More Holiness Give Me

Friday I went in for a prenatal appointment, feeling like I had finally found a good doctor after lots and lots of searching. Everything went was great, my weight was up two lbs from the last visit (BIG news for me...), I haven't been nauseous for weeks, and my energy was up. Thanks to the glorious second trimester! 

She said my uterus felt a little small when she was doing the hands on examination, but that's what the doctor said when I had my first baby, too. No big news there. Then is was time to hear the heart beat, and using the small hand held sonogram machine she put it on my stomach, but I didn't hear anything. She couldn't find it. "Don't worry yet, hon, this happens quite often" she said. From there she brought in a little ultrasound machine, but it was blurry. Then she took me into the ultrasound room, and had the tech do a real ultrasound. She measured the uterus and the head circumference and let the computer run the numbers. "It's small" she said. Then she came around the bed and stood by me as the technician moved the machine to see the babies body. And the heartbeat. That teeny little heartbeat. I could see with my eyes that the baby wasn't moving at all. I could see the colors on the screen flashing my heartbeat, but not the babies. I could see exactly what was happening, but I still had to hear those words from that sweet lady standing by my side. She held my hand and said, "Honey, there is no heartbeat. I am so, so sorry."

That was hard to hear. Even though I could see exactly what was going on, I had to hear it. And it was so hard. I had to say those same words to my husband through my own sobbing over the phone just moments later. There is no heartbeat. This is so hard.

They said that the baby was measuring about 14 1/2 weeks, which is exactly when all the morning sickness disappeared. My mind says, "I'm 18 weeks along", but my ears hear that my baby died four weeks ago. My baby. Our baby.

Tests are being ran, we're waiting for answers. There might not be an answer or a reason, and that's okay too. There is no blame, and no hate. We are heartbroken, we are so so sad, and we are exhausted. But we also know that we are so blessed. There is peace in our hearts that everything will be okay. 

More Holiness Give Me, more striving within,

more patience in suffering, more sorrow for sin.

More faith in my Savior, more sense of His care,

more joy in His service, more purpose in prayer.

-Philip Paul Bliss