Category Archives: Jessica

525,600 Minutes

I was supposed to be celebrating my child’s birth on 1/16/19.  That was the due date of the baby we lost. As Halloween drew near, I remember wishing I was putting together 4 costumes instead of 3. That I should be stressing myself out during the holidays to plan a big first birthday party.

I’ve found myself thinking about our loss every day, but it hurts less until these missed milestones come around. I wish I could be watching him take his first steps while his big sister cheered him on. I wish I still had a baby in a crib and the sweet smell of Dreft lingering throughout the house. I wish I could watch the sibling plots come to fruition, making a mess or creating some kind of trouble that young siblings often do.

I wish more than anything I was able to have carried our second child into the world. But I didn’t and I can’t change that. What I can do, is ensure that we celebrate every January 16th when he was due. I felt a little ridiculous saying I planned on buying a cupcake every year that I’m lucid and here on Earth, but then I realize, why shouldn’t we celebrate his imprint the way we celebrate everyone’s.

Milestones are milestones are milestones. The same dates happen every year and if you want to honor your angel baby that way, don’t ever feel silly. They made an impact on your life and they deserve to be celebrated if you so choose.

Category : Jessica , Volunteer Bloggers

The Ugly Emotions We Don’t Talk About

I haven’t written lately because I have been struggling. I am still struggling with our loss. I am still struggling knowing that “Hudson” is quickly becoming a popular name and I now have to hear it and can’t say, “Oh, that’s my eight month old’s name!”

Even more, I’ve been struggling with the most recent group of pregnancy announcements and babies.  And this is where the ugly emotions come in. After my miscarriage, I did the normal grieving process. I expected that once I came to the point of acceptance that baby showers, meeting new babies, and excitement would just follow. Unfortunately, that hasn’t been the case. All I feel is resentment. It’s fleeting, but I feel it with every single announcement I see.  I realize how this makes me sound. I hate myself for even having the feelings, but they are there.

And what’s even worse, is that the latest round of pregnancy announcements have been from people who have experienced secondary fertility. They didn’t just end up pregnant the first month they tried for a second baby. It has been years for most of them. Some have gone through miscarriages themselves. So after the resentment subsides, all I feel is guilt and shame. Guilt because both of our children were conceived without trying. Guilt because even though we lost our second baby, we have a child here that is wonderfully spectacular and perfectly healthy. And some people haven’t even had the chance to bring one baby into the world.

There is certainly some resentment as well because I’ll never get the chance to have our rainbow baby. I’ll never get that healing of being able to bring another child into this world biologically. And that’s something I’ll eventually have to deal with.

I’m sharing this in hopes that if anyone is struggling with these same feelings, you will understand you’re not alone.  It’s not the healthiest emotion, but it is a valid one and it needs to be identified. And if I’m the only person who holds these feelings of resentment, perhaps acknowledging and naming it will allow me to heal even further.

Category : Jessica , Volunteer Bloggers

It’s different…

Everyone experiences grief differently. For me, I was seven weeks along when we lost our baby. I hadn’t felt him kick or move. I hadn’t felt any symptoms of pregnancy, but those positive tests showed me he was. And while my husband and I were scared, we were excited. I struggle writing this because I don’t want to take anything away from my husband. He is an amazing man and father. And just because his grief was different than mine doesn’t mean he didn’t want this baby.

I think that’s something that has been hard to come to terms with. A woman becomes a mother when she sees that positive line. A man generally becomes a father when he holds or sees his child out of the womb and in the world the first time. Because I was so early, we don’t have any sonogram pictures of a profile. We don’t have heartbeat scans. I still have one pregnancy test and I know I won’t keep that forever. My husband isn’t terribly emotional. He was upset when we lost the baby, but he didn’t react the way I did. The pain he experienced was watching me break down and feeling helpless. He couldn’t make it better and he couldn’t solve this problem. That was his pain.

Last week was one year since we lost our baby. I thought maybe I would magically heal by that point. And I didn’t cry or hide  like I did when it happened. My husband took the weekend off and my mother in law watched our daughter. We didn’t really talk about it, but we spent the entire weekend together. Even though he didn’t talk about it, we remained close to each other throughout the few days and honestly, it felt like we were healing together in our own ways.

It’s hard when our partners don’t grieve to the same depths that we do. But it was also unfair for me to put those expectations on him.  I wouldn’t want to see my husband in the kind of pain I was in. I’m sure he would’ve done anything to protect me as well as our baby, but we are limited in what we can do in these situations. I’m lucky enough now to understand that he didn’t break down because he wasn’t sad, but because he knew I needed his strength.

Category : Jessica , Volunteer Bloggers

I forgot

I know you never truly forget your lost baby. I started writing for Through the Heart about a month after my miscarriage (almost a year ago). I started strong and passionate. I maintained consistency with healing, grieving, outreach, acknowledgement, etc.  And then after my child’s due date, it kind of fizzled a little. And I have an intense guilt about this.

Even though I think of him every single day, I can tell that with the year anniversary, some of the sympathy and understanding is waning. Mother’s Day, I still get to hold my 2.5 year old in my arms, while I think about the should be 4 month old that I’ll never hold. It’s almost as if there’s a timer about to go off, the ding signaling that I no longer am able to grieve intensely. That my waves of sadness won’t be met with a gentle look or touch, but instead exasperation.

One of the hardest parts of this for me has been knowing that I’m the only person who thinks of him every day. That as new babies are added to the family, he won’t be regarded as one of the grandchildren. He won’t be considered a nephew. He won’t be a student, a brother, a graduate, a husband. He won’t be anything to anyone else on a daily basis, except me.

Grief is a tricky, tricky thing. It makes you want to forget everything, but begs you to remember it all at the same time. Each day as I kiss my daughter while sending her off to school, I like to take just a moment to think about him as well. Each day, it gets a little less sad and I spin it in a way that perhaps he’s my daughter’s little angel, watching over his big sister.

Category : Jessica , Volunteer Bloggers

What Happens Next…

My due date has come and gone. My husband, daughter, and I cut a cake made in his honor.  I don’t even know where to go from here. I don’t have the anxiety of a looming due date in front of me, but I also have no baby in my arms.

I almost feel like there’s nowhere else to go but forward. Every day is a little easier and every day I feel a little more “normal.”

Friends are still getting pregnant. I still am not. And I never will be again now that we’ve decided our biological family is complete.

The world kept turning on 5/31/17 when mine stopped and it has continued to turn through this emotional time. There will always be setbacks, but even more promising is knowing good days, great days even are coming.

Category : Jessica , Volunteer Bloggers

The Right to Grieve

I feel very stuck lately. I should be 30 weeks pregnant, but I’m not. I’m not pregnant at all. And here come the holidays, reminding me that instead of swollen ankles and heartburn, I have an empty uterus and a missing piece in my heart.

I’m a very dramatic person. Those of you who know me on a personal level have just laughed and thought, “Understatement of the year.” I come from a long line of dramatic people. When something small inconveniences us or upsets us, we take it to next level insanity.

Over the past few months, people have unintentionally acted like I am being overly dramatic in regards to the loss of this child. Some people have lost their child at the halfway point of their pregnancy, or even further along. I cannot even begin to fathom the type of pain that creates. I only knew my child for a week before I was in the ER with bleeding, and a total of 9 days before it was confirmed that he was gone.

It appears that some people think that because I was only 7 weeks along, I should be over it at this point. That my tendencies for being dramatic are carrying over into my grief. This isn’t the case. Everyone is entitled to their right to grieve the loss of a child at any time during their pregnancy. I don’t even know if my child was bigger than a grape at that time, but to me, he was a person. In my mind’s eye, he had a life ahead of him that he never got to lead.

I still have family members, whether blood or marriage, that still have not said anything to me. Not one word. They haven’t even acknowledged what happened. And that actually causes my grief to be deeper. Because now, I feel like I have to grieve for my lost child not only for myself, but for them. I want to give him the type of honor and memory so he knows he was loved and was never forgotten.

My well-meaning husband mentioned that we could go on our vacation at the end of May, beginning of June. I had to step back, realizing that he didn’t remember those dates had significance. May 31st was the confirmation of my miscarriage and June 2nd was the day I had my D&C. I was so taken aback that he didn’t remember every single detail of the worst three days of my life.  I guess that goes to show the depth of a mother’s love for her child. In saying that, I don’t mean to take anything away from my husband. He is a wonderful, caring father to our spirited two year old.

Here’s my point to the drawn out post: You, as someone who has lost a child, at whatever point in your pregnancy, have the right to grieve. While we can’t expect anyone else to understand our grief unless we’ve gone through it, we have every right to process and feel it. No one can tell you how long, how strong, and how much to do so. It is your healing, no one else’s. And if someone simply doesn’t understand, tell them you’re grateful that they don’t understand. That you’re so happy they don’t have to experience that type of pain.

Category : Jessica , Volunteer Bloggers

No, Just One

My husband and I were on vacation this past week. While in the elevator, a couple had two children in a stroller. One about 4 and the other 2. I smiled at them and said, “That makes me miss our daughter.” She smiled back and said, “Just one?”

I smiled back and said, “Yeah, just one.” She said, “For now?” and I replied, “No, just one…” and looked down at the floor. She repeated, “For now?” and while I know she didn’t know my struggle, part of me wanted to scream at her, to lash out at her, to tell her to mind her own business.

I was supposed to be 23 weeks pregnant that day. And I knew it. I know the week of pregnancy I SHOULD be on. I know that I should have a protruding belly at this point. I know what should be happening.

After our daughter was born, my husband and I threw around the idea of a second child and ultimately vetoed it. When we found out we were pregnant for a second time (surprisingly), we were scared but excited. After my miscarriage, I was hopeful that he would still want to try for a second earthbound baby, but he was firm in his previous decision to only have one. We would’ve absolutely loved and adored our second child if he would’ve made it in this world, but he was not planned.

I’ve been putting off writing this blog because when I type these words, I know the chance of having a second really are over. That the decisions are made and our second will be heaven bound instead.

So for the rest of my life, I’ll just be replying, “No, just one…”

Category : Jessica , Volunteer Bloggers