*Trigger alert*
Miscarriage/references to female internal reproductive anatomy
I came back to bed after trying to figure it out, with no more answers than before. Eric soon woke up, and I shared the test with him. We were both in shock, but came to realized that everything had worked against this happening, and yet it had happened. To us both, that is a clear sign of God’s intervention. It took a couple of days to get over the initial overwhelmed fears of how can we make this work? Five kids?? But once we accepted that this was a gift from God, we rejoiced in it.
I had concerns from the beginning; I am very overweight, and I know that can lead to a myriad of complications during pregnancy and labor. This led me into panic mode, researching everything I could about safely losing weight during pregnancy, exercise programs specifically for pregnancy, and healthy diet changes. I quit sugar, I started prenatal vitamins, and I began stretching and upping my exercise. I was afraid to share the information so soon, I knew I was only a couple weeks pregnant, and something in the back of my mind didn’t want to allow me to get too excited. I shared with a few friends, but chose not to tell my mother or the children until we got an ultrasound to make sure he was in the right place and everything was going according to plan.
He? Yes, I believe it was a boy. A couple years ago, after having our last child, I felt like God was telling me that despite me not wanting any more children, we would have another, a boy. I didn’t think anything of it at the time, I had suffered a terrible, unplanned cesarean, with a painful recovery. I was later told that I had endometriosis and cysts on my ovaries, so to me, baby making time was over. Not to mention that I had already told Eric that we had until I turned 30 to get pregnant because I am selfish, and I want a child free home before I turned 50.
Almost a year ago, in December, I went to the dr. because of some discomfort, which I assumed was being caused by the cysts. It turned out that the cysts were gone, and instead it was being caused by my IUD, which had become embedded into my uterine wall. It had to be removed. At that time, I realized that I was a 30 year old woman who had been medically controlled for the last sixteen years by synthetic hormonal birth control, and I was done. I no longer wanted to be a slave to medical intervention when my body was perfectly capable of maintaining itself. We had the IUD removed, and I went out and got a book on natural family planning, charting your cycle naturally to determine when you are fertile and not. I researched and joined a group on Facebook, and excitedly began a new journey.
There were times that I would freak out, thinking I was pregnant, because I was still learning the rules. Those times led to me remembering what God had told me about the baby. I was worried about getting pregnant because we did not want to have an unplanned pregnancy. I managed to make it ten months without any “accidents”, that is until October.
I waited until I was around 6 weeks along to set up an ultrasound with the local clinic that typically caters to unwed mothers. I was so excited to finally get to see my little “Hammie” as Eric and I were calling him. The experience was awkward at first, as the questionnaire was geared towards women desiring abortions; the nurses and staff were laughing along with relief as I answered some hard questions with uplifting responses. I was even able to share some of my testimony with one of the women who shared that when she was considering taking the job there, she was worried that she was naturally too judgmental. I explained about how God had used my experience with Eric and my separation to open my eyes to how people act out because of a wound inside of them. She was actually pretty taken aback at the wisdom I was sharing, and seemed to let it really sink in that she shouldn’t allow her judgement and anger with the irresponsible behavior of the girls to cause her to be rude or hurtful.
Once all of the formalities were over, I went into the ultrasound room, ready to meet my boy. The tech immediately pointed out a new cyst, which she wrongfully said was on the outside of my uterine wall (it was actually on my ovary, not the uterine wall.) Then she swished around some, and seemed to be frustrated. I noticed that she was acting oddly, and she switched to another type of ultrasound, and tried to look that way. She pointed to the center of the screen, which was just a grey, blank space, and said, “This is where the gestational sack should be.” I got from the “should be” that it wasn’t. I had tested positive again, even that afternoon in their office, so I didn’t know what was going on. I tried to ask her what that meant, but she was concentrating on looking at every different angle that she could find. Then she stopped and took several pictures. It looked like what I thought we were supposed to be seeing, a hollowed, black circle with a tiny grey smudge inside. But instead of confirming, she said she just didn’t think that was what we were looking for. In fact, she said, “I don’t know what that is!”
I got dressed slowly, confused and oddly numb. When I came out of the changing room, the tech was frowning sadly at me. She had me sit down and told me that I was wise to have come as early as I did. She felt I had an ectopic pregnancy, at the very least, and we very worried about me. She had already called a local doctor that she knew and asked me to please go there immediately, in order to get a referral to the Imaging Center, where their ultrasound machines were much stronger. She asked me if I had been experiencing any spotting or cramping at all, and of course, I had not. I had felt nothing but elation for the past two weeks, that is, until that day. I walked to my car, the sun shining so brightly, and the world around me going on like nothing had just ended. But to me, something huge was unraveling and ending.
Once I was in the car, I began frantically calling and texting, asking for prayers. All I could say was, “Something is wrong.” I didn’t know what. I didn’t know what to ask for. I called Eric right away and told him that I needed him to leave work and come with me to the doctor. Because I was so scattered and frantic, he kept trying to calm me down and get some sort of rational explanation out of me. He kept asking me something that was making me so angry, for some reason. He kept saying, “But you are pregnant, right?” As though I wasn’t really pregnant, and that might be the problem. It enraged me because I knew I was pregnant, and I didn’t want to even think about not being pregnant after all this time.
I picked up my kids from the sitter’s, got Eric from work, and then headed to the second doctor, hoping to get some answers. I went in to an unknown doctor, not knowing what to expect. It was pretty depressing. The nurse had me urine tested, and of course, it came up positive. So, without knowing the situation, she walked in and cheerfully said, “Congratulations!” My heart just sank a little. I explained the reason that I was there, and was asked for the second time in one day of I was experiencing any cramping or bleeding, and again, my answer was no, nothing. I was taken to a room to wait on the doctor, and proceeded to sit and wait in cold discomfort while I listened to a painfully embarrassing conversation she was having over the phone with an apparent paramour who was being put in the doghouse. Awkward. All I could think was that I had been rushed over to this doctor hoping to get her referral early enough in the day to go see the ultrasound specialists, and here she was, wasting time talking on the phone. I just wanted answers. After explaining again what the ultrasound tech had told her earlier on the phone already, she asked me about the cramping and bleeding. I was getting tired of this question because it seemed the magical experience that was supposed to be causing all of the alarm I was experiencing wasn’t happening to me, so why in the world was I going through this? She did a quick exam, and then made me wait some more while she booked the appointment, which ended up being set two days later. I went back out to the car where Eric and the kids were waiting, with no more information than what I’d had that morning, only with more questions, and a longer wait.
Tuesday went by as a blur. Eric was off, so we spent time together all day. We shared with some friends who are strong believers that when we are saved, Jesus is now inside of us, and His healing is a past-tense event on the cross. They encouraged us to begin speaking healing over my body, and we did. I really don’t remember anything much about that day, except worrying about what was going on, and my kids seeming confused about me. I was scared. I just didn’t know what to expect the next morning for my ultrasound, but in my heart, I was believing that the baby would be there, and there would be no other issues at all.