“When a child loses his parent, they are called an orphan. When a spouse loses her or his partner, they are called a widow or widower. When parents lose their child, there isn’t a word to describe them. This month recognizes the loss so many parents experience across the United States and around the world.”
— Ronald Reagan
Today, I wrote and finished a blog about our miscarriage in July in honor of National Pregnancy and Infant Loss Awareness Month … which is October, by the way. But, it was such a heart-wrenching blog to write, I decided not to share it. I’m not ready to share it, I’m not sure if I ever will be.
Instead, in honor of this month I want to talk about miscarriage in a been there done that, but also in a removed way.
So, let’s talk about it. Let’s get down and dirty and start with some pretty stale stats … 1 in 4 pregnancies result in miscarriage. That’s 25% and only include those that are reported! Those are crappy stats.
But, they are just statistics. I’ve had 12 pregnancies and my 13th resulted in a miscarriage.
Yet, with these numbers, I can’t for the life of me understand why miscarriage is so misunderstood. You would think it would have sponsors and a color and massive funding drives, like other health related issues and movements.
But alas, miscarriage is something families simply suffer in silence. There is no cure, instead mothers and fathers are told their baby most likely had a genetic problem and it is for the best.
And that, friends, is crap. Best for who? Not me, not my husband, not my baby. Miscarriage is death and there is nothing about death that is good, better or best than anything for the people left behind. Death is The End. And after so much fear, so much worry, so many prayers, a diagnosis of death is devastating.
Of course, our faith tells us God is a merciful God and we have hope that our babies are in heaven. But for a mother who wants nothing more than to hold her child, death comes too early. It is not best.
Why anyone would ever think that a loss of pregnancy is for the best is beyond me. From the first positive pregnancy test, to the announcing to family and friends to online shopping, that mother is invested 100% in her baby. She is in love and is dreaming about the months and years to come.
And yet, we live in a culture of death. A baby that is wanted is a baby at any age; one that is not is a fetus, at any gestation. And society has simply become callous and uninterested altogether. They’ve checked out.
Death, via abortion and now suicide is glamorous, it is defined as a right. Today our very own doctors are participating in ending the lives of the innocent and the terminally ill. They are no longer totally devoted to the life and health of their patients, instead they participate in legal murder.
Planned Parenthood has succeeded in convincing the masses that abortion is mandatory healthcare for women. But what they have actually done is to perpetuate the biggest and most no holds barred attack on women in the history of the world.
They have denounced motherhood, destroyed the family and made a laughing stock out of women.
So much so that when a woman has a miscarriage it’s received with little acknowledgment, a callous statement from a doctor that it’s “for the best” and then nothing. Mothers, and fathers alike, are left feeling lost and alone and completely at odds with how they are feeling.
As a result, miscarriage has a stigma about it, a “it was meant to be” implication that is wholly unfair to anyone who has suffered a loss. It isn’t really ever spoken about. It’s not a subject that Hollywood takes on, it’s not something our media deals with … miscarriage and the grief that accompanies it, doesn’t fit the agenda.
I mean how do you on one hand tackle the sadness and the pain one mother has about the loss of her 10 week old unborn baby and at the same time spoon feed the masses the lie about abortion up to 40 weeks being a woman’s right and that it’s not really a baby and all the other BS that goes along with it.
The obvious answer is that you can’t. And so miscarriage outreach suffers. Which inevitably means women suffer.
Instead of support and love we are told “it was meant to be”. That we can try again. That one miscarriage rarely means you will have a second …
You know what I was thinking? I was thinking, I don’t want a different baby, another baby, I want this baby. I want the baby whose life I am on my knees praying to God to spare.
In those prayers I told God if my baby were to be born with two heads I would love him. “Just please, please God save him.”
My call to action for all mothers and fathers and siblings who have lost a baby to miscarriage is to stand up, speak out and be counted.
Tell the world, our babies were living testaments to his/her parents love for each other, our hope for our future and proof of an all-loving God.
Our grief should not be for naught, our babies lives meant something … even if only in the womb.
Miscarriage is a grief like nothing I’ve ever experienced before in my life and to suffer in silence is it’s own torture. Society needs to understand that miscarriage is not the loss of some clump of cells, but rather loss of a life, a very loved, precious, and real life.
Abortion is the taking of an unloved, yet precious and real life.
By the way, we named him Lucky.
So I ask Lucky to pray for us. So many stories about miscarriage. I had two of my own. I have had 11 live births. So the stats are right on for us. I do want to share a little story about a friend and her miscarriage.
My friend died 7 years ago from pancreatic cancer. She found out on August 20 and died November 5 of that same year. She was so joyful about this. I still cry at how much grace she felt and shared with all that were close to her. Her biggest fear was leaving her children behind. She had a 13 year old daughter and a 6 year old son. One night she had a vision in which she “saw the light”. She told us that she refused to look and went to sleep afraid that her time had already come. It was about 5 weeks before she actually passed away. She woke a few minutes later to another light this time the light was blue. “I wanted to die, the light was so beautiful.” She told me with tears in her eyes. “I can’t believe that the color blue could bring so much joy and peace. After seeing just that color I know that heaven is going to be more wonderful than any color on earth and I can’t wait to go. I will miss my children but I suspect I now know they will be ok.” I questioned what she meant and she told me that after felling the peace of the color blue for as long as she could stand it that a woman appeared in color holding a baby. I thought for sure that the baby must be the Christ Child and that it was the Blessed Mother. She told me that it was the Mary but she was holding a baby that my friend had miscarried years before. I was shocked as I had never heard that she had miscarried. She heard in her heart the words, “Just like I have taken care of this one for you until you get to heaven I will also take care of your other children until they can join us in heaven.” She was so comforted and wanted to share this with her daughter. She was afraid that her daughter might be hurt if her mother told her that was was happy about dying. I advised her to share only if the situation presented itself. A week later she told me that she had in fact had that conversation with her 13 year old. Her daughter sobbed and sobbed but it was a good thing. The daughter told her mom, ” I am so glad because my brother and I are here to take care of daddy but I didn’t know who would take care of you!”
I share that to say that God will bring good even from this loss. It will come in a way that you could never imagine or predict. These precious babies are HIS, they are never ours. Heaven must be filled with these precious souls. I am sorry for your earthly loss but overjoyed by heaven’s gain.
Absolutely the most moving testament I have ever been privileged to read. During this ordeal, Mary came to me as well. I preferred to see it my way at the time, thinking she was keeping him safe, but she was letting me know she would be holding him until we were reunited. Thank you so very much for taking the time to share this. Much love, Shannon. God Bless!!