This weekend took a turn for the terrifying.
I shared a quick note on Instagram Stories, but we ended up spending a chunk of yesterday (Sunday) in the hospital for a suspected amniotic fluid leak. I’ll spare you the TMI medical scoop here, but if you’re also pregnant and want to chat more in depth about the details, feel free to message me and we can chat. BUT. Seeing as I’m only about to be 18 weeks pregnant…that would be no bueno. It was the longest, most silent car ride J and I have had, probably SINCE everything went down during my pregnant with Olivia 4+ years ago at this point.
We made it to the hospital only to realize we were at the wrong building; when we finally made it to the *right* place, a well-meaning nurse came bouncing in the room smiling, “SO, how are we doing today!” apparently not reading my chart or reading the room – ha. I said, “Just super,” and she finally got the hint – “OH, NOT super, right?”
Right, Sharon. Right. 🙃
I’d say I did fairly well remaining calm and not panicking up until we were put in a Labor & Delivery triage room and given the laundry list of instructions for how to strip down and start testing – at which point it all kinda hit me and I started pushing off what felt like an inevitable panic attack.
It’s funny how you can do all the therapy after trauma to try and manage PTSD, but until you’re physically back IN the same triggering environment, it can be a totally different ballgame and hard to predict how your body and brain will react.
Honestly, neither J nor I had really considered the idea that something ELSE bad could happen in this pregnancy for us. We both had sights set on the 30-32 week mark and avoiding the sudden + severe preeclampsia onset I had with Olivia, so much so that I think we pushed any other negative prospect out of our brains.
So here we were, in the hospital at 17 weeks with a potential fluid leak that could be life-threatening to the baby if it was what we suspected it might be – a totally different scenario than Pregnancy Round One, and one we just didn’t see coming.
When the nurse came back to start tests, she checked my vitals before starting the ultrasound machine. While I could hear static indicating fetal movement coming from the machine, I could not hear the heartbeat that we so clearly heard in my routine checkup just two days before – and the nurse clearly couldn’t either. She tried playing it cool and saying this was normal given our gestational age, yadda yadda yadda, but we’re no strangers to detecting bad news bears from medical staff at this point in the game. She left the room to get the doctor to do a “full” ultrasound and he came in saying “the nurse couldn’t find a heartbeat so let’s get down to business,” so she was…busted. Ha.
Thankfully he found baby + heartbeat immediately and baby was active and fine, so they moved focus to me and started running tests to check for amniotic fluid loss.
Long story short, after a few hours or testing, they felt pretty confident there was no leak or ruptured membrane to worry about (THANK GOD).
They don’t really know what happened or what it WAS, but they know what it wasn’t – and that’s enough for me right now.
Really, looking at how yesterday went down, I was more inspired to share this story because of how many little Godwinks we got along the way of what felt so terrifying and terrible in the moment – that there was still good and everything would be okay.
Only a select few people in our life knew what was happening, so they were in full blown prayer warrior mode.
If you’re no stranger to CUR, I’m sure you know I believe in the power of prayer. And we had clear confirmation in two totally separate ways that things were going to be fine – which is always the best little hug from heaven when it happens.
And as we were driving back home (in much happier, lighter spirit), I was just struck to see the good along the way.
Mind you, the good isn’t always obvious. We have to LOOK for it – notice it, acknowledge it.
It’s just as easy – if not easier – to see the bad. To worry about the what-if’s and dwell on the negative that’s just as present.
But sometimes to stay sane in the journey and not spiral downward when faced with the unknown or with the possibility or things not going according to plan, the best next step, I’ve found, is pausing to 1.) pray, and 2.) find something good in what otherwise feels so bad. When we’re open to it, I think God puts those little winks on our path – things we’ll only really notice if we’re tuned into how He is working, always, in our everyday. Some may call it coincidence, some may not notice it at all – I call it God lookin’ out for His kids. Giving us moments of message admist the mess, to give us a breath of pause and peace when we could otherwise just panic.
Even though our hospital adventure started off “negatively” and was admittedly triggering to me…everything was okay in the end. We got to see Baby Gwynn again, totally active and measuring right on track. We got to leave the L&D ward with good news – something we hadn’t previously experienced. They even gave us a quick tour of the rooms in preparation for a totally normal, healthy deliver come summertime – another thing we missed in Liv’s early arrival. It felt a bit like getting to re-write the narrative in our favor, that we COULD be in Labor & Delivery and hear good news. We could breathe easier. We could have hope. We could expect a different delivery this time, and it could all be okay.
Good and bad will always co-exist.
We will always have both in our lives. Some days may feel more “good,” some more not-so-good – but the extent to which we lean into those feelings often determines the overall outlook we carry and the perspective we take on our life as a whole, as we collect “the good” and “the bad” in tandem.
It’s on us to look for the good.
It’s on us to see everything that could good wrong, but set our sights on what could go right.
I think that’s where the healing lies. The slow, still-painful process of picking pieces of the past up off the floor and putting together a puzzle that can look…beautiful. Not without its cracks, but with a full, vibrant picture of a life well lived.
THANKYOU for all of the prayers + messages that came through Instagram DMs when I quickly mentioned where we were – I haven’t gotten to go through them all yet to personally respond (I will! I promise!), but I was overwhelmed by the kindness and support in stopping to lift our little fam up to Jesus.
It will never go unnoticed or unappreciated.
So, thanks. 🙂