Rhys

Today I am 18 weeks pregnant.  I've put off writing this post because I didn't know what to say.  For some reason, writing about the pain of losing a pregnancy was easier than writing about all of the emotions that have come with this pregnancy.  But if I am so willing to share my experiences of losing a pregnancy, why shouldn't I be willing to share my experience of keeping a pregnancy after loss?

It took a while to believe that this was really happening.  I struggled to be happy for the first two months. But then we passed 8 weeks, which was when our most recent loss occurred.  Then we heard the heartbeat once, twice, three times, each time so clear and so beautiful.  Then, at eleven weeks, we learned that we were having a son.  Rhys Jonathan, we named him.  Our little Rhys.

Every day is a new day.  Every morning I wake up, and my hand goes instinctively to my belly, feeling that hard, round bump that has begun to form.  Throughout the day, as I visit patients and talk with hospital staff, I can occasionally feel Rhys moving.  Little pokes from the inside, like a reminder.  "I'm in here, Mommy.  Don't forget about me."

I was afraid to buy anything at first, afraid to jinx the pregnancy.  I didn't want to make plans, to look at strollers or cribs or carseats.  I didn't want anything that might still be around to remind us, in case something happened.  But slowly, others started giving us things: adorable onesies, Doctor Who hat and socks, a carseat, a stroller.  Hand-me-downs were offered, and the question of a baby shower was brought up.  I started an Amazon Baby Registry, and got overwhelmed just thinking about what to put on it.  I bought fabric samples to go with our nursery theme - monsters.  I bought patterns for little boy suits and hats.

We still have time, of course, before Rhys arrives.  Time to figure out where we will be living.  Time to pick out nursery furniture.  Time to sew some cute baby clothes.  Time to knit a blanket.  Time for a few baby showers.  Time to adjust to the idea of having a baby.  But the weeks are moving by fast now.  We are almost halfway there.  Soon, I won't be able to hid my bump.  We'll be decorating the nursery and installing the carseat.  We'll be deciding what outfit to bring him home in.  We'll start packing a hospital bag for when the time comes.  Soon, that time will come, and we'll meet our little boy, and hold him in our arms.  Soon, we will have a son.

A Letter to Baby

Dear Baby,

We haven't met yet, but I'm Mommy. Or I will be when you get here. Sometimes I wish you would hurry up already, but I know that you'll be here someday. I'm ready to love you, to hold you and smother you in kisses. Will you have your daddy's blue eyes, or my ever-changing ones? Will you get my nose, with its funny bump in the middle? Or will you have a new face of your own to bring to our family? No matter how you look, I know I will love you.

It's hard waiting, Baby. Sometimes it hurts. I think that you are on your way, but then I find out I have to wait longer. You'll find this out eventually - I'm not a very patient person. I should probably work on being patient before you get here. In the meantime, I keep wondering who you will be. What will you be like when you get here?

Will you scream like I did? Will you suck your two middle fingers, too? Will you be a snuggly baby, or will I treasure those few and far between moments when you are quiet in my arms? Will you love to run and play outside? Will you tell corny jokes like your daddy, that I can't help but laugh at? Will you sit as I read to you at bedtime, telling you stories from the books I loved best when I was little? Will you love to travel, and imagine visiting every continent? Will you dream of traveling to the stars, or will you be happy here on earth, just like your mommy?

You'll change the world, Baby. I don't know who you'll be or what you'll do, but I do know that. I know you'll change my world, and Daddy's, too. I know you'll make a difference in the lives of everyone you meet.

I'm ready to meet you, Baby. Whenever you're ready to come, I'll be waiting with open arms.

Love,
Mommy

The Language of Miscarriage

A week ago Thursday, Colin and I sat in the sonogram room of my OBGYN's office, watching as a small, black void surrounding a minuscule white dot appeared on a screen.  The pregnancy sac and fetal pole, our doctor told us.

By my calculations, I was supposed to be eight weeks pregnant, but the baby was only measuring at 6.  Not definitely a bad thing, the doctor told us, but not good.  I was bleeding, too, and terrified.

This Thursday, we sat in that same room and watched as the doctor again performed a sonogram.  There was the cervix, and the uterus.  But that black void and white dot were gone.  By that point, we'd known for a week that our baby had left us.  But it was still so strange to look at that place where it had been visible only a week ago, and to see nothing.

I've thought a lot lately about the language of miscarriage.  "I had a miscarriage," or "I miscarried," women say.  Or sometimes "We had a miscarriage," or "We lost the baby."  That had been my language, too, for our previous two losses.  Though I did not believe that I had done something to cause the miscarriage, the language I used made me the subject.  I lost the baby.  I had a miscarriage.

But this time is different.  This, my third pregnancy and third loss, my experience was different.  The baby was in me for longer.  8 weeks, this time, rather than 5 or 6.  I had a month of knowing I was pregnant, a month of experiencing the symptoms, the pains, the emotions.  A whole month where we thought everything was fine.  And then, last Thursday night, the baby left my body.

I won't be too graphic, but I will say this: I knew that the baby had left me.  I knew it physically.  And in that moment, my understanding of our language of miscarriage changed.  I didn't lose the baby.  The baby left me.  The baby left us.

The medical community has yet another term for this: "spontaneous abortion."  Though our society is very single-minded when the word abortion is used, it does work to explain what happened.  The word "abort" is defined as "to fail, cease, or stop at an early stage."  "Spontaneous," too, is an appropriate descriptor: "without effort or premeditation." It happened out of nowhere.  Unplanned, the baby simply ceased to grow, and left.

That understanding of the miscarriage helps explain my own feeling that I've been abandoned.  I was abandoned, in a sense.  For whatever reason, the baby left my body.  We probably will never know the answer, and knowing the answer won't stop my feeling of abandonment, anyway.

It hurts to be abandoned by someone I'd promised to love and protect.  It hurts to be left.  But it hurts a lot less than thinking I am the reason why the baby left.  It hurts less to say that the baby left, rather than saying that I lost it.

I didn't lose the baby.  The baby left my body.   But it will never, ever, leave my heart.

Infant and Pregnancy Loss Awareness

October 15 was Infant and Pregnancy Loss Awareness Day.  Though I didn't post about it, I did a lot of thinking about the issue, since it is one close to my heart.  Not only have my husband and I experienced two losses, but many couples close to us are pregnant, have newborns, or have experienced losses themselves.  In my new role as chaplain of a children's hospital, these losses are never far away.  Some of these losses occur early, like mine.  What is lost is the idea, or hope, of that child, because you haven't felt the child move, or learned its gender.  Others occur late in the pregnancy, and it seems like the child is already with you and a part of your family.

There have been stories on the news lately of parents who lost their children later in pregnancy.  When this couple learned that their unborn son, Shane, had a condition that gave him a life expectancy of only a few hours, they created a bucket list of things to do with him.  They visited museums, went to a pumpkin patch, the beach, and much more.  Though they knew they would lose Shane, they found a way to make him a part of their lives forever.

When I read stories like this, I think about our hopes for a successful pregnancy.  At one time, I thought that if I got past the first trimester, I would be less nervous.  Then, after hearing stories of late losses like this, I began to worry about later losses.  Working at the hospital has made my worries grow worse.

But loss can happen at any point.  At four weeks into a pregnancy, at 39 weeks.  It can happen at age 2, or 12, 50 or 100.  It isn't something we ever know for certain, even when we are given a timeline.  And it doesn't make sense to live in fear of that coming loss.  If we did live in that fear, our lives would be incredibly stressful!

I'm inspired by Shane's parents.  I'm inspired by their desire to live in the moment, rather than worry about the future and what losses may come.  I'm inspired to live my own life in that way.  Instead of worrying about the possibility of losing the next baby, I want to try to experience joy in the fact that we are trying to start a family at all.

It's a difficult idea to live into, but seeing stories of other families brings me hope, peace, and joy.

The hardest prayer to pray

"Then Jesus withdrew from them about a stone's throw, knelt down, and prayed, "Father, if you are willing, remove this cup from me; yet, not my will but yours be done." -Luke 22:42

 When the plus sign showed on the take-home pregnancy test, so faint, but so clearly there, I began praying. Please, God. This time. Please, God. Let it be this time. Each night, I curled my hands around my stomach and prayed with all my heart and soul. Please, God, protect this child. Please God, be with this child. Help me to protect this child. Help me to keep this child safe for the next nine months. 

When the doctor's office called to say that the pregnancy was, again, not viable, I felt betrayed. I had already suffered through one loss. How could I be expected to suffer through yet another? I had prayed for this with all my heart, all my being, but my prayer had not been answered. Silence, it seemed, was God's response.

Not my will, but yours. 

I was reminded, then, of Jesus's prayer in the Garden of Gethsemane just before his crucifixion. How, in that moment of desperation, when any sensible person would have prayed to God to be saved, Jesus prayed that God's will be done. "I don't want this," he prayed, "yet not my will, but yours be done."

 I am awed by his trust. At times, I struggle to trust God's decisions in my own life. Sometimes, I can't help but believe that I'm the only one who knows what's best for me. We're self-centered in that way. We struggle to see and understand the bigger picture. It's difficult for us to trust that God sees and understands the big picture. It's difficult for us to tell ourselves that the world is not centered around our lives, that our lives, added together with the lives of those who came before and who will come after, make up the bigger picture that is God's Kingdom.

 Do I believe that my miscarriages are a part of that bigger picture? I don't know. Do I believe that it was God's will that I lose two babies after only knowing about them for a week? I struggle to say yes, because I don't like the idea of God ordaining suffering. But just yesterday, I told a handful of kindergarten and first graders the story of God's plagues on the Egyptians. And there are certainly other times that God allowed (even aided in) the suffering of God's people.

 As I pray each night now, I find my mouth forming the words - Please, God... - but then I stop myself. As I curl my hands together above where a child will hopefully, someday find a safe home, I pray a new prayer.

Not my will, but yours.

It is the hardest prayer I have ever prayed. But it is the prayer I know I must pray. God knows what God is doing. In God I place my trust.

Grief, loss, and finding dry land

I've been thinking a lot about grief and loss lately.

When I was in high school, it occurred to me that I was the only one of my friends who had not experienced a major loss in my life. All my grandparents were living, my parents were happy together, and none of my family or friends had unexpectedly died.

I lived in a state of fearful anticipation. I knew my grandparents, and even my parents wouldn't live forever.  Not knowing what to expect emotionally, I feared their deaths even more. I was afraid of a Big Loss that I knew was coming - an unidentifiable certainty, because I knew I would not live in this state of blissful ignorance forever.

When those Big Losses did begin to show up - the death of my grandma, the death of my father-in-law, the miscarriage - I stopped thinking so much about what loss and grief were like. When comforting my husband, I stopped worrying about future loss and future emotions, and found myself focusing only on the right now. And when the death of our unborn, unseen baby happened, I found I could only worry about the present. There wasn't enough in me to look forward.

I do not know when I became comfortable with the process of grief. Somewhere between losses, I began to realize that grief and loss are natural parts of life. How did I know the "correct" emotion to have? The "correct" reaction to a loss? I didn't. The emotions simply rushed over me like a wave of seawater. And then they left. And then they returned. Some days, the grief was at high tide. It rushed over my mouth and eyes and whole body so I could barely breathe. And other days, it simply brushed my toes, like a  gentle reminder that it was still there.

Why does God allow bad things to happen to us? It's a question we ask ourselves in the midst of tragedy and loss, a question we all struggle to answer. A question at times we feel like screaming at God, demanding to know: WHY ME??

A friend of mine is going through her own period of loss right now, and in her grief turned to me. I found myself equipped in a way I had not been before. I was able to speak, able to explain, grateful to help, because I recognized the emotions I saw in her.

If we are God's hands in this world, then maybe bad things happen to good people so that when someone close to us experiences those same bad things - death, loss, grief - we can hold out our hands - God's hands - and let them know they will not be alone when the waters rush over them.

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I am eternally grateful to those who held my hands over these past few months as those waves beat against me. I am thankful to have you in my life, and that you knew the right words to say and the right way to be present. It is your hands in mine that helped me to find dry land once more.

Not ready.

I've had a scene from a TV show stuck in my head.  In the sixth season of How I Met Your Mother, Lily steps out of a taxi onto the sidewalk to greet her husband, Marshall.  Marshall is overjoyed with news he just learned, but Lily has some terrible news.  She tells Marshall that his dad had a heart attack, and that he didn't make it.

"My dad's dead?" Marshall asks Lily.  She nods, crying, and he wraps her in his arms.  The two of them rock back and forth like this for a moment.  Then, crying in that way you cry when you don't believe the awful news you just heard, he says:

"I'm not ready for this..."

The camera pans back on the two of them interlocked on the street outside their New York apartment.

I have had this scene stuck in my head for the past few weeks.  That line has repeated itself in my mind over and over again…I'm not ready for this.  I'm not ready for this.

I wasn't ready when I counted the days and realized I would graduate in a month.

I wasn't ready when the pregnancy test was positive and I realized I had to start thinking about life in a whole new scary way.

I wasn't ready when I started bleeding, went to the ER and was told that I was having a miscarriage.

I wasn't ready for the confusion, the uncertainty about what and how to feel after losing something I had never really known.

I wasn't ready when I realized I hadn't turned in my paperwork for Search and Call…that I hadn't found a job after graduation…that I hadn't prepared for life after graduation.

I wasn't ready when I woke up with the worst abdominal pain I'd ever felt.  I wasn't ready when we went again to the hospital and was told I hadn't miscarried, that I had an ectopic pregnancy.

I wasn't ready when they told me they would have to cause a chemical abortion because my pregnancy was, and had never been, viable.

I'm not ready to graduate in 13 days.  I'm not ready to find a new job.  I'm not ready to face the reality of the recent loss in my life.

But are we ever ready?  Are we ever ready for those scary-sudden-life-changing events that jump into our lives unannounced?  Are we ever ready for those just-as-scary-life-changing events that have been on our calendar for months, slowly creeping forward until that date arrives?

But we're never alone in our not-ready-ness.  Like Marshall, I know that I am not alone.  I know that I have Colin to wrap his arms around me.  That I have friends who will go shopping with me and take me to lunch and love me.  I know that in the times when I am not ready - which, let's face it, is most times these days - that my friends will be there.  That they will hold my hand tight so I cannot let go.  And they will fill that space between me and acceptance.  They will stand there and hold me until I can take the steps forward toward acceptance.

I know these things.  I trust in these things.  I have faith in these things.  They have helped me through this, and continue to do so.

When someone is in pain or struggling, we pray that Jesus holds their hand or hugs them tight.  But what has been comforting to me in this time of pain, of struggling, of uncertainty, has been the constant physical embrace of my friends, family, and loved ones.  I do believe that Jesus is with me through all these difficult times.  And I believe that Jesus is with my friends when they hug me or touch my arm in silent support.  But I also know that the physical touch of a person who loves you can be the most comforting thing of all.

I'm not ready for this…for all of this.  But when my friends hug me and hold me, I know that someday, hopefully soon, I will be.