Yesterday when I went back to the OB, they had the results from the testing we did when Andrew was born. Everything was normal. No infections, no abnormal chromosomes, nothing. The OB said there is no further testing that needs to be done, we just won’t ever have answers, but she said the good news about that is that most women who don’t have answers go on to have normal pregnancies. I asked her about the blood clotting testing that I had done after I had Luke. Blood clotting disorders have been known to cause miscarriages especially in the second trimester. Those tests were all normal. After my first two miscarriages we didn’t have any testing done because they typically don’t start testing until you have three. So, when I got pregnant with Elijah after my first two miscarriages the OB suggested I take baby aspirin as a precaution in case I had some blood clotting disorder, they cannot test for those while you are pregnant for some reason. So, I took baby aspirin with Elijah and Luke. Then after I had Luke I decided to have the testing done and it came back normal, so my midwife at the time said I didn’t need to take baby aspirin if I were to become pregnant again, so while I was pregnant with Andrew I didn’t.  I asked my OB, she is a new OB not one I have seen before with any other pregnancies, about all that. She said that if we ever did decide to become pregnant again I should take baby aspirin. She said even though my testing was normal there could be a blood disorder that they don’t test for, because they don’t know about it.

I don’t know how I feel really about all that. We have no answers, really, which I knew was a distinct possibility, but I didn’t expect how that would feel. I wanted answers and we don’t have any. It’s nice that the OB is optimistic about future pregnancies, should we pursue that, but it doesn’t change the fact that I have still had almost as many losses as live births at this point. I don’t want to make any decisions about future pregnancies at this point, I know emotionally that isn’t a good idea. I just feel confused about it all. I don’t know if I can face another pregnancy with all this loss and not having any definitive answers, only what worked in the past but they don’t know why. I have no guarantees. The truth of this whole thing is that no one has any guarantees. The idea that you have any control over what happens in life is just not true. Before all this happened I thought you just get pregnant and then nine months later you have a healthy baby, but that just isn’t the case all the time and most of the time doctor’s can’t do anything to change that. There is risk and loss in everything. Sometimes bad things happen and you have to face that possibility. The reality is there was just as much risk when we got pregnant with Andrew as there is now if we had another pregnancy, I just didn’t realize it. If we don’t risk sometimes we don’t get to experience great things. But staring that risk in the face for nine months to have another baby just isn’t something I know if I can do again. Fortunately I don’t have to decide that right now.

The way to love anything is to realize that it might be lost. G.K. Chesterton