My Rainbow Baby Journey

I lay in the hospital bed after my surgery and looked over at my doctor.

“How are you feeling?” She asked me, lifting my gown to check my incisions.

“Ok, not in any pain. I just feel sad and empty.”

I told her with a lump in my throat. She squeezed my arm reassuringly.

“Don’t be sad, we know that you can get pregnant, that’s a good thing. We’ll just keep trying.” She gave me aftercare instructions and walked out. I burst into tears.

I never knew the meaning of the term ‘rainbow baby’ until after I had my tubal pregnancy removed in an emergency operation. While reading through online forums of other women who went through similar experiences I learned that rainbow babies are those beautiful miracles born after a miscarriage, stillborn, or neonatal death. Many conversations on the forum were focused around the hope that their next pregnancy would stick.

That their rainbows would appear to brighten their life after the storm.

While pouring out my heart to these women someone wrote how she had multiple miscarriages before her rainbow baby appeared. She told me to have hope.

I remember being annoyed with her. This was a forum for us to talk about how much we were hurting. Why did she have to talk about her success? I had been trying for six years to get pregnant and now that pregnancy was gone. Why couldn’t she allow me to wallow?

Then I realized that I was being ridiculous. While it was ok for me to be sad, to acknowledge the loss of the baby I desperately wanted, I couldn’t continue to focus on the negative. Thanks to my doctor’s watchful eye I was alive. Thanks to her skill, I would be able to continue trying for a baby. I had my husband and family’s support to get through this. I needed to keep reminding myself of the future possibilities.

One year and 4 months after my emergency surgery I held my beautiful daughter in my arms for the first time.

Her journey to this world was terrifying as I constantly expected to have a repeat of my first pregnancy. It wasn’t until she was in my arms did I finally relax. My rainbow, the magical light after such a dark storm, had arrived.

TV, movies, books, social media make pregnancy and it’s journey seem so flawless, so easy, when in reality it can be stressful, painful, and scary. Many of us do not talk about these experiences.

For whatever reason we try to conceal the pain and frustration when we should be talking about the losses that occurred during our path towards motherhood. Not only with strangers online but with friends, families, and our significant others.

By being vocal about the losses, we can we start to heal. By being vocal, we can truly start to appreciate the miracle of those amazing little rainbow babies.

If you’re struggling, if you’ve had losses, don’t lose hope. Many have been in your place and we’re here to hear you, hold you, talk with you, and hope with you.