*cue Sweet Home Alabama reference:

Jake and Mel had a bloodhound. Clint and Kels got a bloodhound.

Jake and Mel (well I guess it was kind of Andrew and Mel) had a charming Southern wedding. Clint and Kels *tried to* have a Southern inspired wedding that ended up getting rained out and moved inside.

Jake and Mel had a miscarriage. Clint and Kels had a miscarriage.

This was supposed to be the timeframe that I would post our pregnancy announcement. I had our outfits picked out and planned to take some photos in a field of flowers with our sonogram prints.

If you read my 2020 resolutions, you read that my last resolution was to have a baby in 2020. Clint and I had our first fertility treatment in March that initially appeared as a failed treatment, and my hopes were crushed that we wouldn’t have our 2020 baby. Two weeks later, on April 13th, we found out that we indeed were pregnant and our treatment was successful. We cried together, envisioned our lives and how they would so drastically be changed, gave Ellie lots of hugs telling her she was going to be a big sis, and began telling our friends and family. We celebrated Mother’s Day. We knew we wanted to raise our family in the country, and had an accepted offer on a house the night before our first ultrasound. Everything seemed to finally be falling into place. On May 18th, five weeks after finding out we were pregnant, we discovered we’d never meet our sweet baby. My heart breaks over and over again as I replay the scene of seeing our baby up on that screen for the first and last time. Due to COVID-19, Clint was unable to attend the appointment in person so he was on FaceTime as this nightmare played out. Being alone in such a tragic time was beyond words, and not being able to comfort my husband that had also just experienced this great loss is something that I will hold in my heart forever.

I never imagined this would be the scenario I would be sharing the depths of our trials to get pregnant. I set up an Instagram account and used it as a journal of sorts to write about our “Journey to Little Legate.” I numbered each post (if you do end up reading through the page, make sure to start with #1), and post 25 was when I shared that we were pregnant. I thought that was our happy ending and we would wrap up that phase of our lives with a bow on top. Instead, it continues with post 26, and on. Enter as you will – it’s not everyone’s cup of tea, but it’s my real and raw emotions as we navigated our journey to a baby. We’ve faced so much in our first two years of marriage– abnormal/cancerous cells and many visits to the oncology unit, failed attempts at trying to get pregnant to ultimately discover our struggles with infertility, lots of lab draws and tests, and now a miscarriage. We have crossed some bridges. My scans have come back clean for over a year now and the fertility treatment worked. I feel hopeful that the treatments will work again and we will be able to get pregnant in the future.

The silver lining to this heartbreaking phase has been the bond I’ve formed with the best man I’ve ever known. He has shown me a love I never knew I needed and protected and guarded my heart like no other. He has been my rock. He continues to be so strong when I’ve been so utterly broken. I could never overcome this tragedy without him right by my side.

I’ve read over this post endlessly trying to perfect the verbiage to accurately articulate how I wanted to deliver these emotions to the world. One of the hardest parts about this journey thus far has been coping with the imperfect. I’ve always been a Type A perfectionist and following the “straight and narrow” plan that society has outlined for us – be involved in school, get good grades, go to college, get a job with a 401k, get married, start a family – until the final step in this blueprint was out of our control. I was writing my life by the books, so what did I do to deserve this sick torture? Every rose has its thorn, but this one feels like a sharpened dagger. Having no control over what initially seemed like a check box on a list ultimately consumed my mind and tore me down piece by piece. My story isn’t perfect, it’s come with a lot of valleys over the past two years and trying to learn how to let go of things out of my control has been one of the most challenging feats.

I’m not posting this for attention (also, who cares if I am?) but more or less, my Love Language is Words of Affirmation and writing is really my only way of expressing my emotions. I needed to write to get some of these feelings off my chest and try to heal. It’s tough to comprehend that 1 in 4 of us have endured this type of pain and suffering. It feels like my world has been turned upside down, and I can’t believe so many of us have rode this exact same wave. Writing is my way to release my pent-up emotions – I hope if you’ve been in my shoes, you were able to find a way to cope as well.

Who knows what the future has in store for us, but for now I want to love on my husband, and Ellie, and our new golden retriever puppy, Ruby.

xoxo

Kels

Link to Journey to Little Legate: https://www.instagram.com/journeytolittlelegate/