November 4, 2011 the day to remember Brielle Grace

Our adventure started on October 1st... well technically it started two weeks prior but we will skip those details. October 1st I decided to pee on a stick. Partially for fun because almost no on gets pregnant the first time (even though with did with Riley) but partially because I had a gut feeling.

The first came back faint but a clear positive. The following day it came back a bit darker and the third it came back much darker. We were absolutely thrilled! We calculated that the baby would be due June 8, 2012, perfect timing for the summer. "Our RAINBOW baby is on his or her way!"

and the adventure begins!

Babies flooded our lives as we started to plan and share the news with our family. I wanted this to be our rainbow baby so bad. I was a bit fearful because of losing Riley just a few months prior but I truly thought this would be our first bring home baby. I jumped on Baby Center and started to chat with other Due in June Mommas. Symptoms, emotions and gory questions. We quickly made our first obgyn appointment at about seven weeks. Excitement couldn't even begin to describe our feelings.

Six Weeks

 Momma Author was feeling great. I was nauseous, headaches, leg cramps, sore boobs, I had the whole nine yards and was loving it. I never minded pregnancy symptoms because it was just a reminder that Baby Bug was there. This kind of "sickness" I just couldn't bring myself to complain about because it was such a blessing to be pregnant again. I cannot completely describe the emotions behind this. I felt like the sun was starting to rise after an eternity of night. It made my eyes ache and I couldn't believe how blessed we were.

We decided to announce it to our families on Thanksgiving because the baby would be about twelve weeks by then. I was planning for Christmas and maternity shopping for a dress for my cousins wedding on December 30th. I spent much of my day thanking God for my Riley and my growing Junebug baby.

First ultrasound of bug

We went through our first doctors appointment and everything looked great! I spent that day on cloud nine. However the following day I spotted a bit and panicked. My mom took me to the ER just to make sure that everything was looking okay. The bleeding had stopped but we wanted to make sure. The ER NP told me that we were measuring a bit small for seven weeks but my HCG was good and everything else looked okay. I had ketones in my urine so they said the spotting was most likely from being dehydrated. The doctor put me on bed rest and sent me home.

We felt better because my HCG was good. With Riley my HCG had already began to crash when we went to the ER. I had hope that God would take care of this rainbow baby. We cried and prayed for days until my next doctors appointment. I saw a different doctor than my regular obgyn but she seemed really hopeful. She had a student shadowing her and the student agreed that it looked like I was just earlier than we thought I was and that everything would be okay. I was put on a rotating carb and protein every two hours. I was supposed to drink 3/4 of a gallon to a whole gallon a day. They said that I wasn't gaining weight because the baby was sucking up all my nutrients. I gladly changed my diet and started to eat around the clock. My weight didn't change much but I started to feel better. I felt confidant that things would be better.

Seven weeks

Taken from a previous post (this is too hard for me to retell):
I was on bed rest until Friday and that was horrible to just sit there and lay there all day with nothing to do but think about Bug. My heart was breaking out of fear that we would lose Bug the same way that we lost Riley. I kept thinking about my first baby and looking at his memory box and crying. I wanted Bug to be my rainbow baby so bad. Andrew wanted this to be our earthly baby  so bad. Andrew took care of me for those days. I didn't have to lift a finger. It was a good thing he was there because I could not have survived those days if it wasn't for him taking care of me. I am forever grateful to my amazing husband, the father of my two babies. Friday morning came and Andrew took me to my doctors appointment. The doctor told me that it was unlikely that we would be able to see the baby let alone a heartbeat because of all the bleeding. The tech told me that it would probably look the same as the ultrasound at the ER.  

The tech started doing an ultrasound and immediately stopped. She said, "I saw a fetal pole, we will do an internal to try to catch the heartbeat." I was floored. I started sobbing on the bed and she thought I was choking. I saw on the screen that Bug was there and she said she thought she saw a flicker of a heartbeat but it wasn't steady so she couldn't count the beats. She said, "yup, you are probably just earlier than we thought!" She took lots of pictures but Bug kept hiding. I was so excited to see our little baby. At the ER they wont let you see the ultrasound because its an emergency ultrasound so this was the first time we saw our baby. The gestational sack was small but the yolk sac was good size and Bug was there. The baby kept hiding behind the yolk sac and she couldn't get the machine to hold still but we still saw Bug! My heart soared that we finally were able to see our second child. I felt better about the pregnancy. This was a miracle because we never even had a picture of Riley. The only ultrasound we had was the one at the ER. This time we have pictures of the Baby even after the doctor said we probably wont be able to see a heartbeat we saw the flicker! A little miracle we are forever thankful for.

That was until two days later I started bleeding really heavily. TMI: I started clotting and this is what scares me the most. Many pregnancies bleed, in fact about 30-40% of women spot at least once during the first trimester. I am still bleeding and clotting at the moment. We have an ultrasound this Friday, November 4th, to see if the baby is still there or the baby has already passed on. I will be 9 weeks this Friday. The doctor told us that the baby has about a 1% chance of surviving because of the low HCG levels, Bug was measuring small and didn't have a steady heartbeat at 8 weeks."

Nine weeks

We had our appointment yesterday the 4th and find out that the baby's heart had already stopped. Nine weeks to the day we found out our baby had passed away. We kind of knew it was coming but it didn't make the blow any easier.

On the ultrasound it showed that the baby was still in my womb. With the amount of blood that has been passing the doctor thought the baby should have passed already. She is now worried about infection. The doctor offered me a surgical D&C which I turned down and Cytotec. Cytotec is the brand name of misoprostol. Misoprostol is an abortion drug. I bawled when she said "cytotec" because that is the drug they give you to start a chemical abortion. I know if I would take it that it wouldn't be aborting my baby but I just could not bring myself to take the same drug that women used to kill their children. As all of you know I am strongly pro-life and so just the idea of using the same drug makes me sick to my stomach. I have no problem with people having a D&C or taking cytotec if the baby has already passed away but I just can't do it. It is not for me.

So now all I can do is wait and pray that my body handles this on its own without medical intervention. Riley's sack had already collapsed and was passing by the time I was at the ER with him. This time the doctor told me that it could take two weeks for the baby to pass and the bleeding to stop. She warned me that a small percentage of women can bleed for a month. I am praying that God heals me quickly.

Andrew and I talked about it for a while and decided to name the baby. I wanted a name that started with a "b" because we had nicknamed the baby "Bug" short for Junebug. I was laying in bed one night and the name Brielle popped into my head. I grabbed the baby name book we had bought to look at names and Brielle wasn't in there. Google came up with the name (what would we do without google). Brielle means "Heroine of the Lord" and comes from the masculine name Gabriel (the angel).

So we decided to name the baby we wanted to dearly:

Brielle Grace Hudgins

Grace because we fell into God's grace even when we were so angry with Him for taking our second child. I was very angry but now I am just numb. I have no idea why God would take two of my children away from us but it is in His plan. I just dwell on the fact that we will all have eternity together in heaven. Two Glory babies are waiting for us there, only that idea keeps me going.