Ep 15: Navigating a Late Miscarriage

leaving the hospital that you're normally leaving Proudly showing off your new baby. Everybody has to get wheeled on a wheelchair. Everybody looks at you as you walk by Congratulations. Oh my gosh, so beautiful all these exciting feelings and This time we're walking out carrying a shoebox. Our baby is in it Nobody can prepare you for that Welcome to the Run to the Hard podcast, where we're here to remind you that God doesn't promise us a life free from suffering, but he always brings healing and restoration on the other end. Our goal is to inspire you to face life's trials with courage and trust in God's plan. And oh yeah, run to the Run of the Heart podcast. Thanks. Yeah, this is not going to be an easy conversation as we breathe out our story. Yeah. But I know that it is going to be incredibly impactful for the women out there who are listening. You know, just like we talked about before we start recording, we don't believe we go through things just to hold them in and so I'm praying that this topic will bless somebody because I know that there's so many of us in this club that nobody wants to be in, kind of like Curtis says. A lot of times people are looking at us, a family with five kids, and they're like, are you done having kids yet? And for some reason, we didn't have a piece that we were done having kids. Which is, doesn't make sense to a lot of people, especially nowadays, because you're like, you already, your hands are clearly full. Yeah, so, do you want me to go into how we even? Well, don't tell people how this happened, but yes, yeah, what I... Well okay each time right before we've gotten pregnant with another child you and I both have had a weird sense of somebody's missing where we're counting our kids and we're just like huh not that we're bored because we're never bored life is chaotic enough but we felt that sense again and we just kind of prayed. We actually previously had a very early loss and that launched us into praying, hey, Lord, we have five kids. We're grateful if you want us to have another one. Our yes is on the table, if that's your will. And if not, let's give us a piece, because we've never had that. Anytime, probably after the third kid, everybody's like, is your last one? Or we finally got our boy. So everybody's like, is this your last one? And I've never had that piece of yeah this is for sure my last one not that I just love being pregnant and being in chaos but anyways we prayed that prayer and God very obviously answered within well two weeks from that prayer I was like Chris yeah what yeah unbelievable right before we kind of dive into what happened with our late miscarriage, I think people can see on video that we are expecting again, okay? And we're gonna dive into that as well, but right now we're just gonna cover the story of something we'd never experienced before. And I'll frame it like this. So timing-wise, all the women in our community group and many of the women in our church are having babies and this is going to be exciting. We're going to add another to the feral bunch, but at the exact same time, what also was happening was I was starting a new business. And so the financial piece wasn't all together where we felt comfortable, which when is it comfortable with this many kids. But what's interesting about the timing is we prayed, like you said, and God was like, all right, let's do this. And so we, I mean, I personally didn't have a thought that we were going to lose this baby. So I, I was on edge. I did only because, a little backstory, we went five babies straight with no losses in between. I know that statistically, that's not normal. Usually women who have that many children have experienced loss. And then in between our current youngest and now, there were a few early, like super early, super early losses. I kind of felt like, okay, my body isn't doing this anymore. That's what launched us into praying like, Lord, if you want us to have a baby, let it be so. I don't want to keep going through this roller coaster of are we, are we not? And so I was a little on edge of, God, can we do this? Are you going to allow this baby to come? So I think maybe deep down, I had a sense, but also maybe you could have just called it anxiety. And there's a lot, there's been a lot of loss in our community and just in acquaintances and stuff. Yeah, and typically I'm the voice of reason in these conversations. You're worried about something and I'm like, look, God is sovereign, these things happen. I don't think that God's gonna, oh, no. Clearly answered, of course he wants us to have this baby. Right, right. Clear as day. Yeah, so again, back to timing before we get into all of this. We had just, over the past 10 months, we had just experienced two of our oldest little girls in the hospital with extended hospital stays with like very rogue infections and new business and then we get into the holidays and during the holidays I mean people just stop buying right so the financial picture wasn't all that good. All right, we experienced Christmas and I think both of us feel a sense of gratefulness of just what's to come. Well, because we were also prepping to list our house. Yes. And we were praying about a big move and that was both exciting and stressful. Yes. But yeah, yeah, we had a really good Christmas. Yeah, really, really good Christmas. And then, and then, and then everything just kind of falls apart all at the same time. So December 26th, I get rushed to the hospital with an emergency appendectomy. And I'm thinking to myself, oh Lord, I don't have time for this. Like this is crazy. I mean, we're struggling. We had an insurance lapse. All this different stuff is happening. And so I get the appendectomy. And it wasn't just a few days after that surgery and me trying to recover, I remember knowing that you were going in for a routine appointment, and I'm like, okay, I gotta get back to work. I probably even had a patch on me still from- It's only within a couple of days. Yeah, yeah, so from the appendectomy. Just feeling like everything's chaos, but okay, okay, here we go, I gotta get focused. And I sit down in this beanbag chair, and I start to create a video with my phone and put it on social media and then I get a call from you and I'm like gosh man I'm trying to create this video so I ignore the call and then you call again which two calls for us that's our rule we know that means hey there's something up and so I call you back and I remember your voice on the other side of the phone Chris babe there's no heartbeat and I was like what like just absolutely shocked it just shifted my brain into the Totally away from work I was like no no no no what are you talking about? What are you talking about? You were you were in like tonight. Yeah, and then and then you're like well the doctor's gonna check something else or whatever But just like please pray right and then you and I got off the phone, and I remember texting my friends, texting Curtis, like, hey man, pray, please, please, please, please. I think that something might be wrong, John said there's no heartbeat, we need a miracle type of thing, and everyone's like praying, praying, praying. Then you called me back and kinda affirmed that news. Yeah, so I'll just give my side because it's a little different. What was interesting about this day is it was just a routine. I was 17 weeks pregnant and just a routine. You know, you go in, get the heartbeat check, they measure you, whatever, and then kind of send you on your way. And I had this weird sense that day, I wasn't supposed to have an ultrasound, but I had a weird feeling like, what if just real deep? It wasn't, you know, those thoughts that they're kind of there, but you're not latching on to them. It's just kind of what if they do an ultrasound, there's no heartbeat. And then I kind of let your voice come into my brain, like, just stop, don't latch onto those thoughts. So on the way to my appointment, I'm going to turn everything off in the car and I'm just gonna talk to God on the way. And I just was like breathing out gratitude for our lives, for the chaos, for the big decisions we had to make with work and moving. And for the baby, I was like, Lord, you knew this baby before he was in my womb. You so clearly answered our prayer. And who am I to get to have another child? Thank you. I was just breathing out all this gratitude. Thank you. I trust you. I know this baby is yours and this is okay. Everything's gonna be okay. I had a really strong peace going into this appointment because of that conversation I had with God. And yeah, when I got there, the doctor, he's like, you know what, let's just take a peek. You know, he rolled in the little ultrasound card, which I was not supposed to have, and he's like, let's just take a peek and see how things are going. I will never forget. I'll never forget the feeling in his face because this doctor is a really goofy guy you know I'm talking about really silly always making jokes and stuff and he was making some kind of joke about you know our growing family and he just stopped he just stopped and looked at me and he's like John I'm sorry and I was like instantly I'm like no no like don't know what do you what do you mean? You're sorry you showed me and All I could see was a much smaller baby than what we expected at 17 weeks I knew we've done this a few times when he showed me as that's not 17 week, baby and at that moment I knew something was really wrong and Simultaneously by the way as we're walking through this and if you've listened to run to the heart you've heard about my sister's son Jasper About my nephew. She was pregnant with him and got all these diagnoses and was walking through a lot with him. So all these thoughts are going through my head. And he's just like, this is not what we want to see. I'm so sorry. He gave me a tissue and sat there with me for me to see you want to call your husband. I was just kind of in disbelief when I called you and they were just so gentle. They escorted me to another room. They didn't take me through the waiting room or anything so I didn't have to be, you know, paraded through. And I'm only sharing these details because this is stuff if you haven't walked through it, you don't think about this stuff. And I was, uh, they're like, do you want to wait for your husband? And I wasn't, I didn't know why. Cause I'm like, well, I already know the news, you know, after I went to the ultrasound, I didn't really know why, but I didn't realize we would have to talk about how to get him out. I didn't think about that in the moment. All I'm thinking about is, well, you already told me. What am I waiting for him? But of course, I wanted you there. That's the interesting part about the perspective that we'd never experience is, you get this news and you're like, okay, now what's gonna happen? I mean, what does this even look like? Because your brain can't even catch up. Right, and something that was disturbing for us is I show up, we are together. That's somewhat helpful, right, but still super hard. And then you have to leave the office and we have to make some big decisions on how we're gonna get this taken care of because the reality is when your baby passes, like, still in you and I had never occurred to me. I think when you think miscarriage and I don't want to be too graphic but when you think miscarriage you think of a lot of women experience in the way where their body does it naturally and and it's so hard to talk about it. Well and this was a 17 week appointment yeah and they were they were kind of estimating how long he had potentially been in your belly deceased and all of those thoughts were just really hard for us to process and make the decision moving forward of what are we well because depending on his size I had a couple different options on how to sound stupid to remove him if you had to come out of my body yeah and as the and ask the doctor was as best as he could explain it. You know, we just look at each other like, we don't wanna do any of this. And I just remember crying, obviously so much, I was like, Lord, I don't wanna do any of this. Why do I have to do any of this? You gave us this baby. We asked and you answered. Why are we walking through this? Why, Chris was just in the hospital three or four days ago. Why is this happening? Also, I don't know why I was just thinking this, you know, you know in the Bible where it talks about how when we have grief too deep for words, that we almost have a groaning that's the Holy Spirit praying for us on our behalf. Before you got there, that's one of the only times I've ever experienced that. I didn't recognize, I wasn't wailing, I wasn't wailing and making a big scene or anything, but I had these groans of cries that I almost didn't recognize were coming out of me that I just kind of cling to now as feeling like in that moment that was the Holy Spirit just portraying what I couldn't say because I didn't know what the words were. I just said, this is painful, Lord, I don't know how to pray right now. I'm upset. I'm hurt. I don't understand. But yeah. Yeah, and well, to that end, the decision is interesting because it's really conviction and safety and the balance of that. Because a DNC is the same procedure as an abortion, right? I think it's similar. I think it's pretty similar. Somewhat, right? Except for the obvious that your baby's already gone. Right. And so for us, you know, like we 100% are fully against abortion. And so you almost feel like, oh my gosh, like what, what do I do with this information? Well, once you've seen your baby on an ultrasound, even knowing that he was gone, to imagine him just being essentially, sorry for the language, but to just be vacuumed out of my body like he was nothing, felt so painful. And this is, I want to tread lightly because I know this is so sensitive and I know there's so many women who have walked through this and maybe you felt like you didn't, maybe didn't have a choice, maybe it was an emergency, maybe your body had, and I know I'm not saying you did anything wrong. I'm saying for us, that was how I felt in that moment. Like I've seen my child on the screen, I don't want him to just be discarded. And so we had all these choices, you know, do you want to take this pill at home and you're going to labor at home and here, you know, you're going to have the risk of a lot of bleeding and But you'll be in the comfort of your own home and then whatever okay, so that was an option You can come to the hospital we can induce you You can labor or whatever or you can come and just have a DNC and so we go home Obviously just in shock we've got to go home to our kids and we've got to tell our kids who aren't fully going to understand. But one of the one of the strangest things, and I know other moms who have gone through this can relate, was leaving, knowing that there was a baby inside of me that was not alive, and having to know that I'm going to have to go on for however many days till we figure this out. That was very... And then thinking back to, wait, how long has he been in there like this since he was significantly smaller? Why did my body fail me? Why didn't I know? You know, all these things. So do you wanna go into what we ended up deciding or do you have something else right now? Yeah, so. Because I think it's important to talk because I didn't know these options and I would want somebody to help me walk through this. So I think we did it the best way. I agree. I agree that we did it the best way. And again, it was that prayerfully trying to balance our convictions, your safety, all of the things. And yes, I believe we made the right decision because we were able to actually hold him. And we'll get to that because the next perspective of this is we make the decision to say, you are going to labor him in the hospital. And that is something that was deeply emotional because there's a perspective that we'd never seen before. And we'd been to that same hospital time. So yeah, just just kind of breathe that out. Yeah. Yeah. So it was about a day or so I called and talked to nurses and I asked questions and we prayed and that the decision we decided was, I think it's safest for me to go and actually go ahead and deliver them not knowing, you know, and there's also a sense of, I know that people in the medical field view, like this magical number of weeks gestation that suddenly this is a real baby. So there's part of me that felt nervous, like what if he's really small? I get people who aren't compassionate or they look at it as like what's a fetus, which by the way fetus is just the Latin word for human baby. Anyways, I digress. But yeah, we decided because I have a history of hemorrhaging and bleeding and stuff that and you know with the kids around and stuff I didn't know how intense this was gonna be I had never full-out labored which probably like what you have five kids you never labored no I've had unfortunately had to have c-sections yeah so I've never full out labored before I was like I don't know how painful is gonna be I don't know how much I'm gonna bleed will I end up in the hospital anyways and so yeah what was really interesting about this is that, like you mentioned, we'd had all of our children at the same hospital at this point. And so we make the decision, I want to do it ASAP because I want to get over with a hated, hated knowing he was in me and not alive. And so we're packing our hospital bag, but not packing baby clothes, not packing the little mittens and the little socks and all the little baby things that you are so excited to pack when you're going to the hospital. We had so many times before I'm packing just stuff for me and for you and. Man, it was hard. It was hard to walk into that hospital the same way we had five previous times and know that we weren't leaving with a baby. Yeah, well, you know, even down to the most granular details, it's like the same parking lot, the same door that you walk in, the same desk that you check in, the same waiting room, you know? Like, talk about the perspective of being on one side of the wall and then others on the other side of the wall. Yeah, we go into the waiting room and it's kind of full. It looks like a family, probably their first baby in the family or something because it looked like everybody was there for the same person, just like we were for Lola, like your family, my family, everybody was there for the first baby. And so we see the waiting rooms kind of crowded and I obviously don't want to currently sit by a bunch of joyous people. I feel I'm in my feels, you know, I'm so we sit right on the outside of the wall, which is the only other place to sit and it just again you just keep getting hit over and over again with all these new perspectives of your reality of like they're sitting there anticipating life and we're sitting here anticipating what we know is death and so it's just it's all the same we're sitting right there in the same and waiting for them to call me back they always call me back first and then bring you in walking down that hallway so they don't they don't have a separate wing for women who have lost. It's all the same labor and delivery unit, which perspective we didn't know. And so I couldn't help but think about all the times we've been there and been on the side of how, you know, how blessed we are. And thinking about was there anybody that was walking through a loss while we were celebrating and we just didn't know the very surreal, what's the word, not butterfly effect, but like, what is the, do you know what I'm saying? What, how? I don't know, just the comparison is just so surreal. I can't really wrap my head around it. Well, speaking of the comparison, I'm thinking of this in this very moment. Yeah. So we've had five previous babies at that hospital. We walk in and we have a perspective of just seeing life, right, like you said. You didn't think about it. And now we're seeing a different perspective of losing a child and going through the same rooms and all the things. But what's interesting to me is I know somebody listening to this who has had a miscarriage and they've not experienced even life. And so all they've associated those rooms and those hallways with and the deaths they checked into and when time stood still, all they've associated with is death. And so I almost, in this moment, feel like we can flip it on its head for someone and be like, when you get that opportunity, you have a gift of seeing both perspectives. And I think your gratitude goes to- Cherish it more. Yeah. Yeah, I totally agree. Yeah. Well, that and realizing that you can be prayerful for other people there. Realizing that, oh wow, like, God, thank you. It's humbling, yeah. Yeah, God, thank you. Because I know what it's like to be on the other side. Yeah, so true. So true. So walking down that hallway was one of the longest hallways it felt like ever. The nurse was really... I want to touch on this because one thing we prayed about was, Lord, give us a staff that is compassionate, that knows that this is a baby and that is understanding and gentle. I really was praying for like, please don't make this experience any worse, Lord. Please help us. Give us grace. Give us mercy. Mercy. Mercy. Was the prayer. Yeah. Right? And we'll come back to that. Yeah. Because I remember texting some guys from the church and our pastor and everything, and they're like, we're just praying for mercy for you guys. Like, just mercy. And I was like, okay, thank you, thank you, thank you. And it ended up being a very relevant. Oh, the first, yeah, the first nurse that I even had was so understood the moment. You know, she's walking me back, she sees me. I'm, all these emotions of being there prior times to have our other babies are flooding through my mind. I'm like, I can't believe I'm about to have to do this. And she just was so gentle, so compassionate, held my arm, rubbed my back, was like, as slow as you need, takes me back. I have to put on the gown and the socks, the same ones that I wear every single time. And I just, I lost it as soon as you came in too, because I see it on your face too. I think we always think about what the woman goes through and granted, I know it takes longer for the husband to connect and understand, because you're not feeling and seeing the life grow in you, but this affected you too. You know, and I could see it on your face when you came in and yeah. Well it's hard it's hard to be the husband to be the leader to be the one who's supposed to be the lighthouse and the strength and the raging emotions of everything that's happening and then realize you have no control. Yeah. You're like okay this baby has to come out she has to labor we have to experience what we're about to experience. I have no control at all. And so that's why It was just like okay God this is This is what you've chosen and I don't understand it, but please mercy mercy mercy mercy. This has to be bad, please The specific prayer was don't let her labor for a long long long time with nothing on the other end, no reward on the other end. Don't let this be like some emergency surgery and crazy amounts of medical issues and stuff. Just please Lord, have mercy." And so that was a prayer. And I think that as we continue to move through this story, that piece ended up becoming such prayer from so many levels, from the nurses that came in who were so compassionate. Like you said, the pace, the, you experiencing the labor, but not at the level that we would have like, oh my goodness. Well, because of my history of C-sections, I had talked to an L&D nurse beforehand. The pill they were going to give me, she was worried about because we didn't know how hard this was going to be. Now, I was in pain. I mean, I labored. I was in pain. It was hard there for a while, but it wasn't extended. Here's another part of the prayer was my doctor, the one that had told us the news, and I just really adored it. He'd been with me, he helped deliver Lucan. He was on call, but not till 7 a.m. And I desperately wanted him to be the one to help me through this, because he was so loving. He's a doctor, and he sat down with me when we found out we lost him. And he was just like, this was your family member, this was your child. Please, time to understand that and grieve. And he hugged me and he just, he was so loving. I wanted him to be there. He wasn't on call that night. And I just kept thinking, oh Lord, I just, if I can, I'd love it to be Sullivan, because I'm comfortable with him. They gave me the medication. I don't even know, like probably 11 or 12 at night. And I just rested until it kicked in and that was a whole other thing in itself because You just again the whole time where you're normally anticipating life. You're just you're anticipating death. I know what my body's about to do and it's just I'm gonna say torture, but it's An awful feeling it's awful expectancy. Like you said, there's no prize and I know I'm about to, again I don't want to be like too graphic, but I know there's gonna be a lot of blood loss and and pain and stuff and so around probably like 1230 or one I started contracting and laboring and it got intense and it was on and off through the night as labor is and at one point it got really bad and that's where I think you remember the most I was in tears and just what did I say I just was like God please just make it, like, let us be done, make it stop. Is that what I said? Something like that? Yeah, you were, you were just continuing to pray the prayers of mercy. You're just like, Lord, have mercy on me. Like, this is awful. Because I mean, I was in full on, I mean, pain, painful contractions. And they were like, do you want an epidural? And I was like, no, because I know he's not a full size baby that I'm about to push out. Like, I don't want to do that. But I was just, finally got to the point where it was so bad that I was gonna accept some pain medication though and I just was like, Lord, please just let it be done. Please let us just get to the other side of this. And it was like the minute I said amen, I was able to just sleep for a few minutes. It just rushed over me. God's peace just rushed over me. The pain kind of subsided and I was able to sleep until I could tell it was time to deliver him. And my doctor ended up getting there right away. He literally came in. Or was it that he came in or that he stayed on to make sure that? I think it's that he stayed on. I don't really want to give too many details about what it was like seeing him when he first came out because I think I was in shock because I didn't know what to expect and it was very... Yeah, it was... It was not... It was a moment and I think everybody experiences their own trauma when it comes to this. We have our own that, you know, I don't know that I want to give people that mental picture because they had their own. Yeah, yeah. It was awful. Yeah, it was bad. It made me... I was dry heaving and felt like I was gonna pass out and it just was, you know, again, you just another slap in the face of the reality of this is my baby, like this is my baby. So you actually got to hold him first. I was not ready. Yeah, well, okay, so here, I'll take us here. So, we go through the, you go through the traumatic experience. I'm seeing what's happening, I'm like, oh my gosh, I cannot believe that is the baby. And it ends up that you do have some complications and we have to do a procedure. So there's some back and forth trauma there, that was hard. As they were rolling you out the nurse walked up and Handed me this like this little towel and I was like, what is this? handed me the baby and I was just like I What what he was there he's a baby not only like Believe it's big but he was a baby could not believe it. He was literally the length of my thumb. Wasn't it like this? No, he was the length of my thumb. I thought he was bigger than that. No, he was tiny. I remember just staring down at this towel and looking at him and I was like, that's a baby. All ten fingers, all ten toes, little spine, ears, face, shoulder, like I'm like what in the world? Like that's a baby. And you know, we didn't really share pictures of him with anybody or whatever, but like we took our own and put it in like hidden albums in our phones and stuff because that was special, that was hard. But if you have any, if you're on the fence at all when it comes to like is this a baby or just a clump of cells? I mean, I can tell you with full confidence, holding our son, who was as big as my thumb, but the level of development that I was looking down at was unbelievable. And I was like, okay, there's absolutely no, there's no doubt, there's no doubt. He was about the size of a 12, 13 weeker. But God continued to do special things in that moment because you go off for surgery and the cleanup crew comes in, right? And this lady walks in and I'm just sitting there with him and she stops and she's like, I'm so sorry for your loss. I was like, oh, thank you. Thank you. Not really knowing how to answer. And she's like, are you a believer?" And I was like, yes. She's like, okay. I just want you to know I'm genuinely going to be praying for you and your wife and this loss and everything. If you don't mind me sharing, I experienced a similar loss in this way or whatever. And she was kind of explaining how she gets what we're going through. And man, what a blessing, how nice. She played it perfectly. And you know, just the level of comfort because as a Christian sometimes you're in a secular world and when you have people that come in, like how scripture talks about we carry each other's burdens, you know, to have another Christian come in who was on the cleanup crew and then just stop and say that, I was like, man, God, you're piecing everything together here. It helps you to know when you know you're not alone, you really can share that pain a little bit to be like, okay, she's smiling, she's praying for other people, you know, you get through this. So meanwhile, the nurse that's taking me back to the OR, the same OR that I've had all of our babies, that was another rush of just, I was like, please just put me out. I did not want, I did not want to be in there because I was in a lot of pain. They gave me medicine that didn't work and so they told me they were gonna put me to sleep. I was like, great, I don't want to experience the DNC. I don't want to be, I don't, just give me a break. You know, I was done. And she, but she was so gentle, let me know that she also had experienced loss. And she was really encouraged by the way we were going through it because her experience was not a good one. It was not filled with compassion or anything. So her experience is like, I want to give to my patients what I wish I would have received when I lost, because she did not have a positive, compassionate staff or support person, a spouse or anything. She was just so good. She was on my back and she was like, okay, we're going to go past. There's a mom delivering in this room. I just want to give you a heads up. We have to pass that. I'm going to try to take you this way, though, and just really, really understood what I needed more than I did in the moment. But for how terrible it was, God gave us mercy and blessed us with a crew of nurses and doctors that couldn't have been better. No, it's awesome. It was and it makes me think about someone who might be receiving this news, finding this podcast and being like, oh my gosh, like, how do I prepare for this? You know? And so I'll ask you the question, knowing what you've gone through, let's say you're listening to this, you would have had this resource prior to, how do you prepare for this? I mean, prayer, first and foremost, prayer about what decision to make. I don't think you really can prepare, but I think I would like somebody to know the peace that we were given by getting to hold our baby and see him. The closure, the peace. I think that this experience in our healing journey would have been a lot different had we just went in and had the DNC. And I know not everybody gets that chance. Some people miscarry on their own at home and all of that. But if you have the chance and you have to walk through We have so much peace and closure from being able to see him and hold him. And we took it like we had him cremated. We were able to really go through the motions of honoring him as our child and not just, oh, we lost, and that's it, and you move on. Because I don't no matter what stage, whether it's six weeks, 20 weeks, you know, no matter what stage, I think it's hard because not a lot of people talk about it. I think more people are. Social media is bringing people up, but you're not really taught how to process this. And I think a lot of people, especially would look at us, and I understand if you don't know, you don't know who to look at us, and be like, we already have five kids. At least you're in a flat, already have kids. You know, it's not that big of a deal, you already have five kids. But each time a woman is pregnant, there's a life inside of us. It is not just a clump of cells. It changes you. And these babies, they impact you whether they get to come out earthside or not. Science says that their cells stay with you and they change the makeup of your body and your brain and stuff as a woman, as a mom. And so I think it's so important to grieve and honor no matter what stage the loss was at. Like I said, we had a six week loss right beforehand and you know it's harder with that because I didn't get to see the baby yet and it wasn't as real as it was at 17 weeks but it still affects you because you see, especially for women, we see a positive pregnancy test and at least for us since we have the perspective of a positive pregnancy test means I'm bringing a baby home. So every time I would see a positive pregnancy test, everything, you start planning for that life, you start thinking about what this new person's gonna be, is it gonna be a girl or a boy? How's the dynamics gonna change? Where are they gonna sleep? What's it gonna, you know? Yeah, speaking of, speaking of is it gonna be a girl or a boy. Yeah. So, we're at the hospital. I've been holding this baby for hours. You come back, you're exhausted. Was asking the doctor, I was like, hey, is there any way to understand, was this a boy, was this a girl? And the one doctor was like, yeah, I'm not sure, man. We're just not sure. And that one nurse that we had that had experienced this, she said one of the hardest things for her was not knowing whether it was a girl or a boy. And she said, I will do everything in my power to figure this out for you. So we went behind this curtain, which was also surreal because you think about your baby when you're just trying to rest, you're kind of laying them in that incubator thing. The hospital basement. Yeah, with the light on and stuff. And like here we have this like little envelope that's the size of my hand that's just laying there and there's all this extra space and we we walked back there and she was able to check and show me that it was a boy and then it became really real for me like I don't cry in front of you I'm working on it but it became really real for me. You were asleep and I just whoop you know tears tears just started flowing for me because then because you think about the boys you have at home and like oh I know what that's like I know the hard I know the I know the and I know the payoff you know. That's my son. Yeah you know and so that was really really tough and so I processed that for a few hours while you were still sleeping while holding him again and just being like Like what what was this? but I say all of that because Again, that was another God moment where we have a compassionate nurse who's like that was the one thing that messed me up so I'm gonna make sure that you get this answer and This is God's grace that she was able to discover that for us and that made it really real. Well, that allowed us to name him and honor him in a way. Like it should be, you know, we lost our son and we could grieve better knowing, oh, this is who this was. So we're preparing to leave the hospital. And now different emotions are taking place. The bereavement team comes, the counselor or whatever she is, and talks. You realize, oh wait, we've got to decide what to do with him. We didn't think about this. I've never thought about that before. So she starts telling me, you know, there's a free group cremation basically where at the end of the month or end of the week, I forget when it was, they take all of the lost lost babies and just do like a whole ceremony and I don't like that and then there's the funeral home can come and pick them up or you can do this or that and you're just like hearing all this stuff but your time your mind is just like not talking to me about our baby what like I've never had to make these decisions before so in the state of Ohio if the baby is under 20 weeks you don't have to have like a death certificate and all these things but because he's under 20 weeks we were able to take him with us and take him to the funeral home ourselves, which was oddly comforting to be able to leave with him. And that might be weird to some people, and I understand because I think if we hadn't have gone through this, I might also feel like that was strange, but nobody can prepare leaving the hospital that you're normally leaving, proudly showing off your new baby. Everybody does it, you get wheeled out in a wheelchair, you're holding the baby, everybody looks at you as you walk by, congratulations, oh my gosh, so beautiful, all these exciting feelings, and this time we're walking out carrying a shoebox, basically, our baby is in it. Nobody can prepare you for that. Nobody. And so we went home to our other children and they're confused and they're sad and they don't know, you know, especially the little ones don't understand why we're sad or, you know, they say things though that cut you like a knife because they don't get it and they just say what they think. So you gotta help them try to understand and help them kind of grieve when all you want to do is go to bed, you know, or hide away. Well, yeah, we find out it's our baby boy. We had planned on, if it was a boy, it was gonna be Lawson. And we're like, this is Lawson, I can't believe this. And that nurse, again, was so amazing. She went and she like dressed up this box. She made blue rubens. And footprints. And you guys, they were so tiny and he was so frail. I mean, he had been gone for a couple weeks. And so he was so little and frail, but she did everything she could to give us what she didn't get when she lost. And it was such a blessing. You know, like, I want to stress that because all the stuff in the news, all the stuff in our society, talking about when does it become a baby and stuff. He was probably only 12 or 13 weeks in the womb and he had hand and footprints and face and he looked, he didn't look like anything else but a baby. He was a baby. And transparently if I would have heard someone lost a baby at 12 weeks, well usually announced like 8 to 10 weeks, so you're only like two weeks after the viability and so again the power of actually holding him. Oh my goodness. This was not a chemical pregnancy This was not a a blob. This was a Baby like this and we were already pro-life, but I'm telling you accelerated the feelings of The baby in the in the gift that is a child in the womb. Yeah right now now So then we're trying to make the decision whether we're going to leave him for that cremation or we are going to take him with us. And we're both like, it just, oh, we cannot take the body with us. And so I remember cleaning everything up and she's like, do you guys want a picture? And I was like, huh? Such a weird moment to take a picture. Okay. But yeah. And so, yeah, do you want a picture? And we took a picture and it was surreal. Because we're usually posing with our baby, you know? We're usually standing by the carrier when we take that picture before we leave the hospital. Exactly. So then the emotions of like, okay, we took the picture and now you're kind of putting the box down on a bed or a chair and you're like, uh, am I, you know what I mean? And then when we finally leave, describe what it was like going down that hallway. Surreal is the only word I can think of because it's like a movie where you're having the flashes of your life of all the times we've gone through the hallway on the other side. It just was slow and people are looking at us and I'm like, don't look at me. You know, I don't want people to look at me. I remember seeing in particular one family waiting by the elevators and I just was thinking, please don't ask me anything, please don't say anything, please don't. What's in the box? You know, some well-meaning old guy like, Hey, what do you got there in a box? Or, Oh, how far along are you? I was dreading those kinds of comments because another thing you don't think about, I was far enough along to be showing, especially me because a lot of babies and sisters far enough to be showing. So you don't think about that part, especially if you ever ask a woman, oh, how far along are you when you do? I was so scared to get that comment for the first couple weeks afterwards because I didn't know how it would work. It's awkward for everybody. I didn't know if I would cry or whatever. So, just, I don't want to say dark. It wasn't dark, but it was suffocating. Is that the word? Walking that whole way, what is the word? It wasn't dark. There was still a piece Yeah, you wrap up this part of being in the hospital the whole entire time. It's like you're in this room and silent You're not experiencing cries, but then you hear baby cries down the hallway and you're like, oh and then it hits you It's right and then you leave and you walk out of the room and You turn to walk down the hallway and you see it's a boy on someone's door and you're like, oh, this is real. Yeah, it just continually guts you, just continually. And then you see the parents who are walking by you, walking their baby, you know what I mean? You're like, mine's in a box. And so all of those emotions, and like I said, you can have an incredibly compassionate staff, but you still just get those waves, right? Which we've chatted with Curtis about in prior episodes, it's just those waves of grief that hit you. And this was very new for us. It did offer, in turn, a new perspective of gratitude for what we do have. Not that we weren't already grateful, but it did give me a new gratefulness for the times that we were able to come and experience a healthy baby and get to take them home and stuff. But, you know, I say that and then in the same breath, I can say going home and being home while you're trying to grieve in the chaos of kids not understanding. And kids really play off your emotions. When you're stressed and you're tired and you're emotional and you're sick and all these things, generally the kids will crank up the volume on their behavior a little bit. And that was hard. And our oldest girls, they understood because they'd been through this a few times, they knew, okay, mommy's gonna have a baby. And they were excited, especially our nine year old, you know, she loves babies and seeing them cry and trying to help them grieve was hard. It was different because you don't know, why did God do this? I don't, we don't know. We don't know. But I will say, with that being said, as much as we question God and want answers, we want to know why. We never really did find out why. We assumed there was a genetic condition. We have a hope. We have a hope for eternity. And a lot of people say, oh, they're in a better place, you'll see them again one day. And that's like feel-goods. But we truly believe. Eve lost and went from my body straight into the arms of Jesus and how much better of a life is he going to have there and that we truly will be reunited with him one day. And that gives us hope even though we still don't understand why. Yeah. Yeah. So let's move on again. This is all about the perspective. We'd never experienced and even with a baby who they say we lost between 12 and 14 weeks There's still the Burial or the cremation decision and all this stuff and so and so we get home We're going through the emotions with the kids in law step up They bring us a meal that night and are trying to trying to just kind of help us. I remember my mom stepping up and you know friends are loving on us and praying for us and so we have all the support we need given the circumstances. However, you still have to deal with the reality of okay I have to call funeral home the next day and decide kind of what's up and at this point I'll be honest again, financially was not good. So I'm sitting here like, okay Lord, as a practical side to this too, we talked about our expenses and how, of course, it wasn't gonna be a big funeral or anything like that, but the feeling of not having the money to properly do what we needed to do to have the peace hurt. Like that was hard. That was hard on me as a leader. And so there's a ministry within the Run the Heart podcast and that's the Michael Foundation. And the foundation is something that we are so passionate about supporting those who are stuck in grief, right, financially and with the most practical things you can possibly think of. And we're going to take a quick break, and I'm going to let Curtis explain real fast what the Michael Foundation is. Many of you know that my wife, Michael Christopher, had a mantra that she lived by. We've made it our mantra for this podcast, and that is, Run to the hard, run to the hurt, for it's in the greatest hard that God wants to do His greatest work. It's what we're doing with our podcast. We're trying to help people run to the heart and let God do an amazing work in their life. But we've also started a foundation, the Michael Foundation, in which we not only want to help serve people emotionally, but we want to meet some people's needs. We know that in some of the toughest and hardest circumstances, there's financial needs. So I'm going to ask you folks, if you go to our website, runtothehard.com forward slash give, there's a place where you can actually give to the Michael Foundation. We want to help people in need. We want to help people who are stuck in this awful spot in life. Do that for us, but then more importantly, we're going to thank you ahead of time for praying for our ministry and supporting us in every way you can. Now back to the episode. Well, neither of us like the idea of cremation, but what's interesting about the cremation thing, and you know, there are theological debates around it and stuff, but what's interesting about the cremation thing is the reason I didn't want to cremate is because I didn't want to idolize the body. I was like, the only thing I don't want to cremate, because I don't want to idolize the body, because he's not there. He's gone. However, there was a deep peace about actually knowing that one, he's in the house right now, like his body, his soul's gone, but his body is in the house right now, and there's a deep peace about kind of actually... Getting him back. Getting him back. And again, if you haven't been to this, I can understand why it would sound a little weird. Perspective-wise, let's go back to, we took the box, we had to take the box to the funeral home. And we had to take the body, take him in this little box. I wouldn't even look at it again, because we had to take it to the funeral home. And they had to sign these papers. And that was the first time I saw his full name written. That was pretty. Yeah, so there's this paper agreeing to the crematory services and all that said Lawson Cade Farrell. That hurt. That hurt because you look at his name you're like oh my gosh I'm never gonna see that name on a folder, never gonna write that name on a birth certificate or the doctor's office or a activity form or anything. I'm never gonna write We're going to write his name in his clothing tag, like Lawson, seeing his name hurt. But my mom went with us to the funeral home and kind of supported us there. And when we left him, it was weird. We knew, like you said, we knew he wasn't in the box, but leaving him there and going home and just now suddenly my womb is empty and he's gone. And it just, it doesn't make sense you can't really wrap your head around it the emptiness so for me I show my emotions very much and I remember leaving so like your mom was great she went with us she she even covered the cremation I was like oh I didn't have to do that thank you and I remember getting in the car after leaving him and yeah like just just a disconnect driving away was like oh I actually feel a hole you know and then I'm sitting in here oh you know man this is nothing like it would be if you lost one of your kids that you've had our side for this long so chill out you know what I mean yeah you started trying to find ways to downplay oh yeah but I felt that moment like when we were walking away and when we got in the car and when we drove away from the funeral home leaving the body there was like oh my gosh this does not feel right. Well it's not natural and he was already a part of our family we had already started planning for him. So what was it it was a few days that we were home without him and just again just processing like I said there's something very confusing about being pregnant and suddenly not being pregnant and you know, just, your baby's not here. You know, it's a very strange feeling, but you were really, really stressed. Because now, the beginning of the year was coming, you're like, I gotta hit the ground running, we gotta get this business going, we need sales, we're not doing great, because that's the roller coaster of entrepreneurship. We're getting ready to list our house, I think the very next month we were gonna list our house. That is stressful, all on top of having five kids and grieving and recovering. Both of us recovering from a surgery within six days of each other. And so you always talk about men being in each of their boxes. You couldn't be in just your work box because there was so much else going on. I needed you. You're a processor. So you needed to talk to me. You needed to talk through every detail. You needed to talk about all this stuff. And I knew that was the most important thing, but I also knew, like, oh my gosh, that the practical side of finances is I have to get things figured out. Otherwise, not only is she going to be sad, but she's going to be hungry too. And I was just like, this is not going to work. We talk about the bereavement thing. You can't think. You can't think. Like, nothing matters. You know what I mean it puts life into, when you lose life, like it puts things into perspective. Even just you being in the hospital, put a little bit of things in perspective for you about life and how you're living and what really matters. And yeah, I mean everything just kind of stood still because nothing really makes sense. When you think you got a clear answer from the Lord, and then it's not what you think, or he takes that away, even though you feel like he answered that like it doesn't make sense and so most people have to take time to process these things but we didn't have time. Didn't have time at all. Well leading up to that here's a moment I'll never forget is I don't have time to grieve. I know I need to help you grieve. I know the kids the kids are playing off of your emotions and they also need dad but dad's in the basement working and I remember just being like, Lord, I can't think, I mean I couldn't even like brain dump and prioritize my thoughts because so much was going on. I'm like, okay, I got this, I'm just, here we go. And so I am trying to work through some business strategy stuff and I remember calling you downstairs and you're like trying to support me and get in the workbox for a second and listen what I'm saying And then the kids are screaming behind the door fighting about something and like it's just total chaos Everything feels completely out of control And I was like wait, just hang on Quietly you couldn't breathe. I remember I'm you I was like write them down quite them down like here here this here this what do you think what do you think and and then I'm starting to explain to you something and then my phone vibrates and I look down and It was a funeral home And I answer the phone hi, mr. Farrell Um, the body's ready and I was like Huh time literally stood still all the chaos of the work and all the things and all the kids. I was like almost sitting here with the kids behind the door and it was on speakerphone right? And you and I both were just... Whoa. Your mom had just happened to get there and the funeral was gonna close in an hour and I was just like we got to get him now. We can't do this. I can't focus. Now that you've told me that there's no way I can sit and listen to your business idea and you knew. I mean we both looked at each other like we got to go now. So we picked him up and you feel the closeness when you have him back and um all not all was right but it felt right again to have a piece of him with us yeah. Yeah it did and I remember my mom's like hey guys go to dinner do something and I don't have any money but I was you know what I'm putting on credit I don't even care and so I remember sitting in that Texas Roadhouse and we're just kind of like staring at each other and you know the world's just happening around us and it was it was good to be out but I but I specifically remember kind of looking around and thinking like man Lord what lie do we buy into all the time thinking everybody is just okay yeah another perspective of you don't realize that somebody next to you a Texas Roadhouse just picked up their child at the funeral home and everyone's doing their thing and I just remember thinking Lord some people are in here are hurting you know what I mean but we buy into this lie of being distracted Thinking to ourselves all the time like everything's fine. Oh, yeah, everybody here is just like eating and drinking and being married. No, no problems Yeah, yes, I mean, I think that's why We experience these things to draw us closer to the Lord But then I said the reason we're sharing all of this is a vulnerable we could keep this for ourselves But the reason we share it is because we're not all okay. Every single person you see on a street has gone through or is going through something. On the outside, you could look at us and watch us come in and be like, oh, you know, cute couple out for a date night, whatever, you know, that all they're young, they don't have any problems. I mean, people think we're young, young and cute. But I'm not realizing that's what we're walking through. It just, I keep saying perspective, but over and over again God granted us new eyes to see situations and people differently. Yeah, well I felt like the only way that was coming to my head is we're buying the lie, we're buying the lie, we're buying the lie that everyone's okay and people in here are hurting. And so to that point let's Let's talk about the lies that the enemy tried to fill your head with when it came to losing Lawson. Actually, I do want to mention, this is relevant, it's not totally saying it. It's interesting because I was looking at this cup, my coffee cup here, and this is from woman camp that I went to almost probably a year ago. And why is this so interesting to me that I chose this cup this morning like I just grabbed it is because at that camp there was a few set of songs that were sang kind of repeatedly for worship. One of the songs was Take Me Deeper and I sang my heart out to that song and I meant it and in my prayer time, you know, you go to a woman camp, you don't have your phone or anything, you use that time to grow closer to the Lord and you can worship. You can go, they had this whole experience in the woods where you're just really like getting your mind, you know, we don't have any time without our phones or without interruption. So at that camp, take me deeper was my prayer. And I remember singing it and thinking, shoot, this is a hard, this is a dangerous prayer because while yes, Lord, I want you to take me deeper into relationship with you. I know that means I'm asking for things. Like I'm putting a target on my back. Not that the Lord causes bad, but he will use it. And sometimes I think about that after the year we had. I'm like, you know, there's been times where I've literally said, why did I pray that? Why did I ask for that? Because in that season, I felt peace, but I also felt attacked. I felt a lot of attacks of God took this God took your baby away because you don't deserve another one You can't handle what you have why would why would you be given another baby? See that you just lost your temper, you know, you know, you can't You don't even deserve the five you have that's why that's why you lost You didn't take care of your body. You didn't You have sins from your past that have caught up to you you know Those were the things that were going through my head on the regular, especially when I would lose my patience with our kids. It would just be like this voice constantly like, see, who are you? Why did you think you could handle another one? That's why you took Lawson. You didn't deserve him. And that was hard. Yeah. Yeah, I mean, you know, Curtis mentioned it and it's just like the enemy accuses and he is, he's constantly trying to, trying to get us to believe these lies, these, these lies that create this awful, awful negative emotion in us that impact the way that we, the way that we trust God, you know? Yeah, it tries to, of course he pulls us away and he looks for when we're vulnerable. And by that point I was vulnerable. We had been through so much and we had different friends that really lifted us up in the season because there were more, there's so much more intertwined into that last like 12, 10 months really at that time. Lost my grandma suddenly. Just so many things that happened that our friends had kind of praised us. Man, you guys have walked through so much, but you're still coming to church, you're still smiling, you're still praising God and stuff. And I think you almost, we almost got a, I don't want to say an arrogance, but almost like, yeah, that's right, like, God's got me and I'm handling everything great because the Lord, even the doctors after Lawson had said, we really noticed something different about you guys and the way you handled this and all glory to God, but then you also, your flesh also has the chance to be like, oh, yeah. Yeah, look at me Like I can go through look at all this hard stuff. We're going through and look how good we're doing. Yeah, and then That was that was kind of the last straw For me and I was vulnerable and when you're vulnerable Satan looks for that Opportunity to get in and get into your mind and if you're not careful you latch on to it and I did and it took us down a few months of just spiritual, what's happening? Because we really felt like God was off script. Everything we were praying about, we felt like he was answering and not the way we expected. Like I said, I prayed so hard on the way to that appointment thanking him for that baby that he clearly blessed us with because we prayed and he answered immediately. And so when he took him, well, why did you do that? Like you're off my script. And so all that to say the enemy comes when you're vulnerable and we were at that point we were vulnerable. Yeah I completely I completely agree and and from my perspective it's hard to see you believe those things, to see you believe those lies, for you to come into my office and just sit up against the wall and be like I wasn't a good enough mom I wasn't this I wasn't that I wasn't that my body failed me all these things I'm just like oh lord you have to you have to step in and and and block these lies this is just this is just awful and yeah we went through a spiritual decline not so much in the fact of we're giving up our values or anything like that, but just, but just God, you feel, you feel so distant right now. Everything started to be going through the motions. I didn't want to go to church at first, even though I knew that's where I needed to be. I knew I was going to see all the people that I knew there that were pregnant. And that used to bother me prior to walking through this. It used to bother me when people would say stuff like that if they were going through fertility issues or they went through their own loss and then They were like, I don't want to go around pregnant women. I'd be like, that's so unfair. And so I'm not saying you should I I Think you should always Be happy for others and you can mourn yourself and be happy that others are being blessed but in that immediate time afterwards It was painful painful go to church and see the same people that I was do around the same time with Still happily glowing and carrying their growing bumps and knowing minds empty hmm, and I was hard to reconcile with God's because Again, you answer my prayer. Why why did you take him? And so Like you said Definitely felt the most distant he had felt in a while, for a little while, as we walked through moving states and then now we don't have our community and our church and we gotta find this and God why do you feel so quiet? Why does everything feel so heavy? So yeah, there was a period of questioning God. There was a period of, God you feel off script, I'm curious to know, you know, where it's happening in February 2024. January. I'm sorry, January 2024. Yeah, see, I'm so good with dates. And Lawson was due in June. June, yeah. Yeah. And now we sit here in September 2024. I mean, where's your head? How do you reconcile? I think my perspective is different than a lot because I'm pregnant again. It's hard because we got pregnant in February. So we delivered in January and we got pregnant again in February. And that was not my plan. That was God being off script again. That was so hard. Because as we were getting ready to move, and in the grieving process, I got rid of everything. I donated probably 10 bags of maternity clothes, all the baby stuff. I sobbed. Oh my gosh. They're just clothes, and they're just baby things, and I had to keep telling me, I'm like, this is just stuff. This is just stuff. This does not matter." But after having five babies and feeling like I was closing that chapter, because I wasn't saying we were never gonna have another baby, but I certainly wasn't planning on, let's try again right now. I was not. You were not. We were moving, we're like, let's just, maybe we're closing this chapter. Either way, it was too painful to think about moving our maternity stuff and our baby stuff with us to North Carolina. And so healthy for you. No, it was hard. It was hard to look at it. So we have three girls and then we have two boys. And so I'm putting all these baby boy things away and just thinking, oh my gosh, we were going to have a boy loss and would have worn this stuff. You just not again, again, a thing that you're not prepared for is donating this stuff and just I prayed over I just pray like let this bless somebody else because I can't, I had to get it out of the house as fast as possible. And so, all that to say, once again, feeling like God's off script, our personal conviction, we wrestled with, do we take things into control of our own hands? Because people are asking already, do you think you'll try again? I'm like, we still trust you. And lo and behold, he blessed us with another baby very quickly. It felt too quick. It felt too quick. It felt frustrating, actually. And I think that with everything going on, it's like, wait, is this a sick joke? Are we doing so I would why yeah, why would cuz I just assumed I was gonna lose the baby I'm like, why were we why why God why don't you go through this again? I just went through two back-to-back losses and this one was terrible why and you know a Skeptic or a cynic might hear this and be able you could have prevented that. What do you mean? You know, do you do you guys know how babies are made, you know, and and I understand that, but we have always just trusted God with our family size. I get it. I get it. I know there's somebody that's hearing this and like, you didn't have to get pregnant again. Like, you could have prevented it. But... We prevented it more than normal. We did. Yeah, without too many details. We did, and it felt off script. I was terrified. This was one of the first times I saw a positive pregnancy test and I was shaking. I was scared. I was questioning. God, my body hasn't even recovered yet. Are we just creating a whole army of babies in heaven? Like is this just for eternal purposes? I was trying to get my mind around, okay, we're going to lose this one too. So are we just gonna have some special treasures in heaven that I need to just be okay with what my body's going through? Which camp out there for a second, because that is where the hope lies. Yeah. Oh, yeah. Because we as Christians know that eternity is way longer than this earth. Yeah. Like, our bodies get old, they decay, we die, everything turns to rust that we have. Ecclesiastes talks about how life is meaningless outside of a relationship with God and because we know that Lawson is with Jesus and we're going to experience Jesus and relationship with Lawson, hopefully depending on how heaven works, there is that hope to be like, all right God, this was a gift that you delayed? It's not never, it's just not now. Yeah. Yeah. Also through this time my sister's walking through the unthinkable with her pregnancy and her delivery and Jasper's story. So my nephew passed in July. So again, why Lord, why are we going through this right after he passed, I did question. I just, and you know, it's probably the enemy sinking into that vulnerable moment again and like, do you really believe he's in a better place or is this just all to make you feel better? Because what if he's not? What if they're just gone forever and this is all meaningless? But if you reflect on the character of God and his word and even your own life, you know that's not true. And you and I were having such a good conversation the other night about all the things that had to fall into place for certain things to happen. And you're just like, this can't be coincidence. This can't be coincidence. Even how this podcast started. Even how this podcast started. That's what I mean. It's not. It's not. And so when the enemy gets in your head and starts like, oh, you're just saying that. Everybody says, even non-believers say, oh, they're in a better place now. We'll see him again one day. But as a believer to truly believe that is the only hope we've been able to hang on to. And so as we found out we were pregnant with this baby again, talk about just a full surrender. You just have to surrender. God loves these babies more than we do. And so we just had to surrender and be like, even if he's just being created for you, Lord, for heaven, thank you. And I'm going to move forward here. I mean, not that there was ever an option not to move forward, but when you've already spent 17 weeks being pregnant and then you just have a few weeks off and you're grieving and you're about to move and everything is crazy, and then you find out you're carrying life again. And to think about another nine months pregnant you're just like I gotta take one day at a time. I wonder if you can just be super raw and real in helping practically with how can somebody help you grieve a late miscarriage. Or miscarriage in general yeah well of course first and foremost praying for your friend and checking in on them. I had one friend in particular that just, she really just knew the exact way to handle me during it. She would check in and she would comfort me, but she would never push too much or try to, you know, sometimes people want to say well-meaning things to try to fix it. A lot of us are fixers and they want to put a band-aid on it. Even if it's a scripture band-aid, they want to say things and at least, don't ever say at least, at least you have other kids or at least you could try again or anything like that. Sometimes, sometimes you just need to breathe it out. Sometimes it brought me peace being able to just walk through it, even though it's hard to think about each thing that happened. If a friend would allow you to just breathe that out, sometimes that can be healing. But checking in on your friends, of course, we had people, I think our church started us a meal train, our friends started us a meal train, because when you're grieving, and the immediate, like you said, time stands still and a lot of stuff doesn't matter anymore. You don't want to cook. You don't want to think about what's for dinner for everybody, but your family still needs to eat. And so we were really blessed by those that brought us food. Understand that the person who is grieving might not want to hang out though. They might just want to take the blessing of the food and that sounds selfish I would feel bad The person who started our mail train left a little note like just leave it on the porch and I felt kind of guilty I'm a people pleaser by nature. Like I felt kind of guilty like I had to balance each other out perfect I'm like just drop it on the porch. I feel bad They went through all this time to make our not small family a meal and just leave it on the porch But then I would feel relief because I'm like, I don't... You got to feel a person out and I think you and Curtis have talked about this. Everybody grieves differently. Some people need to be surrounded by their loved ones and by... or distracted. Some people need to process more from afar, but they still want to know you care. So dropping off a meal, sending a text message, doing something, you know, your mom helped us a ton by watching the kids and letting us go on a date. I think a few weeks later was when my mom let us go away for like a hotel night to just really disconnect and not think and get a good night's sleep and all that. It was really, it was a huge blessing and that's something I think a lot of people don't think about is mom and dad lost a baby. They need time together because the only other person who feels this as deeply as I do is you and vice versa. You know, and so the time that we had together to go on a date and just break away from the chaos and process our feelings and talk through things, it's a huge blessing. And I wanna encourage somebody to do that because again, I know a lot of times the male doesn't get the same amount of support because it is different, obviously. Your body didn't go through it, but that was still your child. And you had to be told that it was okay for you to grieve because you tried to toughen up and be like, yeah, but it's not as bad as this, or it's not as bad as that, and at least we have this. You tried to like convince yourself it's not as bad because of course, somebody always has it worse. I agree, you lose a child that you've been with here on earth that is different, but it's a perspective, this is our loss. I remember something that was deeply comforting and if you'd have told me this happened, I'd have been like, oh, that's nice, but my insurance guy at the time, who was also a friend, had got wind that we had lost and he lived like an hour away and all of a sudden we get a knock on the door at nine o'clock the night we came home from the hospital. That night, yeah. Yeah. And him and his wife are standing there with a bouquet of flowers and a gift. And I was just like, what? A precious little, like little statue holding blue flowers. It looked like me. The statue looked like me crying holding blue flowers. What a powerful statue. It meant a lot. We still have it. We love it. I mean, like, I love that thing. Every time I look at it, I'm like, wow, what a thoughtful gift. Yeah. Just little things like that for people to say, hey, I see you. I'm sorry this hurts. I can't fix it, but let me help honor your son or let me bless you in a way. We had other friends bring us flowers and monetary gifts to get us through because we were also, you know, that takes me back and I know we're probably we're way over time but I remember right before we, right after we picked up his body from the funeral home we were sitting in that parking lot at the church because we know what we're gonna do. Like God, you know we're running out of money. How could Chris possibly focus on the business right now when we've been hit with multiple tragedies and surgeries and everything and we're just like, it's so hard in that moment when you feel like he's off script to be like okay, But this doesn't take him by surprise He knew you wouldn't be able to produce right now. Why so now that we're a few months out or a lot of months out Can you kind of reflect and kind of look back? I'm like, what was it was God pivoting you was he forcing us to rest was he making sure you didn't go down the wrong business path because he had this plan for you. That and I think he wanted us to move to North Carolina. And here we are. And to just fully trust him when it did not make sense. If things would have worked out, we would have stayed. Yeah. And I think he wanted us to move to North Carolina and I think he's putting a lot of pieces together right now. I think so too. And as we reflect. After that happened, we're like, how can we leave our community? Because our friends and our church and our family surrounded us with each hospital stay, with each everything. And after this loss, they loved on us the way your village is supposed to. Why would we leave this? What if something else happens? And I, you know, that's so interesting that you say that, because I do think that's it now because we, when we prayed, we're like, God, make it obvious, open the door and close the door. And he, he did want us there. And we're still figuring out all of the reasons, but it is interesting how the pieces are starting to come together. But I just thought of that moment because I remember thinking like, this does not make any sense. Nothing made sense in our pair life at that time. I feel like you were able to really support me and come alongside me this time and you grieved with me, which helped me a ton. So I want to flip one question on you to say, as the husband of somebody who's walking through this or who maybe has walked through this, maybe he's hearing this and realizing I wouldn't know how to support my wife or I don't feel the same level of sadness as she does or whatever. And I also know that if this would have happened earlier in our marriage, you probably would not have handled it as well as you did this time. If you could just speak to the men and give them just a little bit of wisdom. Sometimes the responsibility of being the leader is actually almost all the time. The responsibility of being the leader is a lot of pressure and so I think I think really just really just going to God and be like, Lord, I have no idea how to handle this. By your spirit, you have to give me the right attitude. And something I did during that period of time, I don't think I mentioned to you, but very practically speaking, is I knew we were going through a season. And so I reached out to a pastor, I reached out to a couple people in the church, and I was like, hey, you gotta support me during this, because I don't really know what to do. Trying to find other guys who have been through it. And the other thing I did was I was like, alright, emotions are high, all of these things are happening, I have to, and this is so funny practical, but I have to take care of myself. I have to take care of my sleep, I have to take care of food, eating the right things, all the things, because I need to be clear and show up and be able to make good decisions. So on a ruthlessly practical level, I remember being like, oh, can't like cheat on bad meals and stuff because all I want to do is just crawl in the corner and eat a pizza. And so I needed to just like level up in those areas and make sure I was clear on decision-making. I didn't want to be an excuse. So there's that and yeah I think that just know who your spouse is. Know how they process and then something I've been challenged with is like I don't want to love you the way I'm comfortable loving you. I want to love you the way that you need to be loved. So when we talk about husband loving the wife like Christ loved the church. Like, I need to love you the way you need to be loved. So you need to process, you need time, you need a hug, you need all the things that I'm not... Not naturally. Not naturally inclined to, right? And so yeah, just I know she needs to talk, I know she needs a second, I know this, that, and the other. And yeah, so just really reading what you need and then just kind of trying to kind of be there for you and then be the strength in this in the in that season somebody has to yeah you didn't let us fall all the way apart you you kept us grounded and you showing your emotions I know a lot of men don't like to yeah showing your emotions helped me Because again you feel lonely you're like this was just I'm all alone Nobody knows how I feel and so when you held me in and just like this is sad This I remember you don't know the one night We got into bed, and I put his little His little box that he his ashes are in I put it by our bed, and I just like Start crying again. I was like, I'm just so sad. You're like, okay, it's okay. And you just kind of held me and that's what I needed in that moment. You prayed with me and you're always being the voice of reason when I'm spiraling into all the what-ifs or all the worst-case scenarios or all the, you know, the lies that I would tell myself you would speak truth over me so that's ways that you've really helped me through this process. I pray that there's a husband that hears this and can move forward and not because of us and who we are but who God, how God has enabled us to handle this. We'll be like okay I can support my wife better now. I agree. Yeah. Hmm. That's good. I want to end this episode with you speaking to women who have lost babies with a very similar traumatic situation that we went through yeah, and or worse and Nobody knows still Can you can you just speak to her on? How important it is to talk talk about this. First I want to say I'm so sorry and I mean that because I know this is a club we don't none of us want to be a part of but I'm also sorry that you are believing the lies that this is shameful and that you don't deserve to talk about it or don't deserve to grieve or that that life wasn't as important as a life that was 20 weeks or you know a stillborn at a full term you know if you carry life inside of you and you lost it that deserves to be honored and that deserve to be grieved and I want to tell you that and not that it's okay it's not okay but that talking about it and processing it and grieving will bring healing. You're probably experiencing outbursts of frustration or emotions that you're like, well, where do those come from? And it's because you're bearing down the thing like God gave us emotions for a reason. He gave us the grieving process for a reason. Says in the Bible, there's a time to grieve. Like this is human nature. We are made to feel these things and not stay there. So quiet out the noise of Satan and quiet out the noise of culture that says it's not a baby until it's out of the womb. Quiet all of those lies and just, I would encourage you to just hit your knees and pray and ask God to help you work through grieving, truly grieving your child and your loss and knowing that it's okay to talk about it. There's nothing shameful. I know we feel these feelings of like, oh, my body just failed me, you know? And it does feel like that. It's like, I'm a woman. My body's supposed to be able to do this. Just want to encourage you to quiet those noises, shut Satan up, and just pray because Jesus loves you and he loves that baby more than you did. Obviously, you know, it's like hard to reconcile, but like he wanted that baby more than we did, you know He wanted Lawson with him. We don't know why we don't know why you know, I even said that anyway, couldn't you just Snap his fingers and I had him in heaven without having to make me go through that You know what? I mean? Like doesn't doesn't how it works, you know, and we're just humans are we're not meant to understand everything that God does because And we can't possibly wrap our minds. He's out of time, space, matter, everything. So all that to say, it's okay to grieve. And it's okay. And whether it was six weeks or 20 weeks or 40 weeks, that was still your baby. I always say I'm ending and then another person pops up. I think we've said we're ending so many times. And I'm like, yeah, go on, but this is a question. So someone also is listening to this, and they're hearing our story, and they made a different decision. They had a DNC. And they're thinking like, oh, now I have this feeling of, well, what if I would have gotten to hold him, or figure out the gender, or whatever. Like, what's your gut reaction to someone who's maybe believing that lie. Well I was going to say again, do not let the enemy take my words and twist them in your brain to make you think you did something wrong or give you regrets or anything because each of our stories are different for a reason. And that's why I'm here to share it maybe with somebody who unfortunately is about to go through this and they hear this but if you already made that choice, just give it to God. Just give it to Him. Just pray through it. Give it to the Lord because the enemy will take this moment that's supposed to be of encouragement and try to make you feel guilty. And there's nothing you can do now. You can't change anything. Don't let it fill you with shame and regret. Yeah. Yeah, and back to someone telling their story, I think that God takes us through these things to impact others too. Think about this whole concept. If Michael Christopher wouldn't have gotten cancer and passed away, the Run to the Heart podcast probably would not exist because that was her mantra. You know what I mean? And the community and Curtis's grief and his willingness to share his story and all the things and now all the stories we've had of other people and now our story and stuff like this ministry is catching fire. still be mom to those five kids and for Curtis to continue to enjoy a marriage that filled them both up spiritually. But I'm not. And if I were God and I would have just never taken Michael, this ministry wouldn't exist. And we just don't know how this ministry is gonna impact people. That's what's so cool about this medium is that we're speaking right now, and we're just speaking to each other, right? But who knows how many people, God will use this episode and Josh's episode and Curtis's episodes and all the future episodes and stories and testimonies to touch somebody who's going through that exact moment over and over and over again. Yeah. Yeah. So tell your story, your story, share, share it with somebody, you know, pray, maybe ask God like, God, I'm more of an introvert I don't tell these stories this is uncomfortable but this happened and if you have a purpose for it that I haven't you know I haven't been a vessel to fulfill give me the strength to do it give me the courage to do it good yeah you just said something kind of made me think this baby's not here yet but if we would you know kind of like you said if I were God I wouldn't have taken Lawson but then if we had Lawson we would never have this baby. So what's God's purpose for this baby then? You know, does he have something that this baby's gonna do or impact or create or, you know, maybe not even him, maybe it's down his lineage of children or something, you know? So yeah, yeah. Interesting. Yeah. Wow. Thanks, babe. This has been, it's been good. It's been therapeutic for me. I know. Something about breathing it out, yeah. Yeah, and breathe out. But man, I just pray that people are so greatly impacted by this. And I know that when people hear you talk, they're like, oh, what a welcoming spirit. I wanna talk to her about this, you know? And so, we're gonna set up an email yeah for any women who have gone through this to reach out to you directly yeah and it's going to be jonna r2h at gmail.com so jonna r h j o h n n a r2 and we'll put it on the screen for those that are that are looking for that email. But yeah, so yeah thanks again, I love you and I appreciate you

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