This may be one of those blog posts you may want to skip, if
you’re not comfortable with some of the not so fun details of life. I feel like I need to make this post not only
for others out there that may have or will have the same experience that we
have had but also for myself. The things
that have happened over the last 19 weeks of our lives, have been something
I’ll never forget, but also I feel like has changed me forever.
September 17, 2014, is the day Josh and I officially took a
pregnancy test and knew we were going to be parents! This was by far, the most exciting day in
both of our lives. All the planning,
preparing, and talking about having a baby, became real on this day!
On Monday, October 27, 2014, Josh and I were finally going
to experience what many of our family members and friends, have talked
about. We knew that I was approximately
10 weeks pregnant! We hadn’t told a
single soul we were even thinking about having a baby. We wanted to keep this life changing decision
between us for awhile. We were going to
our first doctor’s appointment. We could
hardly wait for the minute we would be able to see our baby on the ultrasound
and hear the heartbeat for the very first time.
We were beyond excited. We had
been planning and anticipating this moment for quite awhile. We arrived at the doctors office and checked
in at the desk. We were told that the
doctor was running behind because of an emergency. Not the best thing we wanted to hear since we
were so ready for this appointment. Two
hours later it was finally our turn to see the doctor. We started out by talking with the
doctor. Then it was finally time to go
into the ultrasound room and see our little tiny baby. As soon as the doctor found the baby, I knew
immediately that something was wrong. He
pointed to the screen where the baby was and said, “that’s where the heartbeat
should be”. Should be?!?! What exactly did that mean. In my heart I knew what he meant, but I
wasn’t ready to accept it at that point.
Then he told us he wanted us to have a more extensive ultrasound just to
confirm what he was seeing. I had two
more ultrasounds done right after that.
Then came the most devastating news.
There was no heartbeat. Josh and
I were devastated. We had been waiting
forever for this moment, and those words shattered our world. So many questions began running through my as
tears ran down my face. Why us? What did
I do wrong? How could this happen when I
felt like I did everything right to prepare my body for pregnancy? We had planned so long for this, how could
this be happening? The doctor was very
compassionate about the situation. He
then told us what our options were.
After a few minutes of discussing all of the options, Josh and I left
the doctors office feeling completely lost.
We both decided we didn’t need to go back to work, we just
needed to be with each other and try and accept this unexpected news. We went home and cried until we couldn’t cry
anymore. There is no way to even make
sense of what we were now faced with. We
went from being so beyond happy and excited, to now feeling like our whole
world was shattered. An emotional high
to an emotional low, all in one day. I
didn’t know that was possible until this day.
Every thought over the last 10 weeks had been about our future with this
baby we had not even met yet. Everything
we talked about and planned for had included this sweet baby. That was now just taken from us. It wasn’t fair. After discussion, we decided that the best
solution for us was to have a D&C. I
called the doctor and we scheduled it for two days later.
On October 29, I was admitted to the hospital and the doctor
did the D&C. This whole process was
so difficult because it made it final and real.
The surgery went smoothly. At
this point is when I realized, there really was no more baby. I’ll never forget this day for the rest of my
life. Our future that we were planning for
wasn’t going to happen.
Over the next 8 weeks, we did everything we could to talk
about our feelings and deal with the emotional part of what had happened to
us. In my opinion, Josh and I have great
communication in our relationship. We
talked numerous times about what we were going through and how each of us was
feeling. That helped me so much to deal
with what was happening.
All of our healing and trying to move on, came to a sudden
reverse on Tuesday, December 23. The day
had started out like any normal day.
Josh went to work. I went to
work. It was around 12:30pm that day,
and I was sitting at my desk. All of the
sudden I had the feeling that something wasn’t right. I grabbed my cell phone and ran to the
restroom at work. Without going into too
much detail, I was hemorrhaging at work.
I called Josh and he didn’t answer his cell phone. At this point I really began to panic. I wasn’t sure how I was going to get myself
to the hospital without his help. I then
text him and let him know I was bleeding really bad and to please call me
back. He immediately called me after
that. I let him know what was happening,
and he left work to come and get me. I
was really panicking at this point and felt like I might pass out. I decided it was probably best if I unlocked
the restroom door, and let someone know I was in there just in case. Luckily, the sweetest lady at work heard me,
and came to help me before Josh got there.
Josh got to me within a matter of minutes, and got me loaded up in the
car. The hospital is only a few minutes
from my work, which I was very grateful for.
All that kept running through my head was, I don’t want to bleed to
death. I kept telling Josh how much I loved him, I was starting to really think
I was going to bleed to death. It was bleeding pretty bad.
Josh got me to the ER and found someone to help get me into
a wheelchair. A nurse wheeled me into a
room to take my blood pressure and check in to the hospital. I felt like time was moving so slow, and that
I was really going to bleed to death. Finally
they got me into a hospital room and began asking me questions. I explained to them that I had a D&C 8
weeks before due to a miscarriage. I let
them know the doctor I had been seeing.
Luckily my doctor was already there in the hospital. I was then moved into another room. Once in this room, they told me they need to
get me hooked up to IV’s, and prepare me for a possible blood transfusion. I let the nurses know that my veins are
really hard to get an IV in, and that my wrists and hands are the best places
to get a vein. They attempted 7 times in
both arms to get a vein. On one try, they
even blew through a vein and blood was squirting everywhere. The ER doctor then came in and realized that
they weren’t having any luck. He then
decided it was time to put a picc line in my neck. Now just so everyone knows, I already have
major anxiety issues. This was pushing
me to my limit. In order to put the picc
line in, he had to put a paper drape over my face. He numbed my neck three times before actually
putting the picc line in. As he was
doing this, he said “this is going to tickle your throat a bit as I push the
line down into your heart”. I could feel
myself getting more and more anxious as the seconds went by. I kept telling myself that freaking out was
not going to help anything, and that I needed to calm down. As soon as he was done, my anxiety level went
way down. They then had to do an X-Ray
of my heart to make sure the line was in the right spot. I couldn’t really move my neck because of
what he had done. My doctor then came
into the room and began doing an ultrasound.
As they were doing this, they kept pushing on my already full to
capacity bladder. I thought for sure I
was going to embarrass myself even more than I already had, by peeing my pants
right there on the bed. After four
people looked at my ultrasound, my doctor then informed me that they would need
to do another D&C surgery to stop the bleeding. He said that my blood work was also showing
that I was still pregnant. I have no
idea how this is even possible. I later
found out, that if they don’t get all of the tissue out on a D&C, that
tissue can still live and let your body still think that you’re pregnant. Because of the traumatic last few hours, I
just wanted to have the surgery and stop bleeding. Throughout this whole process, I was
extremely worried that Josh was going to pass out from everything he had to
see. I’m sure he wants to erase the 3
hours we spent in the ER from his memory.
I was then taken back to surgery.
In the last 15 years since I have graduated high school, I have had 9
surgeries including this one. This is
the first surgery that I have had that the anesthesiologist hasn’t told me he’s
going to give me the sleepy medicine and then told me to count to 10. I went from laying on the table just wanting
the bleeding to stop, to waking up to the voices of nurses talking. Just like that it was over! I was so thankful to wake up with Josh by my
side. While I was in surgery, Josh
posted this on his facebook page: ( I
just had to share since I have such an amazing husband! After he posted this,
we heard from so many friends that had experience similar things, and made us
feel not so alone.)
I guess you could say I'm pretty private about the real personal
things in my life but today has been a horrible day. 9 weeks ago my wife and I
were so excited to finally be parents, we came in for our first doctors
appointment so happy to be able to see our little baby and hoped to see a
heartbeat. After 3 different ultrasounds they couldn't find a heartbeat and we
were both left absolutely devastated and still haven't gotten over the fact
that we lost a baby that we had so much planned for. A couple days later they
performed a D&C and our excitement had turned to hurt and an emptiness I
could never explain. Today my wife began bleeding very heavy at work and called
me crying and scared, I felt helpless as I rushed to get to her at work. She
was so afraid and thought she was going to bleed out and I will never forget
the fear in her eyes as I tried to rush to the hospital. They nurses poked her
several times trying to get an IV in and finally ended up putting one in her
neck, I cried for her wanting to be in her place. They found clots and tissue
that resisted the first D&C and she is in surgery now getting the procedure
done again. I'm glad they were able to stop the bleeding and find out what was
going on but nothing will erase the fear and hurt we have to relive today. I am
so grateful that I have such a strong and amazing wife. Who knows if we will
have our dreams come true of having a baby but I pray every night that God
watches over our child until we are reunited one day.
The doctor let Josh know they had found several blood clots
while doing another D&C. The surgery
had went well. Three hours later, I was
finally released from the hospital.
Going through this latest experience, and letting other
people know of what we were going through, I have learned that many others have
experienced similar things. I have felt
like this never happens to anyone else, so why are we being picked on, this
entire time. Miscarriage and experiences
like what we have been through, are really things that not very many people
talk about. Over the past 9 weeks, I
have really blamed myself and wondered what I did wrong for this to happen to
us. I want more than anything to have
answers. Each doctors visit when my
doctor asks if I have any questions, I just ask him why is this happening. I felt like we had planned and prepared for
this baby as much as we possibly could, and we didn’t deserve this to
happen. My doctor never has an answer
for me which is the hardest part. I feel
like if I just had an answer, I could be more accepting of what has
happened. Not knowing why and blaming
myself, is something I have dealt with everyday for the last 9 weeks. I’m hoping that as more time passes, our
hearts are able to heal more and more each day.
Josh has been my rock through all of this. I really don’t know what I would do without
him. He has been there to just hold me
when I want to cry. He talks with me
about all of this more than he probably wants to, but he does it because it’s
what helps me deal with the pain. I will
never forget how excited he was when I told him I thought I was pregnant, and
how he hurried home from work as fast as he could when I told him I was going
to take a pregnancy test. Hopefully the
tears are less and less, but the pain we feel will never go away. This whole experience we are going through,
has definitely brought us even closer together and made our love even stronger,
even though I didn’t think that was possible. Hopefully as time passes, we are able to see the silver lining in this life experience.
