It's a Long Story

Today as I sat down in the shower (i do this a lot) I couldn't help but be swallowed up in the memories of how i thought I'd lost my sweet baby girl. Some of you may know that I thought i'd miscarried with this pregnancy, but most of you don't know the whole story. so here it is.
Warning: it's rather graphic.
I was 3 weeks pregnant, and Joe and I had just found out. We were trying to have another baby so this was good news for us. One morning I suddenly got very sick and I rushed to the bathroom and threw up. This is rare for me, I'm not a puker. Even with my last pregnancy i only vomited a few times and each one i could feel coming on for at least 10 minutes before it happened. This one was very sudden, and when I threw up I felt a sharp pain in my stomach and then i started bleeding. It was pretty significant bleeding, and I thought I might be miscarrying. I was still feeling very sick and now became overwhelmed. Of course this was the moment the boys chose to pull the shelf off of the refigerator door and all of it's contents spilled out onto my kitchen floor including a salsa jar that shattered. I texted a couple of friends and they rushed over to help me. after about a half hour with their help things settled down and we talked about what had happened. None of us were VERY sure it was a miscarriage, but we agreed I needed to go to the doctor. I don't remember for sure, but I imagine it was the next day that I went in for an ultrasound to check things out. The nurse confirmed that I had a thriving 6 week old fetus. 6 weeks was further than I thought I was. I'd had a cycle the previous month so I just assumed that I hadn't gotten pregnant. It wasn't a cycle. My bleeding the previous month and recently was caused by a tear in my uterus. When I'd thrown up it must've torn open again and that was the sharp pain i'd felt. I was so relieved! While I was there I had the nurse double check that I was only pregnant with one baby this time. then I had her check again. and then again. It was definitely one baby. Another relief. The tear was supposed to heal on it's own.
Three weeks later I was 9 weeks pregnant and since I thought I was in the clear I had announced my pregnancy to most people already. I was visiting teaching one night, and when I stood to leave I felt as though i had wet my pants-very embarrassing. I hurried to my car so I could run home and change, but as I got closer to my car I noticed the moisture didn't stop and when I looked down I could see that blood had seeped through my pants and wasn't stopping. I had also locked my keys in my car so I flagged down my companion and asked for a ride home, and told her what was happening. I sat on my ensign as she drove me home and tried to reassure me that it wasn't necessarily what I thought. We both knew that the possiblilty was remote with the amount of bleeding I was having-soaking onto the ensign I was sitting on-that it was anything but a miscarriage. When I got home I ran up the stairs and called for Joe, but he wasn't home. I ran into the bathroom and sat on the toilet (not knowing what else to do) and the moment I did a tennis ball-sized mass dropped out of me into the water. No mistaking this time. I was sure I'd just lost the baby. Joe came home shortly after and we dealt with the situation. I got into the shower and tried not to think about what just happened-unsuccessfully. At least it didn't hurt. I'd heard that they really hurt. I felt like this was a tender mercy and the one thing I could focus on that was positive. This time I kept bleeding for a long time. I called the doctor, but insisted that I'd rather stay at home and be with my family. The doctor was reluctant, but told me to come in if I felt any cramping. I never did.
Joe called our parents and friends because I didn't want to talk about it. I didn't want to say it. joe asked our parents to relay the message to our siblings and ask that they not call.I knew that they'd be sad and try to be supportive, but being sad wasn't what I needed. I just needed to lay on the couch with joe, and try to cling to hope that I could try again soon. We assured each other that if a body isn't healthy then it's better this way. At least it was fast.
In the next days I had a lot of support from my close friends which I am so grateful for. I had blood tests done to compare my levels to make sure everything was on track. But after the second blood test I hadn't heard back so I called in to check. A week had passed since it happened and I felt emotionally stable so I just wanted to get on with it and look toward when I could try again. The doctor called and told me that my blood levels were not consistent with a miscarriage, but that could mean that i hadn't passed everything. I was scheduled for an ultrasound that afternoon to presumably have a D&C. I was really scared because I knew it would be emotionally and physically painful. We started with an ultrasound. That was the miraculous moment. The moment when I got my baby back. The nurse turned the moniter to me and showed me a healthy baby with a strong heartbeat. It took me a while to soak it all in. For the first hours I mostly felt guilty that I'd been wrong. I told people I'd had a miscarriage a week ago. Friends and family emailed supportive letters and memories of their own sad experience of miscarriage. I had drudged up all of these terrible memories for them, and I was wrong about what happened to me. Loosing a baby isn't something a person should be wrong about. You just don't do it. But the signs were almost undeniable. I didn't understand what had happened to me. Eventually my Doctor told me that there was no way of knowing. It definitely wasn't a twin because I'd checked VERY thoroughly that I had only one baby this time around. Our best guess what that the tear never closed, but just clotted and grew and the blood leaked into and filled up the clot until it was the size of a tennis ball. At which point it must've torn off and passed through.
People ask me if this pregnancy was easier than when I had the twins. Of course carrying one baby is much easier than two, but this pregnancy was much more difficult. It was an emotional roller coaster. I thought I'd had a miscarriage twice. The second time I thought it for a whole week. And then I got the best news of my life. Now that Joelle is here and healthy I can't hold in my happiness (Joe can attest to this. I cry all the time). I have my sweet baby girl. I'm so grateful to have her here in my home. She's such a joy with her smiles and her chunky legs. I love her.
Her story is a long hard one, but it has such a happy ending.