Treasures in Heaven

The Trust Project ♦ October 15, 2021 ♦ 1 Comment

“…But store up treasures in heaven, where neither moth nor decay destroys, nor thieves break in and steal…” –Matthew 6:20

Today is National Pregnancy and Infant Loss Awareness Day. Five years ago that would have meant nothing to me, today it means everything. Oh how quickly things can change. My husband and I have committed five precious souls to Jesus in five years. Prior to our losses, miscarriage was simply a word without meaning. Everyone knows when you get pregnant, there is always a chance of miscarriage. But many women do not think twice about it until it happens to them. Suddenly your world is turned upside down, and this seemingly meaningless word takes on a meaning beyond compare.

It was the fall of 2016, and I had two relatively uneventful, healthy pregnancies behind me which resulted in the birth of our two daughters, who are now 8 and 6 years old. When we found out we were pregnant again, we were overjoyed! My husband and I have always dreamed of having a large family, so we figured we were well on our way to making that happen. This time we were hoping for a boy…we figured having a little extra testosterone in the house to balance out all of the estrogen we currently had might not be a bad thing 🙂 This pregnancy felt different to me, and instinctively I knew our baby was a boy. There was no reason for us to be concerned with anything initially…no history of loss, and two previous pregnancies that resulted in living, healthy children. Our first ultrasound revealed a sweet eight week old baby with a healthy beating heart. Things progressed and seemed rather normal until I went away on a weekend youth retreat with some high schools students I was ministering to. Something felt different, my belly seemed a bit more saggy, and the vivid dreams I had been having stopped. The Monday after the retreat, I was scheduled for my second pre-natal appointment. When they went to locate the heartbeat, they couldn’t find it. By this time, I was beginning to get anxious, but they told me not to worry and that they would likely find the heartbeat on the ultrasound. After being taken to the ultrasound room, I laid down and they began their scan. I knew immediately something was not right…the baby on the screen was lifeless and still. I was alone, and all of a sudden my world seemed to fall apart in a matter of seconds.

No one prepares you for miscarriage. No one tells you what to expect, or how it feels when you are the unfortunate victim. There is no guide book, and worst of all, after it is over everyone around you expects you to act like it never happened. Somehow, because the life inside of you never came to be outside of your womb, there is an unspoken rule that your baby isn’t worth speaking about. Some people actually tell you to forget about it. Common comments can pierce to the heart, such as “I’m sure you’ll have other children” or “Maybe there was something wrong with the baby”. Although most people are well meaning, their comments can jolt you to your core. It doesn’t matter if you can have other children (which is never guaranteed even though some people mistakenly assume it is) the baby inside of you was your baby, and nothing can ever replace that life. After finding out our baby had passed, I opted to try and have a natural miscarriage at home. I delivered our sweet son James at twelve weeks, a perfectly formed little boy who literally had his hand extended in what appeared to be a blessing. But shortly after, I knew something wasn’t right. I was bleeding out, and had to be loaded onto a stretcher into an ambulance in the middle of the night. When I arrived in the ER, I was barely conscious from all the blood loss, but I vaguely remember a doctor asking me if I had other children at home. When I said yes he replied with something akin to “Well, at least you have other children.” In that moment, I couldn’t believe the insensitivity of that doctor. He may of thought he was saying something comforting, but in reality his words poured salt on my already open wound. I wanted to scream “I may have other children, but did you know this was my first son! His life mattered!” I had to spend the rest of that night and the next day on the labor and delivery floor, trying to complete a miscarriage and hearing a lullaby being played every time a baby was born. Meanwhile, my now lifeless son was lying in a box that my husband and I had put together for him when we found out he had passed.

Experiencing a miscarriage puts you right at the foot of the cross with Jesus. You may not be the one physically dying, but you are watching your baby slip from this life into the next and you are powerless to do anything about it. You feel the agony, and with every drop of blood you shed you are living the way of the crucified Christ and His sorrowful Mother. There are so many feelings that accompany miscarriage, stillbirth, or infant loss that no one ever talks about. Perhaps you ended up having an unplanned pregnancy that you weren’t prepared for, but then you lost the baby and feel guilty for having hesitancy. There are other couples who try for years just to conceive, only to have their hopes and dreams devastatingly ripped away from them when they lose their baby. Other mothers may be told not to grieve their child and to move on, only to realize years later they have a wound from their miscarriage which never fully healed. Guilt is a huge emotion associated with miscarriage. The second you learn of your baby’s passing, your thoughts can immediately turn inward. “What did I do? Was it because I went running after my other toddler? Should I not have drank that cup of coffee or ate that lunch meat sandwich?” There are a million and one reasons to blame yourself for a miscarriage, but the truth of the matter is, a miscarriage is hardly ever the result of negligence on the part of the mother. Another terrible emotion that comes knocking at your door after miscarriage is shame. “Why was my body not able to complete something that is supposed to be natural?” “I can’t bear to tell others about my loss, and how I failed my husband, or my parents who were really wanting a grandchild”, etc. A woman should never have to live with shame after a miscarriage. Miscarriage is something that is completely out of the mother’s hands. Perhaps this is why God has allowed me to experience so many. You see, I come from a family line of movers and shakers, doers and take charge types who mistakenly think we can somehow plan our lives out in the way we want them to go. My miscarriages have humbled me greatly and made me realize that I can plan all I want, but ultimately God is writing my life story and the sooner I make myself comfortable with that, the better it is going to be for me.

When I finally began to think that maybe, just maybe my miscarriage days were behind me, it happened again. A couple of months ago, my husband and I were sitting outside of the Cathedral church of our diocese, asking ourselves the question we have asked each other countless times. Were we ready to be open to another child? Even though I had three previous miscarriages (including the loss of our twins in September 2019), we went on to have two more healthy boys in between those losses. I was feeling good and thinking that perhaps I could finally have two healthy pregnancies in a row again, but praying for whatever God wanted. We weren’t actively trying for another baby, but we knew there was a possibility of conception and felt open to that. When my cycle hadn’t returned mid July and the days of its impending arrival came and went, I figured I should take a pregnancy test. I knew I had felt extra tired lately, but I figured it was because I was a mom of four now. When I got a positive result, I didn’t know what to think. Of course we were happy, but after loss my husband and I are now a bit guarded when we see those two pink lines. Why? Because we know a positive pregnancy test is not a guarantee of happily ever after and a baby in your arms at the end. I don’t know if either of us were expecting a possibility to become a reality again so quickly, but after loss you welcome any baby that comes your way…all of our children are so precious to us. We began imagining what our lives would be like with five children, and speculating about the sex of the baby…we both felt it was a girl this time.

I was busy planning and preparing for my husband’s family to visit at the end of July. It was special this time around because we were actually going to be able to tell his mom and sister in person about our pregnancy, which is something we hadn’t be able to do since learning we were pregnant with our first. They arrived on a Wednesday, we told them on a Thursday, and I began miscarrying on Friday evening. I didn’t know what to think this time, so I just tried not to think at all. I was hosting people in my home, and I was miscarrying another baby. And this wasn’t my second or third miscarriage, it was my fourth. It didn’t seem fair. We had just begun planning and hoping and dreaming…having five children may not seem like a dream to everyone, but a house full of little ones has always been a welcome thought to me and my husband. The weekend progressed, and I knew I was losing our baby. Somehow, I made myself push through. On Sunday, August 1, our sweet Sophia Catherine entered into eternal life, not into our arms nine months later as we had hoped. That Sunday in mass, I left my dreams at the foot of the cross with Jesus.

There is something so innately wrong about miscarriage. The child you had hopes and dreams for, the life that had begun developing in your womb, just stops. And when their life stops, your whole world stops. You should never have to wrap your developing child in a toilet paper shroud and bury them in a box in the ground. It just shouldn’t happen. But it does, and then you are left with the whys. I have learned that there are never any real answers to the whys, there are simply some things in this life we will never fully understand. As I reflect on this day, and what it means to so many women, especially to me, I find myself still struggling. My rate of pregnancy success now stands at 50%…four healthy pregnancies, and four miscarriages (but five children in heaven because of our twins) .

Friends, I can’t tell you why I have lost so many children. I can’t tell you why moms and dads continue to experience stillbirths, why some children are born with fatal conditions that only allow them to live a few hours, or why some women lose all of their pregnancies and never give birth to any living children. These realities and the reasons behind them are known to God alone. But I do know where my treasure lies…and that is in heaven. I used to be extremely afraid of death as a child…now my heavenly children point the way to my true home and the happiness that lies therein. My husband so poignantly stated after our most recent loss “God is just increasing our joy in heaven!” What a beautiful and profound thought. Yes Lord, thank you for increasing our joy! I recently attended a ceremony with many other moms and dads to commemorate our children lost through miscarriage, stillbirth, or infant loss. At this ceremony, you are invited to take a pinwheel for each baby you have lost and write a special message on it. As I looked around at the others present, many had one, or maybe two pinwheels…not five. But when I looked down at my full hands, grief intermingled itself with joy and a profound feeling of being extremely blessed. I have five sweet treasures in heaven and four on earth…yes Lord, my cup overfloweth.

“Do not store up for yourselves treasures on earth, where moth and decay destroy and thieves break in and steal. But store up treasures in heaven, where neither moth nor decay destroys, nor thieves break in and steal. For where your treasure is, there also will your heart be.” ~Matthew 6: 19-21