A lot of this post was pulled from one I wrote 6 years ago on our previous blog, soon after we found out we were pregnant again after walking through a season of infertility and miscarriage. It’s so cool to see how much God can change a person from the inside out- I don’t even recognize the hyper-controlling side of the person who wrote this 6 years ago. Praise the Lord.
When Matt and I got married back in 2007, we had dated for 6 years- half of high school and all of college. We were 22 at the time (I tell you when I see 22 year olds now they look.like.BABIES.), and we knew we had plenty of time to start a family. We wanted to live in the same place, get away on the weekends and do nothing on weeknights. We wanted to travel when we could and just enjoy the stage of being married without any responsibilities. I’m talking…we didn’t even have a plant.
Fast forward 4.5 years, and we were both feeling like we were ready to enter the next chapter of our lives. We loved the time we spent with our nephews and friends’ kids, we had been in our little house in the city for a couple of years (a house that had a designated “nursery” room the moment we moved in), Matt felt established with his job, we had saved, we had traveled… we had talked through everything about what the next stage would look like (if you know us, you know that we had talked.through.everything.), and we were ready.
I had the timeline down to a science. I wanted a Fall baby because if we had a boy first, he would have the advantage of being the oldest in the class (and as a teacher, I knew boys matured slower than girls and could struggle in the early-elementary years if they were the youngest). I also knew that my insurance would cover through the early Fall if I decided to not go back to teaching- not to mention that I would only be 5ish months pregnant at the end of the school year and would easily be able to take down my classroom and not feel uncomfortable being on my feet during those last few weeks.
I look back now and think, “That girl was so young.” God had so much to teach me to prepare my heart for motherhood.
Fast forward 6 months later. I was still not pregnant and we were clear-on-the-other-side of my perfect timeline. Matt, mind you, was ever positive and was constantly balancing out my overthinking (a theme in our early years of marriage really 😉 ) by reminding me that it sometimes takes a while and that we would need to be patient and trust in the Lord’s timing for our family. In those moments I could feel God trying to unclench my fists and ask me to hand over control– and it made me feel frustrated, if not annoyed. (ahhh yes, so much growth that sweet young future mama needed to experience.)
Aunt and Uncle life and sleepovers with our nephews are some of my favorite memories from those early marriage days!
I soon decided that there was a balance between trusting in the Lord’s timing and being proactive (haha- translation, “How can I still try to take control of this situation?”)
So I went to see my doctor and asked for his thoughts. He told me to try as hard as I could to not think about getting pregnant and give it a couple more months- then he would be happy to see me again and take a look at things.
I, of course, thought this would be the ticket. I saw the doctor, I was going to be more relaxed, hand things over, trust in God’s timing… all that good stuff.
Two months later, I went back. I told him the “don’t think about it” plan wasn’t working.
At that point, he said he would take a look at my ovaries and make sure everything looked okay. After a few tests, I got a phone call with the results of my egg reserve count.
Egg reserve measures the “strength” of a woman’s eggs, which directly relates to her ability to conceive with those eggs. This number can run anywhere from 0 to 20, with the average being between 6-10 and a strong number being between 11-14. After running the tests, they called me a few days later with the results.
My count came back at 1.06.
Ugh. That was hard to hear. But probably not as hard as the nurse saying, “I have seen people get pregnant with these numbers.” Something about the way she said it sounded like she was really saying the opposite.
But I felt encouraged to finally have a “reason” and did feel hopeful that there were ways to work around a low egg reserve and help my body encourage pregnancy.
During this time, we loved celebrating with friends as they welcomed their first babies and so looked forward with hope to the day we would be able to do the same.
So they started me on a medicine called Letrizole- a milder version of Clomid, with lower hormones and a lower chance for multiples.
After two rounds, and who even knows how many negative pregnancy tests later, Matt and I got the best news of our lives.
It was 10:30 at night, after driving home from a long weekend in Orlando, when we saw what we had always hoped to see every time before…two lines. TWO LINES!
It was like that country song, “Laughed Until We Cried” –we tried so hard, we almost gave up hope… we danced and screamed and held each other tight.. we laughed until we cried. It really was one of the best nights of our lives.
That was May of 2013. We were ecstatic. We were hopeful. We were more than ready for what lay ahead.
God was not done teaching us and growing us, though. He had and will always have a plan that is better for us than our own, but not one that’s void of heartache.
Finding out we were pregnant was a kind of relief I had never experienced before. I felt so incredibly joyful and hopeful for what the next 9 months would bring. I was ready to be the best darn pregnant person out there. I exercised everyday, I increased my daily intake of protein, I started thinking about finally setting up that room we designated as a nursery when we moved in two years ago. It was go time- and “go” I could do.
We found out we were pregnant late Monday night, May 20th, 2013. I called the doctor Tuesday morning to share the good news, and they scheduled our first appointment for Monday, June 17th- fittingly falling the day after Father’s Day.
In addition to our exciting baby news, we had also received a call from our breeder that our golden retriever puppy would be ready to be picked up on Saturday, June 15th.
Life was feeling good.
During the next month, we told our closest family and friends about our exciting news. We had my family over for dinner and had our nephew, Noah, pretend like he was going to sing a song that we had taught him in front of the whole family. When everyone was in place and the cameras were rolling, he announced that Aunt Heather and Uncle Matt were going to have a baby. It makes me tear up remembering their total shock and excitement, and seeing Noah’s big smile as he looked at us like, “Did I do a good job?!”
For Matt’s family, we bought our nephew Jackson a personalized T-shirt that would be his size at the time of the baby’s arrival and brought it with us to the family beach vacation. The first night we were there, we told everyone we found the cutest gift for Jackson that we couldn’t wait for him to open, and everyone watched as he pulled it out of the bag. This was great because there was the slightest delay as everyone processed what the shirt said, “I love my cousin.” And then the explosion hit. Sweet sweet memories.
That entire week at the beach, Matt and I thought about what next year would look like with a 5 month old and a dog, and enjoyed our beach-reading days, knowing that those would not be happening again for quite some time.
Fast forward to Saturday, June 15th, when we added sweet Tally to our family.
That next day was Father’s Day, and I wanted to celebrate Matt for the future daddy he would be to our baby and for the day (literally) he had spent being a great doggy daddy to Tally. 😉
Monday was our big day. We were pumped! I was just shy of 8 weeks- already only a month away from my second trimester. We had to spend a long time in the waiting room, which gave us time to talk about what we were about to experience. We talked about what we would do if we heard two heartbeats and decided we would actually be really excited about twins. We also talked about how we would respond if, worst case, they couldn’t find a heartbeat. Looking back, I see this now as the Lord preparing our hearts.
When it was finally time to head back to the room, I was happy to know that my doctor would be performing the ultrasound as opposed to a tech. I was on the table and Matt was by my side in the chair as my doctor started the sonogram. I waited patiently for his response as he focused on the screen. I had had enough friends have babies to know what was supposed to happen at this point. And it wasn’t happening. But with one last ounce of hope, I asked in my strongest voice if he had the sound on.
At that point, my doctor took my hand and told us that we had unfortunately lost the baby.
I didn’t want to cry. I wanted to be strong and hold it together, for me and for Matt. And he was thinking the same thing. But neither one of us could really hold back the tears like we wanted to.
All of the previous joy and announcements and future planning suddenly felt silly. I remember thinking, “This will be okay, we can do this,” but feeling like everything else our doctor told us was a blur of words going in and out of my ears… the good news was that we were able to get pregnant… we could decide whether we wanted to let the process of losing the baby happen naturally or have a procedure to remove it… the pros and cons of both sides… what most of his patients decided…
I don’t really remember the drive home, but I do recall getting home to that little 7 week old puppy who needed us was about the best thing that happened to us that day. The timing of us picking him up just two days before could not have been more perfect.
My DNC was scheduled for that Wednesday. Waking up that morning I remembered thinking how much things could change in two days.
Matt took off work for the day and sat with me for as long as he could before they wheeled me back for the surgery. Everything after that, including the drive home, is blank for me- a side effect of the anesthesia they said. I slept that afternoon while Matt worked from home and took care of Tally, and then sweet friends of ours brought us dinner that night.
If I’m honest, those next couple of weeks were a blur of highs and lows. Highs from visits with friends and family and lows where I stayed in workout clothes and glasses with no makeup for most of the day- trying to focus on whatever positive I could find, thankful that I had this sweet puppy to take care of, and honestly doing a lot of burying feelings so I wouldn’t have to feel sad.
Going through the miscarriage changed me. No longer did I feel like I was “trying” to let go and “let God” like I felt throughout the whole trying-to-get-pregnant process. I finally felt like I was there… like I didn’t have any other choice. And it felt like peace. Brokenness, but peace.
Throughout the entire process of trying to get pregnant and then miscarrying, there were two huge moments where I felt the Lord breaking me and refining me. Both revolve around Sunday morning worship at our church. The first one came during the song The Lord Our God. There’s a line in the song that says, “Promise Maker, Promise Keeper, You finish what You begin. Our provision through the desert, You see it through to the end. In the silence, in the waiting, still we can know You are good. All Your plans are for Your glory, yes we can know You are good.”
I could feel God asking me if I really believed that HIS plan for my life was better than the future I was planning for myself. I was reminded, as I stood there listening to the song, of Abraham preparing to sacrifice Isaac, his only son, because he felt the Lord was calling him to that- and in that moment, I realized God was asking me to trust that His plan would always be better than my own, and to hand over my plan of having our own children completely.
Did I believe that if we were never able to have our own kids, that God would have a plan that was somehow sweeter for our lives? Because the truth was, he would. And it wasn’t until that moment that I believed it.
There’s a line in the song that repeats, “I won’t move without You… I won’t move without You… You’re the light of all and all that I need…”
I cried in brokenness as I sang those words and finally meant every one of them. I had to stop moving on my own. I had to hand over every single part of our future family- down to the idea that we may never have children of our own- and trust that God would show us what He had in store for our family, and that what He had is store would be amazingly better than what we could imagine.
The second song that really spoke to me in that season was a song called Give Me Faith by Elevation Worship.
There’s a line that says, “I may be weak, but Your spirit’s strong in me. My flesh may fail, but my God, You never will. So give me faith to trust what You say- that You’re good, and Your love is great. I’m broken inside, I give you my life.”
The truth in this song piggybacked on what I felt God teaching me in the song The Lord Our God. It reiterated what I already felt but added specific clarity- I felt like my flesh had failed but finally believed completely that God never would.
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When I think back on those days, and the real feelings of worry and anxiety and longing I felt, I see a person in the middle of being refined- someone being made better and stronger and more equipped for the path that God had in store.
I would love to see the reaction of my 5-years-younger self if I was told that just five short years later we’d be expecting our fourth baby. I can assure you my mind would be blown.
I know I’m not the only one who has experienced hurt like this. In fact, my story is a walk in the park compared to what some of you have lived through. I wanted to share our story because reading about other people’s experiences when I was in the middle of our own brought me hope.
If I can pray for you, I would love for you to email me {heather@makinghomehere.com}- and whether or not you share your story is completely up to you.
I also want to offer up a wonderful source of encouragement for other women- a magazine called Glittering Grace. This magazine is $5 a month and publishes articles twice/month that are entirely geared toward encouraging women and discussing topics on marriage, parenthood, and life struggles, as well as occasional recipes and home decor ideas. It is a magazine made for women and one you are sure to love. The best part is, your $5 subscription supports the precious Smith family. Mandy and Chad are both full-time missionaries along with their 7 children! You can read more about them here and sign up for a trial subscription here. This month, I wrote an article along with three on women specifically about our journeys through infertility. If you would like to read that, or share it with friends who may find encouragement through the post, you can find that here.
