A couple months ago on Easter we had another miscarriage this was our second miscarriage our other one was last August. I decided I wanted to share about my experience miscarrying again. I think sharing our stories is important. It helps those who may be going through similar things not feel alone. It helps those who may go through something similar in the future. It also gives us a glimpse into one another’s lives, hearts, and experiences. We need more vulnerability in our world today we need to learn to share our experiences and the emotions surrounding them. I think our world is becoming less able to understand one another because we are not allowing one another to experience emotions. We are uncomfortable when people express how they feel, we disregard how someone feels, and we act without thinking about what someone may be going through, or how what we say or do may make someone feel.
Anyway I say all that to explain why I want to share about my second miscarriage. Sharing my story is one way to help me process and in return share about miscarriage which I think should be more widely talked about. By it becoming more of a topic that’s discussed it will help others not feel so alone when it happens to them.
Things I have learned so far through this miscarriage
- I have a greater understanding of HCG levels and progesterone then I did before which I think is a good thing and beneficial to have knowledge about especially for me moving forward
- No miscarriage experience is the same physically
- No miscarriage experience is the same emotionally
- You never know what someone may be going through. Now this is obviously something I already knew, but I definitely got a real reminder of this with this miscarriage which I will explain about later
- It is okay to be sad even about the little things no matter how silly
- For example one reason I was excited we were pregnant was because it would put our due date in the middle of November. Meaning on Halloween I would be super pregnant with a giant belly. Essie loves Monster’s Inc. and so I had the idea for us to be Sully, Mike, and Boo for Halloween. I was thinking it would be so fun to make my big belly to be Mike’s round head. So when we miscarried that was one thing that just made me super sad. We have to allow ourselves to grieve even the little things.
This miscarriage definitely felt different than the one I had last year. Physically it was different as in I had very little pain with this miscarriage. I had some light cramping and that was it. It also was much quicker, it did not affect my day really (beside emotionally) whereas last year I was down all day, while miscarrying I just had to lay in bed when I wasn’t in the bathroom. Emotionally it was different. I had barely told anyone about the baby so this time around it was just choosing who and when to tell about the miscarriage. Last year we had got almost all of our friends and family told about the baby and had to tell them about the loss. We were excited about being pregnant again, but pregnancy is just different after loss and so having another miscarriage emotionally just felt different. I think the miscarriage not physically being painful or really impacting my day at all made it harder to process. So I feel like there were so many things that made processing this miscarriage different than the last one. I read through my miscarriage blogs I wrote last year and honestly felt like a lot of what I processed and was feeling then did not carry over to this miscarriage and that felt kind of weird.
It is kind of hard to explain, but I still struggle with how I have been processing this miscarriage or even feeling like I am wrong in how I am feeling. It also feels hard and weird to have two losses to grieve. Sometimes it feels like I was more sad or thought about the other loss more. And honestly that does sometimes make me feel weird or bad. I don’t know if it feels different now because that baby should be here with us and there is more time that has passed. I don’t know if anything I continue to have a better understanding of loss and grief. This last miscarriage made me realize a lot of things and I will definitely share a little about that some other time, but yeah I just really realized how different losses can be. Processing those losses can be so different and there are so many things that affect how we grieve and how things impact us.
So yeah those are just some of my thoughts, but yeah also just want to share our story about miscarrying. Now this story will start at our last miscarriage. So our miscarriage last year happened in August. If you want to read about that and haven’t yet or want to re-read them I wrote a couple blog posts about it; about our experience and thoughts. But now I want to share about this miscarriage.
***Disclaimer I am going to talk about the actual miscarriage so if you don’t want to read about that you can stop here. Again I choose to share this because it’s one way for me to remember it and process it. Also I think talking about this normalizes it more, helps others not feel as alone in their experience, and also it helps if you are going through one to read about another’s experience.
So the baby we lost last year was due March 15 of this year. We were just hoping and praying we would get pregnant before the due date. So here rolls around March and I am waiting to see if my period with come or not. March 7th I was supposed to start and I didn’t; that evening I took a pregnancy test and it was negative. That was the first time I really cried over a negative pregnancy test. I was just heartbroken that we weren’t pregnant and that I just had to keep waiting for my period to come. That night I actually had a dream that we had a baby. I was holding her in my arms breastfeeding her and I just remember she was so cute and I was just so happy. Monday I felt hope that maybe we were pregnant (because of the dream) and the test was wrong. So on Monday still no period and so I took another test it was negative. I was definitely sad and annoyed at my body for my period being late. Finally on Wednesday night I went and bought more pregnancy tests because still no period. I took it Thursday morning and got a faint line. I was excited, but also nervous as the faint line didn’t feel super reassuring especially after a couple negative tests.
Friday I went in for a blood draw so we could check my hcg and progesterone. Things looked fine initially. I started taking progesterone suppositories and scheduled another draw for a little over a week later. Went in for that and my levels were increasing. Progesterone still was a little low so I continued taking the progesterone. Friday, April 2nd at almost 11 at night I went to the bathroom and had started spotting. Immediately I just felt discouraged. I decided I would contact our midwife in the morning. It was Easter weekend and I figured not much would be able to be done over the weekend nor did I think it would make much difference even if I could do another draw. If we were miscarrying it wouldn’t have mattered what we did. So we scheduled a blood draw for Monday morning and I was just supposed to keep my midwife updated over the weekend. Had a little more spotting and then it turned to a dark brown discharge. That actually made me feel more optimistic. As I read things online I felt really positive that everything was fine.
I had only told a couple friends I had seen in person about being pregnant and some moms’ from a mom group I was a part of at church. I reached out to those individuals who I had told to ask for prayers. I tried to remain positive Saturday evening and on Sunday I started feeling so much better that things were okay. I had stopped spotting and felt confident is was just something else and that I wasn’t miscarrying.
We were going to my family’s house for the week as my brother, sister-in-law, niece, and nephew were coming to visit. We were so excited as it had been five or six years since seeing them. I had seen my brother a couple times for some really short visits, but had not seen the rest in that time. I was so excited I was going to be able to tell my whole family about the baby while they were there.
I had planned a date on Easter for Ethan and I and was so excited we were going to go do something together. I was surprising him to go see the new Godzilla movie and then we were going to go get dinner. We were just going to head up to my parents’ house that Sunday and they were going to watch Essie. On the way to their house on Sunday I started getting cramps like I was starting my period I began to feel like things were not okay, but wanted to keep it out of my mind as I wanted Ethan and I to have a nice time. We got to my parent’s house I went to the bathroom and had started bleeding again like I had started my period. We left to head to Ft. Wayne for our date and just wanted to make the most of it understanding that I was probably miscarrying. We got to the movie and Ethan was definitely surprised and excited to go see Godzilla and we just tried to enjoy the movie. I got up once during the movie to go to the bathroom and still was bleeding. The movie got over and we had to decide what we wanted to do for dinner. Since it was Easter a lot of the places with vegan options were closed and also we decided we just wanted to grab something to go and head back to my parents given the situation. Flat Top Grill was right there and we knew we could get something from there that we could eat. As we were walking in I could tell I was getting ready to lose a larger clot of blood so I went in to the bathroom. That’s when I officially knew I was miscarrying even though I pretty much knew before. So we got our food and headed out to the car. On our way out to the car I felt myself losing another clot of blood so I had to turn around and head back into Flat Top. That’s when it hit me that you honestly never know what someone is going through. No one had any idea that I was literally miscarrying as I was in that Flat Top getting our food. In those couple hours of watching a movie, and in those 15-20 minutes we spent getting our food I miscarried our baby. Time didn’t feel like it stopped, I was doing normal activities. Unlike our miscarriage last year, I didn’t have contractions, I didn’t lose a scary amount of blood. Honestly I have had heavier periods, but there in that Flat Top when I lost those clots of blood I think it just felt surreal. And sometimes I think that is one reason it felt hard to process as well.
So we drove home and honestly it was just hard to really comprehend. Last year we found out we miscarried and I had to wait for my body to finally let go of the pregnancy. This time it just happened. So we made it back to my parents and we did tell my mom and dad what was going on, but we made the decision to not tell everyone else as we just wanted to enjoy the week with my brother, my sister-in-law, niece, and nephew being there. I think that is another thing that also made it hard to process a little bit as well. Monday morning we went ahead and still went in for the blood draw that we had already had planned that way we had a better idea of my hcg and progesterone levels after the miscarriage. Next time we get pregnant I will be talking progesterone injections right away to see if that will help as it seems that maybe my progesterone may be too low.
So yeah it’s hard to believe that it has already been two months since we lost another little one. We were at about 8 weeks when we lost this one. June was the month last year we began trying for a baby again. This last year has been filled with lots of unknowns in general, lots of emotional things and it’s hard to believe that in this year we have gotten pregnant twice and lost both little ones. One of those little ones should be with us and be almost three months old. Most days I still don’t know how to process it all. But I still wanted to share our story with you guys. Share some of my thoughts and just what we experienced.
When I started spotting that Friday, Friday of Easter weekend obviously I was nervous, discouraged, but then I was trying to remind myself it’s Easter weekend how amazing would it for everything to be fine. But then when I miscarried on Easter honestly it just sucked. This was a day to celebrate resurrection the conquering of death and I just lost a little one, but then I was also reminded about the hope that we have. And because of Jesus death on the cross and his resurrection I know that both of my little ones are in heaven in his arms and that I will one day get to meet them.
Anyway if you read all of this thanks for reading about my story. If any of you ever want to talk to me about the miscarriages, you can definitely reach out to me anytime. I never want anyone to feel alone in what they are going through. Everyone’s experience is different and like I said even for me my miscarriages felt so different, physically and emotionally, but it does help knowing that you are not alone even if someone can’t fully understand exactly how you are feeing. Honestly I don’t even know how to feel about my own losses most of the time.
a reflective perspective 