June 15, 2009

In the Days After

I am doing okay. It is weird, how much I can grieve something -- someone -- I knew existed only for a moment.

When we were driving home from the hospital, after the pregnancy was officially starting to end, my husband patted my hand and said, "This one just wasn't meant to live down here with us." And when I hear those words again in my head, I want to fold in on myself.

But at the same time, I feel so incredibly blessed that even for a little while, I got to be someone's mother.

A friend who also had an ectopic -- and who has struggled with great loss and challenge on her road to parenthood -- said that while it is no balm now, many many infertiles never even get a positive beta. So as strange as it seems, I feel lucky to have had that experience.

That Friday afternoon, as we drove away from the hospital totally in shock and grinning and laughing and exclaiming, "This is impossible!" and calling our parents to tell them my surgery had been canceled (and why), it was such a moment. We went to breakfast (as I hadn't eaten anything or had anything to drink since the night before), and then came back to house and took the dogs out to the lake. I waded into the water, and turned back to my husband and said, "I'm pregnant." Just to say it, so amazing. "I'll remember this day forever," I told him. And I will.

Posted by hannah at 09:32 PM to Making a Family

June 11, 2009

Smile Because It Happened

"Don't cry because it's over. Smile because it happened." -- Dr. Seuss

The pregnancy was ectopic. Today I am 6 weeks, 2 days. It's the most pregnant I've ever been, or maybe ever will be.

We'll be okay.

Posted by hannah at 02:34 PM to Making a Family

June 09, 2009

Holding Pattern

(This is a repost of what I wrote on Facebook. I just can't type it all out again. Sorry if it's a retread for some of you.)

So here is what happened.

On Friday, we got to the hospital a little early (7 a.m.), but they started the check in anyway. I felt pretty calm. Got my wristband and signed some forms and then went into a waiting room with Aaron. Got called back and went with a nurse/aide who weighed me, had me pee in a cup and then told me to take everything off and put it in a bag, put on a gown and wait on a gurney.

A woman came in and took some blood, and then a nurse came in and started asking questions. (Allergies, what surgery was I having, etc etc.) They bring A. in to wait with me, and by this time it's about 8 a.m.

The nurse comes back in with a look on her face, sits next to me and says, we need to take more blood because something came back on one of your labs.

She then says, "Your urine test came back positive for pregnancy."

I said, "That's impossible!" She said they were going to take more blood, and to just wait and see and to just "sit on it" and to not let anyone start my IV. So they take more blood and we wait for 30-45 minutes. The anesthesiologist comes and we chat about what he's going to do and I ask questions (they use brain monitors to make sure you're not aware, only hospital in the Cities to use them, so win for them). He says, "What lab are we waiting on? Could you be pregnant?" Ha ha, no, I tell him.

Finally about 9 a.m. my doctor comes in and says, "What's going on?" "You tell me!!," I told her.

I told her my last period date, and she and I are both looking at each other like, "What?!" The nurse comes back in smiling, holding a piece of a paper and says, "This is for your scrapbook!"

I am crying, Aaron is crying. My doctor says, "You're going to make me cry!" I keep asking if the tests could be wrong. "Was it your urine?" my doctor asks. Yes. "Was it your blood?" Yes. "Then you're pregnant."

My doctor says, "At this point, I've canceled your surgery," She tells me that she is going to call her office and have them work me in for an ultrasound and blood work on Monday. They send us home.

On Monday, June 8, we went in for another blood draw and ultrasound. They couldn't see anything on the ultrasound, but my HCG levels have gone up since Friday. However, they haven't doubled, which is what they would normally look for.

So I am going back tomorrow for another blood draw.

We don't know what's going to happen, or if this pregnancy is viable, but I felt like I didn't want to keep it a secret, because why would we? And no matter what happens, God is good and He is sovereign and He works all things for good.

We have experienced a miracle, and I praise Him for it!

I told Melissa that I felt a little like Abraham. I didn't want to have that surgery, and even that morning, laying on that gurney, I had the urge to flee. But I felt like it was the path and the option presented to me, and I was going to be obedient and follow through. And as my Isaac laid on the alter, and I had the knife in my hand, God stepped in and sent me home. I got up off the pre-operating gurney, put my clothes back on, and walked out of that hospital, uncut and with the knowledge of a new life inside me.

No matter what happens THAT is a miracle.

Thank you so much for all of your prayers, and all of your thoughts and well wishes. It is humbling to have so many amazing friends, and I'm going to be selfish and ask for your continued prayers. All three of us can use them.

Posted by hannah at 09:14 PM to Making a Family