The day we lost Miss Hallie.

About a year after Bennett, Jared and I took a long time to decide that we were going to try again in October of 2018 for another baby. However, to our surprise, we ended up getting pregnant sooner than expected. We were thrilled to say the least, and right away the planning began again.

At 5 weeks along I started bleeding again.

Of course I immediately thought the worst. I thought we were miscarrying again and that it was all over. To our surprise, after our very first ultrasound, we finally saw a little baby and heard a very strong heartbeat. The following week the bleeding got worse, but there were still no changes to the baby. By 7 weeks, we went to our last appointment before our two week vacation and I will never forget our doctor telling us, “It’s either going to happen, or it’s not. There’s nothing we can do to stop it.”

So we left for Disney. I packed up my maternity pants and all of the Disney shirts I own and we were on our way to the happiest place on earth. We had a wonderful first few days there and let me tell you, the bloat was real. Even though I was only 8 weeks at this point, I had clearly ‘popped.’

The morning of November 1st, our third or fourth day there, I woke up that morning in something wet. I was mortified, because I was convinced I had peed myself. However, as I stood up I felt the weight of what was another miscarriage. I ran into the bathroom and as soon as I turned on the light I saw the blood. I yelled for Jared. I told him I was miscarrying again and it took an hour for our doctor to get back to us that morning to simply confirm my worst fear. Losing Bennett was hard, but Hallie’s loss broke me.

The morning after her loss, Jared found me on the bathroom floor sobbing. I felt so much guilt and blamed myself more than I should have. But how could I not? I had lost another child and it was frustrating knowing that my body wasn’t able to do the one thing it was made to do.

We had a week left on our vacation and I continued on every single day even though what I really wanted to do was stay in our room and cry. All. Damn. Day. I had to watch families with their infants and children and see other pregnant women all while I was mourning the loss of my child. I no longer needed all of those maternity pants I had packed. I no longer had my ‘mini-bump.’ There was no evidence I had a child at all.

We made the most of our vacation though and when we came home our follow-up visit was just as difficult as I had imagined it’d be. For a month following the loss I was going for blood work every single week to ensure that my hormone levels returned to normal.

It’s now four months after the loss of Hallie and each day continues to be a struggle. I took her loss much harder mentally than I did Bennett. Each day continues to feel so forced and often times it feels like I’m just going through the motions. But things will get better, just like they did after Bennett and until then, it’s just taking one day at a time.

Always,

Courtney