Journey to Healing

I've been looking for things that would help me understand miscarriage better. Why it happens. How you're supposed to feel after wards. What the signs of miscarriage are. And everything I found is scary, because it is scary to experience this. I've been getting closer to God over the last few months and especially after finding out I was pregnant I really felt a true connection to him that I haven't felt in a long time. After losing this pregnancy, I wanted to find a christian way to deal and heal from this. I couldn't find anything at first. No blogs or internet articles. But then I found a book by Elise Erikson Barrett "What was lost: A Christian Journey Through Miscarriage". I ordered this book and have read a few chapters. I already love it. At the end of the chapters it has reflection questions where you write down your experience, and also exercises to help you heal. Along with writing it all in a notebook, I'm going to blog about it. By doing this, I hope I can help other women out there who are going through this as well. And if you like what I'm writing, please go out and check this book out. If my answers are helping you that much, just think of what the book can do for you. God bless.

***After the first two chapters of the book, it asks you to reflect on how you felt when you found out you were pregnant. If it brought you closer to God, did your prayers change. The second chapter asks you to reflect on the miscarriage itself. Was it out of the blue, did you anticipate it. How did the medical professionals treat you and help you with it. Well, I think I explained all of the pretty well with my first blog. So I will leave it at that for now.*** I do hope that whoever reads this, it helps you understand that a miscarriage isn't just a loss of an embryo. It's the loss of an actual baby. That to the mother it was her child, her flesh and blood. No matter how far along in the pregnancy the miscarriage was, it is still a major loss.

*God's Tiny Angel*

When I found out I was pregnant with our second child, I was scared and excited. I was excited we were expanding our family of three, to a family of four. It's an exciting time in a womans life to be pregnant and to know that you are the home of a little life inside of you. You're responsible for that little persons life.

Now, if I may be completely honest. My first pregnancy wasn't the best time of my life. I didn't enjoy all of the changes my body had to endure. The horomones alone were enough to make me crazy! I did enjoy feeling my baby girl moving inside of me. Kicking me, getting her foot or hand wrapped around my ribs. It was uncomfortable but I loved it. To me, it was her way of saying, "Hey mom,don't forget I'm in here. Take care of me." And I did. I carried her to term and she was a healthy 7 lb 12 oz baby girl.

With this pregnancy, the morning sickness started right away. I had to switch my prenatals to the flinstone's because I was so nauseated all the time. That seemed to work for a while. When I was about 10 weeks, I had noticed some spotting. It wasn't heavy or anything, I didn't have any cramps but it scared me non the less. When I called my Dr's office, the nurse told me it was probably nothing but she wanted to schedule a sonogram just to be safe. My husband went with me to my appointment for support. When we saw the baby and saw the flicker of a heartbeat (172) we instantly relaxed. The ultra sound tech confirmed that I was 10 weeks and told us my Dr would call me once he had a chance to look at the pictures. About an hour later I got a phone call from my nurse and she said everything was fine, and there was a small bleed in my cervix and advised me to take it easy for a few days. I was relieved when I heard this, but there was something in me saying that something wasn't right.

Week 15. I woke up Saturday morning with a full day ahead of me. I had a hair appointment early that morning, then I was going to meet up with my husband and daughter to run errands. After my hair appointment, I started to experience some cramping. I didn't think anything of it because I thought it was from everything stretching, or indigestion. It seemed to get a little stronger than night when my husband and I were at the Brandon Heath concert. I still didn't think anything of it. Sunday morning I when I woke up to get ready for church, I didn't feel right. I didn't feel sick, but I still had cramps. And they were a little stronger than the day before. I stayed home from church and told my mom what was going on. She told me to lay on the couch with my feet up and not to do anything that day.

Despite not doing anything, they kept getting stronger and seemed to last longer. I knew in my mind that something really wasn't right. I told my husband, and he thought it was because I needed to go to the bathroom. I called him an insensitve jerk because it didn't feel like that to me at all. Later, when I was laying in bed for the night, I noticed they were a lot stronger and closer than before. I had text my mom and let her know they still hadn't gone away and also I wasn't too worried about it because I wasn't bleeding. Well, about an hour later I woke up with horrible cramps that had me doubled over. I went downstairs to the bathroom and it was then that I noticed I had indeed started bleeding. And it wasn't light, it was heavy.

I immediately called the OB department at the hospital and told them what was going on. But since I wasn't 24 weeks yet, they couldn't see me and suggested I go to the ER. I went back upstairs, woke my husband up and told him to get dressed and take me to the hospital. While I was getting ready to go, he got our daughter in the truck and back asleep.

We live about 20 minutes from the hospital and it gave me time to think on the way there. I kept asking God "Why are you doing this to me?" I was angry with him for letting this happen. When I got out of the truck at the ER, I had blood running down my legs. It felt like forever in the waiting room. I finally was seen and taken in to the triage room to get checked out. The nurse looked at me and asked what I was in for. And when I told her how far along I was, the look on her face confirmed what I was feeling. A miscarriage.

That night in the ER was the worst night of my life.

The Dr. did a pelvic exam to confirm what everyone knew. He told me and my husband that it was an inevitable misscarriage. There was nothing they could do to save my baby. I had to get a sonogram that night as well, so they could get a look at the baby. The lady asked me how far along I thought I was and I told her 15 weeks. She paused and said, "Well you already know you're having a miscarriage and there's no heartbeat. But I'm measuring the baby at 12 weeks". I was speechless. I just laid there and cried. The "cramps", which I knew were contractions, were so painful but my heart also hurt just as bad.

Once I was back in the exam room, the nurse came in to exlain what my options were. She told me I would either have to have a D & C done. Dialation and Curettage. Which are words that mean stretching your cervix or opening of your uterus and then scraping to gently cleanse the remains of the pregnancy. Such as any left over tissue. Well I knew right away I didn't want that. Then she said I could also do this on my own. They would usually send someone home to do this, but I was bleeding so much they wanted me there. Around 4:40 am I delivered by baby. We got to look at it. It was still in the sac and was much smaller than I wanted it to be. The nurse then moved me to the OB to be observed until my Dr was able to talk to me later in the morning. On the way there, she told me they would try everything they could to get us fingerprints and let us know the sex of our child. But they couldn't do either of those because it was so small. I'm still upset that they didn't at least give us hand and footprints. I dont care if they all those lines I just want it. But I didn't think of any of that until it was too late.

Once we were settled in to our new room, the new nurse didn't close the door all the way. We could hear all the newborns crying. The sound of a newborn cry is beautiful and makes you cry just to hear it. But for me, who just lost my chance at being a mom to two children, it was the most beautiful and heartbreaking sound I've ever heard.

I know earlier I said I was angry with God for letting this happen to me and my family. But I knew he was with me in the hospital holding my hand, guiding me through this horrible experience. When I was checked out in the triage, my blood pressure was 120/74. At that point, I felt God wrap his loving arms around me. It was him who kept me safe that night. I am so blessed to have him as my Heavenly Father. A God who loves all of his children and guides them through everything in life, not just the good, but the bad as well.

When my husband called his parents to let them know, his dad told him to look up  Isaiah 57. It says: "1.The righteous perishes, and no man takes it to heart; merciful men are taken away, while no one considers that the righteous is taken away from evil. 2. He shall enter into peace; they shall rest in their beds, each one walking in his uprighness." Isn't that the truth? God didn't do this to hurt me. He did it to protect my baby from the evil that's to come in this world.