Big Brother

Noah’s sibling is currently growing inside me, and as we move into the second trimester, I’m starting to feel a little more comfortable making that fact known to the wider world. Of course, this pregnancy is marked by the knowledge that there is no “safe” point in pregnancy, no point at which we can just assume we will come home with a baby once our nine month gestational period is over. However, I can’t help finding some comfort in watching the statistical chances of losing this pregnancy go down. A niggling voice in my head likes to remind me that we’ve been on the wrong side of statistics before (I can’t even find a number specific to cord prolapse, though I know the chance of having any type of fatal cord accident is one in a thousand), but I know I need to cling to hope instead of fear. We are praying we will welcome this baby into the world in early to mid February (the actual due date is currently under debate).

I discovered I was pregnant the morning before Mark’s birthday and I wish I could tell you I kept the secret so I could let it be a special birthday surprise, but news this significant is hard to contain, so I told him as soon as we were reunited at the airport that evening (he had been in Maine and I in Ohio for the preceding week). I also felt like I needed his support right away – in spite of my best efforts, my mind was already reeling with thoughts of the many ways we could lose this baby. When I went in for my annual exam in February and told the doctor we were going to start trying to get pregnant again, her first response was to tell me that the rate of miscarriage is 30% and ask me if I thought I could handle another loss so soon. At the time, I had confidently said we had relied on our faith to get us through the worst tragedy of our lives, and we would trust God to get us through whatever happened next. As I processed the news of our new pregnancy, I still firmly believed in that statement, but suddenly the grim statistics she quoted in the office were haunting me. Was I really ready to face the possibility of another loss?

As the days started to pass, I spent a lot of time praying for a peace that passes understanding, and we confided in others who we knew would pray for us and for the health and safety of the baby. For the most part, I managed to stay fairly calm, though I dealt with several moments of fear in the middle of the night (everything seems worse at 2 a.m.). I was also anxious going into our first ultrasound, but the tech found the heartbeat almost immediately. Hearing that sound again was incredible, especially after the silence we experienced when the nurses were trying to find Noah’s heartbeat at the hospital while I was in labor. I will never forget that silence.

Knowing the pregnancy was viable at that point helped my state of mind, but for a long time I still found myself qualifying every statement about the baby with the clause “if all goes well.” My brother and his girlfriend got engaged toward the end of June and people started talking about having the baby at their April wedding, but I always had to interject “assuming all goes well.” Even when talking about the holidays this year and how huge I’ll be, I couldn’t help saying “if all goes well.” I thought I’d be doing that for the entire pregnancy, but I’ve noticed lately that my compulsion to interject that clause has tapered off. I think I’ve made a subconscious decision to start allowing myself to simply hope for a future with this child without trying to manage expectations by reminding myself and others that we can’t assume anything. On some level, we all know any number of things could happen to turn life upside down in an instant, but we don’t say things like, “if I don’t get hit by a bus before Thanksgiving, then I’ll make the sweet potatoes.” We just can’t live with that kind of mindset, so I shouldn’t think such thoughts about my pregnancy.

We had an ultrasound earlier this week and got to see the baby really looking like a baby. Our first ultrasound was early enough that all we could really see was a blob with a heartbeat, but this time we could see the hands with their tiny fingers, the head with the nose and mouth, the little feet – it’s amazing the detail you can see even at this stage. Watching the baby on the screen was an emotional mixed bag for me. I was incredibly relieved to see the baby looking so healthy, and seeing the parts of its body made the whole thing so real. However, I was also flooded with memories of Noah’s ultrasounds and the realization that those times we saw him wiggling around on that screen were the only times we got to see him alive and moving. I think that mix of emotions is going to be fairly typical of this pregnancy as we experience incredible joy mixed with wistful sadness. I feel ready for this part of the grief journey, though, as there is certainly part of us that will heal when we bring a living baby home.

This post has gotten to be quite long, so I’m going to wrap it up now. My goal is to start updating this blog much more regularly with news of the pregnancy and reflections on this part of our journey, so please stay tuned if you are interested. For now, I am going to leave you with some pictures of baby Schuenke number two (we don’t have a nickname yet – please feel free to make suggestions).