Your take on something that is happening. It’s hard to see the world through someone else’s perspective because you don’t live in their shoes, you don’t know their experiences. You can try, but you begin to think about your experiences and still can’t fully grasp “walking in their shoes”.
I am a pretty optimistic person, I often see sunshine on cloudy days. (Cue the band.) I generally just always see the good in everything. Yes, I get upset when things don’t go my way…or something upsets me, but I try really hard–although it may take a few days— to think about the positive in whatever situation I am in.
When I was 10 years old my mom got pregnant, we went for a sonogram and didn’t see or hear a heartbeat. She had miscarried. At 10 years old, I knew what that meant. I knew I wasn’t going to have a new sibling, and I bawled right there in the sonogram room. I actually made my mom promise she would have another…she kept that promise twice.
Before I got pregnant with my sweet boy Bennett, I miscarried. A day before we found out I was pregnant, I had this excruciating pain radiating all over my stomach, back, and sides. I can’t even begin to explain it to you, but it was horrible. I took a pregnancy test the next day, and it was positive. It was my husband’s birthday so I bought a cute onesie so I could announce to him that we were expecting. We had just gotten married 2 months before, so we were actually shocked/happy/confused that I had gotten pregnant so fast. We thought to ourselves many times “Isn’t it supposed to take a long time?” and “How did that happen?”. We told our parents, and that’s really it.
Exactly 2 weeks later, I was at school and I started bleeding. I knew right then and there something was wrong. Thankfully, my mom works with the doctors that I see and they were able to bring me in and see what was going on. After hearing my levels were low, they wanted to do more blood work 48 hours later to see if they had dropped more. They had. I had miscarried this baby that we had made. To tell you I was devastated is an understatement. I took off the next 2 days of work, and just took some time to reflect. My husband was there for me, and I actually went into his office with him cause I just needed someone.
Over the next 3 months, I would have my ups and downs. I knew I would be pregnant again someday, but at the same time I saw so many people getting pregnant and having babies it made me really question why. Why, did it happen to me? Why was I given this baby only for it to be taken away? December 16th, I took a test…I knew there was a slim chance since it wasn’t anywhere near my missed period, but hey doesn’t hurt to check. A positive line appeared, so obviously I had to test again. Positive. I had to tell my hubby immediately so I whispered in his ear at dinner in front of our family. I know, romantic. I was only 3.5 weeks pregnant, and knew that something could happen…but believed it would be different this time.
2 weeks later while on vacation at Nic’s grandparents house, I had that excruciating pain again. It actually hurt so bad that I threw up. It was the absolute worse, and the next night I woke up with it again. I waited and waited for bleeding, but nothing. Our first sonogram was done early since I had miscarried before, and I am pretty sure that my heart was beating out of my chest. I just wanted to see that heartbeat, I wanted to know that everything was ok. That the pain I had experienced was just a “side effect” of being pregnant. When I heard that heartbeat, tears started flowing and relief came over my body. I was pregnant. Pregnancy was not fun…morning all day sickness, reflux, migraines took over my body…and it wasn’t until after I gave birth did they go away.
Little did I know that right after delivering Bennett, I would be confronted with news I never expected to hear. I had miscarried early in my pregnancy (that mysterious pain I had, was a miscarriage.) Say what? Bennett was supposed to be a twin. There were two separate placentas formed, one obviously not as big as Bennett’s, but formed. They explained to me–in my drugged up state–that sometimes this happens, it is known as vanishing twin. Three. The number of miscarriages I have had to cope with in my life. I know people have had to deal with way more, and I am blessed my number is so low and only 2 are directly connected to me.
The person that sees themselves as an optimist sees the biggerpicture. They find the best possible option in the situation at hand. Yes, my past experiences could have defined me negatively…made me worry about my entire pregnancy. If I had not been optimistic I may have worried about getting pregnant, got depressed when I found out in the delivery room that I had miscarried, or worried myself sick during the pregnancy. But, I didn’t. I prayed daily for my boy that he would come into the world healthy. I am a firm believer in the phrase that there is a reason for everything, and I know there was a reason why God chose me to be that little boys mom. There was a reason why he wanted me to only have one baby, why he wanted me to have a baby in August not May, why he chose to have me miscarry. My sweet, sweet baby boy has made me even more of an optimist and I wouldn’t change it for anything in the world.
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