while at dinner in denver thursday night, april 24, i had another bout of bright red bleeding. i've kind of grown accustomed to this with this pregnancy, but i was still really worried. we finished dinner and went to bed that night, and i was up a couple times in the night just unable to sleep. friday morning i called my ob office & made an appointment for ultrasound and to see the on-call doc in the afternoon.
at 3pm, mike and brady and i headed into the office and during the ultrasound, heard the worst news we could imagine. "i'm sorry, i don't see the heartbeat." i don't think i'll ever forget hearing the sweet ultrasound tech say that, as i looked at a really still baby on the ultrasound monitor. just two weeks before, we'd been able to see the heartbeat strong in the middle of the baby and today it was obvious right away to us there wasn't anything there anymore. it felt like a fog as we waited to see the doctor then, and as she discussed our options with us. i felt right away that i'd always known i wasn't going to carry this baby. i hadn't felt the same connection to my pregnancy as i had right away with brady, i didn't have any nausea, and i had more spontaneous bleeding than i had with our first pregnancy. so i wasn't terribly surprised...but we were so, so sad to find out my intuition was true.
we decided with the doctor that the best course of action was to take medication to induce the miscarriage, and hopefully avoid a d&c. we headed to the pharmacy right away, and while we waited we went to our fave windsor mexican restaurant & i had a lovely margarita on the patio in between crying spells, texting & phone calls with our loved ones. mike and i were both so, so sad. i think the hardest part for me was that i've known about this sweet baby that we wanted so bad, for over six weeks. we'd already integrated him/her into so many of our future plans & thoughts, and so to suddenly have to change course for what we thought our summer/fall/winter would look like for 2014 was really hard. i know miscarriages are so common, and SO many of my friends & family have had miscarriages, but you just never think it will be you. and i know they happen for a reason, and after a few days i was accepting of that and ready to look forward...but the first few days were just really really hard to wrap my mind around.
friday night i took my first dose of cytotec and mike and i got into bed to watch tv together and just hang out. i woke up four or five times during the night as my bleeding increased, but nothing major was happening yet. saturday morning mike took care of brady before leaving for work at 9:30, and i was able to get a little extra rest. my dear friend jen & her babies came over to hang out with us and entertain brady around 11, and stayed until nap time. it was really nice to be able to just sit in the backyard and talk with her while the kiddos ran themselves ragged. brady was so exhausted when i laid him down for a nap that he fell asleep almost immediately! i napped while he napped and felt a little better by the time we got up. still nothing much was happening, i didn't have much in the way of cramps and my bleeding was steady but not heavy yet. not what the doctor had predicted for the actual miscarrying part.
around 4pm, our sweet nanny megs came over and hung out with us until mike texted that he was on his way home from work, so i wouldn't have to be alone with brady for long. she took him on a long walk and to the playground for about an hour while i laid on the couch. my cramping was definitely becoming more noticeable by that point so i was glad to not have to be chasing brady around. she helped me feed him dinner & cleaned up and when mike texted that he was on his way home at 6:15, she headed home. right as mike walked in the door, i was headed to the bathroom for the start of the heavy part. my miscarriage was definitely in full force at that point and i was so grateful he was home to take full care of brady. i basically couldn't stay out of the bathroom for more than 3 or 4 minutes at a time. the worst part lasted until about 8:30pm and honestly, although the pain was really bad for most of that time (i just couldn't get comfortable, and it hurt all over my low back & low belly - similar to contractions when i was in labor with B), the actual process of bleeding and pain and clots was really therapeutic. it was good to physically go through the pain and the process, and have some closure when the worst of it was over and i climbed into bed with mike to finally rest a little. i continued to bleed pretty heavily through the night, but saturday night i finally got good sleep after two nights of hardly any.
i woke up sunday morning and took a long hot shower & got a big mug of coffee, and i felt like a new person again. mike was off to work early that day, and brady and i went to the huntingtons late morning for a few hours and stayed through lunchtime. around noon sunday i passed a rather large clot again, with some heavier cramping, but then since then the bleeding has tapered and i feel like i'm done with the worst of it now.
as i sit here typing monday morning, april 28, i feel pretty good again. i feel like i can smile again, and i don't have any cramping, and we are just ready to move forward again. i trust God completely with this part of our journey, and i felt Him close to me through it all. i don't understand why it happened, but we accept that it is what it is and it happened for a reason.
we have been so blessed by the outpouring of support from our friends & family this weekend. seriously, we felt loved in a million ways. from the kindest, most supportive texts and phone calls, to the prayers offered on our behalf. we felt loved, we felt supported, we felt carried by those closest to us. although the experience isn't something we hope to go through again, we have known support that we didn't before & are so blessed by it. and so grateful. here's to moving forward, grieving our loss but trusting in a bright future for our family as well.
we can do hard things, as my friend glennon would say. we have done hard things.
