Our Miscarriage Story

So let me start out by saying I was never ever planning on sharing this let alone writing a blog about it. It is incredibly personal to Andrew and I. Honestly the thought randomly hit me today and I just ran with it like most things. I want to talk about my miscarriage for a couple different reasons. For one being, writing is SO therapeutic for me especially when there is so much emotion involved. It especially was so good for me when I wrote my adoption story of how I came to place Noah for adoption 4 and a half years ago. The second reason is miscarriages are unfortunately so common. When I was going through mine I searched and googled for blogs, articles, and experiences to relate to. I still do. I want someone out there reading this to know you are not alone.

 Lets just say this pregnancy was oh so planned. Like if anything could be planned. It was this pregnancy. Before I even got pregnant I would spend hours just googling babies. Thats right. I was wanting one so bad that I just wanted to stare at all the cute little baby faces all day long.  I started taking prenatal vitamins months before we even started trying. I did some testing to see if I was lacking anything. I started to take iron, methyl folate, and vitamins B and D. Andrew quit drinking diet soda and he started taking a mens multi vitamin as well. We wanted to make sure our bodies were in its BEST possible state to conceive a healthy child.

 Fast forward to a night in November of 2017 where I had a dream that I delivered a beautiful and healthy baby in the hospital. The next day I decided to test even though I wasn’t due for my period until a few more days I just couldn’t help myself. We took a handful of tests before so I knew what a negative looked like. Andrew was at school and I had a drawer full of pregnancy tests. After I took the test it went to an instant positive. I can’t even describe my emotions in that moment. My body was shaking so hard with excitement, fear and shock. But mostly excitement! I jumped in the car to drive to target to get a digital one just to make sure. The whole way there I was just smiling and crying and kept saying “oh my gosh, oh my gosh, oh my gosh” the whole way there. That target trip was literally a blur. I know that is so odd but I am a weird kind of human that when big things happen I just go into shock mode. Haha. Anyway I got my test, came home, took the digital test and it said “pregnant”! You guys, my entire world just turned upside down. WE WERE HAVING A BABY! Andrew got home, I surprised him with the test in a little birthday bag and pretended it was an early birthday present. We cried and we rejoiced. We were going to be parents! The next few weeks I started buying baby things (I know), subscribing to baby websites, I even planned our babies 1st birthday on pinterest. I got WAY too ahead of myself and excitement was an understatement.

I was pregnant for 9 weeks. On the 4th week my OBGYN drew my blood to check my HCG level (pregnancy hormone). It was 305. Great, thats a good number. It is protocol for them to test again 48 hours later to make sure the number has doubled to know if it will be a viable pregnancy. It doesn’t matter really where the number starts just as long as it doubles in about 48 hours. So again, went back 2 days later and they drew my blood again. The number this time was 557. My doctor said thats perfect. It just didn’t settle well with me that it didn’t FULLY double but she assured me it was close enough. That was the unfortunate start to where my excitement about all of this turned into some of the most anxious times of my entire life. I don’t know if it was the numbers, a bad feeling, or the Holy Ghost but I knew something just wasn’t right. I suffer from bad anxiety in general so it's always hard for me to decipher between if I am just having anxiety or if its the spirit. I ended up going to the ER a couple days later because I was having so much anxiety my chest felt like it was going to explode. They checked my HCG. 748. Still rising but not quite doubling. (Remind me to never get my HCG levels checked ever again in the future.)

 Everyone assured me everything will be just fine and to relax. But I just couldn’t. I couldn’t sleep. And when I say I couldn’t sleep i mean it. And when I finally did fall asleep I kept waking up every hour. You know when there is just something heavy on your mind your body just won’t let you have a restful night? It was awful all of the anxiety I felt. I wanted this pregnancy to work out SO BAD and I was so scared it wouldn’t! But I felt pregnant. I felt my uterus stretching. I felt little twinges of normal cramps. I felt extremely bloated. I needed to pee all the time. My boobs were sore. My sense of smell was heightened. I had all the normal pregnancy symptoms. I ended up asking my OBGYN at 7 weeks if we could do an early ultrasound test to make sure things were progressing. I was scheduled for my first ultrasound at 8 weeks so she agreed to do an ultrasound a week early. This was one of the worst days of my life. 

On the car ride to the apppointment I told Andrew, “What if we find out it’s a blighted ovum?” Like anyone else he said, “Huh? What's that?” I told him it’s something I read that a sperm and egg fertilizes and implants into your uterus and for one reason or another (usually a chromosomal issue with the embryo) it doesn’t develop into a fetus. So you are pregnant with rising pregnancy hormones and a growing uterus and a growing gestational sac but your body doesn’t realize there is no baby in that sac. An ultrasound will look like just a big empty blob. I told him its more rare though and we agreed that wouldn’t happen and I just need to breathe and calm down like always. 

We got to the appointment and my doctor performed a trans-vaginal ultrasound on me and right away I saw the big gestational sac. Then my heart broke into a million pieces when I saw it was completely empty inside. I said “there’s no baby”. She told me sounding concerned, “not yet….” This was my biggest fear come true. A blighted ovum. I knew it in my heart. My doctor kept trying to give me all this false hope telling me it was probably just too early and I probably have my dates wrong. No. I knew my dates. I tracked that like it was a full time job. I just started to lose it right there in her office. Tears were just streaming down my face and my stomach and heart just felt like I had the wind knocked out of me if wind could be knocked from those places. My doctor told me to come back in a week and we will do another test again. 

You guys, I never felt more defeated in my life. That was a week from HELL. I couldn’t sleep, eat, or even think about anything else. I couldn’t stop researching about it and I read so many positive stories about this same thing happening to them and then a week later they saw the baby, heart beating and all! I prayed so much that week that that would be my story. That we would see our precious baby we were so excited for in the ultrasound the next week. Part of me really would get my hopes up. 

I went into the next week expecting the worst but hoping for the best. I was in such a slump. I went to the appointment in sweats, no makeup, and my hair a mess from the night before. How could I get ready when all I could think about was the outcome? Andrew and I went into that appointment and his hand never left mine as we saw our ultrasound on the screen. An even bigger, yet empty black sac. It was over. As you can imagine we were crushed. Any sliver of hope we had was gone. Once again, defeated. My HCG levels were over 15,000 at this point. My body was hanging onto that pregnancy so hard and wanted it to work out so bad.

The next week on January 19th, after another ultrasound, I opted for a D and C that day. I thought long and hard how I wanted to go through the miscarriage process and I just wanted it over and done with as quickly and physically pain free as possible. They put me under general anesthesia, and I woke up and it was done. Physically I was feeling pain for about a week but emotionally it’s been much longer. I wasn’t prepared for the hormones that come with having a miscarriage. I can compare it honestly to just having a baby. You have all these hormones that come with pregnancy and then having it all just stop overnight takes a big toll on your hormones. I felt like I was in a really dark place for about a week or two and would just cry all the time.

I know what you might be thinking. There was no ACTUAL baby so why was it so hard? There actually was. It had all the DNA of a baby. I had a choice for them to do genetic testing on my tissue and they could’ve even told me the gender. It’s a loss. You go through grief and a lot of real and raw emotion. One of the hardest parts was feeling SO alone. I felt like no one understood. And honestly they never will understand unless they have gone through something like this.

 I just want to say for those who have gone through a miscarriage I am so so sorry and my heart breaks for you. It truly does because this is something I wouldn’t wish on anyone. Ive always felt for women who have gone through similar experiences as this but I didn’t GET IT. I get it now and I want you know you are not alone. Talk to someone who can be there for you. Join a support group page on Facebook or wherever and take the time to cry and grieve however long you need to. I know miscarriages are incredibly too common so I hope I related to at least one of you. Just like with everything else Andrew and I have turned towards the Lord because boy do we NEED HIM, especially now. 

With all that said and done, Andrew and I cannot wait for the day to get the chance of hopefully becoming parents!