Kelsey's Miscarriage: Heartbroken but Healing

No, please check again," I felt myself repeating in my mind when the nurse delivered the heartbreaking news.  Instead I found myself in tears telling the nurse, "it's okay."

Those were the only simple words I could muster fearing that I would start sobbing in front of my husband and the nurse.

I went from being probably the happiest girl alive to the most heartbroken girl in the world in just a matter of minutes.

Pregnancy: The Beginning

On September 4th, I took a home pregnancy test.  I wanted to wait for Jordan but couldn't stand the suspense of waiting for him. I just had to know! So I took it. Within seconds I saw a faint line appear which looked to be negative. Another second after that I saw another line appear on top. Sure enough the two lines formed a positive symbol.

Rather then screaming and jumping for joy I sat on my bed feeling like I was about to faint.  I repeated silently to myself, "oh my gosh, I'm pregnant."

What I couldn't believe was how quickly I got pregnant. We got off birth control at the end of July and got pregnant in early August.  I thought we would get pregnant at least five months after. I was in absolute shock and felt like I wasn't ready.

I said a prayer asking Heavenly Father to calm my fears and to help me to get a hold of myself. I asked Him to give me the strength and to help me feel confident and ready to be a mom.  After the prayer I began to feel calm and soon panic turned into pure joy. I was pregnant and about to begin one of the most exciting journeys of my life.

I texted Jordan saying that I had some exciting news to tell him and to call me once he could.  Jordan said to me after he got that text that he had a feeling that I was pregnant. Like me he too was excited but nervous.  It took some time like me but once he got on board he too couldn't wait to be a dad.

Dreaming of Our Future Baby 

Like most people are when they find out their pregnant I began imagining what our son or daughter would look like. I began picking names with Jordan and looking at cute baby clothes.  I would read my Mayo Clinic book on pregnancy almost everyday and watch the TV show, A Baby Story to prepare myself.

I also found myself badly wanting to tell people the exciting news.  At times I found myself almost slipping my exciting news to friends. It was hard handling questions like, "so are you guys wanted to have kids soon?" Or "how is the baby making going?"  Jordan and I would look at each other smiling and say things back about how the baby making was coming along and that we had no baby yet.  It was hard lying but we just wanted to make sure things were going to be okay before we announced our news.

Cards and letters from parents. 

Letter from my brother and sister-in-law 

Miscarriage

Finally the day came when would see our baby for the first time. It was hard going to class in the morning and staying focused. I kept thinking of how I was going to tell the news to our close friends and about what questions to ask our doctor.

When Jordan and I got to Valley OBYN I remembered feeling nauseous and hungry since I had eaten little that day or week.  My pregnancy had been relatively easy besides my sudden loss in appetite.  I had gone from weighing 113 pounds to only 108.  I read losing weight was okay in the beginning but just to be sure I planned to talk about it with my doctor.

Jordan and I found ourselves sitting in the waiting room for a long time. The secretary told us that our doctor was running late due to a baby delivery earlier that morning.  Instead of sitting in the waiting room for another hour we decided to grab a quick bite to eat a McDonald's.  I had been craving chicken nuggets and a mango smoothie so it was nice satisfying my craving and getting food into my empty belly.  Jordan and I spent the hour talking about how we imagined the appointment going. I smiled imagining us both crying when we saw our baby's heartbeat for the first time.

Driving back to Valley OBYN I began feeling doubts that everything wasn't okay.  I dismissed this thought immediately and told myself I had nothing to worry about.  I was perfectly healthy and we would receive only happy news at the appointment.

When we got back our doctor saw us right away.Our doctor was a nice man who seemed to be full of life and energy.  I couldn't believe how awake he was given the fact he had be awake early that morning delivering a baby. We asked a couple of questions to our doctor and he went straight to the ultrasound machine.

My heart was racing.

He put cold jelly on my tummy and pushed down gently with the ultra sound scoop thingy (don't know the exact name for this).  I saw on a screen next to me an image that appeared to looked like my uterus. Everything on the screen was grey and black.  I had no idea what I was looking at.  He pushed down harder and harder. I asked if he could see anything yet.  He said he could see my uterus and that he could see a small amniotic sac.

The doctor informed me that I had a titled back uterus which 1/3 of women had. Since my uterus was more titled back it was making it harder to see the baby.  He said he would try one more time and that if he didn't see the baby that he would have me go to another ultrasound technician and have her use more advanced equipment.  He tried again and still no luck.

He then left the room to inform the technician that I would be arriving to her shortly.  The doctor told me to get dressed and that everything that was happening was perfectly normal. When the doctor left I looked wide eyed at Jordan and asked if he was worried.  Shaking his head he said no and that everything would be okay.

We then went down a long hallway to the advanced ultra sound room there was a huge 40 inch screen television and the ultra sound machine was bigger and newer looking. I laid down and the technician proceeded to put warm jelly on my tummy.  The room grew silent and the nurse pressed down harder with the ultra sound scope.  Still no luck.  "I'm sorry but it looks like we'll have to do a vaginal ultrasound," the nurse said.

I was a bit surprised and dreaded having to have a vaginal ultrasound done. It was probably one of the most painful things I experienced. I was uncomfortable the entire time.  Finally she saw the baby.  Looking closer I saw a black shape appear on the screen. The black object which looked like a banana surprised me.  I asked the nurse if the black banana shape object was my uterus.  She shook her head no proceeded to tell me that it was the babies amniotic sac.

The nurse then grew very silent.  In the middle of this black banana was a grey small object.  She zoomed in and I could see our baby.  I had seen pictures of people's ultrasounds before and none of them looked like mine.  I also noticed how quiet the nurse was and knew something wasn't right.  Finally the nurse broke the silence and said, "I'm so sorry but there isn't a heartbeat."  I looked at her shocked with tears at the corners of my eye's.  All I could say back was "it's okay."

As I was saying, "it's okay," I felt numb.  The words there was no heartbeat didn't register.  Jordan when hearing the news of there was no heartbeat couldn't look at me.  I asked later why he didn't and he said that he knew if he looked at me that he would cry.  When the nurse left to give us our space Jordan and I held each other and cried. Not wanting people to see me cry more I decided that I needed to get dressed and see the doctor.

Looking back I wish I would have cried some more.

I left the room with Jordan and went into the room where the doctor would be.  The doctor walked in soon after we did and said that he was sorry to break the bad news but that we indeed had a miscarriage.  I asked if there was a chance that the baby was still alive.  The doctor sensing that I was in denial explained how the banana shaped amniotic sac was a sign that things weren't alright. He also asked if we both were LDS. We said that we both were and he proceeded to say that he was LDS too and that he didn't feel comfortable expelling a pregnancy unless he was 100% that the baby wasn't living.

He then told us what options we had.  He told us we didn't have to make a decision that day and that we needed time to be together to grieve.

As I was walking out I avoided eye contact with anyone in fear I would cry.  As soon as I got in the car I began to cry.  When we got home to our apartment I made sure not to cry until we reached our apartment. Jordan and I both cried for hours.  I had classes that day and ended up skipping all of them to grieve.

Below is a picture of my ultra sound.

Surgery

I decided a couple days after I found out the news that I would have the surgery.  I didn't want to be at work or school when my body decided to pass the fetus.  I found out Tuesday about my miscarriage and went in that Friday for the surgery.

Not many people know but I have a strong phobia of needles.  I was terrified more about the needles than the surgery itself.  The staff at the Utah Valley Hospital Outpatient Center was amazing! They were super friendly and took good care of me. My last memory before the surgery was kissing Jordan goodbye and having piles of warm blankets put on top of me.

After the surgery the nurses gave me jello, crackers and vanilla cookies.  I was in heaven. Not having eaten all day and it being 3 p.m. I was starving! Jello never tasted so good.  The surgery went well and was relatively painless. I left around 4 and fell asleep for most of the day.

I had only heard from women what a miscarriage was like. Though listening to stories and hearing how hard a miscarriage is I still felt totally unprepared.  No one can prepare you for the day you find out your baby doesn't have a heartbeat.

Recovery 

The next morning after the surgery I woke up early to use the restroom.  After getting up I found myself in the bathroom feeling very sick.  I called Jordan's name and asked if he could come help me. When I looked at myself in the mirror I was so pale.

When I went back to bed I experienced the worse cramps of my life. I asked Jordan to give me my pain medicine.  I had to eat something first so I ate as many crackers as I could.  When I took the medicine the pain went away within minutes.  I quickly went back to bed and woke up at 11 a.m.  Besides that one day of pain the rest of the week was pretty easy.  I ended up not going to work on Monday and missing classes on Tuesday until the bleeding and cramping stopped.

For the first couple of weeks I closed myself off from everyone.  I couldn't stand the pain and didn't want people to feel sorry for me.  After the miscarriage I felt completely numb.

I decided early on to not share what happened.  However, I regret not telling more people.  Not sharing my experience prolonged my grieving.  My one advice to those who experience a miscarriage is to share what happened to your friends and family. They can help you the most to get through the pain.

Future

We hope someday to get pregnant again soon.  I pray that the Lord will bless my husband and I with a healthy baby someday.I know we need to be patient and that the Lord will know when the right time is for us.

Natalie's Miscarriage- "Because I Trust Him"

I had a miscarriage in February this year. At first this was really hard for me because I have wanted kids since basically we got married. I was that one wife that was always baby hungry! And when we decided to start trying I could not get pregnant soon enough. So, we found out in January we were pregnant and not even a month later after hearing a heart beat and everything the baby was gone. I don't know much to explain about it other than it happened and it was an awful experience on my body, hormones and all, but I have learned so much from it. And I mean spiritually because there's not much I want to learn about miscarriages.

Let me start by saying that from the beginning I was a nervous wreck. And every time we went to the doctor there was something off. I understand that doctors want to put everything out in the open so they don't have to cover their backs later but it was little things like "well you're measuring a week behind so maybe because you were irregular this is why"..."it's possible you ovulated off schedule"..."the baby's heartbeat is low"..."but your hcg is fine, so the baby could be fine"...."We can't know till next week so come back then for another ultrasound and we'll tell you."  How do you just say those things?!?!

Anyways, I get it. I don't blame them. But I went back to that appointment which was the first one I went alone to. Ray and I had a conversation about it that morning and I felt pretty good. I felt like God knew what I wanted and he was going to make sure I was okay and that meant the baby was okay. But I was wrong. That's the thing about God. He doesn't do what we want to happen...unless it's what best for us. And sometimes we forget this.

I laid on that bench and I am happy and excited. We're talking and I'm looking at the screen thinking, "man that thing grew, it looks bigger than last time." The technician hesitated. She searched around on the screen for a while and then she said, " I'm so sorry. I can't find a heartbeat. I'm so sorry."  I can't even breathe. I can't even move or think or talk. She says go ahead and get dressed and the doctor will meet you. She says sorry again and leaves. She has an awkward job. (I feel bad for her looking back at it.) I still don't know what to think so I just start going through the motions. "Okay this lady obviously isn't good at her job because she heard a heartbeat last time. What's different now?" I go in the waiting room. I still can't cry because I'm in denial. Ray isn't even here so I know this can't be happening.

They call my name and put me in a room. They take my blood pressure or something and then leave and act like nothing is wrong. "The doctor will be right with you she says." And I lose it. I can feel it. I know it's real. The baby is gone. I'm crying. No, I'm bawling. I'm embarrassed and I am trying to stop myself so the doctor doesn't feel awkward and just when I could contain myself she is here.

But she can't even look at me. She just jumps right into it. I know she feels bad but she should say something then. Instead she is asking me questions like if I had any bleeding or spotting or anything unusual. No I say, nothing is different. Then she gives me three options for "the removal". I can have a D&C, which is expensive. Wait it out and flush it naturally, or take medicine to make it come out quickly. She tells me it could be unsafe to do it naturally because it could take a while and according to my tests the baby died sometime after my last ultrasound and most likely it was even that same day. This is bad because it can cause a lot of damage on my body not to mention it's already been a week and no sign of a miscarriage...so obviously I'm going to take the medicine.

I call Ray and he takes the day off. We go to get the prescription and they girl is looking at us weird. Do you know what this does? Do you know how it works? We say yes the doctor explained it. So she says to call if we have questions and we leave. I don't wanna take it. I keep having this feeling what if we were wrong? But I know we weren't because I was there and I saw. No blood flow to the baby and no heart beat.

Its time to take the medicine so I read the label. This medicine is prescribed for ABORTIONS. I lose it again. How am I just suppose to take this medicine after that? I feel like a terrible person. Like I am killing my child. But Ray tells me it's not my fault and I'm not hurting the baby and I have to take this medicine or my body can get really messed up. Its not the same thing. The doctor said it was the best option after all. But I don't know if I trust her or not now, she didn't even tell me what kind of medicine this was!!!!! But I trust Ray. So I take it. And it forces me to have contractions. And I'm throwing up and I'm on Oxycodone at the same time for pain so I'm loopy and I don't know what's what. and then after about a week of bleeding my child out it's over.  It feels so insensitive to see that I just flushed my once-child down the toilet. I feel like I should be burying it. But that's crazy. And some people don't even think that at this stage it could even be considered a child. Don't get me started on that. There was a heartbeat. Distinct heartbeat. At 7 weeks, given I didn't get this baby for long enough to bond for long. But I was starting to become a mother. I was forming habits and thinking and preparing for this little being to be mine but now it's gone.

I don't blame God. I'm not even angry. At least not at first. At first I am just numb. I rarely even cry actually, because I am just going through the motions. But a week or two later it sinks in. While I'm back at work and I think about how I still have to work until the end of the year! And when I see people who are in high school and get pregnant without even trying!!! And when people ask me when are you going to have kids?! Why don't you have kids yet?! ARE YOU SERIOUS? DO YOU KNOW WHAT I JUST WENT THROUGH? Stop asking when I am going to have kids.

That phase lasted a few days and then I really started to pray. I am not an angry person and I hated the way I felt. I was angry all the time. I needed closure and to move on. I asked Ray for a blessing and he gave me one. I cried and cried and felt a little better. I decided I needed to study about the Plan of Salvation a little more. And then for the next week it seemed like that's all I ever heard about! A few days later I was visiting teaching and it hit me like a ton of bricks. God knows my desire to be a mother and it will happen but not on my time, it will happen on his time. It was so comforting.

I felt like it all made sense again. Maybe this experience was more of a sign for me to see that Heavenly Father is aware of what I want and what I need. I was always scared that I would not be able to get pregnant. And now I know I can. Maybe that sounds blasphemous but it really helps me to feel better. I know that now I am only an instrument in his hands to teach his children to return to him. This will happen some day, but I needed to learn this principle about the Lords timing and about The Plan of Salvation. I am so grateful. I'm not saying this is the only reason I had a miscarriage, I know I can't fully know what the cause or why it happened to me until we are on the other side, but I learned some awesome things from it.

I know that one of the biggest reasons we go through trials on this earth is to become closer to Christ. When we are close to Christ we utilize the atonement. This experience allowed me to use Him as my crutch. And come to think of it Ray and I have grown as a couple. :) I love that! It feels like I can look back and see the whole time God was aware. He could see that somehow, right now, having a baby at this time was not in our best interests. And that's okay.

Because I trust him.

Hillary's Miscarriage- "A Part of Our Life"

I had a miscarriage at 6 weeks in July of 2012.  It was the day before my grandpa died and a few days before we lost our car as well.  Needless to say it was an eventful few days.  For the sake of this blog I will only be telling the things that happened with the miscarriage.  I had been having the pains since the beginning of the pregnancy pretty much.  They gradually got worse and worse.  But being the person that I am, I thought that I just needed to deal with it.  I didn’t have an OBGYN yet and my insurance was from California and would only cover ER visits in Utah.  I didn’t know what to do about it so I just kept trying to deal with it.  Over the next few weeks the pains got worse and worse.  I couldn’t walk or talk or even move at all through them.  They came and went.  They seemed to pass through me, and I wondered what kidney stones felt like, because it did feel like a huge rock in my stomach was moving through a tiny tube or something.

The day it was the hardest Andrew and I looked up things about miscarriages and I got very emotional about it.  It wasn’t till later in the day when I had blood on my underwear that I became hysterical.  We looked up on the internet about severe lower abdominal pains and it said that if it was accompanied by blood then it was most likely a miscarriage.  Right when I saw those words, I broke.  I cried and cried and sobbed and we didn’t even know yet that it was for sure.  I was almost inconsolable.  Andrew held me in his arms and he seemed confused and concerned.  He was calculating the situation and trying to figure out what would be best to do.  I had been in touch with my mom constantly when we first started seeing the signs.  She helped us decide that we did need to go to the emergency room.  We went right then, even though it was barely any blood.  We were there for four hours.  I had an ultrasound in a dark, dark room at 2:30 am.  Andrew had to sit far away from me as I laid there on this gurney staring up at the ceiling.  It was there where they saw the flicker of light- and they said it was the heartbeat!  We saw it fluttering and we were so relieved.  They said things looked okay and that the blood could be a few different things.  On that day our baby looked safe and I thought I had overreacted.  They told me to ‘take it easy.’  The pain persisted when we got home, but since the doctors had said everything was fine I took that as a confirmation that, yes, I just needed to bear through it, it wasn’t just me being stubborn anymore. 

My sister Julia and her husband Lester came to stay the night the next day on there way through town.  The pain was still there, getting worse every time and I was still bleeding.  We ate dinner but while we played games afterwards I couldn’t handle the pain anymore and I noticed that I was bleeding more than a normal period for me.  I told them to continue playing and went into the room and called the Kaiser advice nurse.  While I was in there on hold I was so confused.  We saw the heartbeat the day before.  If our baby was healthy why was this happening?  At this point I still didn’t think it could really be a miscarriage.  The nurse on the phone said that it sounded like I was miscarriage-ing and she told me what to look for.  She told me what it would look like if I ‘passed tissue,’ she said it would look like uncooked hamburger for lack of a better description.  She said that it would now just be a waiting game and that I should go into the emergency room again if I could not stand the pain.  But I wanted to endure it.  I don’t know why, maybe it was psychological.  Maybe I believed that if I could get through it the baby would be able to also.  If I could take this pain then the baby would be okay.  That night I couldn’t even sleep through the pain.  I tried lamaze breathing and I tried groaning through it.

The next day my sister and her husband had to get on the road again.  We called my other sister, Mariah, and asked her to come help us with housework and meals, so Andrew could go back to work.  Andrew insisted that I stay in the bed.  He set me up with pillows and snacks, books, movies, journals and a computer.  My sister came that evening, Thursday, with plans to stay through the whole weekend.  She and Andrew went to the library to get me some movies to watch on Saturday.  While they were gone I already was having a hard time taking it easy.  Surprisingly the pain had gone away almost completely so I was up doing a few things that were not too strenuous.  It was then that I felt a different kind of pain all of sudden.  It felt like a snap inside me.  A horribly painful twinge.  It happened a few more times, but I tried again to just bear through it.  I was actually feeling pretty good emotionally.  I wasn’t crying.  I went to the bathroom and was not thinking about it until I was finishing.  And then I saw it.  I had the ‘tissue’ on the toilet paper in my hand. 

I know that this may not be normal to write about every detail of this kind of an experience.  But I’ve decided that personally I want to remember the details.  Because now that this experience is truly a part of me, who I am, I feel like I need to be able to look back at it…all of it if I ever am going to heal from it.  I know myself.  And I know that I don’t want to forget any part of my experience with this baby.

When Mariah and Andrew came home from the library they found me in the bed sobbing once again.  I told them what had happened and we got in the car and went back to the ER.  I could barely talk to the check-in nurse about why I was there, what my emergency was.  We took a seat in the waiting area all of us together.  While Andrew and I sat next to each other he expressed his emotions about it.  It was his turn after all he had done to comfort me. I tried to be there for him for a change.

I had a second ultrasound and a vaginal one as well while Mariah waited in the lobby.  This time in the same dark room as before Andrew asked for, almost demanded, a chair so he could sit right close to me holding my hand during it.  Awhile later when we were back in the normal hospital room the doctor came in and said that they had found nothing.  For a split second I thought he was saying that they had found nothing wrong with the baby and I felt such a wave of relief and amazement.  The whole time I did not believe that it could really be a miscarriage.  Then all at once I realized what he was saying as he kept talking.  When he said they had found nothing he meant that everything had passed and my uterus was completely clean.  Tears instantly filled my eyes but didn’t spill out.  The doctor expressed his sympathy told us briefly about his personal experience with miscarriages in his life.  His words were helpful and kind, but I had no idea how I felt.  It was like I was numb.  Andrew and I were pretty quiet as we packed up and were discharged, both tired and hungry because we hadn’t eaten.  We got Mariah out of the lobby where she had been sadly waiting by herself.  She didn’t know what the outcome was.  And we didn’t tell her until in the parking lot she asked.  As we walked out of the air-conditioned building into the heat I felt it.  The weight of it all.  The extreme sadness I was feeling.  I remember to answer her question I just said, ‘it’s over’ as we walked towards the car and that’s when the emotions began to spill.  Because it was just over.  Everything was over.  The trauma of being in the ER was over.  And the pregnancy was over.  It was just over.  It was the relief of finally knowing and not having to wonder and worry.  But it was first and foremost the devastation of the plain fact that this little life was just gone.  Our baby was just not coming anymore.

Thinking about how quickly everything went with the baby made me feel so incomplete.  I felt like it all went so fast.  One minute I had a baby in me.  The next minute I didn’t.  I remember how excruciating the physical pain was but I don’t remember WHEN it happened.  Because we’ll never know exactly when it happened.  One day we saw the heart beat of our baby.  Two days later there was no sign that I had ever even been pregnant.  Overall it was a very, very hard thing for me to accept and understand.  Even now, a year and a half later sitting here with my 3 month old daughter in my lap, I still don’t fully understand why it had to happen the way it did.  There are a lot of different interpretations and I believe someday we may know why.  I have faith in God’s plan and I have no doubt that He takes care of it all. 

I think most people who knew about the miscarriage at the time just had no idea what to say to us.  Some people would tell us about others who have gone through worse things.  Others would awkwardly say, "Do you um...want a hug?"  Some people told us not to worry because we will have other kids and have a big family someday.  I know people didn't really mean it when they said 'don't worry about it,' but to me those words made it sound like it was something that didn't last long enough to be important.  I saw a quote soon afterwards that summed up how I was feeling: “A baby fills a place in your heart you never knew was empty.”  Well we knew it was empty now and we could feel the hole.  During the miscarriage we started filling that empty space, and afterwards we could feel the emptiness even more.

After it all happened I went through a period of time where I was very bitter about it.  I was seeing so many other girls announcing their pregnancies and I felt like it was so unfair.  I was driving myself crazy.  I feel like the hardest thing about it was how confused I felt.  Sometimes I just wanted to hit something.  Other times I just wanted to sleep forever to get away from it all.  I wrote in my journal a lot.  I actually started typing my journal because I felt like my hand couldn’t write fast enough to keep up with the emotions that poured out.  Writing was very therapeutic for me and it’s something I would suggest to you if you’ve gone through one and don’t know what to do with your feelings.  I look back now and am actually surprised at how angry some of my entries were.  Sometimes I get pretty emotional all over again when I read them.  But I’m glad I did it because I know it helped me heal from the experience little by little.  I felt so much love and support from my parents, siblings, in-laws, friends, and other family.  It meant so much to me.

I believe that there is a purpose for these trials we go through and that this experience was not lost on us or on God.  I know that people have gone through so much worse.  But it doesn’t mean that it wasn’t hard for us.  He knows that it was hard and He will never discount this tragedy.  God’s love is so much more than ours, so who would understand it better?  No one understands it better than He.  He will make the sadness we feel and the growing we do from this experience count towards our salvation.  It is not lost.  It is not in vain.   I’ve found that time really does make all the difference when it comes to healing.  And our life now is living proof that there is hope for the future even after such a hard experience.  It was a part of life that we grew and learned so much from and will always remember.  But that's just it- it was a part of life.  Just one part.  And I know there are a lot of good things to come.

 Ask me any questions about my experience.  I would love to answer them.

Supporting Each Other: Sharing Miscarriage Stories

When Olivia and I first started talking about doing this blog I began thinking about what I would want to write about.  As I sit here holding my sleeping baby, trying to type with one hand, I look around our little apartment and see...DISHES that need to be done.  I try NOT to picture the mountain of laundry that I know is in the other room and I wonder how in the world I’m going to make dinner tonight.  I get discouraged and I think of all the things I miss about not being a mom.  But then a thought hits me with full force.  What I miss about not being a mom is nothing, absolutely nothing, to what I would miss about being one. 

What I’ve decided to write about right now is miscarriage.  My miscarriage made me want to be a mom so badly.  Losing a baby made me ache to be a mother more than ever before.  And now partly due to that experience it’s something I never ever want to give up.

Maybe miscarriage is a strange thing to write about on a blog for moms, but I feel that it is something that is so important to talk about but is rarely discussed.  I went through mine about a year and a half ago and one of the hardest things about it was trying to find support.  I found it in my husband Andrew, of course.  We went through it all together and I don’t think for a minute that his pain of losing the baby was any less than mine.  But we all know ourselves and we all know that sometimes women just need support from other women.  Because obviously there were differences between the way it all felt for me verses the way it felt for Andrew- physically and emotionally.  My mom and sister also were a support to me, but having never experienced miscarriage themselves I think they felt apprehensive about what to say or how exactly to support and comfort me.  I didn’t have any friends who had had one that I knew of and I just wished that there was someone I could talk to that would know how confused and sad I felt. 

After getting pregnant the second time and feeling confident that things were running smoothly, I turned to family, friends, and social media for pregnancy support.  By that I mean advice, sympathy, and basic information.  I found relief in hearing and comparing the experiences of others, and was able to cope with the normal hardships that pregnancy brings simply because I knew I was not alone.  Now having my baby here I do the same thing during this part of life.  Looking back now, I really wish there had been a similar place that I could go when I was dealing with my miscarriage.  Even if it was just something to read from a real person and not a pamphlet telling me that everything I was feeling was normal.  I was having so many emotions and I know now that what I really needed was that emotional support from a girl who knew what I was feeling.  That is the goal of this blog--to provide information and emotional support to mothers who are sometimes looking for something other than just the medical aspect.  I hope that this blog can also be a place where women who have experienced miscarriages can find that emotional support as well.  And I hope that here they can also find hope for the future.

So much came to my mind while trying to write this out that I’ve decided to do it in a few parts.  There will be guest bloggers about this subject to share their different experiences.  

If you or anyone you know has had a miscarriage or any kind of pregnancy complication who would like to have their story told please comment here or contact me or Olivia and we would love to feature it here on the blog.  We hope we can all learn and grow from sharing our experiences with each other.

Look for this series to begin the next few days.