three miscarriages. that’s a secret heartache my husband jude and i battled with for the first 2 and a half years of our marriage. having a miscarriage is not only excruciatingly painful but it is emotionally distressing as well and without the right help, even losing just one child could cause a person to go into deep depression. losing three children that could have been in our arms by now tormented me for the whole two and a half years.
the first time i found out i was pregnant, it was one of the best feelings of my life. i couldn’t wait to tell the world but just before i hit the three month of pregnancy mark.. i started bleeding. we rushed to the hospital and i stayed overnight. in the morning i had an ultrasound and was told that the baby had no heartbeat. it felt like the world had frozen when the doctor said those words. we were devastated. we couldn’t even find the words to talk to anyone about it. so we kept it to ourselves. the second time i got pregnant was only a few months later. again, i was over the moon.. a little scared but excited nonetheless. not long after.. baby number two passed away. when i found out i was pregnant with number three. i stayed silent. i remember i was even too scared to tell jude. the only thing i felt was the fear of losing yet another child. i told him eventually and even though i could tell he was scared too. he had so much hope in him still that it kept me strong. we tried to do everything right for this baby.. i stopped working, ate right, slept right.. in the end we lost the battle again. at this point we knew there was something wrong with me.. but even our doctor couldn’t tell us much. after a few tests he basically told me that i was obviously able to conceive a child, it was carrying my child for the whole nine months that made it almost impossible for me to do because my body was too weak. after hearing that.. i didn’t feel like a real woman anymore, i felt bitter.. depressed.. defeated. seeing my husband cry was the worst part. he really wanted to hold his children but he’d never get the chance. i had most of my miscarriages at home and after all the painful contractions, the baby would come out with the tissue that covered it. i hated, HATED the fact that we had to keep burrying our own children. it killed me inside. i tried to talk to a few people about how i felt but some of them would say things that made me wana punch them in the face during the conversation. things like..
‘you shouldn’t be so sad.. the fetus was only tiny when you had a miscarriage so it wasn’t really a baby.’
what could a person be thinking to say something like that to a woman who just lost a child? i know they were just trying to help but it was like they talked about MY CHILDREN like they were nothing in this world, so easily flushed out and that i shouldn’t have cared. but they were alive, and they were growing so beautifully inside me. to me, i loved them like they were fully formed and already in my arms.. they just never got the chance to make it that far. because of those type of conversations.. i became even more segregated from people. i blamed myself for not being able to just ‘be better’ and i blamed God for creating me this way. i constantly demanded an answer from Him about why he kept taking my children away. for weeks it was like he had his back to me.. until one day, he answered.
a friend of mine, who had no idea about my miscarriages started randomly talking to me about a bible passage, which spoke about hope.. and within that passage was a small verse that spoke specifically about barren women (women who are unable to have children). the scripture that stood out from the passage read..
‘He settles the barren woman in her home as a happy mother of children’. -Psalm 113:9
i knew it straight away. from something so small God was trying to tell me something big. He had probably been trying to encourage me for a while but i was too busy being angry at everything. so instead, like he always does.. He sent someone else to tell me.. someone who had no clue that God was even using them to tell me something. i started to get hope inside of me again. i started reading my bible to build up my faith because i knew someday soon.. i would be ‘settled in my home as a happy mother with my own children’. i was singing, dancing, laughing again and i knew it wasn’t just positivity, something in me had changed and i knew that feeling well. it was that feeling only God could give me.
amongst all this new refreshened happiness. there was only one last thing that bothered me. it was the fact that i knew i wouldn’t be able to ever meet the babies that i had lost. it was the only thing that would make me lonely sometimes. but yet again, God had put in another friends heart to buy me a book called Jessie. Not thinking anything of it, i started reading the book and cried the whole way through. The simple book was about a baby called Jessie who was never able to be born. In the book, the babies soul was taken by an angel up to heaven and the child watched her family happily from heaven because she knew she would be able to meet them all one day. It was an encouraging book that reminded Christian mothers that even though they had lost their child not to give up hope because in some other world, after we pass away.. we’ll be able to see our children again. I know it sounds weird but that wasn’t the reason i cried. the reason i cried was because of the books title - ‘Jessie’. One of the babies we had lost was named Jessica but during the pregnancy, we had nicknamed her Jessie. No way in the world would my friend have known that because it was something only Jude and i shared with each other. i knew i was able to say goodbye to that part of my past because instead of a final goodbye to my children it was more of a.. ‘i’ll see you later’ which was so much more comforting. finally for the first time in years, i felt completely at peace.
everything was falling back into place and not even month later.. i fell pregnant. this baby.. i knew was God’s promise to me.. because he had told me so in the scripture he gave. weeks passed, and i kept thanking God for his gift, no longer scared, no more fear. just faith that he’d pull our family through this. the 3 month milestone passed where the chances of a miscarriage lessens dramatically. that’s when i finally told the world! it was exciting because for the first time, jude and i were able to experience the happiness with our family and friends. it was and still is the best feeling. right now, i’m still 7 months pregnant but with each monthly hospital vist were getting told that the baby is big, healthy, strong and a perfect size for my body shape since i’m just a tiny person. i’ve been praying throughout my pregnancy and not once has baby shown any signs of distress. she loves judes voice and would kick the crap out of my guts everytime he’d sing to her. i know i’ll be seeing her soon which gets me even more excited. thinking of finally being able to be a mother, seeing jude being a father and us being a small happy family is such an uplifting feeling. God constantly teaches me that even in my weaknesses He is strong. strong enough to carry me through a promise he gave despite what doctors and my body might tell me. speaking of a promise, that’s our baby girl’s name. Kairi Promise. we wanted to name her that so that we’ll always remember God’s beautiful gift, miracle and promise to us for the rest of our lives.
To all the mothers and fathers out there who have lost a child, i decided to write down my story for you guys to let you know about hope, about faith, about God’s healing and God’s promises. It’s sort of hard for me, putting my story out there for randoms to read but i did it because i believe God wants to use it to encourage you guys. I wasn’t the first person to have that number of miscarriages and i’m definitely not the last. but at the end of a story that started off with heartache.. finishes off with love. and that’s a story my God never fails to deliver.
