Many times moms assume that because I have this many children I must have easy pregnancies.
Let me assure you that is not so. Some pregnancies have been easier than others, but I have certainly had my challenges.
And miscarriages.
Like I did a few months ago.
I was excited to get a positive pregnancy test and kept my little secret until I had a special date with David. Since our children are a little older and can now babysit, we have been trying to make it a habit to get out for a date a couple of times per month. We went to our favorite steakhouse where I had leftover gift cards and sat down in our usual booth. As David prayed over our yummy supper, I ended the prayer with, “and thank you for our new baby.”
David was overjoyed. He made a doctors appointment for me later that week, and we decided to wait to tell the children until we had a due date. When we got to the doctor’s office, David and the doctor began their usual banter about triathlons and racing because we have now been good friends for over 20 years. Since I really couldn’t remember the first day of my last period, he sent me for a sonogram.
Once I was up on the table the technician was silent. She never really turned on the video monitor so that we could see what was going on. When she was finished, she asked us to sit outside the doctor’s office and wait for him to speak with us.
Doc explained that they really couldn’t see anything in the sonogram, although the urine and blood test revealed that I was pregnant. “You probably just caught it really early,” he said. “Come back in two days and let’s check your blood levels again.”
But in two days the levels had not increased significantly and within a week it had become obvious that this pregnancy was not going to have a happy ending. Another few days passed and the bleeding began. As best we can decipher, I was probably about eight weeks along.
I had busied myself with the large enough task at hand of running my household and loving on the gaggle of kiddos I had right under my nose. I continued thinking that God could do a miracle or God could decide that this baby I would only hold in heaven…either way I was going to soldier on and keep this to myself. I was all well and fine until about the third day of bleeding when the pain was pretty severe and I went in for a check up. The sonogram and the exam were excruciating and humiliating beyond all belief. My doctor friend had apparently not realized that passing “products of conception” was NOT NORMAL TO ME and showing me the results of said “tissue” after an exam was almost more than I could stomach.
You see, that wasn’t just “tissue” to me. It was a baby. A child. A future and a hope. I already had a name and a Pinterest board full of cute ideas on how to welcome this new little life and bundle of joy. And I wanted to share this with you so you would know….
It hasn’t always been easy. It hasn’t always been pretty and fun and just-so-picture-perfect. I have difficulty and struggles. I want you to know that so when you get the wind knocked out of your sails, you don’t look over here at me and think I can not relate, or that I have never been where you are.
I am sorry to every one of you who has experienced this same loss. I know our hurts are not wasted and I believe He has a reason and a plan. I trust Him and I know He is good even when things in my life aren’t. And for the record, I am extremely grateful for every precious life He has blessed us with but it does not mean I can not be sad or sorry for this wee one I won’t meet this side of eternity. And I pray you know from the depths of my heart that I understand your loss if you have faced a miscarriage, and I pray even more that you know how amazingly He loves you and please allow Him to heal your broken heart. xoxoxo
Jenny says
I’m so sorry, Lyette, for your loss. I just experienced my first miscarriage a month ago. I was almost 12 weeks. Hugs to you, friend.
Lyette Reback says
So sorry Jenny! Big hug back! xoxo
Sonya says
Lyette, I can’t wait to give you a big hug!!!! As always, you use your journey for the greater good and His glory. Love you my dear sweet friend!
Lyette Reback says
Love you too Sonya! Having you ladies every week in my home was one of the major things that got me through it! xoxoxo
Marilou says
This article will bless many. Thanks for your words and taking the time to share your heart.
Kati Pippin says
I am so sorry for your broken heart! Your beautiful precious child is well loved and in the presence of God. Thank you for sharing your story.
Amanda says
Love you my beautiful friend! ALWAYS praying with you and BELIEVING!! Thank you for sharing your private moments to help and encourage so many. Xoxo
Jaime Harvey says
Thank you for sharing, brought tears to my eyes as I reflected on my own experience with this. many other mothers experience this, yet often keep it to themselves as it seems so hard to talk about. my heart goes out to you and will be praying for you.
Jody says
I am so sorry for your loss, Lyette. I know that pain all too well. I’ve had four. Two were early on, probably five weeks. One died at 8 weeks, but my body would not release it and my OB sister-in-law did a D&C over a Thanksgiving so I would not hemorrhage while traveling. The most horrific one was in between Jonathan and Melody. I was 16 weeks along, going in for my second ultrasound. I had a VHS tape in hand, ready to record the moment and had already heard the heartbeat. The heartless tech said, “This one’s gone. It’s already breaking up.” My midwife was called on the phone and she talked me through it. Thom was home with the littles waiting for Mommy to come home with the video. When I walked through the door, I so wanted to spare my other children, but when Thom looked at me I just cried and told them the doctor had said the baby had died. Josiah, my faith-filled son, immediately sprung up and at 7 years old prayed a precious and powerful prayer that God would raise our baby from the dead, just as he did with Lazarus. He believed. We believed with him and refused a D&C. A week later I was showering and started having contractions and delivered right there, into my own hands. Since the body was absorbed into the tissue, I didn’t see anything. I’ve always wanted to name our babies, but I’ve struggled because I didn’t know if they were boys or girls. I’ve asked God to name them and I’ll find out someday who those children are. So, I have ten children. I have trusted God with my womb and He has given me 10…. six here, four there. While the pain of loss is great, the season of intimate comfort I received from God is something I wouldn’t trade. Every child is a gift and those children have allowed me to gain mercy and compassion and understanding for others, intimacy with my God and a greater anticipation for our life in Heaven. Trusting Him doesn’t mean that things will be easy, but that the hard will be filled with great love and peace. Thank you for sharing a precious and private corner of your heart. Thankful for this blessing that was with you physically a short time but left you forever changed. {{{hugs}}}
Michelle says
Lyette, like always, you touched a part of me….today, it was where my womb used to be. I may not have lost a child in the same way, but it was a painful and real loss to me nonetheless. I wrote this 13 years ago, but I felt the need to share…there are many ways to lose a child and there is one way to find your joy again…through the Lord.
Losing Hannah in a Sea of Cotton Balls
Hannah was the most beautiful baby that ever was or ever shall be for me. She had red ringlets of baby soft hair, sparkling blue eyes and alabaster skin with the slightest hint of freckles across her nose. Hannah was a very bright child whose intelligence was but a promise of the future ahead for her. She was kind, loving and her laughter was like bottled sunshine on a cloudy day. Hannah was perfect. But she was never real.
Hannah was the name that I had chosen for the child I would someday have with my husband. We talked about her daily, saw other children and took the best parts of them to make up our Hannah. We dreamed of what she would look like and of all the things we would do with our sweet girl. I loved Hannah, or at least the thought of her, almost as much as I loved real people. Hannah would be the child I “raised right” now that I was older, wiser and better able to afford a child. She would keep me young, as she grew and be a joy to her older half-brothers. She would join my husband and I like an unshakable bond. But Hannah only lived in the recesses of our minds and I lost her for good one morning in a sea of cotton balls.
My husband’s doctor only gave him a 50/50 chance of ever being able to father a child, and that only if he underwent a costly surgery that insurance would not cover and that we could not afford. I was the last woman in my family who had not had a hysterectomy and my deteriorating health demanded that I go through with the surgery. I was angry when the nurse paraded me by the nursery on the way to my hospital room. I was mad at the pregnant girls I saw in the waiting room with loving hands on their protruding stomachs. I was hurt that God never saw fit to give me the baby girl I had always dreamed of having. Yet, God sent me a hug in the form of one very petite nurse who came to prep me for my early morning surgery.
I cannot remember her name, but a smiling face burst into my room of gloom and she acted as if this was not one of the darkest days of my life. She chatted about this and that and saw to my comfort as if I was her sole patient. Then, she asked me if I had children and I told her about my wonderful son. “You are so blessed,” she said. “I see so many girls in here every day, much younger than you are, who will never know what it feels like to hold their baby in their arms. You are lucky to have had the chance to raise a child of your own. I had to have a hysterectomy, too, but God used me to raise three adopted children and I would not change my experience for the world.”
Blessed? Me? I guess I had been blessed to have such a wonderful son in Halston and having him had brightened each day of my life. I could still look forward to blessing my grandchildren, my stepsons, Halston’s friends, and the host of other young people that come in and out of my life. God wasn’t punishing me by not letting me have a child; He just had another path in mind for me to take at this time. By the time I saw the inside of the operating room, I no longer felt sorry for myself and mad at God for taking Hannah from me. I was thankful for Halston and all the many years behind and in front of me that we would share. I know that the Lord held my hand as I drifted off into the anesthesia and He listened quietly as I told Him all about the girl that I had dreamed of for so many years. Then, as if looking through a sea of cotton balls, I gave Hannah to God and I let her go once and for all. Slowly blinking again, I saw an austere recovery room filled with doctors, nurses and a newly healed woman who was not going to hold onto what could never be, but who was thrusting her loving spirit around what should be in her world.
Being in God’s perfect will is not about getting everything you want, it is about taking everything you are given and using it to glorify the Giver. Living in God’s perfect will is not always fun, easy or where you might want to be, but it is where you will grow, mature and receive mighty blessings if you are willing to accept His direction for your life. God’s map for your life is not set in stone, with a strict list of directions to heaven. It is a perpetual, living pathway that leads where you need to go, when you need to be there. If you choose to take another path, you will be on someone else’s road that will lead you right back to where you left your own path…time and time again until you get back on the right path. If you decide not to go any further and stop on your path, then you will not receive all the blessings that God has in store for you on the way to your final destination. No, it is much easier to just keep putting one foot in front of the other on your own path and following where the Lord might lead you. He will show you flowers and scenery beyond comparison. He will hold your hand through the dense forests, rushing rivers and high mountain passes. He will take you where you need to be to become the best “You” you can be. What other map can promise you such great treasure?
Letting go of a dream that I had fostered and fed since childhood was not something that I wanted to do, because it meant letting go of the pain and loss that accompanied that memory as well. I had to release the fantasy and grasp reality to realize that my future lay in another direction and that I would miss what God had for me if I continued to live in a past that never really was in the first place. Giving Hannah to God allowed me to turn a corner in my life and start off in another direction full of promise. I know not where this path leads, but I know that I am not alone and I no longer feel the pain and loss that had previously come with thoughts of Hannah. She was at peace now and so was I. Looking back, I see no familiar or painful sights because of the bend in my road. Looking forward, I see all I ever wanted in new and exciting forms. I guess He really does know best. Are there things in your life you need to let go….and let God handle?
Whether therefore ye eat, or drink, or whatsoever ye do, do all to the glory of God. I Corinthians 10:31
Heather says
I’m so sorry Lyette and for your hubby too. I know that pain also. It blows my mind how common it is. That “tissue” was our sweet baby and I buried him outside his nursery window. Even though he was only 8-10 weeks old, it was clear as day to me to see his little body. I’m so encouraged that I will see him and hold him one day in Heaven, by God’s grace. Thank you for being so transparent and sharing your heart with us.
Kimberly says
Thank you for sharing such a private hurt which brings so much of the reality of miscarriage. Hugs and prayers to you and your family – both here and in heaven.
Lyette Reback says
Thank you everyone for your kind and encouraging words. I am so thankful for my many blessings under my roof, but hoped that by sharing this I could encourage other moms who have faced similar heartbreak. If you have found this article helpful, please feel free to share it on your social media.
Rachel says
I am so, so sorry. The loss is heartbreaking. God has a plan and a purpose, and His plan is so much greater than ours. That thought has gotten me through…my heart still breaks for the loss of my baby, and I still cry for him/her, but find great peace knowing that God has a very special plan. Lots of love, my friend.