Experiencing Pregnancy Loss
March 15, 2018 – Good fruit comes from past pain
Every year on March 15, since 2010, I remember the first baby my husband and I lost.
I had found out, on Wednesday, March 10th, that I was pregnant. After about 2 years of trying we were elated!
Then the cramping started over the weekend, then the bleeding and finally the pain. Early Monday morning I said, “We better go to the ER, something is not right.”
We were rushed in for an ultrasound and told that I would have emergency laparoscopic surgery to remove the baby and part of my fallopian tube due to an ectopic pregnancy.
I was numb when I returned home that night, empty, no longer pregnant. My womb had turned into a tomb that day. I still grieve that loss as I remember the emptiness. For almost an entire year after that experience I wondered if I would ever get pregnant again. Is it possible to have a baby with only one tube?
The following is part of my journal entry, as I considered that first loss, now in light of this unexpected new pregnancy.
March 15, 2018
Just got done talking with one of my best friends. Its so late but I had to write. I’m so thankful for our friendship. In so many ways we are similar – our weaknesses and areas we need to grow in. But even while she grieves from her own [pregnancy] loss, to have her support on this day, is a true testament to God’s ability to make beautiful friendships.
Thank you for the gift of suffering 8 years ago [losing our first baby to an ectopic pregnancy]. That experience started me on a path I am so thankful for now, though it took me – no, because it took me – to the depths of despair and death.
You have redeemed my experience and renewed me. I am so thankful now for that suffering. To be able to help just one person who is grieving the loss of a pregnancy and point her to You is more reward than I deserve.
But I know the reward I feel now is not even comparable to the eternal, incorruptible reward You are saving for me in heaven (1 Peter 1:4). I’m only so thankful to get a taste of it here on earth.
It’s been 10 years now, and four children later….I still cry about that baby.
But that experience, however hard it was, is also something that helps me connect to other women who have lost pregnancies or who look into the future and wonder if they will ever have a child of their own.
It was in speaking to this friend who was suffering from her own pregnancy loss, that I saw the value and gift it was to be able to identify with her and love her in her loneliness and emptiness.
I learned, my suffering had not gone to waste. The suffering through all those dark nights eight years ago, was bearing fruit I had not expected. Grieving with my friend but also being able to show her how God can heal those deep hurts was a blessing to both of us. I got to encourage her and love her when she felt lost and alone.
I learned that even in pain, friends can still support each other. Godly friends are capable of looking outside of themselves and their own pain in order to lift someone else up. She blessed me by her ability to encourage me, as I experienced the one thing I knew she longed for deeply. It was like her acceptance gave me permission to hope and be happy about this pregnancy. I could put away the lies, like feeling guilty, and instead be thankful.
She made me realize that the next time I am in pain, I too will be able to love others and encourage them no matter how I’m feeling. With God’s help I can change my perspective in such a way that I am not the center of my universe. He is. And when He is in that proper place I can see other people in need around Him too. I can have empathy and sympathy and reach out beyond myself by His strength.
Because the truth is that we are all in need of something from Him at every moment of every day. We all need more of Him. And when we embrace our weakness, instead of hiding it, we can minister to each other more deeply and wholly because its His love that flows through us just at that moment we have nothing of ourselves to give.
God is our redeemer. Every life experience, u-turn, roadblock, disappointment, misunderstanding, or devastation – can be shaped into something that makes us beautiful in Gods hands.
He is truly the potter and we are the clay. His wisdom in molding us is unmatched. He is the ultimate artist that has a picture in his minds eye of what each one of us could become if we allow Him to work. He sees us as we truly are, without this weak sinful wrapping of human nature constricting us. He sees our beauty.
We must remember and truly believe that – All things are being worked together for our good (Romans 8:28 my paraphrase). It doesn’t mean only good things will happen to us. It means all things, good or bad, will be woven into our personal testimony of God’s goodness.
He is able to redeem our tragedies in such a way that we get beauty for ashes. I’m living proof its true.
What an awesome God.
