The weekend

We had a good, fast-paced weekend.



Friday was a busy day at work. I work at SECU and we had member appreciation day with our kid's mascot FAT CAT (my manager, haha) in attendance. Kyla brought Addison to see him and to eat lunch with Mommy. We had so much fun. She was intrigued with FAT CAT and wasn't scared of him until she saw him take his head off. She still didn't cry or scream but she ran up to me and held onto me for dear life. I held her and she refused to move at all in my arms, just clinged onto me. It was cute. As soon as he put to costume head back on she was fine and even was "calling" (here, kitty, kitty, kitty...) him to get his attention. Addison also decided that it was great fun to walk around from person to person begging them for "bips" (chips) and "tuk-dies" (cookies).



My Mom turned 50 last week and we had a small family dinner to celebrate then. What she didn't know was that my dad, sister and I were planning a surprise party for her for this past Saturday. Kyla and I were busy planning, buying and preparing food and decorations for the party and my mom couldn't figure out why we were hanging out so much and not cluing her in to what we were spending our time doing. I just knew that she would figure it out because she always figures things out early. But she ended up not having a clue about it and we really got her good! It was fun and I hope that she enjoyed it!



Later Saturday night we went to a friends house for an early Halloween costume party. First we went to Jordan's sister's house and put Addison to bed there. She only lives a few houses down from the party. Jordan went as Caesar complete with toga, wrist bands and headband and I was a black cat, although I think it looked a bit more like cat woman. I'm not really into costumes for adults (mostly because the woman's costumes are all so, so trashy and I'm not very creative to be able to come up with my own ideas) so I didn't have any old costumes laying around or any inclination to buy one so I wore dark jeans, tall, black boots, a black turtleneck then added a cat mask and tail. Yeah, it was kind of cheesy but I figure I can wear it again when we take Addison trick or treating because she's going to be a kitty cat (white and pink and super cute!). Also in attendance were a witch, a monk, a Scotsman (in a kilt), a policeman, Betty from the Flintstone's (adorable), a nerd girl, and my favorite, Russel and Walter from the movie UP!. They were so, so cute. The girl was Russel with the little boy scout uniform and backpack with balloons tied to it and her boyfriend was Walter with baby powered hair and walking stick with tennis balls on the ends. They just needed a big bird named Kevin and a golden retriever named Dug and they would have had the whole cast!



The party was fun! We ate and played games and watched funny you-tube videos. A few of my friends were there and we broke off from the party and were having some great girl talk. Right in the middle of laughing and having fun I kind of sarcastically joked something about how I should have been pregnant and had to have been dressed as a big pumpkin. I normally don't talk much about my miscarriage and I'm still not really sure why anything about it came out of my mouth but when it did, all of a sudden I was sobbing. I felt so bad for being a downer, but those girls, Kirby and Katie, were so sweet and supportive. They embraced me and talked to me and we all shared different struggles that we are all facing. I'm actually kind of glad that I had my mini-break-down because I obviously needed to get it off my chest right then. I also feel like it brought us closer. We have decided that we need to start having a "girl's day/night" at least once a month and the first one is scheduled for this weekend. I'm excited about it!



I feel fine most of the time even though I still think about losing the baby and not being pregnant a whole lot, I'm just not letting it consume me. I have so many positive things in my life and so many blessings to count from God. I know that no one expects me to "be over it" and I'm still grieving, but sometimes the grief just sneaks up on me. Friday was National Pregnancy and Infant Loss Day. So I was thinking about it even more than normal but didn't really make myself the time to process it. I was so busy and consumed in party planning and costuming and taking care of Addison that I didn't really let myself "go there". I also think I was trying to avoid it. I have such conflicted feelings because I want to be over it (although I know I never will be) but I also feel bad if I'm not thinking about it and still grieving. I think of the women and families that have lost babies multiple times or other family members that they really knew and loved and I feel that what they are going through has to be worse than what I'm going through. But I guess grief is what it is in any circumstance and maybe it's like sins. Although we want to see it that way, no one sin is any worse than another sin in God's eyes. As humans we like to add degrees to everything or turn it into a "good" to "bad" scale. Maybe it's to make more sense of things and add organization or maybe just to make ourselves feel better about things we have done... I don't know.



I'm rambling...again. This was supposed to be about the weekend and yet I've made it about grief, like I always end up doing. I really am doing much better and I'm happy.



Our weekend was a good one, even if I just laid around the house Sunday afternoon and got nothing better done than catching up on watching my DVRed shows. :) I have a huge pile of laundry to do, but that's okay!

*I have some pictures to add but I can't get it done at the moment so I may come back and update. Or I might just do a separate post... Stay tuned. :)*

Big Sister

Yesterday Gena told me how much of a helper Addison is turning into. She likes to bring Ellett things when her Nana asks her to. It's really hard for me to see how good she is with Ellett and how loving she is with her baby dolls. All I can think about is how good of a big sister she would've made in just 5 months. I can also see that she gets jealous of Ellett, too. I know that she'll be a good big sister when the time comes, but I was so worried about how she would be at only 21 months as an older sibling. Now I can see her comprehending things, following directions and helping out when asked and I just wish that things had panned out differently and that our family was going to be spaced out as I had thought it was.

I still want to have our children be close in age. That leads me to having to deal with the question of when. When will we try again? I don't know the answer to that. I think that we aren't going to start trying right away. I feel like that would be stressful and that I need a break for a while from thinking about pregnancy related things. Not that I don't want to hear about other people's pregnancies or babies. I can deal with that and I don't want people to shy away from the topic because they don't want to hurt my broken heart more. Really, it's okay. I just don't want to think about myself being pregnant for a while. Several months at least. We'll just wait and see what God holds for our future.

I came across Addison's "big sister" shirt that I bought for her a few months ago. It's a long sleeved 2T and I keep thinking that she might not be able to wear it whenever the time comes. I'm thinking of getting a memory box to put all of the cards and pregnancy related things in. I keep thinking of different things that I want to put in a place to keep but get out of my sight for a while. I don't want to throw things away but I also don't want to be looking at them all the time. Things like my ultrasound pictures from my 8 week appointment, all the cards and messages people have given me, the miscarriage pamphlet from the hospital. Now Addison's Big Sister shirt may go in it too. I've been thinking of calling it my "heartbreak box." Too sad? I don't know... maybe I'll call it something else.

I feel like all I do is ramble and wallow in all my posts. I'm certainly not trying to have myself a great big pity party. This blog has just happened to become my outlet for getting some emotions out that I wouldn't necessarily express to anyone in person for fear of breaking down. If I get upset and start crying while typing a post then I can just stop and do something else, but a conversation with someone is a little different. I also have a hard time expressing how I feel when talking, so as I type, I get a chance to think about how to word things and how to get across what I'm really trying to. It's like my therapy right now. So just bear with me and I'm sure I'll get back to some happier thoughts soon (or maybe not too soon, but in time).

Now I know

Now I know why I wasn't gaining any more weight for the past three weeks.

Now I know why I wasn't feeling very hungry or nauseous recently.

Now I know why I felt so good, without many symptoms at all.

Now I know why I wasn't so emotional as most pregnant women are.

Now I know what it's like to experience an unexplained loss.

Now I know what miscarriage is.

I lost my baby. Today I went to the doctor for my regular check up. I was so excited and very much looking forward to being able to hear the baby's heartbeat on my birthday. After waiting in the lobby, seeing the nurse and answering a few routine questions, Dr. Miyazaki tried to locate the heartbeat with the doppler thing that they use. After 5 minutes of him of hearing nothing but static, sweaks, and my heartbeat he said I needed to have a scan done. As I was laying there and looking a the ceiling I felt an awful, sinking feeling and started pleading with God that the baby was okay and just in a funny position. I had to wait in a little sitting cubby for a few minutes before the ultrasound tech could see me. They were playing Christian music on the loudspeaker but all I could hear was the loud beating heart of a healthy baby that was also being proudly advertised over the speakers.

The sweet ultrasound tech came and got me and I held my breath as she put the slimy wand on my belly. Immediately my sweet, beautiful baby came up on the monitor but there was no flickering that should've been present. I knew. She looked for a few more seconds before gently rubbing my thigh and saying softly that "It doesn't look good. There's no heartbeat." I just started crying and she was so, so sweet about it. She said she had to look over some things and get some measurements but asked if I wanted to monitor left on or off. I composed myself for the most part and decided to watch as she looked over my baby, since that was the most I'd ever get to see of it. I called Jordan and told him to come to the doctor's office and before I could tell him he asked if we lost the baby. At that point I was crying again and feeling so alone. They took me back into the little sitting area (back to the loud thump of a healthy baby's striving heart) and I waited on Jordan to come and grieve with me. When Dr. Miyazaki came back over to me he embraced me in a such an understanding hug and said he was so, so sorry.

Jordan came in the room that they moved me into and we both lost it for a few minutes. Dr. Miyazaki went over some things with us and said that the baby had stopped living and growing when it was at 13 w 4 d. He stressed over and over again that when miscarriages happen after 12 weeks it's about a 90% chance that it is due to a chromosomal abnormality and that it was nothing that I'd done. He said the the baby had some kind of growth (or pocket of fluid, not really sure) on the back of it's head and neck and that was a huge indicator of something genetically not lining up. It had a name but I don't remember what it was. He went over the procedure that I would have to have done to remove the baby from my uterus. A D&C, Dilation and Curettage. This is where the cervix is dilated and the contents of the uterus are removed via suction curettage. It's commonly performed following miscarriage in cases where the uterus fails to empty its content, as mine did. (It's also what is commonly performed for abortions in the first trimester, but I'm trying to block that from my memory.)

I went to the hospital where I was taken back to a pre-op room in GYN Surgery. Dr. Lipscomb was in the OR today so he preformed my D&C. He is also the same doctor that delivered Addison (the irony did not escape me). He was also very kind and understanding and also stressed that this did not happen due to anything that I had done. He also assured me that he didn't think I'd have any trouble getting pregnant or having a healthy baby in the future, since he knew my body had done it before. They don't think that it was because of any genetic defects that Jordan and I have together. We could pay to have the tissue sent off for testing but because the baby had already been dead for a few weeks it's doubtful that there would be any viable tissue to analyze.

I had a spinal block to numb me from the waist down and I was given medicine to somewhat sedate me and keep from remembering being in the OR. It worked because I think I slept through the whole thing (which only lasted less than an hour). The sweet anesthesia nurse let me listen to her i-pod which I only vaguely remember was playing contemporary Christian music. I had to wait about 2 hours for my legs to be able to hold me up and allow me to walk before I could leave to come home.

I rode home with Mom while Jordan and Dad went to get Jordan's truck and pick up food. Mom and I had to pick up my happy girl from her Nana and Papaw's. It was wonderful to see her and hear her precious voice saying "Mama". When we got home, my sister, Kyla, had washed all my dishes and cleaned up the kitchen and Jordan was arranging a beautiful bouquet of pink roses that he bought for me. He's been so great through all of this, but is full of grief too.

I had no indication that there was a problem with the baby except for a lack of symptoms which I assumed just meant that I was having a good uneventful pregnancy. I had no bleeding or discharge that would lead me to believe that the baby had died. When I am ever pregnant again in the future, I'm going to be a nervous wreck if I feel good. I knew I was pregnant during every passing minute with Addison because I felt pregnant, even before I was showing. This time, I had even made the comment the I didn't feel pregnant because I felt so good. Now, I know that I wasn't.

I've had an amazing amount of love and support from so many wonderful people and I am so thankful that God put them in my life. How people without faith get through tragedies like this is beyond me. I wouldn't have to strength without God giving it to me or giving me people to lift me up.

I cannot imagine how much more tough this would be if this had been my first pregnancy. I wouldn't have my beautiful girl to cheer me up and make my laugh. I wouldn't have the peace of mind that comes with knowing that I can have healthy babies.

Now I know what's its like to be awake at 2 AM, mourning over one baby but rejoicing in another one who is sound asleep in her crib.

Now I know how much pain and grief you feel after losing a baby that I never even got to meet.

Now I know that my baby is heaven and will never feel the pain of this world.

Now I know how it feels to enter the hospital carrying a baby and leave the hospital empty handed.

Now I know what is feels like to be empty inside.

**THANK YOU to everyone who has shown such love and support to Jordan and I. We know you're praying and it's carrying us through.**