I’ve been inspired to share my testimony of Julia and her pregnancy (or do I say my pregnancy with her?). 

In November 2006, the day after Thanksgiving, I found out I was pregnant. I wasn’t thoroughly surprised, as we’d been trying for a few months, and I was pretty late. It was a strange feeling, because just a week before I woke up feeling rather sick and immediately thought “I’m pregnant”. Since I’d thought that every month after coming off the pill, I prayed that God would calm my heart and that if this was “it” He’d reveal it to me through morning sickness/test/etc. Within a few days I stopped feeling very sick, just tired. A few days later I took a test. Positive.

Yet, there was a fear that surrounded me. How was it, that I felt sick, but now didn’t? Was that normal? I mean, the test said yes, but something deep, deep inside me said no. But time went on. One week, then two. Jonathan was reserved about sharing our news, where part of me thought if we started sharing then it would be real, and these fears would be unfounded.

On December 10, two weeks since I took the pregnancy test, I began cramping and spotting. I immediately knew things were wrong, that I was having a miscarriage. We went about our day; it was Sunday so we went to church that morning, had lunch with some friends, then went to house church that night. We didn’t make it through house church, before I begged Jonathan to take me home. My body was breaking, as was my heart.

That night I took a long bath, trying to meditate on God, trying to realize that everything was and would be okay. That God was good and would come through. Maybe everything would be fine. Maybe my baby was fine. I’d call the doctor in the morning, and maybe, just maybe, they’d tell me that this was normal, that the baby was still alive.

Monday morning I went to work, called the clinic and explained my symptoms. I will never forget the nurse on the other line when she said “You know there’s nothing we can do. You know that you’ve lost the baby. Come in anyway to see a doctor.”

I lost it. I’m not sure if in all my fears I was still clinging to the shred of some hope, but in that moment everything was shattered.

Jonathan met me at the clinic, where we were seen right away. The worst part of the process was that my doctor wasn’t there, so I was seen by someone new, by a man. There was something invasive about the whole process. His mannerisms, continually referring to my baby as a fetus, never acknowledging that my baby was just that, a baby. Today was just the beginning of what seemed a long and too painful road to endure.