This is Part Two of a three-part series. Please Read Part One First. Miscarriage At 11 Weeks: My Story
One at the bigger hospital, I was very relaxed. We were in good hands, at this point, I figured. Unfortunately, things started getting worse rapidly.
I was already on IV, but I hadn’t been at the hospital for long before my blood pressure began dropping like crazy. I think it dropped to 60/30, or something like that. It started with getting dizzy and feeling weak. In a sense, I passed out, yet my mind was 100% clear.
I knew exactly what was going on in the room, yet the nurses were slapping my cheeks and trying to revive me. I got a shot of epinephrine, and I started feeling better.
I could talk again and felt stronger.
The doctor did an in-room ultrasound and couldn’t find any baby. He told us that it had probably passed very early, possibly at 6 weeks already, and often the body kind of absorbs the baby.
The nurse told me that the shot would last ten minutes. The doctor came and told me I needed a D&C. I had to sign a liability document, which kind of felt like I was signing my life away.
At one point I remember the doctor cleaning me out internally from all the blood. I felt a bit better after.
I started getting dizzy again and begged the nurses for another shot. She joked that usually patients didn’t ask for the shot, because it was usually on the operating table that they used this medication.
During this time, they also asked about blood type, and were preparing for a possible blood transfusion.
It felt like such a long time before they finally wheeled me into the surgery room.
At this point, I was very weak, and couldn’t lift my head anymore. I had some anxiety about going under anesthesia because I had never needed it before.
I kept repeating bible verses to myself as I fell asleep.
Soon I was slowly waking up. I felt very groggy as I woke up, and very weak. Slowly, the anesthesia started wearing off. The doctor came in and asked if I wanted to take blood. I didn’t want to at all.
He told me the recovery would be slower if I didn’t get a blood transfusion. I was fine with that, and he left the decision up to me. I told him I wouldn’t take the transfusion.
A short while later, my blood pressure started dropping again, and I started getting dizzy. I remember thinking, oh no, I thought I was done with this!
The next time the doctor came in, I told him I would take the blood after all.
I was wheeled to a room at this point, and a blood transfusion was started. I had to have two units. We stayed the night, and after getting blood, I felt so much stronger.
We went home on the first of January. I felt very weak the first couple of days and took it easy. After the first week, I felt great, except when I would take on too much work.
It was 4 months later that my health started crashing….but that’s a story for another day.
It took several weeks before I recalled what God had shown me that night when I was feeling discouraged. How interesting it was to see that He had shown me what was about to happen, and how He spared my life. His plans and purpose for us are far greater than we can see.
As I was lying in the hospital bed, before they did the D&C, I also knew with clarity that this experience would help me to have much more compassion for people going through miscarriages.
Until you have walked a mile in someone else’s shoes, you cannot feel their pain as much.
Having had five healthy pregnancies, I wasn’t fearful that we wouldn’t be able to have another baby. Yes, I had had a miscarriage, but those things happened.
To struggle with infertility wasn’t something that I was worried about. Yet, in 2022 I started longing for another baby. My youngest was three, and there were times I had baby fever.
Yet, I was also content with our five. If God willed us to have more children, then great. If not, I was also fine with that.
But I didn’t get pregnant, and after becoming pregnant so easily for many years, I started wondering what was wrong with me. I wasn’t sad about it, but there was this lingering wondering.
Then in December of 2022, two years after my miscarriage, I was pregnant again. You can read about my second-trimester loss here.