My husband and I have dual-factor infertility, each with multiple diagnoses. Our journey through infertility was long, painful, and at times felt never-ending. After 4 medicated cycles, 4 IUIs, 4 egg retrievals, and 4 embryos transferred, we were blessed that our final embryo gave us our beautiful son, our miracle baby. After everything we had been through, we were physically, emotionally, mentally, spiritually, and financially exhausted. We decided our family was complete.
But life had a different plan.
Shortly after our son’s first birthday, we discovered I was pregnant naturallly. It was a complete shock as our fertility clinic had told us we had a 0% chance of conceiving without medical help. We were stunned, in disbelief, and cautiously hopeful. Our clinic kindly agreed to follow our pregnancy, and we began making the 8-hour round-trip every two weeks for ultrasounds.
At our 9-week ultrasound, our hopes were shattered. Our baby had stopped growing. We were heartbroken. The joy of such a miraculous and unexpected pregnancy turned into a deep grief that felt unbearable. Two days later, I underwent a D&C. The emotional pain was compounded by the slow decline of my beta levels, requiring bloodwork every two days. It was a constant reminder of what we had lost.
We chose to have our baby tested, hoping to find answers. The results showed that we had been expecting a little girl. Learning her gender reopened every wound. But it also gave us the chance to know her a little more. Through this testing, we learned she had an unbalanced translocation, which led us to pursue further genetic testing at our fertility clinic. It was then we discovered that I carry a severe balanced translocation, giving any pregnancy an 80% chance of inheriting a condition incompatible with life.
Soon after my D&C, we found out I was pregnant again. This time, the shock was replaced by fear. Navigating pregnancy after loss is incredibly hard. The innocence and excitement was replaced by anxiety, grief, and the heaviness of what we already knew could happen.
The first half of this pregnancy was full of testing: genetic screenings, an amniocentesis, and two anatomy scans, all to determine if our baby was viable. Just before I reached 20 weeks, we were told that everything looked good and that our baby was healthy. That moment brought a wave of relief we hadn’t dared to hope for.
I borrowed the rainbow skirt with the intention of getting photos done at 34 weeks, however shortly before the scheduled shoot I went into preterm labour. Our baby was born 6 weeks early and spent 29 days in the NICU for significant breathing difficulties. Today, I am holding a healthy baby boy, our second miracle, in my arms. We are so incredibly grateful. This baby is our rainbow after the storm.
I wanted to take part in the Finding Your Rainbow project to honour our daughter, who we never got to hold, and to celebrate the life of her little brother, who is growing each day. Sharing this story is part of my healing. It’s a way to give our daughter the place she deserves in our family’s story while holding space for the joy that is to come.
Photos taken by Stesha Bella Photography.
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