8 Words

TRIGGER WARNING – This post includes content on the topic of miscarriage that may be upsetting for some readers.

With National Pregnancy and Infant Loss Remembrance Day coming up on October 15, I felt it was time to share my own story. Not only a story of loss but also a story of healing. A story of family and forging closer bonds when grief hits. Of leaning on each other when life slaps you in the face and drags you through the mud. A story of how 8 simple words can either destroy you or heal you. I share this story in hopes that it can help someone else, and if you have your own story of pregnancy or infant loss, I hope you will share it with me as well.

“I’m sorry ma’am, but the fetus didn’t survive”. Those 8 words can alter your entire trajectory. These words that countless other women have heard, and now I joined those ranks. Even with how common it is (10-20% of all pregnancies end in miscarriage), nobody tells you about the self-blame, the emptiness, the internal struggle that follows. All the hope and excitement you feel after seeing those 2 pink lines can be ripped from you in an instant. It’s excruciatingly painful.

The Aftermath

The weeks that followed those 8 devastating words were a blur of doctor’s appointments, pain, rivers of tears, and surviving. My body didn’t want to admit defeat, and after 2 rounds of the medication, Cytotec, didn’t work, they went ahead with a D&C (Dilation and Curettage) to complete the miscarriage. I went home that day with an empty womb and a numbness I felt to my core.

On the outside I was handling it, doing the day-to-day tasks required of the mother of a young child, but I found myself unable to focus, let alone find much joy in life. My grad school advisor, a father himself, had me take a break until the following fall to give myself a chance to heal and find my focus again. While I knew he was right, it also meant I had too much time to overthink things. To wonder if I could have prevented it. To wonder what I did wrong. To fall deeper into a dark hole of depression. I couldn’t let that happen. My older son was about 16 months old, and he deserved to get his mother back. I knew I needed to find an outlet.

Being in nature has always had a calming effect on me, whether it’s relaxing in a hammock, hiking a 14er, camping, etc. I figured it was a good place to start looking for myself again. As if on cue, I happened across a post in a local Facebook hiking group advertising a fairly new hiking challenge in the area we were living in at the time. Call it God, fate, destiny, or just a convenient coincidence, but something about this challenge called out to me as if saying “Hey, I’m right here! I can help you heal!”.

Hearing the Call of the Trail

The challenge involved reaching 12 peaks in the Adirondack Mountains surrounding Lake George, New York. With some research, I discovered that not many people had completed the challenge yet. It made sense since one of the peaks involved a bushwhack to the summit and another involved 14-16 miles of hiking. However, the more I researched, the more I wanted to try it… as a family. After all, I wasn’t the only one who needed to heal.

I talked it over with my husband and he reluctantly agreed to give it a try. We weren’t exactly in excellent hiking shape, but he could tell that I needed this. I needed something to focus on. Something that wouldn’t be easy for us but could be rewarding in so many ways. I started to feel just a little bit more whole again.

Instead of dwelling on what was lost, we got to work planning routes. The 12 peaks included some easy summits along with some strenuous inclines. This required researching possible bail-out points and backup plans in case the long, strenuous climbs proved to be too much with a toddler in tow.

The Start of a Journey

The day came for our first peak, and I was nervous. I knew that once we started, I HAD to finish it. I couldn’t take another loss. We started with an easier peak to get our bearings and progressively climbed harder peaks. Every time we marked off a summit, I felt more confident and more like myself again. I could feel that hole left by what could have been slowly closing with each footprint down the trail.

We were all slowly healing through the power of nature and connection. As a side benefit, we were becoming closer as a family and making so many amazing memories along the way. Our now 18-month-old was getting used to longer stints in the framed hiking pack, singing or napping along the way. He would explore and walk short spurts down the trail until his little legs got tired. In hindsight, this family journey we embarked on is likely what set him on his current path as a capable, avid hiker and outdoor lover at 8 years old.

Our toughest hike, a 15-mile traverse complete with a roller-coaster of peaks and about a million biting insects, put our determination (and marriage) to the test. We were able to mark off 3 of the 12 challenge peaks in this one hike, but it also required thousands of feet in elevation gain and our toddler was being particularly fussy that morning. It was rough. I was so tempted to bail out early, but my husband reminded me why we were doing this. I leaned on his faith that we could manage it, and by the time we made it back to the parking lot about 8 hours later, I was so high on adrenaline that I cried. I was so overly exhausted and yet so utterly full of life!

Finishing Strong… and Whole

Our Final Peak Marker

Our final hike was one of the easier peaks. We considered it our “victory lap” to finish out the challenge. It wasn’t until we reached the parking lot that I realized that had I carried the baby to term, they would have been born right around that day. I was shocked that I hadn’t thought about it before then. I was so busy planning routes and looking ahead to the next hike, that I hadn’t even realized the significance of the timing. It made for an emotional hike. By the time we made it to the peak, I was bawling. I not only cried for what we had lost but also for what we had just accomplished. We grew so much through those months of planning and hiking, and we likely never would have considered taking on this challenge had we not needed this outlet.

We were able to take the pain we felt (because let’s be real, my husband felt that pain too) and use that energy to accomplish something amazing. I still wonder what that little whisper of a being would have been like today had I never heard those devastating 8 words. However, instead of letting the “what could have been” thoughts swallow us, we look back on those incredible memories, put one foot in front of the other, and accept the things we cannot change.

Getting a Victory Smooch From My Oldest

Turning Devastation into Healing

Shortly after finishing the challenge, my husband smiled at me one night and said, “You did it, you found your way back!”. 8 words. 8 glorious, healing words to take the place of the 8 devastating words that started this journey. We were blessed with another healthy son a few years later, who just happens to be the most nature-loving one of all of us (and that’s saying something!). Life works in mysterious ways, but hitting the trails and letting Mother Nature wash over us will always be our healing source.