Tag Archives: pregnancy after loss

Less than 18.5 hours until the ultrasound

Posted on October 13, 2011 by Crystal Theresa| 16 Comments

We’re going to see Bumble Bee again tomorrow afternoon, and I should be 6 weeks and 4 days along. This is around the time that we should be able to see the fetal pole and a heartbeat. And that is what I really, really, really want to see.

I know that I have no control over the universe. I know that I cannot will my baby to live if it’s not meant to be, but I have to believe that everything will be okay, that I can carry this pregnancy to term, and that our fourth child will be the one to come home with us. I have to keep those thoughts ahead of the fear.

So I have a request. Will you lift us up with prayers, positive energy, and good vibes? Can you surround us with light and keep us in your thoughts? Can you send out the the intention that Louie and I will feel love and comfort and peace no matter what tomorrow brings?

Thank you so much.

How do you feel about this?

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Posted in Bumble Bee, Faith, Pregnancy

Tagged louie, prayer request, pregnancy after loss, ultrasound

Not-so-Wordless Wednesday

Posted on October 12, 2011 by Crystal Theresa| 2 Comments

Prometrium Capsules - 200 mg

For the past 8 days, I’ve been sticking one of these capsules in me when I wake up in the morning and before I got to bed at night. I don’t like it. It’s uncomfortable and messy and sometimes it hurts. But I will keep doing this for the next 237 days if it means I can bring my Bumble Bee home.

How do you feel about this?

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Posted in Bumble Bee, Photos, Pregnancy, Wordless Wednesday

Tagged pregnancy after loss, progesterone, prometrium

One small pregnancy goal at a time

Posted on October 7, 2011 by Crystal Theresa| 12 Comments

Because I was so anxious and worried and nervous and scared and terrified that I might have an ectopic pregnancy that would burst while I was traveling to Florida, my nurse agreed to do a blood test to see if my hCG levels were high enough to do an ultrasound (she also checked my progesterone, because I was anxious about that, too, given my early losses). So on Monday, I went in for the bloodwork. I got the beta hCG results on voicemail at the end of the day: 7,057. Then my nurse called me back the next morning, and I got scheduled to go in.

Bumble Bee's 1st ultrasound and my pregnancy packet We saw our little Bumble Bee on the ultrasound—well, his or her gestational sac and yolk sac (the little “cheerio” in the black sac in the image on the left) in the gestational sac, in my uterus. I heard Louie let out a huge sigh. The nurse practitioner said that it looked good for this early in pregnancy and with my numbers, things appear to be going well. I was given a pregnancy packet (I haven’t received one of these since being pregnant with Calvin) and told that my due date is June 5.

The thing with taking fertility meds is that it can cause more than one egg to be released, and even if one implants in the uterus, there is a rare chance of one implanting in the fallopian tube instead of making it’s way down. So, I’m not completely in the clear, but I am so relieved to know that this pregnancy seems to be going well. I just need to hold onto that, and continue to set small goals (on the advice of some amazing baby loss and rainbow mommies out there) instead of getting myself into a panic over trying to reach the end of this 9 1/2 month journey. So, my next goal is to make to our ultrasound next Friday and see Bumble Bee’s little heart fluttering away. I didn’t get to see that with Rainbow or Gaelen, so, of course, it is a huge milestone. And as always, prayers, hopes, healthy vibes, positive energy, sticky baby dust, and good baby juju are most welcome.

This post is part of the NaBloPoMo daily blogging challenge. The theme for this month is “Between,” which goes perfectly with how I’ve been feeling and where I find myself: between hope and despair, between love and fear, between trying to conceive and holding a living child in my arms. The prompt for today is: Talk about one important thing that happened between last Friday and today.

How do you feel about this?

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Posted in Bumble Bee, NaBloPoMo, Pregnancy

Tagged 5 weeks, between, early ultrasound, nablopomo, pregnancy after loss, yolk sac

Between Love and Fear

Posted on October 2, 2011 by Crystal Theresa| 10 Comments

Three Postive HPTs Project Pee-a-thon ended with very much wanted results for me and Louie, and we held onto the high of congratulations, support, encouragement, and prayers for days. We told ourselves we would enjoy this blessing and hold onto the joy. I promised myself I wouldn’t get caught up in the fear and worry and just love every day that I have our little Bumble Bee growing inside me. But things started snowballing. And as I tried to keep the anxiety at bay, it all piled up and knocked me spiraling down into a place where I was practically convinced it was over, that I was just setting myself up for disappointment, and that I was foolish to ever believe I could bring this baby home. Not a good place to be, is it?

I’m teetering on the threshold between love and fear, and I need to find the place of perfect love, the love that will drive out all fear (John 4:18), the love I felt as my heart expanded to hold another child. So I’m pulling out all the stops: prayer, guided imagery, affirmations, mantras, and—most important and most difficult—surrender.

Right now, I’m reading A Return to Love by Marianne Williamson (recommended to me by Elisabeth Manning), and I’m starting to understand what it means to let go and let God:

When we surrender to God, we surrender to something bigger than ourselves—to a universe that knows what it’s doing. When stop trying to control events, they fall into a natural order, an order that works. We’re at rest while a power much greater than our own takes over, and it does a much better job than we could have done. We learn to trust that the power that holds galaxies together can handle the circumstances of our relatively little lives (56).

Part of doing that is trusting that I am held and that, the greater scheme of the universe, my and baby and I are safe no matter what happens. The other part is recognizing that the fears will come, and I need to acknowledge these emotions so they can move through me, instead of trying to wall them up and letting them rot inside me.

I’m teetering on the threshold between love and fear, and though I know it’s impossible to feel completely confident in this pregnancy, I want to leap towards love.