Tomorrow I will be 40 years old and I will also be 30 weeks
pregnant. Just writing that statement
brings tears to my eyes. I’m happy and
sad at the same time. There is nothing
wrong with my baby and I am not sad about being pregnant. I am overjoyed about this baby and can’t wait
to meet her. The tears come because of
everything that led to me being pregnant for my 40th birthday (which
was certainly not in my life plan).
This is my sixth pregnancy but I only have two
children. I had three miscarriages
between 2013 and 2014. I thought the
first one was the worst thing that ever happened to me. It involved two trips to the ER and minor
surgery. It happened right before
Thanksgiving. I couldn’t get over
it. I went through the holidays in a
daze.
Then January came and I thought the new year would be
better. I was so wrong. Just a few days later, my son, Julian, got
sick. He had a high fever for days and
his eyes were bright red and the doctors didn’t know what was wrong with him. I was caring for him day and night and then
he was hospitalized for Kawasaki disease.
The stay in the hospital was awful.
The IV treatment he needed lasted 12 hours and then we had to stay for
24 hours to make sure his fever didn’t come back. He came home and seemed better but his fever
returned and he was back in the hospital a few days later for a second
treatment. The stay in the hospital was
easier the second time because he was allowed to go to the playroom and he had
a more comfortable hospital room. But he
consumed all of my energy. I barely saw
my husband or my daughter. I was
strangely grateful that I wasn’t pregnant while having to deal with all of that
stress. When we went home from the
hospital the second time, Julian seemed much better and he looked better. Then the fever returned and blood tests
showed that the treatment still hadn’t worked.
We ended up at the hospital for a third time but this time, we had to go
to Seattle because Julian needed to see specialists and get a different kind of
treatment since the others hadn’t worked.
My mom came to the hospital with us and stayed overnight
with us for the first two nights and she was amazing. I had a meltdown on the second morning when
Julian threw his cup of chocolate milk with his aspirin in it. He had been on 20 aspirin a day for over two
weeks by that time and it was torture trying to get him to take it, whether at
home or at the hospital. When he threw
that cup, I finally lost it and said some choice words. My mom told me to take a break and leave the
hospital for a couple of hours. So I did
since I knew she would take care of him just as well as I could. We left the hospital the next day and never
went back. Even though the treatment
worked, he still didn’t fully recover for several months after that. He tired very easily and hardly ate and we
had lots of follow-up visits with his pediatrician and his cardiologist. (In fact, we just had another follow-up with
his cardiologist this week and everything looks great.)
As Julian continued to recover, I found out that I was
pregnant again at the beginning of March.
I couldn’t believe it and didn’t want to get my hopes up. Just two weeks later, I miscarried. Before my first one, I kind of imagined that
it would just last a day or two and then be over. But that is definitely not the case. My second miscarriage lasted eleven days and
for at least two of those days, I hardly moved from my recliner and heating
pad. The pain was intense and sometimes
felt like being in labor.
After that, I forced myself to feel better. I walked for almost an hour every day and
started training for a 5K. I was doing
pretty good until the week before Father’s Day.
The first baby that I lost had been due on Father’s Day and for that
week, that’s all that I could think about.
I was in tears constantly. Then
on that Saturday night before Father’s Day, I found out that I was pregnant
again. I couldn’t believe it. I wasn’t sure that I could allow myself to be
happy about it.
When I was about 8 weeks along, I went to the OB because I
wasn’t feeling well. She did an
ultrasound and said that she saw the heartbeat and that everything looked fine
and the baby was measuring just over 6 weeks.
I left the office feeling vaguely reassured but also confused because I
knew there was no way the baby could only be 6 weeks. But I just hoped the doctor was right and everything
was fine. Two weeks later, I knew it
wasn’t. When I realized that I was going
to lose my third baby, it felt like I fell into a hole and I was never going to
get out. I barely left the house and my
kids watched TV all the time. I ate
whatever junk food was available and curled up in my bed.
It took me a few months and the help of a good therapist to
finally feel better again. I was
referred to the infertility clinic for some testing to see if there was a
reason for the multiple miscarriages.
They did a few tests and everything was normal so they said it was
probably just my age and that I should try to get pregnant again. But if I did get pregnant again, their clinic
would support me and give me early ultrasounds to check on the baby.
On December 1st, I found out that I was pregnant
again. I was very worried but slightly
hopeful too. I had an ultrasound at 6
weeks that was good, then another at 9 weeks that showed the baby moving. The doctors said that after seeing that, my
chances of another miscarriage had dropped to 3%. I finally relaxed a little. I started to actually plan for a baby. I had more ultrasounds at 12, 16, 19, and 20
weeks. I just had my last one at 28
weeks. I started feeling the baby move
at around 16 weeks and she has been kicking like crazy ever since.
My rainbow baby is a girl and the name we’ve chosen for her
means “bright.” She has brought the light
back into my life and I can’t wait to meet her.
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