If you follow me on Facebook you have probably already noticed my post last night about Capture Your Grief Project. October is Pregnancy & Infant Loss Awareness Month. Unfortunately, I know about this all to well. In honor of this month Carly Marie is hosting a Capture Your Grief project. Anyone that wants to participate takes a picture everyday in October relating to their grief of going through pregnancy or infant loss.
For those that have not heard, I am actually in the middle of miscarrying for a 4th time. This makes it my 5th loss since I had an ectopic pregnancy back in November. I hope by doing this project, while I'm actually going through a miscarriage, it will help me deal with my loss better then I have in the past. Showing my emotions is tough because I'm NOT a super emotional person and I'm very independent so a lot of the time I don't open up because I do not want sympathy. I will share more about this as I share pictures this month.
Carly has given us ideas of what to capture everyday in October, but we do not have to follow her suggestions. So far I have used her suggestions, but I probably wont for the entire 31 days. Here are my pictures for the first 3 days.
Day 1: Sunrise Her thought on this is that it is a beautiful way to start the project. For me this was very healing because it was the day after I found out I would be miscarrying. I only slept about 3 hours Monday night and was up by 4:30 ready to go get a picture of our Alabama tree lined sunrise. I went out to the lake at 6 and spent about 1.5 hours taking pictures. I just finished taking a photography class to learn how to use manual mode, so this was great practice for me! It was cloudy & cool so it was a great morning for pictures which ended up being very therapeutic.
Day 2: Before Loss Self Portrait This picture was in January 2010 and is one of the only pictures I have before my first loss in October 2010. At that point we were not actively trying to get pregnant, but we were not trying to prevent pregnancy.
We were both so innocent to pregnancy loss.
Day 3: After Loss Self Portrait. This picture was taken last Christmas in Florida. My parents came to visit. It was great timing because I had just had surgery for my ectopic pregnancy the beginning of December. I definitely needed family around to get through Christmas. We look so happy in this picture, but deep down we were both sad and angry about having to go through another loss. The tubal pregnancy was the hardest one for me to deal with, as I was pregnant before they put me under and when I woke up I wasn't pregnant anymore. So grieving was totally different then my miscarriages because other then pain of surgery I had no
physical symptoms of losing a baby.
If you have gone through a pregnancy or infant loss I encourage you to join in this month. Make sure to let me know if you are so I can follow you.
Thanks for everyone that has been with me through our losses. I appreciate all your thoughts, prayers, flowers, cards, phone calls, and everything else!
If you have any questions about pregnancy loss I would be glad to answer them, just leave a comment or email me. By the way, if you are not following me on FB yet, click on the icon in the right column to follow A Modern Hippie.
Til' next time,
This is so brave! Thank you for sharing. You are not alone...I am surprised as to how many of us are going through pregnancy and loss, and yet it's a silent fight for so many. Love this project!
ReplyDeleteI am also surprised by how many people share with me that they have had issues after I share my experience. I am loving this project to, even though it is tough.
DeleteThank you so much for sharing sweetie! I found your blog from the Capture Your Grief Facebook.
ReplyDeleteNo problem, thanks for stopping by. I'm off to check your blog out now.
DeleteI am so, so sorry that you are going through this again. I suffered two consecutive miscarriages before we had our baby girl in February. I am trying to do my part as best I can to raise awareness for PAIL on my blog this month. Sending you lots of love. <3
ReplyDeleteThanks, I appreciate it. I'm off to check out your blog now
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