To be honest, the reason I haven't blogged in a while is simple. When I started this blog, it was so that I could be transparent, real, honest; but to be all of those things, I'd have to say I kept a lot of secrets. I lied to people. A lot of people. I lied about all the same things.
"When are you guys going to have children?"
"Have you thought about trying soon?"
"Are you guys trying?"
I always said the same things.
"Oh, no, we're taking our time...it's not a priority right now...I have nieces and nephews to hold me over."
All lies! And if you're reading this and I said that to you, I'm sorry.
At the time, I thought it was something to hide and cover up; something to be embarrassed about. Now I know it's not that way at all and, in fact, it's just the opposite. Even just hearing the word makes me cringe.
Miscarriage.
A heartache my family is all too familiar with. A heartache that I assumed I would never deal with and that I thought was rare.
I have always loved children. About a month into mine and Aaron's marriage, we decided the whole birth control thing really sucked and we'd take our chances. Months went by and our "chance taking" turned into hopes and those hopes turned into questions. We were young and in what we thought to be perfect health. Why was this not happening? During all of this, my sister was diagnosed with Polycystic Ovarian Syndrome. It was mentioned to her that it could be hereditary. So, I made an appointment with my doctor and did all sorts of testing. Nothing we could find told us anything was wrong; in fact, everything was exactly right. Most would have been elated! I was actually pretty discouraged. I had gone into it all hoping there'd be something wrong with a magic pill that would get me magically pregnant! Instead, it was on to the next. And that meant bringing Aaron in which I did NOT want to do to him. Thankfully, I've been blessed with a husband willing to do whatever it is he needed to do for us. So, he went in. I'll spare the major details for his sake, but his tests gave us the answers we needed and showed us a sports injury that commonly affects male fertility. Our treatment option was surgery. We scheduled the surgery and went on our merry way, praying and praying and praying that it would work and everything would go smoothly. He had surgery in August and our doctor told us that though he doubted it would take so long, it could potentially take up to FIVE YEARS to conceive. This was discouraging to hear, of course, but we thought to ourselves, "we're young and we have that time! We will take what we can get."
To our surprise, the first month of trying after the surgery, we conceived. We were ELATED and shocked!
We told my family the day we found out and had plans to tell Aaron's that weekend. Our excitement was quickly turned to confusion when my doctor called and explained a "chemical loss" to me. This is where a miscarriage happens before anything can be seen on an ultrasound, but pregnancy levels are detected in the blood and urine. She also told me that chemical pregnancies are the reason that approximately 1/3 pregnancies end in miscarriage. Most women who have chemical losses never even knew they were pregnant in the first place.
This terrified me.
My first thought was, "how many times has this happened to me?!"
She assured me that my awareness of what goes on in my body (a polite way of putting my obsessive need to be "in tune" with my body) would have lead me to know about any prior chemical losses just like I knew about this one. She then gave us the go ahead to try again right away. And that's what we did.
And...you can imagine our shock to have found out we conceived AGAIN the next month. After nearly 2.5 years of nothing but negative tests, this seemed to be almost TOO easy now. We praised God that clearly Aaron's surgery was a success and he had made a full recovery much quicker than expected.
We announced the pregnancy to our families about a week and a half after finding out. We followed my blood levels every 3 days, I took supplements, I did everything I thought was right.
Our biggest fear came to life once again and I found myself in the ER at just 6 weeks listening to yet another doctor try to medically explain and degrade what happened. I know it is their job to try to make you feel better, but while he is explaining to me why this is nothing to worry about, I'm hearing him tell me that my feelings and my heartache about this loss is irrational.
I'm not writing this to get every reader to sympathize for me and write me a letter of sincerity. I appreciate those that have reached out, but I want to make perfectly clear why I'm speaking out. Amongst those apologies I read were not just a few, but multiples of women privately messaging me to say they've been through it and understand and kept it a secret because it's uncomfortable and sad and we don't want to be looked at like abandoned puppies. I want people to know that, yes, this is sad and hard and I wouldn't wish it upon anyone, but next time someone tells you they've experienced loss, instead of just apologizing, do that AND remind them how strong they are. Pray for them. Encourage them. Don't try to "fix" them. Don't make them feel broken.
There is a common misconception about miscarriage. It is that people who have them have something wrong with them. This isn't true. Unfortunately, miscarriage is not an uncommon diagnosis. If you're reading this and you've been through it, remind yourself this: you are not broken. You don't need fixing. You are a woman. No less.
I will end this by answering a question many of you are probably wondering. We WILL try this again and we are believing everything will be fine. But right now, I am really looking forward to having my body to myself for a while. ❤️
Thank you all so much for the prayers. Keep them coming. But while you're at it, say a prayer for those that haven't spoken out. Because I can 100% guarantee you that someone you know has gone through or is going through this silently.
