The Silent Life

We were attending a cheer competition for our oldest daughter at a nearby theme park, when I suddenly fell ill. I couldn't tell if it was the miserable August heat, or something I had ate, but I had an inkling it was neither. By the time we made it home, my nausea had grown worse. My husband headed off to the pharmacy to pick up a pregnancy test, thinking that may have been what was causing it. And sure enough it was.

My son who was eighteen months at the time, took me eleven surgeries, countless fertility meds, and seven years to conceive. To say that we were shocked it happened again so quickly, would be an understatement. After a few days the shock wore off. We started planning the rest of our lives with our new baby in it. We bought a bigger car, and even put an offer in on a bigger house.  We were excited to grow our little family.

A few weeks later, the nausea started to overtake me. I had Hyperemesis Gravidarum with my first two, and it was imminent I was going to have it with this one as well. I spent the next eight weeks in and out of the hospital. I went from vomiting all day and all night, to puking blood, and then a black substance. My doctor had me on three different types of medication. One in the form of a pump that has a line into my stomach. Nothing offered any type of relief. 

After my twelfth week, the sickness subsided slightly. I was able to be home with my family for two solid weeks, and return to a little bit of normalcy. In my fourteenth week, I was scheduled for a routine ob checkup. Which I thought would be just that...routine. 

The baby measured perfect.  I was feeling so much better. I had already started gaining back the twenty pounds I had lost.  However,  when the doctor went to check for the babies heartbeat, she was not able to locate it. She called an ultrasound facility down the street and sent me over right away.

I arrived by myself, and when the tech was checking for a heartbeat, there was absolutely no sound. Complete silence. So quiet, you could almost hear my heart instantaneously shatter. I had heard this babies heartbeat almost everyday for weeks, being in the hospital. I could not comprehend what had made it stop. The tech left the room, and came back in a little later, with my doctor on the phone.

She told me that the baby must have stopped growing, since I was in the hospital last, two weeks prior. And that it seems as if I would be passing it very soon. She wanted to save me the heartache of going through that process at home and offered to meet me at the hospital the next day, on her day off, to deliver. 

The rest of the day and night are a blur. I was definitely in a state of shock. I had lost loved ones before. I knew grief. But I had never lost a part of me.  We went into the hospital the next morning. I remember asking her to recheck for a heartbeat, and she did so, without success. All I can remember after that, was waking up and screaming for my baby. Through eyes of tears and anesthesia, I rolled over to see two of my best friends sitting in the room beside me.  They had been where I now was, and wanted to be there for us, so we didn't have to go through it alone.

The next morning, I put on my uniform and headed into work, like nothing had ever happened. It wasn't that I was required to, by my employer, it was just what I had to do to cope. To continue on with life as though I hadn't just lost such a huge part of me. 

And it was never talked about again.

A child that I carried, that I already loved immensely, was now gone forever. Not just from this world, but from the minds and hearts of everyone around me. I never saw their face, knew their gender, or held them in my arms. But they were a part of me. A part I would never get back. And a part I would grieve forever.

Still to this day thirteen years later, my baby has never left my thoughts. I wonder what they would look like? What they would love? What would make them smile? What their laugh would sound like? Would they be strong like their big sister? Would they be intelligent like their big brother? The questions I have are endless. And someday, when I get to Heaven, I hope I will get the answers to them.

I have had family that have lost children from infants to adults. I honestly cannot fathom that sort of pain. It's almost hard for me to tell of my loss, because I know it doesn't compare to the depths of their heartache. However, I do know it's important to share my child's story. They were and are a life. Not a secret, forgotten one. God created them for a purpose. Although, I may not ever understand that purpose here on Earth. I know, and trust that he does.

 I often think, if that child would have survived, we wouldn't have ever conceived our youngest daughter. If you know her, you know she is such a ray of sunshine. She lights up our world. I couldn't imagine where I would be, if God never sent her to be my rainbow, after my storm.  

They say when a child's heart stops beating, so does a mothers. I couldn't think of a more accurate way to describe it. A part of me died that day. I physically lost my will to live. Even though I had other children that depended on me, I could not recover from that loss. And honestly I am not sure we are suppose to. But what we should do...is not stay silent about how they changed our lives for the small moments we had them. We should keep their memories alive. We shouldn't continue through life, like they were never created. Share their stories. Trust in God's purpose. And strive to get to Heaven, where someday we can hold our babies in our arms. Some once more, and some for the first time♡

The Strength in Our Scars

While getting ready for work the other day, and checking out all of the imperfections in my aging face (like most woman approaching forty do), I rediscovered a scar on my lip. One that I had almost forgot. It had been there since my mom busted it, along with my nose, when I was 4. I was throwing a temper tantrum in the store. Her first instinct was to backhand me, which quickly resulted in a horrific shrill, followed by blood pouring from my face to my hands... to all over the floor.  It took awhile for my lip to heal, but the scar has always remained as proof of that moment. Becoming a part of me.

The past few years, I've had so many similar revelations. Many things can trigger a memory. From a current day traumatic experience that allows one from my childhood to resurface, dealing with a temporary state of lonliness that awakens the fear I have from being all alone during some of my darkest days, or simply writing about an experience and remembering the way I felt while living it.

As I work through these triggers, I've discovered they tend to leave me in a state of trauma. One I cannot move on from once engaged. I've read recently this would be called Complex Post Traumatic Stress Disorder. For me, it isn't like depression, which I have only battled from losing a child in the womb. It's more like a state of shock. Just like the movies depict, my mind is transported back to a specific incident, that replays over and over. I become like a ghost.  Operating physically the same, but mentally frozen in time.

Learning to identify it, has helped me tremendously. And in the moments when I am unable to pray my way through, I've called on my friends, to go to battle  for me.  I've asked God over and over, why? Why if I had to live through them the first time, must I relive them now? Why if he's healed my heart so long ago, must I feel the hurt all over again? And I've realized that just because he can wipe away all of our sorrows, does not mean that he will take away our scars. They are part of us.  They are proof of the pain we've endured.  Some visible, others not, but all have a purpose. Just like Jesus did after he was resurrected, we have to show them to those who doubt that we've been to the cross. 

Our scars are meant to be reminders from where God has brought us from. They are our untold stories of survival. They are passports to our pasts. Most of all they are proof, that through Christ, we are stronger than whatever tried to destroy us. And they are there to offer others hope. They are not our shame, they are our stories. Our painfully, beautiful, healing stories.