M’s Story: Coping with Miscarriage

In September of 2009, I suffered a miscarriage.  My husband and I had only “tried” for one month, and we were shocked to find out that it had happened! That joy, though, was short-lived.

Just 4 days later, I lost our baby. I was about 5 weeks pregnant. Only now can I look back at what happened and actually be somewhat grateful. I know that may sound terrible, but I understand now that something was wrong with my baby and that is why he/she died. Even writing that word now brings tears to my eyes. And that doesn’t mean I don’t still desire that baby…but I can see that without that awful time in our lives, we would not have our little boy now. He is 16 months old and the most precious thing in our lives.

Miscarriage is one of the most terrible experiences ever. I didn’t think I knew anyone who had been through it – until I started talking about it. Talking about it was the best thing I could have done. It helped me to understand how many other people had been through the same terror. Since then, I, sadly, have known several others who have gone through a miscarriage too – and I think I really helped them. At least I hope I did. It’s so hard for someone to “understand”…unless you’ve been there. When I was first recovering, I remember people (unknowingly) diminishing my feelings by saying things like “Oh, you were only 5 weeks” or “It was meant to happen this way”…and there was nothing I wanted to hear less. Those things may have all been true – but I was too broken and too hurt to hear them.

For all the women still hoping for a baby…know that if you truly decide you want a child, it will happen for you in some way. Whether you get pregnant or adopt, you will have your family and your happiness back.

T’s Story: Hope in Spite of Loss

Our journey towards parenthood began in July, 2007. We had been a couple for 7 years and married for one. We spent much of that time discussing at length the merits of starting a family and those of living childfree and struggled with the decision to go one way or the other. We decided that we wanted a family and that we would begin trying to conceive. At the time, I was 32 and was aware that I was on the back end of that “ideal” time to conceive. Still, my doctor explained that I was healthy and that there was no reason that I shouldn’t expect to be pregnant in a year or less. Good thing because we knew from the beginning that any sort of chemical treatment to assist us was not the path we wanted to pursue. This had to happen “naturally” or it wasn’t going to be for us.

My husband and I were determined not to get too intense about the process. We tried each month, but not with significant effort to follow my temps or test for peak fertility with ovulation sticks. Afterall, we were supposed to assume that this would be easy, with no obvious challenges in our way. In 2008, we moved to Colorado and convinced ourselves that the move and new surroundings had distracted us from our goal, explaining away why we weren’t yet pregnant. Nevertheless, a year had gone by and we were not pregnant. My mind immediately went to adoption. It was supposed to happen in a year, and it hadn’t, so if we wanted a family we should adopt.

We looked into every possible avenue for adoption. We considered all forms of adoption. We went to informational sessions and interviews and paid lawyers to understand the laws around adoption in Colorado. In the end, this didn’t prove to be the right fit for us, so we decided that we would double down and try in earnest to conceive. Ah, if only trying were all it took.

In early 2009, we decided to begin acupuncture treatments and charting my temps. The first clinic I went to did not specialize in fertility and I felt that in the way the treatments were administered. We wore ourselves out focusing so much on getting pregnant that we stopped acupuncture, herbs and charting after just a few months. We spent the rest of the year trying to convince ourselves that this would happen if it was meant to and when it was meant to.

In October 2010, I had a breakdown about my lack of ability to visualize our future with or without children. The “playing it by ear” approach was not working for me and my not feeling like I was doing anything purposeful to realize our dreams, aside from the obvious, left me frustrated and helpless. We agreed to try in earnest for a year and then decide if we would accept that we were a childfree couple if nothing happened by the time my 37th birthday rolled around.

I sought out Jane’s expertise and began treatments. By my December 2010 cycle (two and a half months later), I was finally pregnant! After 3.5 years of trying, we had made it! I learned of my pregnancy while traveling in Ethiopia without my husband and spent those two weeks reveling in the announcement I got to bring home to him. We were blissful. Nothing could’ve dampened our spirits. We had unending thoughts of relief and acceptance that there really was nothing wrong with us and that we were meant to have a family as well as all of our friends and family.

Tragically, that dream ended in mid-February, when we miscarried at 10 weeks. I don’t know how we’ll heal through this yet. It is devastating and life-altering, as much as being pregnant in the first place was life-altering. Initially, neither of us could imagine going through this seemingly insurmountable loss again. We recoiled from our lives and just stuck together to get through the grief. Now, we still have moments of overwhelming loss and anger, but we are trying to conceive again. We’ve both agreed that we only have one more bout of this in us. If we are lucky enough to get pregnant again, but not carry the baby to term, we will likely end our journey. The pain is too great.

For now though, we have tremendous hope.