20 Questions Game! With my GYN.

It was finally time for my follow up appointment with my gynecologist. Mike went with me of course, we had so many questions and no answers. We checked in. I sat down in the waiting room with my head down, trying to avoid looking at all the happy pregnant women. They made me angry, I had belly envy... I had baby envy. I wanted my baby back... so so much. I wanted to be them. I avoided the posters on the wall of the diagrams of healthy full term moms with their perfectly formed fetuses. We waited what felt like forever and finally got called back to see her.
"So what brings you in today?" the nurse asked, [[ can't you just look at my chart?! I have to tell you? I have to say it out loud!?]] "I had a miscarriage." She weighed me. 96 lbs. I had no appetite. They ran a pregnancy test... I watched as it slowly popped up negative. [[ gut punch, little did I know this would be the first of a lot of negative tests for me ]] The nurse said, "don't worry that's a good sign." [[ Yeah, easy for you to say, gut punch ]] Then I had blood drawn. "What is that for?" I asked.  "We are going to check your HCG levels to make sure they are all the way down to zero. [[ gut punch ]] "Okay." Finally we were taken to a room... "How are you feeling?" the doctor asked. Should be a simple question normally right? I had no words. Actually I had a thousand words but I didn't want to speak them. I simply said, "as well as I can be I guess." She shook her head, as if comprehending. I had an exam. It hurt. I was still sore from the war that had be waged inside of my uterus in the previous weeks. My sweet husband held my hand, squeezing it for comfort. When she finished, she requested we do another ultrasound to ensure that "everything" had passed. [[ gut punch ]] I watched the monitor... staring at my empty uterus, where my child was no longer. I held back tears. I told myself it was over. We were taken back to the room and waited for the doctor once more. "Good," she said, "the ultrasound was clear." [[ yep... clear of my baby... gut punch ]] I stayed composed. "So do you have any questions?" Oh boy did we. We asked her everything we could think of...

• "Why did this happen?"... "Well there's really no way to know for sure, sometimes it just happens."
• "How often does this happen?" ... "I'd say close to 15% of pregnancies." [[ whoa, all those women... I wonder if they feel like I do right now ]]
• "Was there anything we could have done?" ... "No." [[ are you sure?! ]]
• "Will this happen to us again?" ... "There's really no way to tell that until you get pregnant again."
• "Are there any tests we should do to see if it will happen again?" ... "No, we don't do any testing like that until you have at least 3 miscarriages." [[ The thought of that blew my mind. Having read things online I know there are countless women out there that have had more than one loss, I know some personally now... and I still can't imagine going through all that again and again. And they WON'T test until I have at LEAST 3?! This was the beginning of my frustration with this particular doctor's office ]]
• "When can we try again?" ... "Just wait one month, if you have a normal cycle, you can start with the next one." [[ Fantastic! We will be pregnant again in no time, and then we WILL have our baby, maybe I was a little naive after all ]]

The questions went on and on... we asked many questions and received hardly any answers. It irritated me. I wanted answers. Part of me knew there were none. Part of me knew there had to be more to it than that. But I wouldn't find that out until months later. Finally the visit was ending. And I had to ask THE question. The one I had asked myself over and over. The one I hoped I knew the answer to but had to ask her to validate it. I meekly spoke the words as my throat tightened and my eyes burned... "Did I do something to cause this to happen?"... "No, you can't think like that, this was not your fault." That was the first time I felt like I had been spoken to like an actual person who was cared for by this office, and not just another patient they had to get through. I nodded, unable to speak and we left... feeling defeated and drained.

Mike never told anyone "Steph lost the baby" or "she had a miscarriage." It was always "we lost the baby" or "we had a miscarriage". I was seeing a side of him I never knew existed. I was so grateful for the words he used. So very grateful.

Soon... it would be time to try again.

Now that my body was healed... it was time to work on my heart... and my faith in God.