Random thoughts as Aidiliy's first "birthday" approaches...

So it's almost been a year. It's almost Aidiliy's first "birthday".  Some days it seems like yesterday and some days I definitely feel the weight of that whole year and still wonder how I even survived. I can't believe I have lived almost a whole year without one of my babies when I thought even going on for one second without her was impossible that first day.  I can't believe it's almost been an entire year since the most horrific 2 days of my life.

A whole year since we had to tell the kids their sister was gone. A whole year since I labored all night, knowing she was going to come out silent. A whole year since I held my third beautiful daughter and looked at her perfect face...

...and then had to give her back.

It's hard...approaching that milestone and all of those memories. And it's hard...because I feel a little guilty and a little like I don't have the right to be having a hard time and grieving for her again. As I sit typing this I have her sister, her beautiful, perfect, healthy, bringing so much joy back into our family, sister, sleeping on my lap. The biggest gift. A gift that a LOT of bereaved parents don't ever get. MANY many parents don't ever get their "Rainbow". And I kind of feel like I should just be being thankful for that and focusing on that instead of still having little breakdowns over Lily this week as the 20th/21st approaches. I have...like...grief guilt or something lol.  I don't know why I feel like that, it's ridiculous....obviously one child never replaces another. I want them both...

But then, see...that would never be a reality. There isn't a circumstance where we would have both Aidiliy and Dorothy. As much as I wish now that I could have all 5 of my kids in my arms somehow...we never would have had 5 kids haha.  If Lily had lived she would have been the last baby, period. Dorothy is sitting here, smiling at me in her sleep. She is supposed to be here, I'm sure of that. She is absolutely amazing and I know she is going to do great things in her life...she's only 2 and a half weeks old and it feels like she's always been here in a lot of ways. She is the missing piece that I don't even think we knew we were missing a few years ago. We needed her. HER.  It's just that sometimes it's really weird to try to wrap your mind around the fact that one of your children wouldn't be here if one of your other children hadn't died...again...I wish I could somehow have them both. I've been trying to focus on the fact that someday though, I **will** have them both.

I've had a few people asking if I have anything planned for the 21st...we will be dropping off several care packages in her name to Kaiser L&D for other parents experiencing a late miscarriage/stillbirth. I'm hoping to do this every year. Other than that, planning to just focus on/enjoy and be thankful for our kids that are here with us and I would love for family and friends to do the same...give your kids an extra hug that day, go do something fun with them, just sit and be thankful for them...they are **all** miracles. 😊❤❤👼

Thank you will never be enough, but thank you, thank you, thank you for all of your love and support and listening and prayers this year. ❤❤

Almost 19 weeks down...approximately 36372826 more weeks to go...

As I've said before...I try very hard to in general, stay positive and thankful and try to look on the bright side of things...which has obviously been pretty hard over the last 7 months. Of course we are very blessed and even more thankful for the kids we have here now. I am blessed to have a great husband to lean on through this. And of course I cannot believe that we are blessed and lucky enough to have another chance for a living baby. A bit of hope in the dark.  I thank God for this every day, all day. So so many bereaved mothers do not get that chance.


But...this sucks you guys. Pregnancy after loss just. plain. sucks.



I knew it would be hard and full of anxiety, I was advised of this by Drs, others who have walked this path, I've read other blogs by moms pregnant after a late loss, etc, and my experience is definitely not unique or abnormal, but seriously, it is REALLY. HARD. I'm almost 19 weeks and it already feels like this pregnancy has lasted approximately 5000 years.

Back to the topic of being thankful for a minute-  I am SO thankful that I was somehow lucky enough to have 3 normal pregnancies that ended in live crying babies before we had a tragedy.  I think about this a lot. I'm a person who, until June 2016, has always had fun, for the most part, being pregnant. We had some complications with Ella but I mean, she was ALIVE. Pregnancy is exhausting and hard and we had our anxious moments, but I did enjoy and have fun with them. And I will always have that. Other mothers, who have lost their first baby, will never have a fun pregnancy.  A pregnancy where you relax for a second or dare to imagine bringing home a live baby. I think that is so sad and unfair. Everyone I've talked to who has had a late loss has lived in constant fear for subsequent pregnancies and I am no different. But at least I did get to experience that *3* times.

When you are pregnant after losing a baby, you walk around just waiting for the bottom to drop out again. I was hoping maybe once we got passed 17 weeks 3 days, the day I delivered Aidiliy, I would relax just a little but nope...now at almost 19 weeks I just feel like we are on borrowed time lol. Ugh. I'm realizing there will no relaxing until she is in our arms, crying.

One thing that is no longer fun after a loss...at all...is Dr's appointments and ultrasounds. And there are a lot of them. I'm so thankful to be receiving amazing care but I will be spending quite a lot of time at Kaiser. Sure it's always fun and reassuring to see your baby, but this time, not only is there anxiety about appointments and scans, but it's not fun to be there. I hate driving past the L&D building, I hate sitting in the waiting room, I even hate the smell of the place lol.

Another thing is, at some point we are going to have to buy clothes and items we need for her (which is usually one of the most fun parts about being pregnant!) but I'm terrified to. I had placed an order for a bunch of adorable clothes for Aidiliy 2 days before we found out she had died. 3 days after I got home from the hospital they all arrived in the mail. They are still in the back of our downstairs closet... It was horrible and I'm so scared of something like that happening again. I have bought a few small things this time and it makes me so nervous...and this is small stuff, I can't imagine purchasing the larger items like stroller/car seat/etc.  Maybe we should just wait and do a huge Target trip on the way home from the hospital with her lol. The prepping/daydreaming about and for the future that was always so fun when I was pregnant before is just stressful and scary now.  There is just that constant "What if?" in the back of your mind.

I'm still not really feeling movement yet because of an anterior placenta but I know when that starts it will also be a double edge sword...amazing and reassuring but also panic inducing on her quiet days.


So you stress and worry...and then you stress and worry about being stressed and worrying....lol.


All of that said...I do think I am handling it pretty well, considering.  Everyone close to me knows I struggle with anxiety anyway, so something like this is quite a test lol 😬. And I am doing a much better job than I would have thought I could do, of trying to stay positive and just focus on the end goal. Yes I absolutely have those days where it feels suffocating, and I'm distracted, and impatient, and everything is an effort, and I'm probably not being a very good wife and/or mother on those days, which I hate, but I think overall, I'm surprising myself and keeping it check pretty well!! I 100 percent credit my handling this this well with my amazing support circle. My husband, my best friend, my family, all of our other amazing friends... I know I say this in almost every post but I mean it. I really, really mean it.


....but it still sucks. 😜😜





**side note- I've been being added by different people to various online child loss groups. I know your hearts are in the right place and I *soooo* thank everyone for the support and for thinking of us. 💜💜 Really, I appreciate it!! But I am needing to take a little step back from these groups. At least for now, they raise my anxiety about something happening to one of our other kids. My heart absolutely breaks for anyone that has lost a child at any age, but I need to try to kind of put blinders on a little bit, for now. (Bless our pediatrician for always being patient with me, but I think he's getting sick of seeing us haha 😜😜). **

I am 16...going on 17...

Just some ramblings...

I knew going in that this part of the pregnancy would be stressful and anxiety provoking and....it has not disappointed.  

I am just over 16 weeks pregnant with #5. Aidiliy died at 17 weeks. 

With almost no warning. 

So let's just be honest, I'm pretty much walking around this week waiting for this kid to drop dead. I know it's irrational, I know it's a different pregnancy, I know precautions are being taken, I know 17 weeks isn't some magic safe number either and doesn't really mean anything, I know, I know, I know. But I'm still thinking it. 

I keep thinking things like "you better hurry up and name her because that sucked trying to rush and pick something on the spot while delivering Aidiliy".

It's all totally normal, I know that, but that doesn't make it any more fun.

Placenta is anterior this time, so I can't feel her much yet either, which is really great and un-reassuring. I have a friend's doppler, which is keeping me sane, but that split few seconds before I find her heartbeat every time make me want to puke.  

My perinatologist is fantastic (literally, the only person at Kaiser I trust) and has put me on every 2 week appointments/growth checks and will start NSTs as soon as baby is remotely big enough. He told me I can come in ANY time I want, unscheduled, just to see her on ultrasound for reassurance and to not feel silly about it or like we are bothering anybody.  He's known us for 10 years now and he gets it, and I/we appreciate that. 

There is something just...kind of weird...about knowing exactly what your baby probably looks like inside of you. I, like I'm sure most moms, have seen a lot of ultrasounds and read a lot of books and seen online illustrations of babies in the womb at different stages. But this time, I now know exactly how big she is and exactly what her face probably looks like. I know what a 17 week old baby looks like because I've held one. It kind of...ups the stakes? Or something? I don't know.

I do have some good news: I called genetics yesterday and this time we PASSED our 2nd trimester screening. This is fantastic news! This is the part of the screening that Lily failed horribly and they thought she had Down Syndrome. (But it was the placenta failing). Hopefully, this is a sign that the placenta is still looking good at this point 🙏🙏🙏🙏🙏

2nd Trimester- The safe zone...except when it isn't...

On Monday of this last week I turned 13 weeks pregnant with #5.  13 weeks. 2nd trimester. That magical time when pregnant people everywhere breathe a sigh of relief and feel like they are pretty much guaranteed to bring home a baby 6 months later.

Except when you just lost your daughter at 17.5 weeks out of nowhere.  

There was definitely no sigh of relief here...not this time. 

Crossing into the 2nd trimester is weird this time. I'm definitely not relieved. I actually have a little more anxiety than I did very early in this pregnancy.  Part of that is because we are getting closer by the day to the point in the pregnancy that Aidiliy died and that is hard. And weird. Part of that is that because with each passing day of a pregnancy and each ultrasound you get more and more attached and in love with that baby, no matter how hard you try not to. Part of that is because I know we are going to have to tell the kids pretty soon.  And part of that is because when I first got pregnant with this baby I was pretty fully convinced it would be an early miscarriage. I kind of just put it in my head that we wouldn't make it out of the 1st trimester. A defense mechanism I'm sure, but that's what I was thinking....and I was thinking somewhere in the back of my mind that "at least it will just be a "regular" miscarriage this time". NOT that any loss is not totally and completely devastating (and I actually hesitated sharing these thoughts because I think it sounds like I am minimizing 1st trimester miscarriages and I am so, so not. A baby is a baby. Period.) but I was telling myself that at least it wouldn't be an actual labor and delivery and holding and saying goodbye to your baby experience...and now here we are....right back in the 2nd trimester again...if we lose #5 pretty much from this point on it is going to be a repeat of the horrors of last June. 

I think there may be some confusion from well meaning friends on what happened with Aidiliy.  I seem to get a lot of comments like "It will be fine this time" "Just relax" "It was probably just a horrible fluke" "I know tons of people who had miscarriages and then their next baby was fine" "Everything looks great so far so just enjoy the pregnancy". In our situation it was not a fluke.  As horrible as it was to order the autopsy that day, I am thankful we did...because what it showed was that her placenta had clotted...and that is what killed her.  Sometime in between my totally perfect pregnancy with Max and my pregnancy with Aidily, I, for whatever reason, developed some type of pregnancy clotting disorder. (Which is actually not that abnormal as you get older.) Without treatment, there is a VERY high likelyhood of it happening again. And even with treatment (the lovenox injections I take daily) there is still a chance of it happening again because the dosages are not always perfect. And it doesn't always work. Not to mention there are a ton of other totally unrelated things that could happen. (Pregnancy/infant loss support groups are great but you also start to realize all the different ways babies can and do die before birth...) Aidiliy died at 17 weeks, but a clotting disorder can kill a baby at 4 weeks, 10 weeks, 20 weeks, 40 weeks...there will be no relaxing here until they hand me a screaming baby...

All of that said, all we can do is pray, hope for the best and wait for June to get here. And try to stay positive!  This baby *DOES* look great so far, and they are keeping a very close eye on us. All early testing and growth checks have come back perfect; hopefully that trend continues and we bring home #5 safe and sound at the end of all of this 👍🙏🙏💪❤💛💚💙💜

EDD: 11/26/16

Tomorrow is Aidiliy's due date.  I've been dreading it (this whole month/season, really) since the day we lost her and now it's here. And....it pretty much is as hard as I thought it would be.  I was even warned by my OB at my last appointment that facing the due date would not be easy.  At least I know it's normal.  I've very much just been going through the motions this week, I feel a little bit like I'm partly on autopilot again like I was right after.

I think the thing with the due date after the death of a baby is that it's the deadline to what should have and would have been.  As of tomorrow, that's it. She should be here. (Yes it likely would have been earlier in my case but I'm never allowed to go late...so tomorrow would have been the absolute deadline.) I should be holding a newborn on my chest.  I should be plastering a million pictures all over Facebook and annoying people. Aaron should be on FMLA leave. There should be baby paraphernalia all over our house. I should be delirious from exhaustion and desperate for a shower.  I should be up all night with a cluster feeding, screaming baby. And I actually think my body somehow knows this.  I'm back to waking up a million times a night....but there is no baby to tend to.  That actual physical ache for her is back that was there in the first few weeks after she died.

Going out has been hard again the last few days, after having gotten easier. It feels raw again. Little things set me off. I heard "How to save a life" by The Fray on the radio today and lost it.  I know it is not about this situation at all but..."I would have stayed up with you all night, had I known how to save a life...".... couldn't take it. I would give anything to be up all night with her.  Then I was behind a lady with a newborn checking out at Target. (Because of course I was at Target with 3 kids on Black Friday 😬😜😜) She was all disheveled and moaning and complaining to her friend about how her baby never sleeps and wants to be held constantly and why can't it just be quiet for 5 minutes.  I. Wanted. To. Kick. Her.

I know it sounds like I'm wallowing and I know these blog posts are depressing.  I really am doing ok. Good, even. This particular time and season are hard this year but I never lose sight of what I DO have. Ever.  And I even feel.....guilty....in some ways about my grief at this point, given that I am lucky enough to be pregnant again.  It does not escape me that many many people lose babies and do not go on to get their rainbow, or to even try for one...

Speaking of little #5, things are so far so good, as far as we know. We will see how things look the next few weeks when we start getting genetic screenings back and I have my first growth scan. Praying so hard the Lovenox injections are doing their job.  I am trying very hard to think positively but of course it's terrifying. We still have not told the kids (and I am obviously showing, but they haven't said anything, which is hilarious). The thought of actually bringing this baby home alive next year is simultaneously something keeping me going and giving me hope and then also a thought so out there and remote and behind so many hurdles I have a really hard time imagining it *actually* happening.  I just don't want to be wheeled out of that hospital again with nothing but a memory box. I. Just. Can't.  Continuing to wish I could just fast forward the weeks but so far no luck ;)

And I think that's going to conclude this downer post.  I'm hoping that maybe the next post will be a happy update post on #5 when we find out some initial screening results and pretty soon, gender :) Praying...❤🙏🙏

Random thoughts....6.5 weeks pregnant...

It's been kind of a weird few weeks.  It's finally Fall, which is my favorite season but it's weird this year. Coming up on Aidiliy's due date next month. She was due November 26th but they would have delivered before then...so she would have been here in the next few weeks.  I would be huge and miserable at this point and making sure everything was ready...instead I'm still figuring out what to do with her ashes and all her things.  I was so excited for another Fall baby. She would have been here for Thanksgiving, brand new, and then this would have been her first Christmas. I try really really hard not to dwell on it all and to focus on what I DO have (which is a LOT!) but it's hard not to think about all the would haves and should haves, especially the closer her due date gets....I think it will be difficult to see newborns for the next few months.

And of course all of THAT is juxtaposed with my tremendous joy and thankfulness (and fear) of being just over 6 weeks pregnant with a new life.  I finally had my first ultrasound and they thankfully found a baby with a good heartbeat, so I was relieved for about 17 seconds and now I'm freaking out about my next scan at 8 weeks lol. I'm guessing that's going to be the trend here for this pregnancy.  I'm trying desperately and quite unsuccessfully not to get too attached to this baby in case the unthinkable happens again but of course that's pretty impossible.  I know that everything that can be done to help this baby grow and be healthy until delivery, is being done, and it's in God's hands if we get to bring he or she home next year. I know that worrying is not going to help at all or change anything but I'm only human.  I'm trying!!  I've never been so thankful for our crazy busy schedule...less time for thinking haha 😝😤

One thing that stinks is that a lot of pregnancy, especially early pregnancy, is just trusting your body to do what it is supposed to do. Well, I don't trust my body at ALL. My body failed and betrayed me in one of the worst ways possible this year...so how does THAT work?!

.....Is it next year yet?

All things are possible...baby #5.

We are hopeful, terrified, cautious, and also very happy and thankful to announce that we found out last week we are pregnant again.  ❤

Barely pregnant...so soon I have not had an ultrasound yet and at the stage where anything can and often does happen. But lets be real...we know all too well that a baby can be lost at any point. There really isn't any safe zone. And my thoughts are, whether we get to bring this baby home with us next year or lose it at 4 weeks, 6 weeks, 17 weeks, or any other time between now and then, I want him or her celebrated, and above all, prayed for.  If the unthinkable happens to us again, I will want and need the support again, regardless of how far along. 

We will NOT, however, be telling the kids until much, much, MUCH later.  They do not need to re live that experience if I can at all help it. 

So here we are. A little bit pregnant. They have done 3 sets of beta hcg levels (the pregnancy hormone) and they are so far on track and rising appropriately.  I'm probably 4-5 weeks along.  I'm on baby aspirin and will be starting an injectable blood thinner tomorrow to try to protect this baby from any clots in the placenta (which is what they believe led to Aidiliy's death).  

Ultrasound in 2 weeks to check for a heartbeat...

Praying and hoping to be holding a screaming baby in about 8 months, and for now, just happy to be pregnant! 🙏🙏🙏💜💜