I never want to forget ~Part 2~

ATTN: This post has some very descriptive, real writing* Day 4 was here and I was headed to my midwife appointment. This appointment was made a a few weeks back when I had called to make the first check up/ultrasound. This was the appointment that we were waiting on to make sure everything was good so that we could tell everyone. Having this appointment was truly a blessing and made a huge difference in how things went today. Let me explain... Had I not had this appointment already on the calendar (remember it was made before all of this began), I wouldn't have gone in that day. When I walked through this before, I stayed at home and did not need any medical help or intervention, so that was nowhere on my brain at this point. I am able to reflect and see exactly where the Lord was in each moment from Thursday evening up until after surgery. To be honest, I went into the appointment with a little bit of hope that there may be a chance that the baby was OK and healthy. It's funny what you can try and make up in your head when you want it so very badly to be true. But here again, the ultrasound revealed the same news that I had already known. I mean, I was fine until I walked into the dark ultrasound room. The very sweet lady was taking all of her pictures and I couldn't dig up the courage to look at the screen. The tears just started coming and she asked me a question but I could not get it together to respond. I realized at that very moment that I was not going to get it "together" through this but I had to surrender all of me and that precious baby to the Lord. And that was the only way that I was going to get through it and make it. After discussing with my midwife and the doctor, we agreed to move forward with surgery the next day. 6:00pm was the time to be back at the hospital. 24 hours later, Jason and I had all the details worked out for the babysitter, kids, etc.. No big deal: we would have a 15-minute procedure and be home after dinner. Around 3:00pm my "plan" was shot and life got intense. I started having contractions and everything started happening. I felt a huge relief because now we didn't have to go to the hospital and we could stay home with no intervention. But once we saw how things were progressing we realized I needed to go to hospital after all. This is when I went into shock. We literally turned into the wrong driveway and we couldn't think clearly enough where the ER was. We have both been to that ER over 20 times and I could not think straight enough to remember where the darn ER was. At this point I looked down and my whole seat and pants and hands were bright red. It looked like a murder scene. Once we got up to the room and cleaned up we had both calmed down but I was very weak from losing so much blood. Everything was happening so fast! Nurses hooking me up, asking me things like, "Do you have a will?" The contractions were getting harder and I could barely hear voices. I didn't want to hear them. I was giving birth to this 6 week-old baby whom I would never meet and I wanted to be left alone. The tears would come every time a contraction came. I can't explain the horrible feeling of breathing through a contraction knowing all the while the outcome. Before surgery, Jason kissed my forehead bye and I was trying to be so brave but inside I was terrified. Would I be ok? Would I see him again? What about my babies? You talk about scary, but all the while I knew and trusted that the Lord already knew. I did believe it. I do believe it. Even if not, God is still God. Amen! Surgery went well and I was much better. After a few hours of recovery I was wheeled out of the hospital. Just like I had been with all 5 of my other babies. Except this time I was empty-handed and heartbroken. But guess what? God was still God. He is still good. That does not mean that it's easier, nor less scary. It does not mean that life will go on and be peachy. IT DOES MEAN that in the middle of the night when I wake in sweat reliving this that I am never alone. IT DOES MEAN that when I think of late July of when our baby should have been here but won't be, and there is a piece of my heart missing, that Jesus heals. He has healed me in ways I never knew possible already. IT DOES MEAN that when I talk to my 9 year-old little girl about when we lose someone we love I tell her how we have hope and a reason and purpose to continue living. Also, how we can lean into the Lord even when it's hard to understand it all. I am at a different place today than I was almost 3 years ago when I walked through my first miscarriage. I find myself wanting to talk about this. Before I really know how to cope, how to act, what to say. Losing a baby before you meet him/her is somehow not "as bad as losing a baby after you meet him/her" in our society. That is what I tell myself on some days...Jen, it could have been much worse. But the truth is that telling myself that doesn't help at all, it just helps me to minimize the hurt and somehow makes me feel like I should not be so heart-broken. I want every single woman who reads this to know and understand that miscarrying is BIG; no matter how far along, no matter your situation, you have every single right to grieve and cry as anyone. Just know that we ( me before I experienced this) really don't know what to say to help. We say things to help but, dang it, those words can end up making the hurt worse and bleed more. We are sorry for those words. I am sorry for not ever understanding and making light of the situation. I want to help women to know what to do, how to respond, so that when women go through this they feel supported, loved, and feel no shame in grieving a human loss. My support system was amazing this time. The women who surrounded me for a few weeks will never know how much they helped me get through the days. From meals, to vacuuming my floor, watching my kids, texting, emailing, praying, hugs- lots of hugs, cookies, Sonic drinks, and the list goes on. But it all helped. Thank you, Lord, for the women that I have in my life to walk this life with even when life gets hard. One of my very favorite songs these days is "Thy Will Be Done" by Hillary Scott. This truth is no matter what we walk through, His will be done and He has goodness in store. https://yo

I never want to forget ~Part 1~

I have so badly wanted to write everything down, but every time that I've set out to write it, it just didn't happen. But tonight, when the house is as quiet as can be, I grab my computer and get comfy on the couch. It seems like the perfect time to try and put the past month into words. I never, ever, want to forget. Isn't that weird that I want to remember such an excruciatingly painful, scary, and traumatic memory? Well, it's not the actual memory that I want to hold on to but the place my heart was in the very moment of all of it. In our right minds, we would never choose to walk through hard yucky, but oh, how these times bring us to a place of learning more about ourselves, others, and Jesus. John Piper said in one of his sermons that we don't go through hard times to make our faith stronger, but it's the faith that we had going into the hard times that has grown. Have you ever heard someone say, "You are going through this to test your faith or to only make you stronger"? What we forget is that our faith before life took a turn is also important. January 12,2017- It had been a long, normal day for me. Dinner was on the stove and the kids were loud and asking every 30 seconds if it was time to eat. I had not really felt good all day but I figured that I was overly tired and that I would go to bed early. I ran to the restroom and before I could even put my thoughts together I went into panic mode. The "dreaded moment" I had for 12 weeks now was here. NO! NO! NO! I was talking to myself as so many things ran through my head. NO! NO! Had I worked out too hard today? Do I call my midwife? I gathered myself together as I can do so very well and went back to preparing dinner. Gosh darn it, I can be so good at that. If I don't accept it, then maybe it isn't real. I was in there maybe 10 minutes and then it hit me. I went back into the bedroom trying to figure out what to do. Was there anything I could do? I have been through this before. I knew the answer. My precious 9 year-old daughter walked into the room totally oblivious of everything and very sweetly said, "Mom, when will you find out if you are having twins or not?" I could barely get the words out to respond to her because all I could think about was that at some point her daddy and I would have to tell her that there would not be a baby. Now that is what broke my heart. She was the only child that we had told and boy, was she thrilled! She walked around feeling so big because no other sibling knew our surprise yet. A few minutes went by and all of a sudden I found myself in the car driving. I remember telling the Lord out loud that I did NOT want to walk this road again but I knew that HE already knew what the next several hours looked like so I was ready to face it with HIM. Even if......You are still God. I kept saying that. Did I really really believe that? After sitting in the ER for hours I was able to get an ultrasound and I knew. It all was very familiar. The ultrasound tech knew, and even though she couldn't say, she knew I knew what she knew. So now the wait. I just had to wait.