The Shock and the After Shocks

The past few weeks have been a roller coaster for us and I am going to do my best to share what has been going on. We found out four weeks ago on a Wednesday that we were pregnant again. This was a major SHOCK since I was on birth control and still nursing at the time. When we went to the doctor a week later, they didn't see anything in the ultrasound but they thought that we were too early to see anything since we didn't know how far along I was. They didn't seem concerned and told us to come back in two weeks when we were further along. We left the office excited about the idea of having another little one but still processing the big news!

They then called back the following Monday and wanted me to come in for another blood test. My hormone levels were a little low and they wanted to check them again but they weren't worried because I wasn't that far along. They thought that they may need to prescribe progesterone to increase my levels. When they checked my levels they were extremely low again. What my doctor then proceeded to tell me was a huge SHOCK. He told me that this wasn't a normal pregnancy and that he was worried this may be a tubal pregnancy. He said that I would need to decide if I wanted a D&C (which wouldn't immediately tell us if it was a tubal) or if I wanted to take a shot that would force me into a miscarriage. Neither option was acceptable and I was devastated to say the least.

Since I had such a healthy pregnancy with MB, it never crossed my mind that we would be faced with this. I asked the doctor if I could have my levels tested again because we were hoping that the test results were wrong. And since I wasn't having any issues and I felt fine I didn't want to make any decisions before we were 100% certain what was going on. They took my blood again the next day and the numbers actually went up some so they decided to do another ultra sound on Friday. Dan was out of town for all of this so I was going through all of this alone, it was awful. So then I went in for the ultra sound and the best case scenario at this point was that there would be sack in the uterus as this would confirm that we didn't have a tubal pregnancy which is extremely dangerous.

The first thing we saw was a sack in the uterus and my doctor and I were relieved. Then, I saw this little flutter and I yelled out "is that a heartbeat?" We were shocked and amazed that there was a heart beat!!! My doctor couldn't believe it and I told him about all the prayers that have been going up for this baby. We were so excited and just in awe at the little fighter! That day, Dan was flying back in town and we were going to the mountains for the Warrior Dash. We were staying in a cabin with some of our closest friends and filled them in with what was going on since they needed to have a heads up that I may burst into tears at any moment. I started bleeding Friday morning and it got really bad over the weekend. I cried on Saturday and told Dan that I knew it was over, I was so sad but it was great to be around our buddies to help distract me with all that was going on.

I called my doctor first thing after the weekend and he brought me in and told me not to get my hopes up. He did another ultrasound and amazingly enough there was still a heart beat! I couldn't believe it! SHOCKing! This was way more than we expected at this point, we were thrilled!

My doctor wanted to see me again last Wednesday since I was leaving to go out of town for Memorial Day weekend. I went into that appointment extremely hopeful since the bleeding had slowed down and we had seen a heart beat two days before. Well, when he did the ultra sound, we couldn't see anything. There was no heart beat and the sack completely disappeared. We were SHOCKed again because I was not expecting this news. I was actually feeling confident that we would see a heart beat for the first time during this pregnancy. There were some shadows on the screen so he wanted to draw my blood again to have my hormone levels checked to confirm. We left that afternoon for St. Simons to go to the beach with Dan's family. They called me with my results on Friday and my levels had dropped to almost nothing. The doctor told me that she was convinced that I miscarried. I went to the doctor again this Tuesday to confirm. After nine trips to the doctor's office and having my blood drawn six times, they were able to officially confirm what we were dreading for the past two weeks. To add insult to injury I was sick most of the time we were at the beach and they said it was as a result of the miscarriage.

To say these past few weeks have been hard for us would be an understatement. It has been a roller coaster. We have been so high and so low and it's hard to believe that something came and went so fast. I am doing okay but am sad. We already loved that baby so much and my heart is broken. I keep telling myself that God is in control and that is really helping. There wasn't anything that we could have done to prevent this, and I may never understand it but I am doing my best to make peace with it.

I know many of you will think that it is uncharacteristic for me to post such personal info. Please understand that I am communicating this way in an effort to tell all of you what has been going on with us and to keep from having to repeat this story over and over. We would appreciate your prayers as we keep moving on and dealing with this the best way we know how. I am truly grateful to have such amazing friends and family who have been so supportive and have loved us so much. I feel blessed to know this kind of love and want to you to know how thankful we are. We have tons of other things to post about over the past few weeks so I look forward to sharing that with you as well.