Parallizing fear

In my last few posts, I have talked about losing our first child, Angel. To continue...


After we lost Angel to a miscarriage, I was overwhelmed by a blur of anger, sorrow, confusion, but mostly FEAR. The day that I described in a previous post, when the baby left my body, was sobering. The moment I knew for sure that our baby was gone and that all hope was lost, I was actually hit by a sudden wave of calm. I don't understand it at all, but I was just stunned to silence. There was nothing left to beg God for. There was nothing I could do to save our child. There was no hope. It was just ...over.


For the next 24 hours I experienced excruciating craps and bleeding. In fact, there was so much pain and blood, I was convinced I was bleeding to death. I called the doctor several times, and after heavy narcotic pain meds and assurances that it was normal didn't calm me down, he scheduled a D&C.

The couple of days that I waited for the D&C were very lonely. I felt like God had abandoned me, and while my husband was always there and always doing an amazing job taking care of me, I had closed myself off emotionally to him. I wanted so badly to be a mother. I wanted so much to meet my baby. I remember asking God several times to take me so I could be with my baby. In fact, I was afraid I was never going to wake up from the D&C, but I would have welcomed it that day. 


After the D&C I became terrified that I was going to get an infection from the procedure. And if my uterus got infected, I may never be able to have more children. So I went in to see the OBGYN 4 times in the following two weeks because of pains and cramps and fears. On the fourth visit, my OBGYN gave me the contact info of a counselor who specializes in pregnancy loss and infertility. I was embarrassed, and I didn't call the counselor, not yet anyway.


My fear grew and grew and grew to a monstrous size. I would sit by the phone while my husband drove to work, afraid he was going to die in a traffic accident. I called him at work very regularly to make sure the chemical plant he worked at hadn't blown up. I worried about my parents and about my cat. I was afraid of a forest fire burning down our house. 


My fear grew as my trust in God shrank. While pregnant, I had prayed every day for God to take care of my baby and He chose not to. He could have... but He didn't. So why would He protect my husband and my home? Why would he take care of anything I cared about? Until Angel died, I knew that God would protect and care for me and my family, but with the loss of Angel went the loss of that confidence.


God has a plan, and He is in control. "And we know that God causes everything to work together for the good of those who love God and are called according to his purpose for them." But unfortunately, He still lets bad things happen to His people. And He let a bad thing happen to me and my husband.


In reality, the whole experience helped me to understand how little my plans and desires really mattered. It showed me how little control I really have.