A lot is unknown, but no bad is known, so that is my consolation for now. In three and a half weeks I have a chance to hear the heartbeat. Hoping for reassuring June and July visits. I'm still emotionally disconnected somewhat, but I think once I have some evidence baby is ok, I will start the enjoying process. Bit by bit.

Dudes may find this TMI

I had my first post loss cycle in early March. From that first day on I have had relatively minor yet uncomfortable lower abdomen issues, mostly digestive in expression. I conceived that very first cycle and am now due December 12th. So I am just over 5 weeks now.

The night before last, I had my sister over for a sleepover. As we hung out until really late at night, I slowly got more and more uncomfortable and started going to the bathroom a lot. By the time I did go to bed, it was bad enough I couldn't sleep. I would have almost tuned out the pain enough to get sleepy, then I would need to pee. I spent hours falling asleep, but not sleeping. I finally got a couple of hours of sleep starting after 6 am. That morning the pain was less, but still enough I called in and got an appointment with someone at my doctors office. Since my pain wasn't bad and I was barely able to say I was spotting, they didn't do an ultrasound on me. They did take cultures and did a UA because I went in thinking I had a uti caused by a bacterial infection. So, I went home with no answer. I grabbed lunch on the way home, being exhausted, then as I drove home I felt progressively worse. By the time I was home I could not eat, and just alternated between bathroom and bed, throwing up from the pain a couple times. Thankfully my husband was just finishing work when I got desperate for him to come home and take me to the ER. After thinking about it and talking to my midwife, we were concerned about ectopic, and my pain was becoming more than I could handle. My sister continued to watch the boys and he took me in. Walking was excruciating. After they got me triaged and waiting, I tried to get comfortable, then went to the bathroom to pee and vomit. Having hardly eaten anything, my vomit was only bile and the liquid I was drinking to stay hydrated. They finally got me to a room (it felt like forever but was probably 20 minutes since I was a somewhat priority case), and put warm blankets on me, drew blood, took my stats again, and after I vomited, gave me zofran in my hep lock or whatever they call when they put it in your elbow and can unhook you. That sort of helped and my.pain was sort of diminishing, but I was probably a 9+/10 on the pain scale when I got there, so a minor improvement wasn't enough. They gave me morphine with zofran, and that was awesome. My pain dropped to a 3 and I could relax for the first time all day. They had me give a urine sample, and I still had blood in my urine, though hardly visible to me in spotting form. They did an ultrasound after the morphine had me comfortable, and then took me back to my room to wait.

The news that came back was a mix of relieving and concerning. Baby was not ectopic, they were in the uterus. But there was bleeding around the baby. So... The baby may end up fine, or we may lose this one too. They want me to see if my hcg numbers have doubled on Monday. The pain I was feeling was plower right abdominal, and they said that was the side my corpus luteum cyst is on, EO the side I had ovulated on. I asked about what if I end up in pain again, and all I can do is Tylenol unless I am miscarrying. I've had minor recurrences since last night, and hardly have a moment I feel totally normal, but I still have no red spotting at all, and am trying to take it easy to not exacerbate the pain or the risky situation.

So, after all that, please pray the baby stays and joins us, healthy and strong, in December, and please pray I don't have pain like that again. Thank you, if you read all this.

the upward way,
New heights I'm gaining every day,
Still praying as I onward bound,
Lord, lead me on to higher ground.

Lord, lift me up, and let me stand
By faith on heaven's table land,
A higher plane than I have found,
Lord, lead me on to higher ground.

............

I am doing better. Last weekend, at the reminder of my midwife, I started remembering my supplements and got an additional one. So now I am taking about 6 chlorophyll caplets, my three prenatal multivitamins, and Garden of Life's Healthy Blood supplement. That has made this week much better. I still got a minor cold, but with the vitamins it has stayed minor, and I am slowly getting back into keeping up with my home. It also helped that my sister and mother came over to help me catch up on my overdue housekeeping, so I am starting from a good point adjusting back into all of it. The food and help really have made a difference these 2 1/2 weeks, and I am deeply grateful. The loving words and prayers have similarly supported my heart and mind. ♥

I've been finding even an easy recovery challenging. I feel good, I overdo it, but don't feel it until I get worn out, and bleed again. Rest, repeat. I know I am only 11 days out from it, but I wonder if I will have the same protracted weeks of this like after my term births. Which, after a term birth of a healthy baby, is ok. After a loss, with those empty arms and no love hormones, you just desperately want to get back in your normal groove. You don't want your body constantly reminding you that life isn't normal, you aren't normal, and you shouldn't expect normal. My mind has been ok processing this, and my heart has been easing. But then my body reminds me. It takes me backwards. Turns my face to look straight at my grief. I don't want to look right now, I've already poured myself into it, and no good, just pain comes now. My hormones must be still wacky. Last night and again tonight have been face-the-pain moments. All it took to go from rested to overdone today was to be Mom and to fold four loads of adult sized laundry. I've ignored buying groceries, doing the dishes, the floors, the toilets, the bathtub... still too much. Sigh. Sometimes the body and the soul are at war.

I really need to post on here more often, because it is hard that this is the next post after the last one. Our little baby is home with God. I carried him to 18 weeks, but he probably died at about 15 weeks. He was developed enough that we knew he was a boy, and his name is Enoch. I don't know for sure what went wrong, so much of him looked perfect. Beautiful fingers and toes. But he did have some fluid around his neck and on the crown of his head, so unless that was from the three weeks and settling, I think that may be why it happened. I woke up with the beginning of a poem in my head for him (the way poetry usually strikes me, in bed when I ought to be sleeping), and I got up and finished it, before trying to rest again. I'm going to share it, if it would be too hard for you, don't feel you have to read it.


My womb is small and empty,
A hole is in my heart,
For I just wasn't ready
So soon to have to part.

I dreamed of knitted sweaters,
Of snuggles while you nurse,
And many hopes now hopeless,
As I face their reverse.

I know you are now seeing
Hope's everlasting end,
But waiting here behind you,
I yet but slowly mend.

I know I'll someday meet you
After braving best and worst,
But in my heart I whisper,
"I wish I'd known you first."
Your loving mother, Robyn Story