Hello and welcome to the Smooth Stones podcast. Today we are going to be talking about nine lessons that River taught me, and I want you to stick around for this. And I was thinking I wanna talk about my baby. River River is our second loss. River died at about 14 weeks, and I talk a lot about Lauren. I talk about both of them, but sometimes River does not get the attention they deserve, I don’t think.

But what’s really powerful is listening to stories, listening to other people’s experiences, and comparing it with yours, contrasting it with yours, not comparing in a like a negative way. Just saying, oh yeah, I felt that too, or I thought that too, or I was treated that way, or whatever it is. Um, I think that there’s so much power in sharing our story and listening to other people’s stories and.

Especially if you’re not ready to share your story, listening can be really powerful, but I, I really just want to share a little bit more about me. I have never, in all the years I’ve been doing this podcast, here’s the deal. Here’s the truth. I have actually recorded, so I have an episode of Lauren’s birth story and I talk all about how I had Lauren.

Lauren was still born at full term. I have recorded probably multiple times, river’s birth story, maybe river’s here. Something just fell, um, that was random. Anyways, I recorded this, what I would call birth story, but really was like this surgery nightmare. Um, um, I’ve recorded it multiple times and every time I’m just like, no, I don’t like.

I am happy to share. You wanna talk to me about it? I will share. Um, I will probably talk about that at some point, but it’s just been really, really hard. This loss was just different for me. It wasn’t better, worse than losing Lauren. It just was different and it definitely was traumatic in a lot of ways.

And so I had a lot more feelings. I had a lot more stuff I was dealing with physically, emotionally, mentally. A lot of things that were happening. And so I think I’ll just, well, I’m gonna go through the lessons that River taught me because whenever I have guests on, I love to ask them, what are the lessons that your baby taught you?

And I wanna talk about RIVER and what they taught me. Um, we did not find out a gender on River and I’ll go into why here as I, as I go through these lessons. But I think what I’ll do is I’ll dive right into the lessons, and as I’m going, I’m gonna explain how I learned that, and if there’s any details that I’ve left out, um, I’ll add those at the end.

But I, I’m just really, again, so thankful that you’re here. Thank you for listening. Thank you for coming here to. Find some peace and some happiness even in the midst of your own losses and challenges. And that’s always my message. So even though I still, there are things that still really bother me about this story, I do have a lot of peace around it.

And I wanna be that example for you, that you can also have peace and joy and happiness around your story no matter how. Kind of horrific it might have been or not, right? Lauren’s story was devastating, but it was not as traumatic, I don’t think, as what happened with River so let’s just start with number one.

It is okay to be angry. Uh, well, so many of us are taught that we shouldn’t be angry. We should be nice. We should be happy. We should be grateful. We should be, you know, good. Especially good women, we shouldn’t be angry. Uh, I was incredibly angry after River died. I was angry because this baby died and I had already lost a baby.

I’d had a rainbow baby. I was so grateful for, and I had been doing so much work in the baby loss community. I just thought this isn’t fair. Like I’ve already been through the toughest thing ever and I think some of you can relate. ’cause it does seem like these hard things come in waves or when it rains it pours.

We just, it’s like our baby dies and then there’s something else. It’s like the, something else is just the straw that breaks the camel’s back. It’s so infuriating to be honest. And. I am not, I don’t really get angry. I get frustrated, like I get annoyed with people, whatever. Like I can definitely get grouchy, but I’m not like an angry person.

I’m a pretty chill, I’m pretty good to like let people live their lives and even if I don’t agree with it, it’s like whatever. I’m okay with it. I had had trials in my life before. I’d had hard things I’ve been through, and I was not angry. I wasn’t angry with God. I wasn’t kind of angry with what had happened.

It just was what it was, and I kind of tried to accept things and just roll with it. But with River, I was intensely angry. I’ll just list some of the things I was angry about. I was angry. Like I said, that they died. It didn’t seem fair. Uh, I was angry at the timing because we had just seen a great ultrasound.

Everything looked good. We just told our kids and I had been like so sick. And so I was taking that as a really good sign and then all of a sudden symptoms lifted and I was like, yay. I’m in the second trimester. I don’t feel like throwing up all the time. Um, and then just to go back. And have no heartbeat was just, oh, I was so angry.

I was angry because I ended up hemorrhaging and losing a lot of blood during, um, surgery. I was angry that I couldn’t stand for a week. I was angry that I chose surgery even though I felt at the time and the reasons I chose it. Like, I felt like it was the right thing to do, but I also wasn’t given the option to deliver.

And I think if I would’ve been given the option to deliver, I probably would’ve taken that. Um, but I wasn’t, and so I was kind of angry at myself. I’m, I was like, I’m in the baby loss community. Like I know that you can have babies at this age. And it was just, anyways. So I was just kinda angry at myself.

I was kind of angry at my. Medical care. I was angry that they told me, this will be 20 minutes and you’ll be home for breakfast. And it was not. It was 90 something minutes of them trying to get me to stop bleeding and then a hospital stay. I was angry that we had just moved and nobody knew I was pregnant and I didn’t have the support system that I had when we lost Lauren.

Yeah, I was, I was angry at God. I was just beside myself to be honest. Just couldn’t believe that this would happen again and. It was really tough, and I don’t know if it was conscious, but I did decide to just be angry for a while. Um, I decided, yeah, I just hung onto that anger and I don’t highly recommend it, but also I do, because sometimes we just gotta be angry.

We gotta let ourselves be angry. Like if I could have just screamed into the void, um. Screamed. I think I did almost scream at some insurance people because there was like a whole bunch of stuff that went down with the paperwork and the um, the billing. And I was like, heck no. I am not paying for this nightmare.

Because we had really good, like, I’m lucky enough to have really like a hundred percent maternity coverage. And so when I started getting bills, I was like, no, uh, I’m not doing this. But I remember being on the phone with the insurance and just being so upset that not only am I having to be on the phone trying to hold it together, they’re not understanding, they’re not able to help me.

Like it was just so incredibly frustrating, infuriating, and emotional. Um, and I just didn’t wanna be do that, doing that at all. And then. And I was angry because we chose surgery, because we wanted to do testing, because we wanted to get answers. And the hospital made a mistake, put the wrong code or bar code or something.

They labeled, um, River’s body incorrectly. And after waiting and waiting and waiting, we got no answers. We don’t know what happened. We don’t know why it happened. We don’t know the gender. And you know what, it’s okay to be angry about that. It’s okay to be angry. So if you’re angry about something in your life, in your loss story, something else that’s happened around your loss, where it’s like, this doesn’t seem fair.

Like my baby died and you know, I couldn’t, I lost my job. Or like something else happened. In your life, it’s okay to be angry. I would just say, own your anger. Just recognize it’s coming from you. It’s coming from the way you’re looking at some really crappy circumstances. And sometimes the right thing to do is be angry about it, and that’s okay.

All right. Number two, speak up for what you want. I, the, the first part of this lesson is I. So this was in 2016 and I had talked to a friend of mine and she had done, I don’t remember exactly, I think it might be the NIPT, it’s some testing, but she was having twins and she had done blood tests at like nine weeks and she found out the genders and like all kinds of things.

And I was like, oh, that’s really cool. I, maybe I’ll do that. And so I had asked my doctor at that point, you know, at nine, 10 weeks. Can we do a blood, like, can we do testing on this baby? Can we find out, you know, gender and everything else? And she was like, I don’t know what you’re talking about. I’ve never heard of this.

And like, come to find out and looked it up. And I’m like, it’s a very common, like, well-known test. I think there might’ve been some discussion of like how much it would cost. And I was like, it’s fine. Like I, if we had to pay for it, we’d pay for it. And, um, because I, I really had wanted to know early on the gender,

I think partially because this was my second pregnancy after loss, and I just wanted that connection. I wanted to, yeah, I just wanted to know, and my doctor just kind of brushed it off and I didn’t push harder and I didn’t, again, sometimes we just, we don’t, you know, you have someone who’s in authority, I guess, and someone who’s an expert, and I just didn’t take it any further than that.

And so. When we had the baby, when we had it, um, and when everything happened and we never did find out a gender or information, which that test might have told us, Hey, there’s something going on with this baby. Um, yeah, I wish I would’ve spoken up. I wish I would’ve. . I also could have explored more options.

Again, I give myself a ton of grace for this because like, yeah, I didn’t, I was kind of in the option surgery or wait for it to happen naturally, and I was at home alone with a toddler, um, just like busy mom stuff and I just couldn’t imagine like trying to have a 14 week miscarriage by myself. It just. It sounded really scary and I didn’t know how long my body would hold onto the baby.

And so, you know, that’s why I made some of those decisions. But, um, so I didn’t even know at the time that I would’ve wanted to hold my baby, but it was weird because I already had volunteered and knew like I made clothes and hats and blankets for babies at 14 weeks. So like I knew it was a possibility.

I don’t know, honestly. Again, I give myself a ton of grace and love. You do the best you can with what you have in the situation and in the situation. That was the best I could do. But, I also didn’t speak up with the, afterwards, with the testing. Again, this was another thing that I didn’t even know I could, in my shock I didn’t ask.

What happened with the remains and how was that disposed of? And I wish I would’ve, um, again, at the time I was just so devastated with the bad news and like nobody helped me and nobody Yeah, nobody said anything. So, um, and there were a couple of things in the hospital too where it was like. There was a point where I needed more blood and they couldn’t get ahold of my doctor and everyone was there like waiting because the doctor had to sign up off on it.

So they’re trying to gimme fluid. I had like no blood pressure. Um, they had already given me a bunch of blood in surgery, but I needed more. And I think it was probably my husband at the time who had to just be like, do something like, take care of her, help her. And really stand up in a medical situation, which again, can be really tricky.

Especially in that situation where it seemed like everyone was just waiting for someone else to make the decision. But in the end we were like, okay, this, we’ve gotta do something. So, um. All my hard things have taught me to speak up for what I want. And I’ve learned a lot from ’em. And I wish we could learn them in a different way, but sometimes we just do.

Sometimes you gotta end up being railroaded to learn to speak up for what you want, and I’m way better at doing that now. Way, way better. Um, yeah. Okay. Number three. Gummy bears are the best. I will never forget, and my only biggest regret is I didn’t have my phone. Anyways, we weren’t able to record a video.

I wish I had a video like so bad because I like wanted to record it and we didn’t. Um. But the one time we got to see River was this little ultrasound at like, just, just about 11 weeks. And they were jumping around and just tiny and had like the little nubbin arms and legs and so cute. And I just, that is a memory.

I hope that I’ll always get to keep with me. Um, like I said, I wish I had it outside of my brain, but um, I do just. I just think about that a lot like the little gummy bear song. Uh, if you’re old like me, if you remember the Gummy Bear song or you’ve seen it, um, gummy Bear cartoon, look it up. But they are the best and it was so sweet and I’m so glad that I have that memory.

Uh, number four, it’s okay to let go of anger. I carried that anger for. Two and a half years, I carried anger for all those reasons in succession, sometimes all at the same time. Sometimes, you know, different, um, things made me more angry, less angry, some I don’t know. It was just a mess of anger. And there was a point years later where I was like, you know what?

It’s time. It’s time to stop being angry. It’s time to stop blaming myself. It’s time to. Like, um, my doctor happened to live really close to where we lived, and she’s a runner, and I would see her, I would see her running up and down the hill, uh, where we lived, and I would pass her and I, it was a really weird mix of feelings, and I think I’m totally entitled to those feelings.

But there was also a time where I was like, you know. I am just gonna let this go. I wasn’t angry. I think it was a weird mix for me, and maybe you’ve experienced this, but for me it was this weird mix of she saved my life in some ways and maybe potentially caused some problems. Like we never really dug into what all happened.

Um. And what happened with the lab results, like, I don’t know whose mistake that was, but there definitely were some mistakes made and, you know, I, we couldn’t change anything. We weren’t gonna like sue anyone. I can’t remember. I might’ve written an email if I didn’t. I should still, but. I just couldn’t be mad every time I saw her.

I didn’t wanna be mad every time I thought about it. I didn’t want to keep that anger. I didn’t wanna blame. I didn’t want to carry that anymore. And so I hired a coach and I said, I’m done with this. I wanna put it down. And that’s what I did. And it was amazing. Once I decided I was ready. Once I worked with someone who knew what they were doing, who knew how to pull out all the yucky, scary, dark, angry thoughts, and just let me look at them and let me say no, I’m, I’m gonna let them go.

Um, that happened pretty quickly and I feel really good about that. Number five kind of goes along with what I said before. It’s okay to not like people. I think as many of us are kind of these recovering people, pleasers or we, we just wanna be nice and we want everyone to like us and we wanna be kind.

And like I, in my church, it’s very much like be a peacemaker and be like Jesus and be, you know, all these things.

But I didn’t have to, like, it was okay to avoid certain people. It was okay to not like people, especially some of the medical people, um, to not be a fan and. To kind of cut them outta my life, even though I didn’t see them. It was like changing doctors. That was a big thing for me. I was like, okay, uh, I’m not gonna go back here.

And especially when I got pregnant, I had another rainbow pregnancy after that and I was like, yeah, I’m not doing anything. We actually live in this small. County and there’s lots of great people, doctors, there’s a little hospital there. But I was like, Nope. Like I’m going to the big city. I’m gonna get the best doctors.

I am just like completely not dealing with this system. That failed me in so many ways. Because even. Like the surgery center I went to, I always say, it’s so crazy I didn’t, they didn’t even gimme a pamphlet, like they didn’t gimme anything. It’s just like you go in pregnant, you go out and it’s like goodbye.

There was just no support and the. The weird thing is, which is really common, is that labor and delivery often has really good bereavement things, or like the NICU will have great bereavement teams, but sometimes if you’re in the emergency room, if you’re in a surgery center, they just do not have that same level of care.

And so yeah, it, it’s okay to not like that place and not want to go back. Number six. Strangers are so kind. Like I said, I had just moved. We had moved maybe six weeks earlier. I was pregnant when we moved. I felt awful. I remember just like barely being able to pack and barely being able to clean my house and getting it ready to go and just being exhausted.

And then we had all kinds of other struggles at the same time. We kind of had a real estate nightmare. Speaking of like, it’s okay to be angry. We had a real estate nightmare the same time that we had. Uh, lost his baby and just everything went sideways real quick. Um, but people were so kind, even though we just moved there, even though they barely knew us, our neighbors brought us food.

Um, the sweetest lady brought me flowers and sat with me and talked to me. So many people were so kind, and I will never forget that. I love that. And I think sometimes we hold ourselves back from serving people if we don’t really know them and we don’t know, like, uh, I’m not really in their inner circle.

Should I do something? Should I say something? Should I drop something off? I always say yes, yes. Because if people would’ve thought they needed to know me better in order to help me in that hard time, nobody would’ve come. And that would’ve been really crappy. Like it was already crappy. Um. Yeah, the service from strangers was absolutely incredible and kind of like this little lifeline that I had, and I’m so grateful for that community.

Um, and part of that was my faith community. So I’m so grateful that I belong to a church. When we move, we just find our congregation and, it’s like a built-in family. And that’s so beautiful. So if you don’t, um, if you struggle with community, you don’t have a place you feel like you belong, I really encourage you to get out there and find somewhere.

Like go say hi. Make the strangers not be strangers anymore. Um, show them who you are. Tell ’em what’s going on and make those friends. ’cause we do all need a village like so hard. Number seven, all grief journeys are unique. This was a really great lesson for me because like I said with Lauren, it was absolutely devastating, like the worst thing.

And we had a lot of peace. We had a lot of peace around what happened. We had a lot of peace with like decisions that were made. It just. I made the choice that I could either think everything went wrong so that she died, or that everything went right and that was just her path. That was our path, and I decided that.

And so even though I was devastated, heartbroken postpartum, like recovering my kids, I had four living little girls, they lost their baby sister. They were devastated too. Our whole community was mourning ’cause everyone was so excited for us to have this baby. Um, you know, our family, our friends, I had a lot of peace and I felt a lot of like, strength from people praying for us.

I felt really close and connected with heaven. I saw a lot of signs. I, it was just like, if it’s gonna be awful. It was the best version of Awful River like I said, I was just like, it was hit after hit, after hit, after hit. Um, I lost so much blood that I could not stand for like an entire week. I was like out.

Um, it was terrifying. Um, it was terrifying. Medically. It was traumatic. I didn’t have any of that closure. I mean there, you know, whatever closure means, but I didn’t get the opportunity to hold my baby. I didn’t get pictures of my baby. I didn’t get footprints. I didn’t get molds. I didn’t get to dress them.

I didn’t get to know the gender. I didn’t. It was like, not only did I lose my baby, but I lost the whole birth experience. I lost so much information and answers. I. You know, there was, like I said, the anger that came in of like, who, like, why did this happen? Why are these mistakes being made? Like, what’s going on?

Um, there was a lot of blame. There was a lot of shame inside my heart because I didn’t get the remains. I didn’t know what happened. I felt really helpless. Um, yeah, I just. I hated all of it. I hated all of it and I didn’t wanna remember. So actually River, we had surgery the day before my birthday. Um, I hadn’t told anyone when we were pregnant, but I had to make a Facebook post and say, Hey, please don’t wish me happy birthday because.

We just lost another baby and I’m in the hospital and we’re devastated and it was awful. Um, I don’t want to remember the day that I went into surgery. I actually think I found out on like a Tuesday, but my husband was out of state, so I was actually alone that whole week except my amazing angel of a friend came to stay with me.

Um. But yeah, I had to wait until Friday and it was actually Friday the 13th. So I’m always like, don’t, don’t do it. Don’t do surgery on Friday the 13th. But that was a start of my grief journey was just feeling physically, emotionally, spiritually, just like absolutely knocked unconscious. Like I just.

Everything was a mess. Everything was hard. Um, it just seemed so unfair and it’s never fair. But that was a really a big theme was like, this is not fair. I also didn’t identify with the due date, which is actually why I decided to do this episode this week because my due date was November 4th, but I had River in May.

Um, but because of our history, because we lost Lauren at full term and then we had my Rainbow Baby, we induced it 38 weeks just to make sure, like everything, everyone was mentally and physically okay, including our poor doctor who had been with us through Lauren. Um, I was like, oh, we’ll probably have a baby in October.

So I didn’t really identify with November 4th. I was just like, oh, it’ll be sometime in October. But I also, yeah, so I just like didn’t identify with a due date. I didn’t wanna remember the day. So we don’t actually have a day, Lauren. We have a birthday, we have a grave. We have like molds and pictures and, and memories and so many things.

River, we have nothing. And so it’s been a different journey. It’s been different. Um, so all grief journeys are unique. Is something that I know is true. Um, and like I said, even if you had the most perfect experience, you might be absolutely angry and devastated. Like you might have the different circumstance, same feelings, like all jumbled together, whatever it is.

Like it doesn’t matter ’cause it’s just we are unique. Each time is unique. I see this sometimes with recurrent loss. People are like, oh, I’ve done this before. Like, I should be, I should like know how to. Grieve my third baby better than I grieve my second or something. It’s so weird. No, you’ve never lost three babies before.

You’ve never lost four babies before. You’ve never lost a baby at this time. You’ve never had surgery, or you’ve never had a baby this far along that you lost. You know, sometimes people have early miscarriages and then they get to like third trimester and then they lose the baby, and it’s like, oh my gosh.

Like everyone is so unique and so every grief journey is unique. So please be compassionate with yourself. Number eight, miscarriages deserve care too. Like I said before, being in an outpatient surgery center for this whole thing, even though I ended up in the hospital, um, it was like they put me in the hospital for blood loss, not for baby loss.

And so again, there just like, there wasn’t care. There wasn’t anything. And there was no support. There was no comfort items, there was no memory items, there was no acknowledgement that this baby existed. And I know that everywhere is different, but I’ve actually talked to many, many, many hospitals and I know that this kind of probably is a problem because, um, in a lot of places.

Um, or like if you had the baby at home, sometimes they just send you home and they don’t really give you information. Or like, I, there’s just like so many stories. There’s so many ways that we don’t get the care that we deserve when we’re experiencing miscarriage. And so I hope that each one of us, and if that’s been on your heart to help that.

We can help make a difference, that we can speak up, that we can donate, that we can do things. I have a sweetest friend who started actually making little miscarriage kits. It had like a little tiny hat, little tiny blanket and a little pamphlet, and she donated it to the surgery center. Now, a lot of times they’ll say, well, we don’t have space to store it, or We can’t do this.

We can’t do that. Well figure it out. Honestly, most places are pretty receptive overall, if you want to serve in that way. Um, if you wanna donate miscarriage kits or if you work for like, some, you have a support group or something and you wanna share information, like get in those emergency departments, get in those OB GYN offices, get in the surgery centers because that, I feel like is a spot, at least in the United States where.

These babies slip through the cracks and these families slip through the cracks because we just don’t get the care. So, um, like I said, where with Lauren. We had such sweet care with the river, it was complete opposite, just like zero care for the fact that we lost a baby and. Number nine, I think is one of the biggest ones.

And this is something that I love to teach my clients. And if you come into any of my programs, I’m gonna teach you this. Um, whether it’s LIFT or pregnancy after lost peace.

Or I have stopped blaming yourself in six weeks, which I haven’t done that program in just a bit. Uh, but I’m thinking of starting one up. So if you are interested in learning how to stop blaming yourself in six weeks, and I actually believe that you can do it, this isn’t one of those like bait and switch like big promises.

I really believe it, or I wouldn’t say it because that’s not my jam. Like my jam isn’t tricking people into working with me. It’s telling you you could stop blaming yourself in six weeks if you really want to do it. Um, if you’re ready and you’re like, I’m tired of carrying this, so reach out to me, Instagram, or excuse me, or email, um, amy@smoothstonescoaching.com because I will.

I think I’m gonna do another one. And that’s a really beautiful thing. So, um, you can stop blaming yourself. I think because it was so easy with Lauren, like of course, our first thought was what did we do? What did we do? How did we cause this? But I pretty easily was like, no, that’s not it. Even if it is, I’m not gonna blame myself.

Like even if we messed up, ’cause we like went for hikes and drove down a bumpy road, I just was not gonna continue blaming myself. Um, with River I really had to learn that lesson and it was a long, long, long lesson. Um. I had a lot of blame and a lot of shame, but I can tell you with a hundred percent certainty, you can, even if you straight up know you did cause the death of your baby, like it is your fault, which most of the time, you know what, it really isn’t like we, things happen, life happens, bodies happen.

You know, like there’s just so many factors that go into. Getting a living baby here and keeping them alive until adulthood. But even then. You can stop blaming yourself because we feel like if we just punish ourself enough, somehow that’ll fix it or that’ll make it better, or that’ll kind of vindicate what happened.

But you’re really just punishing yourself. You’re punishing everyone around you who needs you, who loves you, who needs you to shine and be the light that you are, and you’re holding back. You’re holding back from living the full beautiful life that you could have when you’re stuck blaming yourself forever.

So I’m gonna encourage you and say again, you can stop blaming yourself whenever you’re ready. If this is speaking to you right now, please reach out. Um, and I will help you. But the thing I wanna say about River, I didn’t get to see them. I didn’t get to see their little fingers and toes, their little face.

I didn’t get to know if they were a boy or a girl. Um. We chose the name River because we’re kind of outdoorsy, so we picked a gender neutral nature name. Um, my living kids voted on it and I love it, and I can’t wait to find out more about River, but especially this time of year, especially in October. Um, you know, just thinking about them, I don’t have a.

grave for them. I don’t, I do have a little shadow box with a little hat and a blanket that I had made, even though I knew I would never get to wrap my baby in it. Um, we still have it and we have a little block in there and it says, you are loved. And I think that’s maybe the bonus. Lesson number 10. I picked nine because River would be nine, I think I forgot to say that, but River would be nine this year.

The bonus lesson is that like love literally conquers all things and the love in a family, the love for a baby, the love of a parent for their child lasts forever, and it’s so strong and it’s that love, not the blame, not the shame, not the grief, not the sadness that is your connection to them. And so.

I hope that even one of these lessons has spoken to you, and I’d really encourage you. Think about your baby. What are the lessons that they taught you? What are the little ripples? That have gone throughout the world because they lived. Yes, they died, but they lived and they matter. And you matter and your experience matters and you deserve the best support and the just everything good.

Um, because you know what? Life is hard. Losing a baby is hard. And I’m sorry that you’re here, but since you are here, I just want to encourage you and say, there’s so much hope. You’re so amazing. Keep going. I know none of us wanna go through hard things. I don’t think we go through hard things just to learn lessons, but I think the lessons are there if you want them.

So that’s what I’ve got for you today. I’m gonna send my a little love out to River um, on there would be ninth birth time. And yeah, thank you for being here with me. I’ll see you next time.