It’s all a gift… David & Kristen’s story
I can't help but close my eyes, smile with relief, and whisper "hi, baby girl" and thank God as I rub my big ol belly. This season has been anything but easy and has brought us to our lowest of lows, but it has allowed us to appreciate the miracle of life that is birth, and stand in awe that we would get to be parents to this little life. -kristen curran
One of my favorite parts of my identity is being a sister. As the “baby” of the family I’ve always cherished time with my siblings. An even greater joy has been watching my siblings fall in love and getting new additions to the family. Kristen has graced us with her kindness and humility and I’ve watched my big brother David develop into an incredible fun loving husband. Their journey has not always been simple or easy... I invited her to share their pregnancy journey with us. Their family is growing and I cannot wait to be an auntie to this sweet “long legged girl” (as the Dr. says). Their maternity shoot near and in their home in Edna Valley was full of golden light and thankfulness as they await their daughter.
note: this content includes some graphic content about miscarriage, thank you Kristen & David for sharing your real and authentic story of redemption with the world and shining light for many who have had a similar journey.
Hi everyone, Kristen here. Hope asked if we would be willing to share a bit of our pregnancy journey with you, so here it goes! At the end of 2018, David and I felt ready to enter into the world of parenthood. Friends had warned that it can take several months to actually conceive, so we leisurely started down the path of trying to conceive, with very little expectations. MUCH to our surprise, we ended up getting a positive pregnancy test the first time around. This was February of 2019. What a shock and also how exciting that something SO unseen and such a mystery actually seemed to work! As a woman, I feel like the ability to conceive was such a mystery to me - will it work? Does my body function normally? How long will it take? I was never someone to closely track my period, let alone "sense" when I was ovulating, as some women do. Anyways, we were full of hopeful anticipation leading up to the first OB appointment and hadn't really told anyone our secret yet.
Then, I so vividly remember this particular Friday. I was about 7 weeks pregnant, used the restroom during lunch at school (I'm a teacher), and saw some blood. Quickly following this, I started feeling slight period-like cramping. Flushed and silently panicking, I got through class to the next recess where I quickly called David and the doctor. The doc said it was likely that I was miscarrying and there's not much they could do about it but to come in on Monday after the weekend was over. Or, I could go to the ER. I had recently talked to a friend who went through a miscarriage and asked her all the questions about what I should do. She was extremely helpful and convinced me I didn't need to go to the ER, but to ride it out and see what happened. The cramps and bleeding progressed and the reality set it pretty quickly. It's a memory and a feeling I will never forget. The excitement and awe of carrying a new life inside of you... gone. so. fast. I could see the concern on David's face and in his tone, not knowing how to help and also lamenting what was happening. It was one of the most painful (mentally and physically) weekends I've ever experienced. Friday night I was mostly in shock and in pain, pretending to be okay. Come Saturday morning, David and I woke up and just began to weep until our eyes were bright red and puffy. Each time I went to the bathroom, it was a reminder of the loss that was happening. We made it to our OB appointment a few days later and they confirmed the loss and had me come back a couple weeks later to make sure everything had cleared. And that was that. We decided to tell a few of our closest friends, so that they could pray with us and be aware of what we were going through. It's hard to describe the feelings that followed my miscarriage, but it made me much more introverted than I had previously been (typically craving the company of others).
We prayed and healed a little and began to try again once my cycle regulated. Fast forward to August and we found out we were pregnant again! We told a few of our closest friends so that we could have a team of prayer warriors in it with us this time, the whole time. Come to find out, two of my closest friends in SLO were also pregnant, we were all within 6 weeks of one another. What a dream! Every day that passed felt like a major victory. We made it all the way to our 10 week appointment this time. David and I anxiously arrived at the appointment, the flood of fears and negative connotations tied to that office creeping in from the few months before. The midwife started the ultrasound, and was having trouble finding the heartbeat. My worst nightmare. She sent me downstairs to a more high tech ultrasound tech. THIS tech said she actually sees 2 yolk sacs, but only one of them has a viable heartbeat. I can live with that, I thought. Also, wow, what, twins?! She said she would see me back in about a week and check on the progress, because the gestational age was younger than it should've been but that could be due to the twin factor. Well, that was news we could live with... not good and not bad, a "wait and see". David and I had a trip with some of our dearest friends planned that weekend in Montana, which was the biggest gift of all. A chance to be running around in beautiful mountain air and not ruminating on the "what ifs" that could be swimming constantly in my mind. When we returned the next week, we went back to the OB for another ultrasound to see if the baby was growing. This time, I had started spotting the morning of my appointment. Wow, this again? I thought - It's not a lot of blood, it might just be typical first trimester spotting, it might be okay. Once again, the OB had trouble finding the heartbeat, so she sent us back downstairs to see the high tech technician. Once this technician did our ultrasound, we had to go back up to the OB's office and wait for the results.
David and I didn't have much to say to each other. I think we both knew what was coming, and didn't know how we were going to handle it. They left us in that office room for what felt like an eternity, just to tell us that we were indeed miscarrying... again. With a crackly voice, I asked what we could do to prevent this from happening a third time. She responded with "we don't do any sort of testing until it happens 3 times, and then we will look into possible reasons". I was not okay with this answer. I knew deep down that I could not physically, mentally, emotionally handle a third miscarriage. The actual "miscarrying" this time around was even more brutal, more painful, more blood, more tears, more devastation. I spent the weekend in bed, with a heating pad and some goldfish and my sweet husband constantly checking in on me, holding my hand through it all. The "healing" phase this time around was twice as hard. I went pretty far inward, not wanting to be around people, not wanting to smile, not wanting to be "seen", feeling extremely insecure, like me and my body had failed again. Amidst all of this, David and I were in the process of buying a new house with my Dad. Our dream home, with bedrooms to fill with children and land for our kids to explore and get dirty. Our "walk through" was the weekend I started miscarrying. I'll never forget walking through the house, cramps blaring, my mind spinning as we anticipated moving into the place with a baby coming. I had an overall dress on, and toward the end of the tour, I had blood dripping down my legs, so I quietly disappeared to the car where I sat, hoping David and my dad would get the clue that it was time to go. Maybe TMI, but it felt like such a dichotomy - this incredible gift of moving into our beautiful new home, shadowed by the pain of this grieving we were experiencing. We had about a month in between when we closed on our new house and when we moved out of our sweet, old condo. That month was unbelievably hard. Every day was a fight to feel anything but sadness and grief. Our years in the condo were full of festivities, dinner gatherings, community group nights, many many people and sweet memories, but it was almost as if we needed to physically move from the place where we had lost our first 2 babies, and start fresh.
This time around, as I waited for my cycle to return, I searched for new doctors and some possible answers to cling to. I found a doctor who ordered me a multitude of tests, and sought out an amazing acupuncturist who specializes in fertility. I loved having the two perspectives of eastern AND western medicine, I felt like it was covering all the bases. We found that I have the MTHFR genetic mutation, which (controversially) might play a part in difficulty sustaining a pregnancy. I also had slightly low progesterone, which is vitally important during the first trimester before the placenta takes over in producing the hormone. I honestly felt so relieved hearing that SOMETHING could actually be wrong, and that there was something I could do to try to have a better outcome next time around. Over the series of a couple months, my mom found an amazing naturopathic doctor in Santa Barbara who ordered me some serious blood panels (I'm talking nearly 20 vials of blood) and started supplementing everything that was low (Vitamin D/K, thyroid, all the b vitamins, etc.). I was taking about 12 pills a day at the peak, plus a couple of tinctures. All of it was so worth it. Finding a doctor who really CARED about our situation and didn't merely brush us off as a classic statistic, was life changing and brought us a feeling of renewed hope. After a few months of trying again and building up my body's resources as much as possible, I had a check-in phone appointment with the naturopathic doctor coming up, so I decided to take a pregnancy test JUST IN CASE.
To my disbelief, it was positive. In my royally awkward way, I immediately took a deep breath and walked into the garage where David was working and showed him the test. He instantly started weeping and we just held each other for several minutes, and then prayed hard for a chance to meet this little life inside of me. Once you've experienced fertility difficulties, every part of the pregnancy experience is different. We hold our breath as we walk into every doctor's appointment. We hesitantly tell our friends and family about the amazing news. We don't plan far ahead or buy any baby things, knowing that this could all be taken from us tomorrow. We started seeing a new OB who took the MTHFR thing seriously and designated me as "high risk," which allowed me to get frequent ultrasounds and extra care. I also took progesterone pills for the first 14 weeks, which helped me get past the hurdles we hadn't conquered before. It meant that I was pretty dang sick the first trimester, which was such a blessing. Although it makes it hard to function, it was a constant reminder that my body was doing what it was supposed to do. I was so thankful for this. Every positive, problem free ultrasound gave me back a little more life each time. We had never had good experiences in the OBs office until this little one came along. We didn't announce to the "instagram world" until after our 20 week anatomy scan. I'm now 38 weeks pregnant with our little miracle girl, and it still sometimes feels hard to believe. Most days, as I feel her cartwheeling around inside of me,
a water color painting by Ebey Sorenson (David’s sister) in the baby room representing a family portrait with Jesus holding the lives of the unborn children
I can't help but close my eyes, smile with relief, and whisper "hi, baby girl" and thank God as I rub my big ol belly. This season has been anything but easy and has brought us to our lowest of lows, but it has allowed us to appreciate the miracle of life that is birth, and stand in awe that we would get to be parents to this little life.
I hope that if you're reading this and experiencing loss, suffering or disappointment in the fertility journey, that you would know that you're not alone. It feels like it, especially when you watch friend after friend get pregnant and deliver their healthy babies. Or when your doctor says to just try again and again and again. I urge you to seek the right care, a person that will fight for you and not be okay with having the same outcome time and time again. Push to have blood tests done that aren't just your typical "hormone" panel. Get a full snapshot of how your body is functioning. Read blogs about others who have gone down similar paths (this is how I knew what to request to be tested once we found a good doctor). It's okay to not be okay when you're experiencing hard things, and I urge you to protect yourself and your wellbeing even if it means not going to a 1-year-old birthday party or staying back from a big dinner party because you're not wanting to be around a lot of people. Protect yourself, pray, and pursue good doctors to be on your team.
I pray that you would find hope even when it feels like there's nothing left to hope for, and that someday you'll have your own baby in your arms.
Thank you David & Kristen for sharing your journey and story with me and welcoming me into your home and hearts in the precious time. I can’t wait to meet my baby niece!
**side note: I am back in the Bay Area and might start doing a few portrait sessions again in 2021. My style and perspective on portraits has shifted since spending time in France. I am focusing more on a “relational journalism” approach and visual storytelling rather than poses and props. Paris has taught me much about light and beauty over perfection!