Retro-Post: The week and a half from you-know-where - Part 1
So here is the first post that I wrote almost a year ago, but never published...I know I won't publish this post for awhile, but I wanted to write it while I was in the moment and everything was still fresh...
This past week-and-a-half has been the week-and-a-half from you-know-where. In early April we got a positive pregnancy test. We were excited, of course. It was our thoughts (God-willing) that there'd be about 2 years between Henry and his next sibling, and so after a bit of a tumultuous relationship with the new birth control they put me on after having Henry, we finally decided at the end of February to just go ahead and see what happened. I took the test on Sunday and Matt left that next Monday morning to go to Mississippi for the week for work. Because I had just stopped my birth control, I really didn't have a good idea of how far along I was, as things hadn't been particularly "regular." I'd also bought the pregnancy tests that can tell you as early as possible (seemed like a good idea at the time - in retrospect, I won't be doing that again.) Anyways, you don't feel much different in those early weeks anyways, so I felt fine and assumed that all was fine. The week after Matt got back from Mississippi, I made a doctor's appointment and on April 16 we went to the doctor, excited to see our new babe. It's amazing how much more you know the second time around. I was feeling good because I knew what to expect from the doctor's appointment, etc. I am always nervous during this time, probably a bit abnormally so, but generally, I believed that everything would be fine and we'd leave there with a picture of our teeny-tiny bean, just like we did at Henry's first appointment.
Not so much.
She did the ultrasound and pretty quickly we knew things weren't quite right. There was a sack, but nothing in it. Nothing. Empty. Wow. That pretty much took the wind right out of our sails. I have a wonderful doctor and she explained that there were two possibilities:
1) It is a pregnancy that will miscarry; however, this is strange to say, but if you're going to have a miscarriage, this is the "best" way because the baby never actually forms. The egg is fertilized and implants (hence the positive pregnancy test), but the embryo never develops - no heart beat or anything. As hard as it was to even think of the word miscarriage, I was thankful that if we had to go through that, it would be like this. I know that many couples suffer from much worse circumstances.
2) The other possibility was that I was still really early in my pregnancy. Since we didn't know the exact date of my last period (because of the birth control issues), I could be off on my timing and things just hadn't formed yet.
Of course, I wanted it to be the second possibilty, but I knew in my heart it was probably the first. It is a suprisingly common thing to happen, and sometimes it happens before a woman even knows she's pregnant (so I learned from my prompt Googling). My doctor suggested taking my blood to test my hormone levels. We'd take it that day and then a few days later. If my numbers were doubling, that was a good sign. If they weren't, it probably meant things weren't going to work out. I also had another appointment in a week-and-a-half to come back for another, more thorough ultrasound.
I managed to hold it together at the doctor's office, but once we got outside, the tears came. Again, if this had to happen, I was so thankful that it would be this way, but still, it is such a sense of loss that accompanys that news. I can't imagine how people get through it when it happens later. Matt was wonderful as always and clearly shaken by the news as well. There was absolutely nothing we could do now though, but wait. Hopefully, on Friday I would get the news of my hormone levels and that might give us an idea of where things were going, but we wouldn't know anything for sure until my next ultrasound in a week and half. Thus began the week from you-know-where.
Well, on Friday my doctor called and said that my hormone levels were going up, but they didn't double like they should. Basically she told me that this meant it probably wasn't a viable pregnancy. She urged me to come in first thing Monday if I had any bleeding over the weekend. Otherwise, I'd keep my Thursday appointment and have an ultrasound to confirm things. Despite the bad news, I almost felt better just "knowing" something. We still had to wait, but at that point, I was pretty convinced things weren't going to work out and I was ready for my body to just be rid of it so that things could get back to normal.
Nothing happened over the weekend, and we went into the next week pretty sure that things were over, but still with that bit of hope in our minds that it was just really early and things would turn around. It was a bad place to be...not knowing for sure. I had a couple of breakdowns, but I really was so thankful that if it had to happen, it happened this way. I know people deal with much worse. By mid-week, I had convinced myself that it was over and was just praying for my body to deal with it so that I didn't have to have surgery or take medicine to speed things along. I just wanted a fresh start. If it was over, it was what it was and there was nothing I could do about it...I just wanted it done.
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