Not Okay

We got pregnant right before Thanksgiving.  We had two little girls who, for at least a little while, were growing in my womb.  This is the only picture I'll ever have of my sweet baby girls.

With our families walking this road of infertility alongside us and us being as public as we are with our IVF journey, we just don't get to have any of the fun surprises that "normal" couples get to have.  So when we scheduled our transfer and snuck away to Colorado, only a handful of people knew.  

We transferred the only two embryos we had and prayed that we would get to hold those babies in our arms.

On December 2 we heard the words from my IVF nurse that we had waited so so long to hear.  You're pregnant.  Definitively.

My HCG needed to be around 50, and mine was at 77.  Thank you, Jesus.  We are pregnant!  I literally stood in the middle of my living room and repeated those words over and over and over again.

Thank you, Jesus.

Two days later I went in for a routine blood draw just to make sure my HCG was increasing at the necessary rate.  I looked around the waiting room that morning at the women waiting there, remembering the battle it had been to get to this point.  To finally have life growing inside of my womb.  To finally be pregnant.  I don't know how to put that feeling into words.

My nurse was off that day, and it was unusually late in the day for me to not have heard from my doctor.  I finally got a hold of a nurse there.  She was somber.  My HCG had increased, but not as much as it should have.  We'd run the blood work again in two days.  

Two days later I found myself once again sitting in the waiting room for my HCG blood draw.  This time, though, I was scared.  Could this really all be taken away from me?  After the joy and the tears and the struggle?  The sweet nurse there didn't make me wait for my doctor's office to call.  She called me into an office and told me that my HCG was now at 39.  My babies were gone.

The last couple of weeks have been difficult to say the least.  My heart is broken, and I'm trying to understand why and how.  I've turned into this sad, cynical person I don't recognize.  Spiritually, it's a battle, and for now I'm just trying to be okay with not being okay.