Rainbow Pregnancy, the Waiting Game.

It’s an honor to have my dear, sweet friend Ashley Bridges on the blog today. She writes with such honesty and her love for her children, both here on this earth and deep in her heart, gone to soon babies in Heaven. Her dependence on Christ during this time is taking her into a place most will not experience, the deep loss of children gone before they are kissed.

I am standing in the gap for her in prayer, claiming wholeness to her baby growing even now in her womb. Her fifth pregnancy:

The number 5 symbolizes God’s grace, goodness and favor toward humans and is mentioned 318 times in Scripture. Five is the number of grace, and multiplied by itself, which is 25, is ‘grace upon grace’ (John 1:16). The Ten Commandments contains two sets of 5 commandments. The first five commandments are related to our treatment and relationship with God, and the last five concern our relationship with others humans.

Thank you Jesus for this fifth baby , made in love.

Ashley, and her beautiful girls.

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G-5, P-2, SAB-2, Current Gestation-8w6d. This is what my chart would read at an OBGYN office. 5 pregnancies, 2 live births, 2 spontaneous abortions (aka miscarriages), & currently pregnant. Those numbers define me. Those numbers haunt me.

As I lay here in bed feeling nauseated and depressed, I decide to write. I decide to try to connect to anyone going through what I’m going through. Funny enough, I don’t really want to connect with anyone at all. I’ve been in bed all year long (happy new year), and that’s where I want to be. Away from people. Away from anyone who might talk to me about my pregnancy. I don’t want to face it. I’m not ready.

Around 6 weeks in my pregnancies, I’m one of the blessed ones that begin feeling sick. I get nauseated and often throw up, sometimes multiple times a day. This go round, we’ve also had the flu and sinus attacks hit us twice! So in the bed I’ve stayed. Week 6 was especially difficult for me. Emotions came flooding in with the sickness and I was filled with nothing but time to think. Thinking about what could be happening. Thinking about what could be wrong. Thinking that I wasn’t sick enough or I wasn’t growing enough. Emotions-emotions-emotions. Understandable though, right? After those 2 spontaneous abortions last year. Spontaneous. I’ll say. I didn’t want to be caught off guard. Again. I wanted to prep myself this time. Just in case! I try to stay positive, but as my midwife put it so eloquently “the heart is so much harder to convince than the head”. That blessed woman, I love her dearly. She’s so right. So, thanks to my unconvinced heart, I sank into my pillows and my depression. Then I avoided thinking by binge watching Gilmore Girls. Thanks Netflix!

Week 8. Things are looking up. Still feeling sick, boobs are sore. Good signs right?! Emotional, and growing! Am I growing? Oh no, what if I’m not growing. I can’t tell. Why can’t time go faster?! I just want to hear a heartbeat, and feel a flutter. I cry to myself until Netflix loads and I begin to binge watch Friends. In between episodes, I choose to seek council. I reach out to my friend and the apprentice to my midwife. I share with her my feelings of despair, my hurting heart, my knowledge of all the good things I should be thinking, yet can’t. She gives me special advice. She tells me that if this baby is not meant to be held here on earth, not meant to be cuddled, not meant to grow up before our eyes, then there’s nothing we can do. All you can do is love your baby now. Enjoy your time with this little one. No matter how long you have with baby, enjoy the moments.

My baby is inside me now. Hopefully growing perfectly! So I’m choosing to love on my baby. It doesn’t mean I’m ok yet. Being pregnant after a miscarriage (or two) is one of the most difficult things I’ve ever done. I’m a wreck and I can’t do anything about it. The one thing I can do is enjoy my baby while I have it. Whether 11 weeks or 80 years, I’m choosing to enjoy my babies. So I put my hand on my belly and pray for the babe inside. Then I hug my big girls who can’t wait to have a new sister (or brother, but there’s no telling them that). Then we wait. Wait to hear, wait to feel, wait to hold. Life is full of waiting and it’s no fun!