Somewhere Beyond the Rainbow

6.21.16

I'm pregnant. I'm pregnant?

Due to a sweet, personal experience, I knew I was pregnant. I didn't know how I knew it. I just knew. I could feel this precious spirit with me. It was late, but I stopped at the store for a pack of pregnancy tests. I hurried home and decided to get ready for bed and test in the morning. I was 4 days early to my projected period start date, and I had drank tons of water. I knew the result would be more clear in the morning. So, I washed my face, brushed my teeth, always keeping an eye on the box of pregnancy tests. I shoved it in a drawer and went to bed. I laid there for 5 minutes and jumped back up to go to the bathroom. I laid the test on the counter to "season" (Juno) and went back to my room. I changed my pajamas to pass the time. I watched the clock: 1 minute, 2 minutes... 3 minutes. Back down the hall and slowly into the bathroom. I peaked over the test. One pink line; not pregnant. I just turned around and went back to bed. But as I laid there I felt it again. No, I know I am pregnant, I thought. I went back to the bathroom and picked up the test. I pulled it closer to my face and stared. There to the side of a dark pink line was a very light pink second line. I gasped and threw my hand over my mouth to keep from shouting. It was midnight, and Tyler was gone to High Adventure for 2 more days. Before I could think clearly, I was running up the stairs and bursting into my mother-in-law's room, hyperventilating and terrifying her, "I think I'm pregnant!" "WHAT?" She threw the covers and jumped out of bed. I told her she had to come down stairs and look at my test. With a second pair of eyes and my undeniable feelings, it was confirmed, I was pregnant.

6.23.16

I waited and surprised Tyler with the news when he got home. We were ecstatic, scared, overjoyed, shocked, etc. with a wide range of emotions. The Lord was blessing us with our little Rainbow baby. The timing, the feelings, we just felt sure that this little miracle was going to come and be ours and be the Rainbow we desperately needed after years of dark storms. 

The weeks pass and I start getting sick and feeling pregnant. It is the worst best thing in the world, feeling pregnant, but I'm just happy to be doing it! Sure enough, as with the others, my little bump makes it's appearance early. By 7 1/2 weeks I have a round belly by nighttime, and by 8 weeks it's present from the time I wake up in the morning, I'm wearing maternity pants before 9 weeks. Eh. Who cares? I'm pregnant!

7.28.16

I wrap the tissue paper thin sheet around my waist and hop onto the chair. Tyler, grinning, grabs my hand and we wait for the doctor to come in.

Dr. Lister, is all smiles and excited to see us. She's as hopeful as we are for this pregnancy. We chat about how I'm feeling (so sick, puking multiples times a week sick) and about what an amazing surprise this is to have just gotten pregnant so soon and so easily!

Finally, it's time to see this little babe, so we stare up at the dark screen with anticipation. The screen lights up as she moves over my uterus. And there it is. This perfect little gummy bear, just sitting there looking just like he/she should. Looking just perfect for 9 weeks. But... what? Dr. Lister's face droops. She closes her eyes and cries, "Dammit! You've got to be kidding me." She drops her face into her arm and says words I can't even believe I'm hearing, "There's no heartbeat."

I stare at her, confused. She grabs my leg and locks eyes with me, "I'm so sorry, Brittany." She turns to Tyler, "I'm so so sorry." She measures it's little body- 8 weeks and 2 days. My pregnancy is exactly 8 weeks and 6 days. It just died a few days ago. My head is spinning. I'm not crying. I'm just staring at it until she removes the ultrasound wand, and my baby is gone. Inside my head is just a voice screaming, WAKE UP! THIS ISN'T REAL!! WAKE UP! THIS IS A NIGHTMARE!" But nothing changes I'm still laying here, with my feet in the stirrups and staring at a black screen where I had just seen the image of my lifeless baby.

With tears in her eyes, Dr. Lister says she'll give us a minute and leaves us there in the dark. There's tears in my eyes but I'm still not crying and I don't know why. I can't find my words. Tyler and I try to console each other, but we're speechless and we're... we're... confused? broken? lost? wrecked? Yes. All of the above.

Dr. Lister comes back and we go over our options. We know from plenty of experience that we just want to get this over with and have a D&C. She completely agrees.

We wander out of the office and out to our cars. We call our parents and we drive home separately. Alone in my car, driving down Harrison, it hits me and I lose it. I feel my chest burst open and like my heart is being sliced into tiny pieces and I'm trying to see through a fit of tears to keep driving. I just keep rubbing my bulging bump and begging God to give our baby back.

How much breaking can our hearts take? Heaven now holds our 3 children, and we/re left to wonder if we'll ever get to have one to bring home, left to wonder if we'll ever have the chance to truly be parents in this life. I cannot help it. I'm breaking apart. It just feels so unfair.

7.29.16

Today marks 2 years since Boston's due date. I can't believe I could have a 2 year old right now. But instead of thinking about a birthday party or the "terrible twos," I'm laying in bed thinking about the baby inside my body that's no longer living and waiting for the hospital to call me for surgery.

For what it's worth, this is a much better experience than that with Boston. With Boston we had tried medication to induce me to miscarry on my own, but it hadn't worked and I ended up in the ER a week later hemorrhaging and needing an immediate D&C. Since I'd had it on a Sunday, they had to keep me in the Postpartum unit. They had wheeled me past the nursery on the way to surgery and I had laid in a recovery room with a bassinet and the sounds of babies crying in neighboring rooms. It was a cruel form of torture. It took hours to revcover due to days without sleep and all the blood I'd lost. However, for this D&C I got to the surgical unit before it closed for the weekend. I checked in at 5:30 and was home before 9PM. So, by comparison this was much easier... but I just still can't believe it happened.

When I came out of anesthesia, I was delirious and confused I wasn't sure if it had happened yet. I looked over at the nurse next to me and asked if it was done. She came over to check some things and told me that I was in recovery and that they'd take me to my husband soon. I don't know what came over me, but I started bawling uncontrollably, It hit me that if it was over, I was empty. Through tears I heard myself ask the nurse, "So, my baby's gone?" Her eyes turned glassy and she just nodded and grabbed my arm and mouthed "I'm sorry." She turned and left the room, and a different nurse returned to take me back to my recovery room. Tyler and I felt like by the time we left we'd broken every nurse's heart. Going over my history, or asking questions, they would come to find that this was our 2nd pregnancy loss and that our 5 week old son had just died in December. You gotta love that look people give you when they find out. Like you're so broken- which you kind of are. Like how are you surviving- which you're kind of not. It was good to finally leave and not having everyone looking at us that way anymore.

Dr. Lister, obviously, felt concerned with the pattern our pregnancies have taken. Missed miscarriage, infant loss with multiple birth defects and, another, missed miscarriage. She got permission to perform genetic testing on the fetus, so we'll have another microarray done to test this baby's genes. If the genes come back normal, we'll know that this miscarriage was just a fluke and we can try again, if we're up to it, in the future. If the genes are abnormal, we'll need to do some more extensive keriotype testing with my and Tyler's genes. It may just be that we cannot conceive a healthy embryo, and we'll be done with trying to. 

7.30.16

So, here I am now, waking up today and realizing this dream has really come to an end, again. There is a hallow and dull ache in my abdomen where our little baby's home has been demolished. 

I really thought this was going to be our chance. I had faith in it. I had faith in the Lord for it. I believed that this little baby would be our Rainbow and that we would bring this one home, healthy and full of life. But, again, we're left with empty arms and little hope. I can't really even seem to cry, even though I feel like it might help. I just feel numb.

I would like to tell you that my faith is unwavering and that I see God's hand and I understand His purposes. I want to. I want to be ever-faithful and ever-leaning on my Lord. But this time has made it very hard for me. This time I feel so blindsided, so broken. I'm so embarrassed to say that my prayers are weak and feeble, and my heart isn't truly in it. I am falling apart in the wake of this loss. Instead of getting our Rainbow we got another devastating storm. 

I just feel like somewhere beyond the rainbow, the end of it that we'll never reach, lay all of our hopes and dreams. And I feel so pessimistic for thinking that. I feel so disheartened that I feel so bitter. But I just do. I just feel so hopeless. I feel like it will never be our chance. The realization that we truly may never have children, is a tough pill to swallow. I feel like I'm leaving this blog post so unresolved, but I have no resolution right now. I can't tie up this sad story in a perfect bow and tell you that everything is just going to be alright, because I don't feel alright. So, I'm sorry. I'm sorry I can't give you an hope. I feel almost out of hope today. I just don't know how much more our hearts can take.

XO

The Faith & Courage to Keep Going

I haven't blogged for awhile, and there is a reason for that. I want this blog to be a place with uplifting messages, a place to find comfort and reassurance. But it has been some time since I could come up any words to portray that message, and then more time to figure out how and if I could share this. As difficult as this will all be to share and admit, I feel that it is important that I do.

Theodore Roosevelt said, "Comparison is the thief of joy," and, man, is that ever true. No good comes of looking at the things others have that you do not.

After Max died I couldn't go see friends who had babies around the same time or right after. All I could think of is how old my baby would be, what he could be doing if he had been a healthy baby like them. The ache of seeing these little babies that were the same age as mine was too much for me to handle. I felt so much guilt for not being able to, but I couldn't help it. 

I've tried to keep a positive attitude throughout our journey to have a family. Of course, I've had my up and downs during years of infertility and my miscarriage, but a darkness seemed to slowly envelope me in the wake of Max's death and I sunk below depths I wasn't sure I could make my way out of. I looked around at the happy families with their beautiful healthy children, and I ached for my baby boy and for the joy of a family. I felt the pain of "unfair" and jealousy for what others had been blessed with. Despite what I knew about Max and his special mission, my broken heart outweighed my knowledge and I just wanted my baby back.

In the beginning, the grief had been difficult, but manageable. But as the months waned on, it just seemed to get harder and harder. I began to hear the voice of self doubt whisper to me that I wasn't worthy of a family, that I hadn't been a good enough mother, that I would never have the family I dreamed of. It felt like my heart grew more and more broken, instead of healing. Just as I would try to mend the pieces, they would crumble to dust in my hands. My chest began to feel like a gaping hole that would never close. Between the grief of loss and postpartum depression, I began to feel nothing but miserable about my life without Max. I felt hopelessly unhappy. I saw no way for us to ever live "happily ever after" after what we'd gone through. I wondered how I could ever escape the darkness of grief and the pain that I felt. I spent many of my days in bed and in tears, aching and, ultimately, just wishing I could die and be with Max again. I would find myself haunted by suicidal thoughts constantly in my moments alone. The longer I kept my feelings to myself, the more unhappy and hopeless I began to feel. I couldn't find the courage to admit to anyone how horrible I was feeling. 

People have come to expect me to be this positive, uplifting, ever-see-the-bright-side person. So, I felt like I had to keep up that act with everyone, everywhere. But it started crushing me.

My counselor suggested I get further evaluated by the psychiatrist to try a new medication. So, I started there. I prayed that I would have an easy transition and that the Lord would guide the doctor to put me on the right medication to help start making me feel like I could manage again.

Finally, I told Tyler about how bad my depression had actually become. I was embarrassed to admit my defeat to him. But, as he always does, he wrapped me up in his arms and comforted me. We prayed together for peace, help and guidance to navigate both of us through this difficult time, and to know what we should do to help me find my way out of the pit of darkness I felt I was in.

As always, it never fails to amaze me how the Lord so often blesses us through others. In church the following Sunday, a sister in our ward taught a powerful lesson I will never forget as long as I live. To me, it felt as though the entire room had vanished away and she was teaching only me. Her words struck my very core. She relayed her own story about trials and experiences that had lead her to a dark time in her life. And as if God was speaking directly to me through this amazing woman, she spoke the words I needed to hear and gave me the answers to my prayers. While I had been struggling so much, I thought that I had dug myself into a pit of hopelessness I would never be able to climb out of. She shared that she when she had reached such a time in here life, she had heard a voice declare to her, "If a seed of faith can move a mountain, it can surely fill the deepest hole." As she bore her testimony of that experience, a light began to peak in through my clouds of darkness and I began to see pillars of hope again in that very moment. 

As I began to actively seek that light and turn that hope into renewed faith, I began to feel my small seed of faith fill my deep hole. As time went on and my new medication also started to take effect, I slowly began to climb out of my pit and out of the darkness. 

Each and every day takes faith. Faith in the Lord, faith in myself, faith in the future and faith in each day. Is it easy? Not always. Some days it is so hard just to get up out of bed. I think, it would be so much easier to give up. It takes strength and courage just to keep going. But with a little bit of faith, I promise, it will start getting better.

Gordon B. Hinkley said, "In such hours of darkness there has shown forth a light, steady and certain, to sustain and comfort and bless." That light is the gospel of Jesus Christ. His perfect love, His infinite sacrifice, His faith in each of us even when our faith in Him dwindles. He is the truth and the light. When my faith is steady and strong in His redeeming power, I feel lifted up by His glory. He loves me. He doesn't doubt me, even when I, shamefully, doubt Him. We are never alone, if we can just believe in Christ. His atonement meant that He took on all of our griefs, sorrows, pains, losses; everything that has ever and will ever break our hearts broke His first. He knows us. He knows that pain and He wants to take it from us so we can hurt just a little less. It is the most beautiful part of His gospel, the most beautiful gift He could give us. 

And so, with faith we keep moving forward. We keep hoping and believing that something better must be somewhere up ahead. In the meantime, we seek out the joy that surrounds us right now. And, if we just look, we can find so much of it. Despite all the hardships we face each day, there are always blessings. That is the thing I know most to be true about my Heavenly Father, no matter what trials He allows us to face, he never leaves us empty-handed when we are faithful. With our most difficult trials come abundant blessings, if we can just have the faith to see them. If we can just stop worrying about "happily ever after," we might realize how happy we could be right now. We just have to find the faith and the courage to keep going.

XO