God obviously wanted me pregnant. We were preventing pregnancy and honestly, may be too much info, but the one egg I had dropped in two years somehow got fertilized. God obviously was giving me the greatest gift He could. So with that, I presented Steve with a name I wanted if this baby was indeed another girl.
"Steve, if it's a girl, I really like the name SHILOH. It means God's gift. And obviously, beyond a shadow of a doubt, God wants us to have THIS gift."
Steve thought about it for a moment and said, "Well, I'm not sure. Let's think about it." I hadn't gotten him convinced yet. Plus, I knew he was thinking I was jumping the gun even thinking it's a girl because he quickly responded, "You know...I could have made a boy this time too!"
A few days went by and I started feeling periods of "morning sickness." Then one Friday afternoon, I was so sick that as soon as Steve got home, I had to go to bed. I cried to him saying, "I can't handle this for 6 more weeks if I get sick like this." Oh how I wish I could take back those cruel words. How I wish I could still feel that tinge of morning sickness.
The very next morning I woke up and was alarmed....I was spotting. Now I know that this can be fairly normal for early pregnancy but it was nothing I had done in my other pregnancies and I was spotting too much for my liking. Of course since it was the weekend, I had to call the doctor on call to put my mind at ease. The Doctor told me that this can be normal, but to call back if my bleeding got heavy. She told me to lay low all weekend. And that I did. But my emotions did not lay low.
I thought I would wake up Sunday and it would all be gone. No..the cramping was horrendous and spotting even more. I was wanting to hold out until Monday...especially since I was not "heavy bleeding" like the Doctor noted as to when I was to call back. I felt horrible all day Sunday and knew in the back of my mind, that I was losing my precious baby. The anxiety I felt was even more horrendous then the cramping I was feeling. I was asking where God was in all of this? Why couldn't I feel His comfort? All I kept hearing was a still small voice telling me, "Trust me Sarah...Trust me". But how could I? Why wasn't He telling me everything was going to be ok? Why couldn't I feel that peace that it was going to be ok? I kept asking God to speak to me...but I could feel nothing. I could hear nothing except trust. Then I asked God, "Please...God.....please just give me one word to focus on today. One word, Lord to make the object of my focus on this day." Thinking that God would give me a word such as "peace" or "It's ok". But no...the word I got was "Grace". Grace? How was I supposed to take that? But ok, Lord, I will focus on your Grace in this day...knowing you will give me the Grace to get through this and this day. But I wanted assurance that I was going to be OK. I wanted assurance my precious baby was going to be OK. I didn't hear it...I heard, "Grace...Sarah...Trust". Unfortuntely, the anxiety continued....
Monday, I woke up...even more bleeding. I called the Doctor's office first thing. The cramping was, at this point, incredibly painful. The doctor wanted me in at 10:45. My mom came up to be with me and stay with the other girls so Steve could go to the Dr.'s with me. I told my mom, "Momma, I am so scared. I will be shocked if there still is a baby here." I haven't called my Mom, "Momma" in years. But I was scared. I was a scared little girl who had no idea what was going on with her body which was in so much pain, or with a child that I loved with all my heart even though we hadn't officially met.
We got to the Doctor's office and I was trembling. The Doctor walked in to do the ultrasound and said, "You know, when I got the phone call about this this morning, and since the dates of the size of the baby didn't match up to your last period, I was concerned. You know...you are now at a high risk for miscarriage." There he said it. He even knew that most likely, he would not find that precious babe in my womb that we had just seen a week earlier bouncing around.
Imagine my surprise that right away, I saw my baby on that ultrasound screen and the heart was fluttering away!! My heart was OVERJOYED. Even the doctor was shocked. The doctor went on to say, "And not only is the heart still beating, but the baby has doubled in size since last week!! You now have an official due date of 11/1/11..just like I said last week!" My heart rejoiced and immediately I gave thanks to God above.
But why was I bleeding?
The Doctor didn't know. He replied, "It could be early signs of a miscarriage...or it could be numerous other things. Many women do bleed while pregnant. It sounds cruel, but right now you are just going to have to wait it out. Come back in a week to do another ultrasound."
And with that, he gave me the most precious pictures of my 4th baby. I was overjoyed thinking...well if the baby doubled in size from last week surely there is no way that it could be a miscarriage. For once in 3 days, my anxiety lessened up a bit.
On the way home from the Doctor's Steve looked at me and said, "Ok...if it's indeed a girl...her name is SHILOH. She honestly is a true gift after all of this."
Shiloh it was going to be.
I had asked many people to begin praying for me at this point. Praying that I would stop bleeding and that the horrendous cramping would go away. I could barely walk I was in such pain. But it appeared the bleeding wasn't slowing down at all. The anxiety started creeping back up again.
As I was rocking Harper to sleep that night in her room, I started crying out to God. I was thanking Him for the gift of my dear baby and the precious picture I head in my mind of the little heartbeat I saw with my own eyes...but was also praying for comfort...for the bleeding to stop and the cramping to go away. Now I do believe that our God is a relational God....I believe that God wants to have actual conversations with his children but many times we don't stop to listen. But as I was rocking my little one year old to sleep, God appeared to me. Now I didn't literally see God...but I knew of his presence..I could feel it...and most importantly, I could hear Him. My 20 minute actual conversation with God will stay with me forever. It went something like this...and I feel that God reaffirmed to me that indeed this baby was a girl...
First of all, He told me again the word, "Trust" and then he gave me a word picture. It looked something like this:
"Sarah, your little girl, is in my hands. Nothing can harm her. I am taking care of her right here in my hand. Fear not my child and trust me. I will give you the GRACE you need at this time."
I said, "But Lord, why am I still in pain...why aren't you taking away this bleeding?"
He said, "In time, Sarah. For now, you just need to focus your life on Seeking me with your WHOLE being. Everything else will then fall into place. With your seeking me, you will receive the wisdom to get through difficult circumstances."
I said, "Lord, I want this baby with everything I have. Thank you for blessing me with this 4th blessing. Please help me to be the mother to her that you would want...to be an example, and to raise her to love you with everything she has."
Then the Lord specificially told me something I will never never forget....
He said, "Sarah, this little baby is very very special. I cannot wait for you to meet her..."
After 20 minutes of rocking Harper and listening to my Lord, I felt calm. I felt the peace I had been yearning for. And I felt like everything would be ok. I thought I would be able to hold that special baby in my arms and meet that special baby on this side of earth....
But the next morning, I knew something was drastically wrong. The bleeding was very heavy and I was having some other symptoms that I won't go into. But didn't God tell me just a few hours earlier that He was taking care of my Shiloh? Didn't God tell me she was one special baby? Why hadn't these symptoms gone away?
I had to teach class that morning. The last thing I felt like doing was going to do a Intro to Psych lecture for an hour and a half standing on my feet. I could barely walk, let alone stand. I got to class, and I knew deep down inside that I was losing my precious baby. I couldn't handle being in class. The panic started overtaking me. I was short of breath. The room was spinning. My face was hot. I felt like I was going to throw up or pass out...I didn't know which. I needed to get out...and get out quick. I dismissed the class after only being there for 10 minutes. I couldn't do it. The peace I had just felt hours before was out the window. I was in pure panic mode.
My mom made her way up and I called the doctor's again. They couldn't get in in until early afternoon. Again more waiting. Again more agonizing. Again more pain...physically and emotionally.
We got to the Dr.'s and right away as she was doing the ultrasound, I knew that my precious Shiloh was in the Lord's Hands...literally.
After searching for my precious baby I had seen just hours before, the Dr. proceeded with the agonizing news. "Yes, I am sorry but you have had a miscarriage."
The baby I had just seen fluttering in my belly just hours before had vanished. The baby, that special baby, I had a conversation about with my Lord, that I must have misinterpreted that I would see here on earth, was literally in the Lord's hands.
My heart desperately grieved. There would be no swaddler diapers, no fresh scent of a newborn, no sleepless newborn nights around 11/1/11, and no little voice whispering , "MOMMA" for the first time from the lips of my little Shiloh.
After the Doctor left, I clung and cried on Steve's shoulder. I cried, "But Steve, we just saw her yesterday. When did it happen? "
And Steve responded,
"Probably during your conversation with God. He was literally taking care of her Sarah...right in His very own hand."
My heart ached....and unfortuntely the anxiety just lingered....but oh what God has been teaching me here...I will share what else happened soon....
