Another one in heaven...

I'm drawing a blank. I could start this post a million different ways and you would think after all we've been through, I would be a pro at this by now...but I'm not.

We now have another precious child in heaven waiting for us. This was not in our plans, as our plans (which we are totally up to God changing) are to wait to try again until January when get go to Chicago to get the TAC surgery that will help us not lose a baby the way we lost Annabelle anymore. However, we ended up being surprised this month and found out we were expecting again. We were VERY early on, the only reason I even knew so early was because of being pregnant so many times now, I know exactly how my body feels during early pregnancy. Anyways, after blood work and hearing back from the midwife, we realized we were miscarrying a very early pregnancy. We were just 4 weeks along. This is the earliest we have ever lost a baby. One good thing that we can already see as a result of this, is me finding out something that I will need to take from now on to help with my MTHFR blood clotting issues (MTHFR can cause recurrent miscarriage due to very small clots undetectable and other issues) and this new thing I will be taking will help with that. It is called HomocysteX. We also realized we need to have a plan in place and not just wait for the surgery so we will be scheduling our appointment with the maternal fetal medicine doctor this week, so that we can discuss the plan of what to take now and what to take/do once we do get pregnant again in the future. That way we can do what we can, do help prevent miscarriage so that the baby can make it far enough along for the TAC surgery to actually be able to help!

To be honest, when we found out for sure we were miscarrying, part of me was relieved because it was kind of like closure, realizing for sure this was what was happening but then part of me felt even more in pain, realizing the reality of it all and that we had just lost another little one. I will be honest and say this is the easiest one we have been through so far, but I think that is just because this was so different from Annabelle. However, this one is just as much a baby and our child as all the rest, we just didn't have as much time to bond with it. So we look forward to eternity when we will get to meet and get to know all 6 of our other children up there. Isaac was already knowing where the baby was growing too, he would say "there" and point to my stomach when we asked where the baby was. It was so cute! We had just started to get excited and get our hopes and dreams going when they came crashing down. The first night was really hard and the past two days I've been trying to rest my body as I am miscarrying and I find myself out of the blue just crying for a minute or two.

The night I started miscarrying, I had an AMAZING time with the Lord rocking Isaac to sleep. At first I was just singing to Isaac, then I started singing over Isaac and praying for Isaac in song and then the Lord just used the songs to speak to my heart as I was singing "never once, did we ever walk alone, never once did you leave us on our own, You are faithful God You are faithful..." and I knew He was reminding me that whatever the outcome (because this was before I started bleeding) He would NEVER leave us and that He is faithful NO MATTER what we go through in this life...I think He was preparing my heart for what took place just an hour or so later. I thank Him for that and for that time. So because of God's faithfulness and how He was reminding me and preparing my heart just an hour or so before our miscarriage started, that He is faithful and would never let us walk alone and would never leave us, we have decided to name this baby...

Emani - which means in different languages either faithful, trustworthy & God with us.

Plus we just really love the sound of the name! We look forward to now having another child in eternity that we get to meet one day. We again, do not know all the reasoning behind this nor the purpose or plan God had for Emani's very short little life but we know from the past that through each of our losses, God has used them all for growing us in many ways and using us for His kingdom and for that, we are forever grateful.

Emani Starkey 07/01/12