When Hearts Break, Again.

As the two new posts below reveal, Jeff and I learned I was pregnant again at Thanksgiving, blessed with a new little life after our second round of injections and IUI.

Turns out that 2012 wasn't our year after all. It's been bookended by the losses of our two sweet July babies, Blueberry and Beanster. Today feels both eerily similar to and strangely different from January 13, 2012. Our D&C will be performed in the Maryland headquarter offices of our capable and gentle RE, not in a hospital. This time, extensive genetic testing will be performed, both on our little Beanster and on me. Jeff will not sit alone in the waiting room as I go through surgery; our beloved friend, M, will sit by his side. And we won't come home to an empty house; friends will come to distract us with silly movies, and our church family will bring dinner.

In some ways, this time is so much less lonely. We'd shared our joy--very intentionally--with so many, and so they are wrapping us in prayer and home-cooked meals and constant texts and emails of encouragement. And that is so nourishing and good, and it holds the grief at bay for whole hours at a time.

But, in other ways, this time is so much scarier. We've now lost two sweet angels, both in the seventh week of their brief lives inside me. We know, with this one, that a tiny heart actually stopped beating, which puts our type of miscarriage in a very small minority. It seems the issue isn't just getting me pregnant (as we thought) but keeping me pregnant. And so I am overwhelmed with fear and guilt and doubt. Why can't my body keep my babies alive? What if all the testing reveals nothing we can fix? How do I watch the man I adore and would do anything for grieve again for a lost opportunity at fatherhood?

I trust my heavenly Father has a Plan, and I don't even need to know what it is today. Right now, I just need to make it through today.