I have been struggling with whether to share our story. After all, this is a place where I want to share happy, pretty things to inspire you to love your home. However, as you might have noticed, I haven’t shared a lot this year. I found it hard to share “normal” things when my heart has felt so heavy. Today I am choosing to share a (large) piece of our life.
In the past 6 months we lost our first and second babies to miscarriage. Missed miscarriage to be specific. I share this as a tribute to our little angel babies and to shed some light on a little discussed topic: pregnancy loss and miscarriage.
OUR FIRST BABY
We found out we were expecting in early February. I was exactly four weeks along. We were sooo excited and nervous all at the same time! Filled with joy, trepidation, excitement, nerves, and everything in between. We had our first pre-natal appointment at 7 weeks. They confirmed I was pregnant (yay!), gave us some reading materials, answered my 1 million questions (only slightly exaggerating) and we scheduled another appointment to come in when I was around 12 weeks along. Two days later I started having light spotting as soon as I woke up. My heart sank, and I immediately panicked. I was terrified I was having a miscarriage. I called my doctor. She had us come in for an ultrasound that day. We were so relieved to find out everything was just fine, and our baby’s heart was beating away. The doctor was not sure at this point what caused the spotting, so I was told to monitor it. If it didn’t go away or got worse, I was supposed to call. Over the next week it slowly went away so I thought everything was fine.
Exactly one week later the spotting had returned. My heart immediately sank. Something just didn’t feel right. I called my doctor, again. We went in for another ultrasound that day and again we were relieved to find the baby wiggling away and the heart beating steadily at 168bpm (I was 8.5 weeks at this point). However, during this ultrasound the tech saw a small bleed in my uterus most likely caused from implantation, which is known as a sub-chorionic hematoma. Based on what my doctor explained they are not normal, but they are not uncommon. My doctor reviewed my scans and said due to the small size of the bleed and the fact that the baby was growing on track that everything would probably be alright, even though there was a chance it might not be. Her best guess was that the bleed should completely go away as the baby grows more. However, I needed to monitor the spotting and if it got worse or if I had other issues like abdominal cramping I should come in again. I was SO worried. Wracked with fear, worry and anxiety that something would go wrong. I was terrified of going to the bathroom only to find the spotting had gotten worse. I tried to remain calm and anxiety free, but the fear kept creeping back.
Fast forward three weeks and slowly the spotting went away, like my doctor predicted. My worry and anxiety subsided significantly as well because I thought if the spotting was going away it must be a good sign! Plus, I was still feeling very pregnant; nauseous in the afternoons, VERY tired, and very bloated. All normal pregnancy symptoms, which I was honestly very happy to be having because it was a sign that everything was still alright.
We went in for our scheduled 12-week appointment at the end of March, we were excited and went with high spirits and anticipation. After the doctor had completed my exam she used the doppler to find the baby’s heartbeat. She couldn’t find it. She said not to worry and that sometimes the baby is hiding, and it can be harder to find the heartbeat before 12 weeks, but she wanted to get us in for an ultrasound that day just to ease our anxiety. It was after 5pm and I thought for sure that the tech would be gone already, however, she wasn’t and agreed to squeeze us in before she left. It was at this point that I knew something was truly wrong with the baby. I was terrified and almost didn’t even want to do the ultrasound that day, but I still held on to a glimmer of hope that everything was alright. As soon as the tech pulled up the baby on the screen our fears were confirmed. Even though Nathan and I had both only seen two prior ultrasounds we knew something wasn’t right. The tech was quiet for about 30 agonizing seconds and then very gently and with the most compassion I had ever experienced told us that our baby’s heart had stopped beating. Probably around 10 weeks. Just one week after we had seen such a strong heartbeat and movement. We were in complete shock; how could that be? The grief and pain hit immediately like a ton of bricks, which almost surprised me because this was a baby we had never even met, right? Wrong. I was so wrong. We developed a love so deep for our little peanut, even in the few short weeks we had. I wanted to get out of there as quickly as possible and get as far away as possible from all things baby, but we knew we had to hear what came next.
The doctor came back in to discuss the scans and our options. The odd thing was based on my scan that day the bleed had gone completely away which was why my spotting had stopped so it is likely was not the cause of the miscarriage. She explained we will never truly know why the baby passed, which is so hard to comprehend and confusing. It left us questioning everything. Why us? Why did it happen? Is something wrong with me? Was something wrong with the baby? We will never know what happened to our first baby and that is such an awful feeling.
Since my body had not yet recognized the baby had passed it was hard to know when my I would miscarry naturally. We determined to go ahead with surgery for a D&C the next day as both we felt this was the best option for us. We left the doctor’s that day feeling completely numb.
All the next day I just went through the motions. We arrived at the hospital feeling sad and emotionally drained. The procedure went as planned, but I left feeling like a shell of a person. I was so suddenly no longer pregnant. Physically, the recovery was easy for me. Emotionally, it felt like that little life had been ripped out of me.
OUR SECOND BABY
After months of grief, heartache, questioning, and slow healing we found out we were expecting again at the end of July. We were excited, but extremely scared. Despite all the fear, hope was nestling in and we were feeling so happy and confident that I would carry this sweet babe to a full-term pregnancy. From the beginning we felt my second pregnancy was different than the first, that everything was going to be okay.
I was much more nauseous this time around and the food/smell aversions were making it hard to eat anything. I kept thinking, you can get through this nausea and severe fatigue – it’s a positive sign that the baby is growing, and I would have suffered through almost anything for that.
Since I had a previous miscarriage my doctor had me come in for weekly monitoring of my HCG and progesterone levels, which was a huge relief for me. We also came in for an early ultrasound at 6 weeks to make sure everything was growing appropriately. Based on the first scan the baby was the appropriate size, but there wasn’t a heartbeat yet. The doctor assured us this was okay and that it was likely just too early, and the baby was too small to see the heartbeat. We scheduled another follow-up ultrasound for 8 weeks. We sadly never made it to that appointment. At 7.5 weeks I was at work when I started having intense pain on my left side that nearly caused me to black out. The pain subsided after 30 minutes, but I knew something was wrong. I (much to my bad judgment) drove myself home and called my doctor who told us to come in later that day for another ultrasound. When I got home I went to the bathroom and noticed I had started spotting, but it stopped just as soon as it started. My heart knew this was the beginning of the end, but I kept trying to convince myself that it was just some freak thing, and everything would be alright. We went in for the ultrasound and knowing I should be almost 8 weeks expected to see more on the screen, but the baby was the same size as it had been the week before and the tech confirmed there was no heartbeat. It felt like we were reliving a terrible nightmare from three months before. We were stunned and felt very numb. This just happened 4 months ago, why is it happening again? What went wrong? Was it the baby or is something wrong with me?
We discussed with my doctor and it seemed my body had already started the process to miscarry we decided to let things happen naturally. Well that same day the spotting stopped, and the pain completely subsided. A week went by and I was still feeling very pregnant, so I went in for another ultrasound to see what’s going on – basically nothing had changed, and the tech confirmed this was not a viable pregnancy. It’s like a double gut punch having to hear that two ultrasounds in a row, but I wanted to be 1000% positive the baby had passed because at 6-8 weeks everything is so small and can change very quickly (in terms of growth). Well, I received that confirmation at the second scan and decided to keep waiting for things to happen naturally. I proceeded to wait for 5 weeks to no avail. I was a shell of a person walking around knowing my baby was no longer living and knowing I could miscarry at at any minute made that worse. After 5 weeks I felt I could not wait any longer and started having a few symptoms that were worrisome of a potential infection. We decided to go ahead and schedule a D&C. We officially said goodbye to our second baby on September 11th. Recovery after this procedure was much worse than it had been the first time around and I am finally, almost 3 weeks later, feeling a tad more normal (physically at least).
Our second pregnancy and miscarriage left both of us feeling confused. I find myself at moments feeling very angry and asking why. Other times I am swallowed with sadness and the thought of what could have been.
We hope that with the help of our doctor we will be able to find some answers as to why this is happening. Although, I know there is a very real possibility we will never know.
Though we never got to meet our sweet babies, we love them dearly and they are forever in our hearts.
MY THOUGHTS ON OUR EXPERIENCES
We waited until we were almost 11 weeks to tell our parents we were pregnant with our first baby (some of our close friends figured it out sooner than that). I wish we had experienced that joy and sharing with our families and friends sooner because only a few days later that joy turned to heartache.
With our second baby we told our family at 4 weeks and a few close friends shortly after. I was hesitant at first to tell anyone so early, but do not regret that decision one bit. Having our family and friends there to share in all the initial joys and then the eventual sorrow that came was so very helpful.
One thing I’ve learned through this experience and through others sharing their experiences with me is that there is no “safe zone”. Like life, anything can happen at any time during pregnancy, birth, or after a baby is born. I want to savor every second as much as possible. Not letting yourself get excited in the moment won’t protect your heart later if something goes wrong. Pregnancy is amazing, terrifying, precious, and full of unknowns. Personally, I wanted our family and close friends there for the good and bad. I wouldn’t have been able to get through without them.
No one tells you how hard it is to lose someone you have never met. We developed a love so deep for each our sweet babies in the few short weeks we had. Sometimes I still cry thinking about our babies and what could have been. I see or hear something that brings back the overwhelming feeling of sorrow, and then there are days I just feel grateful I was pregnant at all and could carry our babies for those precious weeks.
I never thought this would be our story, but it is. I must believe there is more to our story and that light will come from this darkness. It must. These past months have been a rollercoaster of us figuring out life after loss. It has only intensified our desire to live with purpose in this one precious life we have.
I am still fearful every hopeful future pregnancy will end this way, but I also still pray and have hope that I will get to be a mommy to a baby here on earth.
