The Day My World Fell Apart

We were so excited to find out we were pregnant. The baby was due April 6, 2011, what would have been my Mamaw's 66th birthday. It seemed so perfect. Piper understood as well as a 2 1/2 year old could, and was excited about being a big sister.

On August 8, 2010, I noticed my pregnancy symptoms seemed to be disappearing. I know it's normal for symptoms to come and go during pregnancy, so I tried not to worry, but I just felt like something was off. The next morning, 8/9/10, I started spotting. I think I knew at this point that it was over. I called my doctor and they had me come in for an ultrasound.

Tim left work to come to the doctor with me. The ultrasound showed a sac, measuring about 2 days small. Since I was charting, I was pretty sure of my dates. It was too early to see a heartbeat. They didn't see a reason for the bleeding and they couldn't say for sure if I was miscarrying or not. They took some blood and sent us home with a printout of our little bean and no answers. Later that night, the cramping started and was accompanied by A LOT of bright red blood. I can't even begin to explain how I felt that night. The physical pain combined with the emotional pain was too much to bear. I just sat in Tim's arms and he held me while I sobbed until I had no tears left. My heart was broken, that baby was so wanted and already so loved.

I don't remember much about the next few weeks, I was in zombie mode, just going through the motions. I had several doctor appointments to have blood drawn, so they could follow my HCG (pregnancy hormone) levels down to zero. Then I had a follow up ultrasound to make sure there wasn't any retained tissue. I went to have the ultrasound alone, which was a big mistake. I thought I had prepared myself, but it was overwhelming to see nothing where just two weeks before our little baby was growing.

At some point, I can't remember if it was before or after the ultrasound, we met with a midwife from my OB. We were told that we would never know why we lost the baby. Most likely it was something chromosomal and just because it happened once didn't mean it would happen again, but it also didn't mean it wouldn't. We were told to wait one cycle, then we could start trying again. I left that appointment with a lot of sadness, but also hope. I knew I could carry a baby, my body had done it before. I didn't know when I would be ready to try again, but I knew I still wanted a baby more than anything.