11 Things My Miscarriage Taught Me
Grieving Mama,
There’s no amount of understanding or preparation that can bring you to a place where miscarriage will ever make sense. It’s something that truly is highly underdiscussed and can leave you feeling like you’re on a sinking island with nothing to turn to but the vastness of the sea and all the uncertainty it brings. To try and give words to something that feels as fleeting as the very air we breathe would be a disheartening thing to all the little ones we will never hold; however, I learned a few things through this valley that I hope will bring light to a very dark moment in our shared stories.
1. Being Angry is OK.
We’ve been made culturally aware that as women, childbearing is our “job.” Our bodies were made for this beautiful, hard, and sanctifying process that is growing another human. So, when our bodies become the very thing that can no longer provide a nurturing space for these little ones, we question it all. Our purpose, our bodies, our creator, the people around us, even the point in it all. The never-ending spiral brings a whirlwind of pain and complete anger. Then comes the guilt. Guilt of degrading ourselves, hurting those around us, questioning God and His divine intention for our life. I struggled with the back and forth of being angry with the world and then guilty for feeling this way. I finally concluded that I had a lot to be angry about and that the Lord didn’t spite my anger, rather he sat with me in it. Realizing that the Lord didn’t run from my pain and felt the weight of it there with me was a refining reminder that I wasn’t forgotten or being unreasonable.
2. Allowing Yourself Room to Breathe is LIBERATING.
Let’s talk about adult friendships and just the hard that they bring. Life moves and it moves regardless of your capacity to reach out after a 50-hour work week to catch up with your girlfriends. So, before you know it, it’s been 4 months since you met up with McKenna and you hardly feel like there’s a point... well, cause life. Sometimes the weight of the life lived between those months is too heavy to recap over dinner and I found myself feeling so isolated during those first few months. The amount of baby showers, weddings, bridal brunches, and toddler birthday parties that were thrown those first few weeks felt comical almost. I skipped every single one of them without a text or call why. I knew my limits and I allowed myself the room to breathe and cope. I was happy for them from a distance and hindsight 20-20 I could’ve saved a friendship or two with a simple text, but this brings me to point 3.
3. You Don’t Owe Anyone an Explanation.
Looking back, I think regularly about the lack of information out there for first time moms. I lost my baby at 7 weeks; this is before your first “traditional” 8-week appointment and sonogram. Those 7 weeks, felt like the most transformative and surreal weeks of my life. My body had started to change (hello ponytail holder looped between my jean button), my mood, my cravings, how I looked at the world around me, and my thoughts were filled with ideas of names, nursery wall colors, birthing plans, etc. They don’t tell you this in any of the blogs you read, and they don’t tell you what to do when you start bleeding either. After an ER visit one Sunday night I left knowing two things: 1. My baby had a heartbeat and 2. “It’s normal but it’s not normal to bleed this early.” Three days later my world, my baby, was too far gone to save. A week went by, and I watched as a body I once felt changing by the second started to mold and shift back to its original state. Another thing they don’t tell you, is it’s like blowing up a balloon, once it’s blown up, it never truly goes back to its original form, and you’re left feeling like a stranger in your own skin. I knew then that I didn’t owe a soul in this world an explanation for why I disappeared to heal and try to become friends again with a body that I felt like betrayed me.
4. There’s No Timeline.
I thought healing was linear. Like the peak of those feeling came with the lowest part of that moment. That’s not true at all. Your healing journey will look like the most jagged edge of a shard of glass. One day you’re fine, a win. The next you’re running out of the room when an 8-month pregnant woman walks in. A few good days doesn’t equate the lack of relapse. To be honest, sometimes it makes the fall a little harder. This is when I realized healing comes in waves. It comes and it goes, bringing wins and losses with it. At first the waves are loud, and they crash into your body, overwhelming all your senses. Then someday, I’m not sure when, the waves become background noise and the slight burn of salt on your skin doesn’t cross your mind as much as it did when you first stepped foot in the water.
5. You Can Be Happy for Others & Still Sad for Your Loss.
I remember that moment when the 8-month pregnant woman walked into the room. I felt the weight of three emotions: excitement, disappointment, and jealousy. I wanted so desperately to be happy for her, as I once knew a season filled with those same emotions. I knew the joy and even though it had gone sour in my mouth didn’t mean that she had to taste that bitterness with me. I felt disappointment and jealousy in my inability to create that with my own body and wished desperately that I was able to. The heaviness of all this rushing to my head in a split-second left me barreling to the closest exit I could find before I spiraled into a full-blown panic attack. (Side note: Let me tell you, my man deserves a medal of honor for all the panic attacks he’s walked me through.) I knew in the moments between sobs and unsteady breaths that I was happy for her, I just didn’t know how to express that amid mourning my own loss.
6. We Don’t Talk About Miscarriage Enough.
That first missed period that led to a positive pregnancy test led to a flurry of “Hey Google” moments. Anyone else? I tried to find anything and everything I could on what to do first, what supplements to take, what were the best ones on the market, what am I not supposed to eat, what helps with midday nausea, blah, blahh, blahhh… You know what there isn’t a lot of? INFORMATION. I mean there’s a lot out there for when you make it to 8-weeks, but anything prior to that, you’re on your own. Brutal reality. Then when the reality of miscarriage settles, suddenly there’s a ton of people that are like “yeah, me too.” WHERE HAVE YOU BEEN?! Please tell me I am not the only one who was appalled at the amount of people who sat in the valley with me! We truthfully couldn’t see the community we had due to the darkness and lack of information that surrounds the topic itself. Miscarriage happens. A lot sadly. & NO ONE TALKS ABOUT IT. Why would we? There’s shame around it, unspoken of course, but it’s there like a dark shadow in the corner. Looming. It’s the most isolating feeling in the world and despite that, I felt most seen when I sat with women who understood it. Despite the pain it brought to talk about it, I was shocked by how much healing came from simply speaking the words out loud for the first time. COMMUNITY HEALS. EDUCATION HEALS.
7. Time Doesn’t Heal All Wounds.
I wish it did. I wish the longer time went on the less the pain weakened your knees, but it’s just not true. A friend described the story of the box and the ball. The box is you, the ball your grief. Every time the ball hits the side of the box it inflicts pain, reminding you of its presence. As time moves on, the ball shrinks. The box never changes, but the grief you feel, and the weight of its presence does. It’ll still hit the sides from time to time and when it does it still hurts, but the frequency of your grief isn’t as often and the aftermath of it doesn’t linger quite as long. Time never removes the ball from your box, it just gives you time to settle with the grief and come to terms with it.
8. Sometimes, No Words Carry All the Weight Too Many Words Can’t Explain.
When thinking back to how some of my closest friends and family responded to our loss, there was a solid mix of “wow, really?” moments and “thanks for just getting it.” I thought a lot about how to shed light on this season of my life and truthfully, it’s summed up that words can’t heal this. There’s nothing that anyone can say to you to make this less heavy or less real. Miscarriage sucks. End. Of. Story. People will give you a thousand bits of advice on how to move through it with an endless amount of “I’m sorry,” “I can’t fathom how that feels,” or my personal favorite “The Lord will give you a baby in His time.” Some are meant to bring healing; others are empty hallmark card slogans simply due to the fact they don’t know WHAT to say. My advice, have grace. While you are navigating YOUR loss, people who care about you are also navigating the loss FOR you. No one talks about miscarriage, so while it’s new to us, it’s also new to those around us. I’ve found that telling people what I need to hear sometimes is just “that sucks, I’m here” and sometimes just sitting in the silence and telling them they don’t have to fix it for me is medicine in itself.
9. Music Helps.
Taylor Swift’s Bigger Than the Whole Sky… All I’m saying is I don’t know how I didn’t single-handedly take this song to the top of Spotify charts. Music will put words to a part of your life, regardless of if in the valley or on the mountain top, to help you commemorate it.
10. Living, Despite the Pain, Is How We Heal.
I sat and sulked for weeks. I felt like any sudden movement and my body, one that used to feel strong and capable, would cripple and give out on me. I felt so betrayed. I felt so incapable. I felt so frustrated. How on earth was I supposed to move on? Been there? Suffocated by the fear, failure, and pain. It’s debilitating. I was told once, long before this season I might add, “Throw yourself a 5-minute pity party and then stand back up!” I live by this. Miscarriage is HARD & it is not to be discounted, regardless of if it’s your first or your eighth. Sit in the hard, sit in the pain of it, I invite you to feel this, but don’t stay here too long. Your life is such a precious testament that our God is gracious and abundantly cares about our desires. Like it’s mind-blowing how genuine He is, and I’ve found that for me personally, that if such a big God is so intentionally in-tune with me, I can brush off the pain that burdens my soul and set it at His feet on my way to continue living a life that brings glory to His name and not mine.
11. There’s Hope in His Promises.
When we think about the hard that comes with any season of our lives, we (or maybe just me) can pinpoint key bible verses or cheesy quotes that have been smeared over hard times. I find it to be borderline cynical. Trust me, I KNOW the intentions are true; however, to a grieving human, nothing stings more than the bible verses that say, “He works all things out for your good.” Really? Does He? Doesn’t feel like it, Karen. Just me? I find in these moments there are two things I am humbly reminded of about my relationship with The Lord: 1. I am not promised an easy path and 2. Even if not, He is still good. He isn’t a cynical God who sits on a high throne staring down at our circumstances and scoffing. He treks through the valley, and He carries us to the mountain top, stride in stride with us. I find hope in the fact that I am seen, known, and loved by my creator, who sculpted me in His perfect image and despite my inability to see the beauty in that all the time, He says I am still worthy.
May you know that there is a community of women who have walked before us and there are many that will walk behind us too. While miscarriage can feel like an island, I encourage you to shift your perspective away from the vastness of the sea where all the footprints of those before you have long been washed away by the waves. Turn around my friend, we’re all here waiting on the other side of the shore to welcome you with arms wide open. We’re ready to meet you amid your grief and love you through it. There is community where there is hope and there is hope for your grieving heart.
XX, One Grieving Mama to Another
