Trying Again….

I’m so sorry for the total radio silence since August. Life has been coming at Tom & I pretty quickly and we are so pleased to share that we are 21 weeks pregnant with our little rainbow baby! 🤍🌈.

Life after loss, trying to conceive after loss and pregnancy after loss is probably a culmination of the second hardest footsteps Tom and I have ever had to walk in. Nothing will ever quite compare to those steps and walks we took when we lost Baby Wicks, but the journey after comes a very close second.

Something I feel not spoken about enough is the craziness around trying again after loss. That inherent want to hold YOUR baby  in your arms and be able to say ‘Yes, We did it!’ Is something that doesn’t go away. So many women I’ve spoken to really battle with those feelings of wanting to conceive after a loss. They’re a real complex mix of emotions. You feel so so so guilty for wanting another baby. Equally you desperately want to hold a baby of your own in your arms. Many women find it really tricky to navigate what other people may think about them falling pregnant again after a loss. Lots of women also say they feel that those around them believe pregnancy after a loss ‘fixes them’. I can’t even begin to imagine how anyone could ever be ‘fixed’ after the loose their child.

Nevertheless, trying again is a well trodden path by many women after they loose a child……but wow, what a rollercoaster of a ride trying again is.

In my last blog post I wrote about my weekly acupuncture sessions and how much I was loving them. It’s safe to say, I firmly believe that these helped contribute in some way or another to the start of our pregnancy after loss journey. I don’t think anyone needs a diagram for how babies are made here but there’s definitely lots of things that I’ve felt have helped us along the way and also some crazy things I did in the process of trying again that will make some of you think my brain has be infiltrated by a psychopath…..loss mummas, you’re not alone here if you’re up to some crazy dark magic hoping it will implant a baby in there somewhere.

I think in school you’re led to believe that if you have unprotected sex once you will fall pregnant….if only it was that easy. Getting to know your body again after birthing a baby you don’t get to bring home is a whole chapter of its own…..if you’ve been there you’ll know. The constant tracking, waiting, ovulation testing, checking your underwear, weeing in pots to test your LH levels…doing all those things you never thought you’d have to do whilst desperately hoping you’ll fall pregnant at the end of it.

I’ll never forget when I invested in some ‘magic pregnancy powder’ from Amazon that was supposed to help you get pregnant….that did the total opposite and sent my cycle haywire. Safe to say lesson learnt.

Ditching alcohol and only eating organic food came next…and in all honesty didn’t last long. It made me miserable and I ended up in town one night and was sick on my drive right around ovulation. Then came the hangover from hell and all the emotions I’d been bottling up. Wouldn’t advise this method for conception after.

The mental pressure you put on yourself. Convincing yourself, that even though you’ve carried a baby before you simply will never be able to again. I read blogs and posts on Facebook about people falling pregnant with such ease and each thing I read made that mental pressure worse. But for some reason, I couldn’t look away. Tom told me enough was enough and took my phone away for a little while. It was clear I’d become obsessed and someone needed to take control. Queue a few days away in north Devon, some time spent with great friends and my amazing family & I was back on track.

The constant symptom spotting and pregnancy testing at the end of every cycle desperately hoping to see those 2 lines or the word ‘Pregnant’….and your world crashing down around you again when you find out you’re not…is heartbreak all over again. 💔

But for any mum out there trying for their rainbow, the best thing I did, was something for me. My weekly accupuncture sessions left me feeling so relaxed. A time when I went out the house and did something for me. A time when I felt all the stress and tension leave my body….I’m not here to sell acupuncture to you, I’m just saying that I firmly believe once I’d given up all the testing, magic powders and allowed myself to just ‘be’….that’s when we fell pregnant. When I’d taken the pressure off myself and stopped trying to force.

Pregnancy after loss is a totally different, brutal journey….but trying again and getting there is half the battle.

In time I’ll share about our pregnancy after loss journey. But for now, to all those mums trying to conceive after loss, I see you, I feel your hope, guilt and anxiety in equal measure….and believe me when I say if you’re doing something crazy in the hope you’ll conceive - you won’t be doing it alone.

Promise not to leave it so long before I write again,

Hannah x