My journey through pain to great joy

I do love being a mom. While there are days when I'd love to just hop on a plane and go relax at some remote beach with a good book by myself for like, oh, I don't know, a month or so, more often than not, I have a deep thankfulness for my children and that I even get to be a mom to them.

When Doug and I first got married, we talked about when we would have children. He wanted to start trying a year after we were married. I wanted to wait two years. We compromised and started trying after we had been married 1.5 years. We got pregnant rather quickly and did what every other normal couple would do, we told our families and celebrated. He gave me beautiful roses, we took pictures of the pregnancy test - the whole deal. And then a week later, I miscarried. It was horrible. It was devastating.

But, we moved on and we continued to try to have a baby. We joyfully found out a few months later that we were pregnant, but at my eight week appointment, our baby was only showing to be about six weeks. Well, since I wasn't on birth control (and had not been since very, very early in our marriage), we knew when my cycle was and that our dates were correct. Our doctor told us to come back in two weeks to see if the baby had grown and that maybe, perhaps, our dates were wrong. We went to Chicago for the Moody Bible Conference and prayed and prayed. We had no idea what God would do. We went back to the doctor's office two weeks later and our little baby had not grown and was not living. Horrible. Devastating.

My doctor offered to perform a D&C, but I canceled it at the last minute telling myself that if there was any small chance that the baby was perhaps still alive, I wanted to give it a chance. Well, sadly, about a week or so later, I began miscarrying and it was awful. Doug ended up having to take me to the emergency room. It was a very long, very painful night.

That was February 2005. We got our house ready to go on the market because Doug had been offered a position at a university in Texas and we were going to move in the next few months. It sold after one showing. But it took us FIVE trips to Texas to find our present home!

We arrived in Texas on June 9, 2005. About three or four days later, I went to Target to get a few things, one of which included a pregnancy test (unbeknownst to my husband). We had started trying again and it was around the time my cycle should have started.

I. Was. Pregnant.

I went outside and hid the test behind my back and my husband thought I was going to shove something in his face (shaving cream, maybe??), but when I pulled it out, he just sort of grinned and I think we hugged and probably exchanged words like, "here we go again".

After a very uneventful pregnancy, I gave birth to our daughter the following March.

That sweet daughter will be FIVE YEARS OLD in just a couple of weeks.

She is a gift. And 'gift' doesn't even begin to grasp all that she means to us. She is amazing. I'm sure that every parent says that about their child, but really, truly..... she is amazing. Don't get me wrong, she's a sinner - she disobeys and is stubborn and wants her way - just like the rest of us. But she really is....amazing.

She's so smart. I'm not even sure we know the depths of how smart she is. She loves, loves, loves people. She's a devoted friend. She's a phenomenal big sister. She has a beautiful voice. She can dance - no, she's not trained, but she feels the rhythm and beauty of music at four years old better than some people who have been dancing all their lives. And to us, she's so very beautiful.

Honestly, I go into her room each night after she's fallen asleep and I look at her and tears just form in my eyes. I can't believe she came out of my body. I sometimes can't believe that God entrusted her with us.

Fast forward to our daughter turning a year old. I had weaned her from nursing around 8 months because we really wanted to start trying for a second child given the experience we had had trying to have our first one. (We had been told that there was a possibility that nursing could possibly cause a miscarriage because of the contraction of the uterus that happens when nursing.) So, our daughter turns a year old, we're trying to get pregnant and I break my foot falling down the stairs in our home. Nightmare. We had to hire someone to watch our precious daughter for a whole month because I was told not to pick her up so that my foot could heal. Nightmare. Now, the lady who took care of her was an angel sent from heaven. Really. We couldn't have asked for anyone better. She was such a blessing. But Doug had to take our daughter each morning over to her house. So, in essence, I missed a month of her life. It seemed like an eternity.

My foot healed and we kept trying to have a second baby. Summer of 2007 rolled around and I discovered that I was pregnant again. Details are hard to remember, but our baby didn't make it and I ended up having to have a D&C. Horrible. Devastating. Third baby taken away. Gone.

March 2008. We heard a heartbeat. Days later. Nothing. Fourth baby gone.

Horrible. Devastating.

Tests. A pregnancy shortlived during the summer of '08. Fifth baby gone. Tests. Doctors. What do we do?

After all the tests, we were told that we had a 50/50 chance of getting pregnant and staying pregnant. There was absolutely no reason (from what the doctors could tell) as to why we were having so much trouble.

So, we kept trying.

And I got pregnant - AGAIN. That was my seventh pregnancy. And I had one living child.

And sadly, we saw a heartbeat only to see nothing on that sonogram screen days later. Sixth baby gone.

HORRIBLE. DEVASTATING. ANGRY.

That's right. Up until that point, I hadn't really been angry. Not like this. Frustrated? Yes. Discouraged? Yes. A little ticked off? Yes. But really angry? Not like this.

I was so mad at God. I couldn't understand why we had lost so many babies. And this side of eternity, I may never know.

That was January 09. It was my third D&C in about 18 months.

Thus began my descent into some very dark, dark days. Sitting in that prep area about to be taken back to have my child stripped from my body again was just too much. I don't think I will ever forget the deep emotion I felt that day as long as I live. The emotional pain was horrendous.

During the days after that last D&C, I began searching the internet and every possible source as to why I was losing my babies. I was looking for something, someone to fix it all. Sadly, I was having a hard time looking to Jesus during those months. I was angry. At Him. He's sovereign, right? So, He knew about this. So, He allowed it, right? So. Hard. To. Understand.

Dark, dark days. We went to San Diego and Hawaii that year. While both trips were wonderful in so many ways, I was so very sad and very depressed. The grief was unbearable at times.

Even though I had never held these children in my arms, I had carried them inside of me. And I had lost six, tiny babes. And I wanted every single one of them. And I missed them. Grief.

And to make matters worse, we had no idea what to do after we lost the baby in January 09. Do we keep trying? Do we just stop and be immensely grateful for our precious daughter? Do we adopt? Neither of us had a definitive answer.

So, after lots of searching, Doug came across the name of a doctor, a reproductive endocrinologist, in Frisco who he thought could potentially help us. Dr. James Madden.

To make this very long story short, I'll keep to the facts. He met with us during our initial visit for TWO HOURS. I had written him a letter telling him that he was likely our last hope. I gave him all my medical records. When we met with him, he had gone over my records with a fine tooth comb and knew my case backwards and forwards. He was so very kind and so very gracious and so very patient. He was everything we needed at that time in our lives.

As I look back on that time, I see that God was lovingly showing Himself to me through this doctor. He did care about me. He did love me (not that I ever questioned this so much). He was in the details.

Dr. Madden basically told me that he sincerely believed my miscarriages were truly just "bad eggs", if you will. He said I actually had an "over-friendly" uterus. The reason I carried each child so long was that my body was giving those babies every possible chance to live, but they couldn't because they weren't quite right. May not sound like much, but it did make sense - especially since I had carried our daughter, uneventfully, to full term.

So, he basically told me that we could just keep trying and that we would likely, eventually, have another child. Real hopeful, huh? NOT! I just didn't think I could go through any more grief. And we would be taking that chance if we did try again.

He did offer some more testing, so I did some blood tests and had some sonograms done and at the end of it all, he did offer a drug that supposedly could help make better quality eggs. But it wasn't a guarantee and it didn't increase our chances at all. So, we said no to drugs (;-)) and decided to thank this precious doctor for his time and go on our way.

But we still didn't know what we wanted to do. We had not decided if we were going to try again.

Well.....

We did.

Try again, that is. That very next month.

And we have a precious, beautiful, miracle baby boy who is already 8 months old.

And I don't even have to tell you how much he means to us. We feel crazy blessed.

So, on those hard days...the days I want to hop on that jet plane to that remote island? Yeah, those. Well, I try to take a deep breath and just say a deep-hearted "THANK YOU" to my God, who is "greater, stronger and higher than any other", Thank you for these precious, precious children and I press on.

NOTE: I had no idea this would be my post tonight. I guess it was just on my heart for some reason. If you are out there and are facing loss or a similar trial, please know this: God has not forgotten you.