My Pregnancy After Loss Part 5:
The Third Trimester
The third trimester is really where the rubber hit the road for me. Everything in my pregnancy so far was familiar territory. We had already been here, done that… the announcement, the nesting, the baby clothes, the baby shower, the birth plan, the heart opening. Until the world showed me something different, I was keeping the potential of this baby actually coming home with us at bay. Mentally, I think I needed to get past 31 weeks; the week Vienna died and I delivered her.
I don’t believe it was a conscious thing; my body and mind remembered and it was just trying to keep me safe.
We eventually got to see 31 weeks, and we survived, but more importantly… so did our precious baby. The potential of her coming home to us was becoming very, very real. My body and my mind had finally caught up to my heart, and as a team, we started getting ready 🤍
Let me tell you… as much as the third trimester was intense and very scary for me, our lives were also crazy!
I don’t know about you, but I don’t know too many people who demolish their kitchen approaching the end of their high risk pregnancy. But we did. Just like this pregnancy was familiar territory, unfortunately so was renovating and our lives being absolute chaos. For us, being pregnant also meant starting a new renovation — with our first pregnancy, we bought our original 70’s house with the daydream of slowly making it our own. We tore out the carpeting and the floors, all while I was miscarrying. With Vienna, the demo’ing continued on. We had people in our backyard chopping trees literally down the day after she died. Our floors were installed when I was only a week postpartum from delivering her. With William, we had no bathrooms and no doors. I showered at the gym and used the luxurious porta potty in our driveway. With this little ones pregnancy, this time: we had no kitchen. Even though it might be insane for some, I was a well seasoned pregnant reno’er and therefore, adjusted quite easily. We had a little make shift kitchen in our garage that consisted of a hot plate, a microwave, a kettle and of course… most importantly, my coffee maker. I think the craziest part of it all was that I prepped my postpartum freezer from our garage with this set up. (So, when I say my postpartum freezer prep recipes are easy… please know, they have been tried, tested and true! haha.)
Our lives were on the brink of a big change beyond my pregnancy, too. My husband, Scott, was preparing to leave his job and close the company he had poured so much of himself into. After nearly eight years of dedication—giving his time, energy, and heart—this was no small decision. He was stepping into a new era, hopefully his earth dad era, and… well, we didn’t know exactly what would come next. But with anticipation and excitement, we were ready to figure out what his next steps would be together.
When we entered the third trimester and approached the same gestation when things went awry with Vienna, my monitoring was increased. My doctors reassured me that while they didn’t necessarily think the amount of extra monitoring I wanted was medically required, they fully supported it. They reminded me that frequent check-ins were a good plan if they gave me peace of mind. Most importantly, they let me take the lead—I was in charge of my care plan, and they were there to support whatever I needed. Magic to my ears.
Sometimes, this was both a blessing and a curse. Of course, any care provider who puts you in the driver’s seat is amazing in my books (as they all should), but my anxiety was so high—I wanted as much monitoring as possible. At the same time, my anxiety would spike heading into those very scans. So I was anxious between scans, anxious before scans… the only real relief I felt was when I was actively looking at or monitoring my baby.
I knew I had some work to do with my therapist, but also—this was just how it was. OF COURSE I was going to be anxious, this was my 5th pregnancy. I did what I could to ground myself. I leaned on my supports: my community of loss moms, connecting with my baby, body work, distraction—whatever tools I had, and most of the time, they helped.
At this point, we started doing every other week ultrasounds with something called a Biophysical Profile — where it would measure baby’s movement, their breathing, their tone, their fluids, their heart and how they respond to movement. We also added in another test called a Non-stress test, which is another way to check in to baby’s heart rate and movements, and how they are responding to potential contractions. As we got further, and further into my gestation, these also increased in frequency. By the end of my pregnancy, I was going twice a week. Sometimes, every other day. Essentially, I felt like a lived at the hospital at this point, but I was okay with it.
Every week that passed I told myself, “this is the week I am going to tell people!", “this is the week I’ll announce on social media” … and I would chicken out. A big part of me felt, this is going so well, I am handling the anxiety, I am enjoying my little bubble… do I potentially want to risk interfering with that? Do I want to risk some well-intentioned comment hurting or triggering my already fragile heart? Did I want to feel the added pressure and eyes on me? And worst off… did I want to have to go back to all these people and break their hearts again, if I were to lose this baby, too? I had a strong, loving community built on my social media. People who were really rallying behind me, whose hearts broke with me when Vienna died. Who watched me rise out of the ashes only to break once again when William passed. It just felt like a lot. I didn’t believe in jinxing, I really didn’t, but I really did feel like I wanted to protect my community, and myself.
One night I had a little bit of a meltdown. I looked back on my pregnancy, and I really grieved how lonely it felt. I really grieved that this baby didn’t get the hoorah or celebration she deserved. And that I didn’t get the celebration I deserved. If you don’t already know this part of my story, Vienna died the same week as my baby shower for her, so it was very valid that I had anxieties with celebrating. But something shifted at 34 weeks. When I envisioned a goal, it was always “let’s just get to 34 weeks.” No idea why — but it’s the number I had in my head. When we did get there, as surprising and overwhelming as it was, we definitely celebrated. I bought a cake, we took some beautiful videos on the beach — and I finally announced to the world: I AM PREGNANT!
To be continued….
my breech baby
planning my birth
my maternity shoot
and; did we finish our kitchen in time? (lol)