Philemon 1:12 ESV
I am sending him back to you, sending my very heart.
I need a moment to get this all out.
Two weeks ago tomorrow (Sunday) my baby died. I never got to meet him/her. Maybe you couldn't even consider it a baby. It hadn't even reached the fetus stage, but it probably did develop a heartbeat. I was 7.5 weeks pregnant.
I found out sadly, on my dear husband's birthday, April 3rd, 2013.
I have never experienced a miscarriage before, and I spent the first day and a half honestly in shock that my body could betray me like that. I felt very angry with God for allowing this to happen.
Let me start from the beginning.
I spent a lot of time last year contemplating whether we should add to our family. After Miles came along, I never felt as if we were done having children. Ahron made it clear that he felt our family was complete. But after five years and my IUD came out, I convinced him that maybe we could try just once. And it didn't happen. And I was okay with that. Fast forward a few weeks to the end of February 2013 and I found myself unexpectedly pregnant. The test showed a very dark positive. I was stunned and scared because I knew this would change our life in some ways. We'd have to get a bigger car. Possibly a bigger house in the future. Three children meant we were outnumbered as parents.
After we came down from the initial shock that I was pregnant, despite trying to prevent it, we began to accept the idea. My daughter came up with some names (terrible names I might add, but the idea was really sweet). We started to picture our lives with three kids. Maybe this is what God had planned all along. It must be if I got pregnant unexpectedly.
At six weeks along, March 13th, I had my first prenatal information class and scheduled my first appointment which would include a dating ultrasound. I was beginning to get excited at that point. But my lack of symptoms from the beginning has me slightly puzzled. People say every pregnancy is different, but I wasn't feeling a lot of morning sickness and my breasts were not very sore which was very different from my first two pregnancies. I told the nurse that at the info appointment but she said nothing.
On my husband's birthday (last Wednesday) he took the day off so we could celebrate and also so we could attend the appointment together. I stepped on the scale and noticed I had lost a pound, which was not unusual from my previous pregnancies. "Good," I thought to myself upon seeing the number on the scale. A little more wiggle room for since I am just barely over the healthy BMI.
The corpsman led us into the little room and I couldn't help feeling that we were going to our doom. I mentioned that jokingly to Ahron. The nurse and I talked for a bit about how I was feeling and discussed a couple more do's and dont's of pregnancy. I faithfully filled out my purple book, the manual to pregnancy you get as a mil spouse.
Then, the ultrasound. She turned the screen toward me and I asked if my husband could film it. He readied his iPhone. But the uterus image showed absolutely nothing. Empty. Void of any life form. At 8 weeks and 6 days we should have seen a clear baby. A heart thumping strongly. I knew right away. The nurse said, "I'm not seeing what I'm supposed to be seeing." She called for the doctor. The doctor came in, took measurements of the yolk sac, which was there but barely visible. He said I would miscarry. I looked at Ahron and Ahron looked at me. Our sadness and shock was apparent.
After that I was told I would need to go the laboratory to draw my blood level for HCG. HCG is the hormone that is present in pregnancy. The levels rise consistently until about the 10 week mark. If it was still rising, it might have been possible that I was earlier along than I thought. If they were declining it was almost certain confirmation that the pregnancy was ending.
I went home and called my mom and told her the news. Thank goodness it was spring break. I didn't have to go anywhere or see anyone. We picked up our kids and told them unfortunately we didn't see a baby. They didn't seem to traumatized or worried which comforted me.
Yesterday was Friday and I was to return to the Navy hospital for another blood draw. They drew my blood. I prayed for a miracle.
Our miracle was not to be. My levels dropped by 2,000. The doctor went over my options to deal with this. I asked about another ultrasound and he did a quick one to show me. Still nothing there. The yolk sac indicated our baby stopped growing at 7 weeks and 4 days, and that my body had already started to reabsorb it. I chose to go home and let nature take its course. I'm still waiting for that to happen. If it doesn't happen by Monday I will ask to schedule a surgery for the doctor to take care of it.
At this point, even though I've accepted it, I am still very sad. It brings me many emotions. I feel angry, incapable, guilty. I feel like maybe we didn't want it bad enough. I know these feelings are illogical but emotions sometimes don't subscribe to logic.
So now, I wait, scared by what might happen today or tomorrow. My heart is broken but I will never forget my little baby who only lived inside me for such a short time. I really hope that I get to see it someday in Heaven.
We will be okay though. We will move forward in strength. We will heal from this, but we will never forget it. I don't know if another baby will ever join our family, because it was so unexpected in the first place. But still above everything else, God is good and present and with us always.
