Nine. Nine miscarriages. Nine miscarriages in less than three years.
This is the heartbreaking reality for Kenzie Eckinger, a brave mumma from Ohio, USA who shares her journey to motherhood on her Instagram page, One in One Hundred.
Kenzie and her husband Stephan have been trying to fall pregnant for three years now. She’s open and honest about her infertility journey and her realness is incredibly refreshing. She’s been to specialists, been diagnosed with endometritis, and has undergone IVF.
She’s also seen the faint positive line a handful of times too. She’s had her blood tests done and seen her HCG levels rising and prepared to share her exciting news with her family and friends.
And then it’s all gone.
In an instant. Before the ultrasound appointment, before hearing her baby’s beating heart, before the nausea and the exhaustion. Gone.
1 in 100
She, like 1 in 100 women, has to deal with the absolute heartbreak that is recurrent pregnancy loss.
Last month, she lost her eighth baby and she shared this poignant message on her Instagram page,
I’ve been pregnant eight times, but I still don’t know what it feels like to be pregnant.
I know what you’re thinking… how is that even possible? But it’s true.
I have no idea what it actually feels like to be pregnant.
I don’t know what it feels like to be so nauseous to the point of needing to throw up. I don’t know what it feels like to have your boobs be so sore that you want to rip them off. I don’t know what it feels like to be so exhausted that you need to take a nap in the middle of the day. I don’t know what it feels like to be completely averted at the thought of certain foods or smells. I don’t know what any of that feels like…
I’ve never gotten to see my baby’s sweet smiling face on an ultrasound. I’ve never gotten to hear their beautiful heartbeat. I’ve never gotten to feel them kick their little legs inside of me. I’ve never gotten to watch my belly slowly grow to the point of not being able to see my feet. I’ve never got to experience any of that…
My body has never made it far enough into any of my pregnancies for me to know what any of that feels like. Even though I’ve been pregnant eight times, I still have no clue what it actually feels like to experience these typical pregnancy symptoms and reach all of those milestones, simply because all of my babies left me too soon.
The only way I’ve known I was pregnant each of those times was from a handful of positive home pregnancy tests and multiple hcg blood draws. But never from actually “feeling” like I was pregnant.”
Infertility awareness
Infertility is a struggle that so many couples go through behind closed doors and repeat miscarriages are all too common, even though they are not freely discussed at most dinner tables.
As Kenzie writes, although she may have lost all of her babies early on in the pregnancy, a loss is a loss. And it really hurts.
Whether your loss happened at 6 months or 6 weeks, a loss is a loss and they all matter. Each of those precious babies’s lives was a gift, and the loss of that deserves to be remembered and that grief has a right to be felt in all it’s entirety.
I know one day the time will come that I finally get to know firsthand what it’s like to experience all of that, but until then I can’t help but wonder what it actually feels like to be pregnant.”
‘Finally our turn’
Shortly after Kenzie’s heartbreaking confession, she shared some happy news that she was undergoing another IUI. She then shared the devastating news that, although she had been pregnant, she lost the baby. Again.
Sharing a picture of her kneeled over in the bathroom, our heart breaks for her and her every single other woman who has sat there and cried.
As Kenzie writes,
Nine. Nine miscarriages. Nine miscarriages in less than three years…
I still cannot believe I am saying that out loud.
It just does not feel real.
None of this feels real.
I wanted to think that this time would be different. I wanted more than anything to believe that it was finally our turn, and this was it for us… but it wasn’t. You’re really gone.
We have been trying to make sense of it all, and continue to pick up the pieces that have been left broken, but some things are just too heavy to hold right now. Our hearts are completely shattered.
I wish I knew where we are supposed to go from here, and what direction to point in… but both of us just feel so lost. We are left with nothing more than empty arms and even more unanswered questions. How could this possibly happen to us again… why us, why our baby. I don’t think we will ever quite know those reasons.”
Never give up
As Kenzie and Stephan go through the grieving process, she continues to share words of hope with other women going through similar things. And she continues to fight for the family she so badly wants.
When you want something so desperately you will do everything in your power and at your disposal to make that dream a reality, even if there is no guarantees that anything you are doing will work in the end. As long as there is the slightest of chances that it could bring you closer to that miracle you have been longing for, you will try anything no matter how crazy it may appear.
You want to know why…
Because there will come a day when you get to tell that precious little child everything you did to bring them into this world… and wow what a beautiful story that will be.
You’ll get to tell them that you never once gave up hope for them. You’ll get to tell them about every single mountain you had to climb. You’ll get to tell them just how much of a fighter you were. And when it’s all said and done you’ll get to tell them that it was all completely worth it a thousand times over, because they are here with you.
So to my future babies,
I don’t know when the time will come that the ending of our journey no longer remains unwritten, and I’ll finally get to tell you this story… so until then, I will continue to write it. No matter how many more chapters that may be, or how much longer it will take, I will never stop writing the pages of it until the day comes that I finally get to share them all with you.”
You can follow her journey on Instagram.
