Day 40 of 100 Days of Grief

"It is not in the going down that we demonstrate resilience, it is in the getting up again."

-Ingrid Poulson

Today didn't get any easier.  In fact I believe it got incredibly harder.  Yesterday I was swimming in the emotions at the end of the day and I vocalized to Nick that sometimes I wonder if we did insemination or an IUI would it decrease the risk of losing another baby.  As you can tell I'm still not ready to shut the door on having more kids.  Recently I got to spend an afternoon with a friend and she has a cute little 4 month old girl.  She let me hold her and play with her as she made lunch and then I was able to hold her as she fell asleep in my arms.  It felt so good.  Just so right.  I loved those moments of holding a sleeping baby or how they grab at everything trying to experience the world.  I know there are hard moments with kids and I'm not saying that it would be all rainbows but I miss having a baby.  I want a baby.  

Then last night I got a notification on my phone from google photos saying here's what happened 4 year ago.  I got sucked in watching videos of when Henry was a toddler and Hannah was a baby.  I spent probably another hour watching the videos of my two beautiful children.  I turned off my phone and that yearning for another child was so very strong.  My mind sat and circled around how we could make it work.  I figured that if I could do an insemination then maybe that would decrease the instance of chromosomal issues.  That's what they always tell me after my miscarriages is that it was chromosomal.  I figured with an insemination I'd have the strongest sperm from Nick and the strongest eggs from me and then it would have to work right?  Or have a better chance of working.

The sickness scares me but if I KNEW that I would have a baby at the end of it, I would do it again.  I would go do the insemination right now.  I know that sounds selfish with all that it puts on those all around me.  I know my kids struggle when I'm pregnant and I know my husband struggles but isn't life worth all of that?!  And I kept thinking that maybe now that Dr. C knows how sick I can get he can give me better options faster.  Maybe he can help me with a nutrition specialist and we can get IV's faster.  

As I expressed to Nick that I wanted to do an insemination he told me he didn't think he could do it again.  He told me that I made him promise after I lost Hope that we wouldn't do this again.  He said he didn't want to have to be the one to say no, but he was.  He was telling me no.  And my heart broke.  My heart is still breaking.  The rest of the night I spent sobbing.  I aksed him "isn't there any way?!"  Isn't there some way to make this be okay?

I cried late into the night and then because I wanted medical answers I went to google.  But I was let down there too.  Apparently now that I've had three miscarriages in a row I'm part of a group that has "recurrent miscarriages".  I read statistics that after the third miscarriage the risk of miscarriage just keeps increasing after each miscarriage.  The risk now would be 30-40%.  They kept stressing the fact that even after that many miscarriages most people ended up having a baby.  But some had 6-7 miscarriages before that.  How can any human make it through 6-7 miscarriages??  

I fell asleep feeling defeated and broken.  My sleep was restless and wakeful.  I woke up just not wanting to do any of it.  Nick tried to get me up to help Henry get breakfast and get to school but I just couldn't.  I couldn't face it.  He took Nick and I so wanted to stay in bed but the chickens needed to be let out and I knew that today was my only day when I didn't have lessons so I needed to get things done.  

As I've tried to push through the day kept getting harder though.  When I was running I was listening to a book by Brene Brown.  I was listening to her tell a story and she mentioned that she got pregnant and then got hyperemisis.  The words she said were "I had a lot of progesterone which causes hyperemisis but because that there is a very low chance of miscarriage."  I lost it.  Tears rushed down my eyes and I had to stop running because the throaty sobs made it difficult to breath.  I was so very sick and I lost her.  It wasn't supposed to happen.  Medically it wasn't supposed to happen.  

And then all day today I've had a really sharp pain on my left side of my pelvis.  We were getting ready to go to the dentist and I went to use the bathroom and I started wiping blood.  I just finished my period about a week and a half ago.  It instantly put me in this fearful place.  That was how I found out I was miscarrying my first.  And then I got so very angry.  Why was my body so broken!?  What did I do to deserve this??  

The rest of the day I've cycled between numb and crying.  

But there were good things too.  I prayed this morning for help.  Some kind of reminder that I'm loved and I'll be okay.  I had to go to the doctors today to get my stitches out.  I parked and sat.  I didn't want to get out of the car.  Mostly cause I was a baby but also because I just couldn't find the strength to get out of the car.  I was so tired.  

I looked out my window and there were some little birds.  They were eating something on the ground but they were all different colors.  The first thing that came to my mind was a book mark that one of my young women's leaders gave me when I was in young women's.  The picture was by Greg Olsen called "In his constant care".  She wrote on the back about a scripture which I haven't been able to find that talks about how Jesus cares about us and that all things are numbered to him.  I also have been trying to find a design for my jewelry for Hope and one of the symbols for Hope is a sparrow.  I felt like this was God's way of telling me that he understood my sorrow and a reminder that Hope was still with me.  

Also in my prayers this morning I told God that I would do my best to serve but I just didn't have it in my today.  I felt like I had nothing more to give.  Strangely enough today I had three different opportunities that came up for me to serve.  I'm not going to tell you each of them but by going and serving it gave me a chance to get out of my pain for a moment.  

I know that God is aware of me and my pain and sorrow.  Everyday I see ways in which He tries to show me and I am so grateful for that.  But even if I know that, I still have painful and hard days which bring me down.  

Today's prompt is:  When you are ready, look up area support groups or Google online resources focused on helping parents after a miscarriage.  Find a place where others openly share their stories and can truly empathize with your loss.  Participate.  

I went to my support group in January and it was helpful but I noticed then too that even though it was nice to know what I was feeling was normal and that others were experiencing it too I came away feeling heavy.  It took me a couple days to work through the thoughts and feelings that I experienced then.  This month I missed it and I was really upset by it.  But then I spent Saturday with my friend and it was nice to sit and live it together but again it left me feeling heavy.  

I've started to wonder if I'm a terrible person because those "support groups" leave me feeling worse than when I went.  Is that normal?  Isn't the idea to support and uplift?  Or maybe it was making me feel things that I have a tendency to shelve?  Am I being selfish because I can sit with others who are in my same situation?  Am I that heartless to not be able to mourn with them?  Is there something wrong with me that I can't support others??