Pregnancy after loss

I am almost in my eighth month of pregnancy with our rainbow baby Willow. My second pregnancy has been similar to pregnancy with the Berkley physically.  Mentally it is completely different. In the beginning of the pregnancy it was very exciting and gave us a renewed sense of hope. The summer flew by and were some of the happiest months we have had in the past year. The highlight of the summer was finding out that we were expecting our second daughter. I was going to try to tell our family together the gender of the baby but, that didn’t happen. I couldn’t even get into the car without starting to make the first phone call to tell our family we were having our second daughter.

Tony and I both really wanted a second daughter but, knew it was most likely going to be hard to have another daughter. Ever since we found out Berkley was a girl we had imagined raising a daughter and wondered what it would be like to have a daughter. We will hopefully know what it is like to raise a daughter in a few months. Things are complicated after you lose a child and are expecting another. I am scared that when I look at Willow I am going to wish for Berkley and that breaks my heart. Having a second daughter gives us a second chance to raise a daughter but, we will always have the void in our hearts where we should have had that chance with Berkley.

The farther we get into this pregnancy the more we begin to shut down emotionally. It’s almost like my mind is trying to protect myself incase something heartbreaking happens. The feeling is very strange and hard to explain. I am very in love with Willow. We want her here in January safe and healthy. There is some sort of disconnect with me realizing that we really are having another child in less then eight weeks. Whenever I catch myself imagining our life with Willow I stop myself and make myself think of something else. It is very hard that not only did we lose a daughter, we lost the ability to enjoy the beauty of pregnancy and engage in the excitement of the process.

We are doing our best and I’m ok with that. It’s hard for us that we are so scared and shut down but, we are trying our hardest. We both are enjoying her movements, reading stories to her at bedtime and just started on her nursery. I made her a beautiful floral mobile to hang above her crib. She will have all of her sister’s things but, we have began to pick up a couple things that are new for her.

It feels as if we are holding our breaths until she is here. Worrying about movement, hiccups, tests or ultrasounds is stressful. So far things are going good and she is doing good. We are hopeful and are trying to believe fully that she is here to stay. I am doing several things to try to keep my mind right. I am going to the gym a few days a week, going to therapy, reading blogs written by women that have/are going through this same journey, and trying to focus on the beauty in each day even when they are hard. Pregnancy after loss is hopeful, beautiful, sometimes sad, hard and complicated.