Life After Miscarriage – The “New Normal”

If you are in Connecticut, thought you might be interested in seeing this:

www.OurHopePlace.com on Cablevision’s “12 on Health” with host Gillian Neff.

We discuss our website www.OurHopePlace.com, our blog http://ourhopeplace.wordpress.com and ways to help friends cope, hope and heal after a miscarriage.

Connecticut program dates and times:
Date: Saturday – Sept 27 Times: 6:30am, 10am, 1:30pm, 5:30pm
Date: Sunday – Sept 28 Times: 6:30am, 10am,12:30 pm, 4pm, 10:30 pm

-Laura and Sharon

Last week my friend wrote to let me know she had a miscarriage. She knew I had had one too… I wrote back to offer help, and sent my thoughts and prayers (something she asked for). She took me up on visiting and bringing over my grandmother’s tomato soup (sometimes a grandmother’s love provides good healing).

So I went with my grandmother’s soup, fresh from the oven brownies, a bottle of wine, and a bracelet from www.OurHopePlace.com. (I love the bracelets; still wear mine everyday.) These were all things that helped me, so I hoped they would do the same for her.

Through her tears my friend told me of her personal Hell she had been/is going through… I told her to take her time and that she didn’t have to talk if she didn’t want to. But she said that talking helped. I too was like that. I felt like I had all this sadness and pain inside that had to come out.

While she doesn’t feel like it, my friend is amazingly strong. It was a special sharing among friends that we had… while neither of us wanted to join this “miscarriage sisterhood” we are both members, and we need to help/support each other.

We all need to help each other… I know it will take time for my friend to heal. One day she will wake up, and her miscarriage won’t be the first thing she thinks of. One day she will go to sleep and her miscarriage and the loss of her baby won’t be the last thing she thinks of. I know she will eventually heal, but she will never forget. Right now, she needs support and our thoughts and prayers. Thought you could keep her in yours too.

From a recent contact at www.OurHopePlace.com,

I’d like to help you share stories of miscarriages. I actually have two in a row and felt like there was such little support or information – yet when you mention it – it is so common. So here it goes.

Over the course of 10 months my husband and I experience two miscarriages as we tried for a child. For us, third time was a charm. Both miscarriages were detected when we went in for a 10 week ultrasound and both times, the embryo did not grow past 6 weeks. Both times resulted in a D and C. The first time this happened we were sad, but understood that miscarriages were common, when it happened a second time, we began to worry. Fortunately, we were referred to a fantastic specialist who ran us through a series of test to rule out all issues.

In June of 2007 we were blessed with a strapping 10 lb. 10 oz. boy who has brought so much joy to our lives. This past mother’s day my church held a rose ceremony inviting families to place a red rose in a vase for every child they had. They also invited families to place a white rose in the vase for every child they lost, including miscarriages. That ceremony was extremely emotional for me, not because of the joy I felt on my first mother’s day, but It had hit me that I was so focused on having a child that I didn’t mourn the two miscarriages – perhaps because they happened so early in my pregnancies.

It is so important that women talk through a miscarriage and to share their experiences. We should know that we are not alone and that there is always hope.

Hopefully this small story helps others.

-Kirsten

From a recent contact to www.OurHopePlace.com,

I’m happy to help lend my support–from the husbands/males perspective. One of the two miscarriages we suffered is still fresh in my memory (although I’ll never forget either) as it happened about a month ago. The facts: The first miscarriage happened more than two years ago (Feb. 2006). We had a healthy boy (now 4) before the first miscarriage and went on to have a second healthy boy (now 16 months) before the second miscarriage. We’re going to try for more still, but want to wait before trying again.

The reason I’m so eager to share my experience is because when I found out my wife had misscarried the first time I had a half hour drive before seeing her (I was at work when she went to the dr’s appointment, and she called me from their office to tell me. She was sobbing. It was the single worst phone call I’ve ever received in my life.)

I didn’t know where to turn for some comfort of knowledge of how to deal with it. I called my sister who had a miscarriage herself, and asked (although I was sobbing the whole way home. Frankly, it’s still difficult to talk about as the emotions associated with the memory come back easily) how she handled the news/information.

Miscarriage hard on both spouses when it happens. Granted, it is much harder on the woman, in this case my wife. But watching her suffer and the sadness or letdown was also hard on myself. I am glad I had family to lean on and that my wife and I had each other. We still don’t know why it happened to us, but we take a great deal of comfort and gratitude for our two healthy boys that have blessed our lives.

-Jonathan

From a recent contact to www.OurHopePlace.com,

My first pregnancy was a miscarriage. I was 29, and was just diagnosed with colitis. So I wanted to try to have a child before symptoms prevented me from having one. I conceived, and miscarried 8 weeks later — during a sonogram visit on my lunch break.

Everyone at work knew. The whole hospital I worked for. It was only the ones that also went through a miscarriage that said ANYTHING to me.

To top it off, it turned out ANOTHER woman in my office had also become pregnant. She had almost the same due date as I had. Plus, she annouced it after a wedding of another worker — siting she only kept it a secret because she didn’t want to ‘upstage’ the bride. So now I was looked on as “an upstager!”
-JoAnn

From a recent contact to www.OurHopePlace.com,

I just wanted to Thank you for all the women out there to have a place to turn to.I suffered 3 miscarriages in a row, 16 years ago, I spent hours in the library, and it only made me feel worse. I found out that the more times it happens, the lower the chance of a good outcome. I am happy to say that I never gave up, I went for tests, and prayer, and I have had 4 healthy children, the oldest is 16. To everyone out there, never give up hope. Talk about adoption, talk, talk, talk. Finding out how many other people have been through it really is a help. Thanks again, even many years later, I do remember the sadness.”
-Deborah

Tears are running down my face, I have tried to rub the tears away totally forgetting that I still have make up on – so now I look like a crying raccoon – quite the visual I know.

So a few weeks ago, my friend emailed and said, “I have great news, can’t wait to get together soon”. Well with the start of the new school year, we were all busy but planning to get together soon… Tonight, just now, I received an email, “the baby’s heartbeat had stopped. I know you know the pain we feel. Please keep us in your thoughts and prayers”.

So I emailed back… I offered to drop off my grandmother’s special soup (that I had made this weekend), offered to come and sit with her (sometime crying with someone who knows helps), and of course anything is up for grabs. I will send her a bracelet from www.OurHopePlace.com Perhaps it will help her know she is not alone. And of course I will keep her and her family in my thoughts and prayers – perhaps you could too. Thanks…

Click here to vote.

As you know our mission with OurHopePlace.com is to demysitfy miscarriage…  this way we can help women and their families that suffer.  We have been nominated to be in the “Best Of” contest at Divine Caroline… 

There are 1 million miscarriages each year in the US…  women and their families are often left alone, suffereing.  We would like to change that!  Please visit and vote for us so we can help others!

From a recent contact at www.OurHopePlace.com,

I delivered a healthy daughter the first time I was pregnant. But I suffered five miscarriages before I had my second child five years later. I was diagnosed with a translocation (two chromosomes with switched parts, frequently leading to early miscarriage) and underwent IVF in attempt to pick healthy embryos — it didn’t work (I had a miscarriage anyway). Eventually I was able to become and stay pregnant naturally.

I think that when you’re suffering from secondary infertility people can be even more cruel, mostly out of ignorance. People assume that if you have an only child that it’s just by choice, especially if you’re young. They’re always peppering you with questions about when you’re going to have another. I was also around so many shallow women who would say things, such as, “I only want a girl.” But perhaps most upsetting were the inconsiderate things people who knew my situation said, including doctors (“You should just be glad you have a child already”), insinuating that wanting two children was greedy or that you obviously didn’t appreciate your first child.

Good luck to those who are trying. Try to find at least one sympathetic ear that you can vent to (not a spouse) – it does feel better to talk to someone who understands.
-Jennifer

From a recent contact to www.OurHopePlace.com,

I was devastated when I miscarried the first time. It was before I got pregnant with our now 14-year-old, Hannah. I tried for so many years NOT to get pregnant. Then, when I wanted to get pregnant—I wondered if I could.

I finally did it! But the excitement was short lived as I miscarried around my 9th week. I told a bunch of people. I eventually felt better—but many people still thought I was pregnant and I had to tell them I wasn’t. That was probably, the hardest part of the whole thing—actually. My friends who didn’t know I’d miscarried (until later) wanted to console me. I, on the other hand, had pretty much gotten past it. So, I ended up consoling them. Telling them it was “okay” and that I was alright.

The one thing I took from that experience, is that I told few people about being pregnant—until I had hit the 12-week mark in my future pregnancies. It saved me a lot of grief the second time I miscarried. Yep…I miscarried twice. When our now 12-year-old, Woody was not yet two, I got pregnant again and miscarried. I think it was Devine intervention. God didn’t want me to have three kids under the age of four! I surely would have needed a straight jacket. With my track record, It’s amazing I ever had kids. But here I am, with five wonderful kids—with the youngest being eight. I think, you never really get “over” a miscarriage…but you do get through it.

-Gretchen