiful family reunion where all of my children are together.
