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If you’re new here, hi! I’m Rachel. I live in the radiant city of Miami with my best friend and husband, Ben. We’ve been married for six years, though I often round up because, well, who doesn’t love a bit of extra credit? Together, we’ve moved through seasons of change, laughter, and more lessons than I thought marriage would bring this early on. Ben and I waited until our fifth anniversary to begin trying to grow our family. We waited for several reasons. We loved our time together and wanted to cherish those years, to build a love strong enough to provide a firm foundation if we were to have children.
Side note: This, or anything else I share about our way of doing things, isn’t meant to suggest it’s the only way or the right way. God has uniquely created each of us and placed desires in our hearts for a reason. To clarify, when I say "a strong foundation," it’s because Ben and I both come from divorced families, and for us, this was something we saw as important.
From the beginning, Ben and I agreed we’d revisit the conversation around years three to five. But when year three arrived, we weren’t ready. At the time, we were living in New York City—a city we loved but one that didn’t exactly scream "family life" to us. We shared a 540-square-foot studio apartment, where every square inch felt spoken for. We climbed subway stairs daily, carried groceries on foot, and navigated a lifestyle that didn’t feel compatible with a stroller, though many people do it.
Every decision felt so big: Could we afford a two-bedroom apartment? Would we move to the suburbs? If we had more than one child, would they share a room? At that point, the answer felt clear: not yet. That’s not to say we didn’t eventually want a family—we did—but in that season, I didn’t have a strong desire to create one just yet. If you know me or follow me on social media, you know I tend to be an open book, so I’ve been pretty transparent about this journey. Somewhere in year three or four, though, I lost a friend over my honesty. My statements about not desiring kids during that time were met with accusations that I idolized my marriage and travel—without any questions or context. But that’s a story for another day. Let’s keep walking through the journey to where we are today and those four days I dread every month… or am learning to navigate.
We loved our life in NYC. We thought that one day we’d build a family there. And, if we had more than one child, they’d just have to share the same room—there was no way we could afford more than a two-bedroom apartment in the city. But as much as we loved New York, we couldn’t picture living in the suburbs there. Not to hate on Queens, but as a girl from the South, I’m just not built for the cold.
Fast forward to the Lord shutting the door in NYC—a testimony I’ll share later—and we ended up in Miami. It was here, in our third city in four years of marriage, that we revisited the conversation about growing our family. We knew we wanted children eventually, but we were hesitant to dive into parenthood without a community around us. You’ve heard it said, "It takes a village," and we felt the weight of that truth.
At the same time, I was navigating some health-related challenges—a recurring theme in this journey. I had to have a second colonoscopy before being cleared to try for children, a procedure that was delayed until the month before our fifth anniversary. That same year, I was finally diagnosed with endometriosis. My doctor recommended freezing my eggs if we weren’t going to try soon, but since we planned to start that year, we chose not to move forward with that option.
Our fifth anniversary, we took a month-long trip to Spain—a country that might just be my favorite I’ve ever visited. When we returned to the U.S., I was hit with one of the worst cases of jet lag I’ve ever experienced. Falling asleep at 7:30 or 8:00 p.m. every night was uncharacteristically early for me. Then, the spotting began. At first, I brushed it off. But as the days passed, I started to feel an ache I couldn’t shake. Why did I feel so sad when I knew it might take time to conceive? I had heard that getting pregnant is often harder than people think.
The spotting lasted for a week but grew lighter towards the end. Could I be pregnant? I doubted it, but five minutes before an interview, I decided to take a test—just to prove to myself that it would be negative. But instead, two blue lines appeared before I had even finished. I was stunned. My shock didn’t last long, though, because I now had three minutes to pull myself together for my interview.
After discovering the interview had been mis-scheduled and wouldn’t happen for another hour, I took a second test—a digital one—to double-check. Shout out to Ben’s mom, who once gave us pregnancy tests as a Christmas gift. I didn’t even check to see if they were still in date.
With confirmation in hand, I grabbed the five-year prayer journal I’d bought for Ben, opened it to that day’s date, and wrote a prayer of gratitude for the Lord’s quick answer to prayer. I surprised Ben with an early Christmas present right after my interview. We celebrated… only to find myself crying three days later when the spotting turned to bright red blood. Was I miscarrying? Was this an ectopic pregnancy?
I would bleed on and off for weeks. Some people assured me this was normal, but to me, nothing about it felt normal. Still, my belly began to grow. I prayed every single day: Please, Lord, keep this child safe.
But peace never seemed to settle in my heart. I told myself it was just my anxious tendencies, but deep down, I knew something was wrong. The days dragged on until our 13-week appointment arrived. I felt a flicker of excitement because we were going to find out the gender through a blood test. Finally, something joyful to look forward to.
That ultrasound felt different from the start. It took much longer than usual. The technician’s silence, the furrow of her brow, and the way she left the room. When she returned, she wasn’t alone. A doctor I had never met came in, followed by two nurses. His demeanor was kind but somber. I braced myself.
He explained that our baby had a cystic hygroma—a large fluid-filled sac stretching from its spine to its head. There was also fluid around the baby’s tiny heart. Multiple chromosomal abnormalities, including the dreaded trisomy 13, were possible. He gently outlined what that meant: most infants with trisomy 13 do not survive beyond a few days, and many don’t make it through birth.
In that moment, my heart shattered. I asked to be excused to use the restroom, and as soon as the door closed, I collapsed. Tears flowed uncontrollably as I poured out my grief to God. Why us, Lord? Why this baby?
That night, Ben and I prayed together, searching for any sliver of comfort. We both had commitments that evening, separate from one another, and we decided to keep them. My event was in Palm Beach, and the Uber ride there gave me much-needed solitude. The driver must have wondered about the sobbing woman in his backseat, but he said nothing, which I was grateful for.
I poured out my heart to the Lord during that ride, raw and unfiltered. Ben, meanwhile, attended a hockey game with a new friend who, when he asked how Ben was doing, was met with complete honesty. This is one of the hardest days of my life, Ben said. That moment was the beginning of a deep friendship, one built on authenticity and the love of Christ.
After my event, I called my best friend to share the devastating news. I can still hear her crying with me over the phone, her voice breaking as she prayed for me. In that moment, I knew I wasn’t alone. God’s grace sustained me in ways I can’t fully explain, giving me a strength that wasn’t my own.
But even with that strength, the questions haunted me. Oh God, You know my health anxiety. You know the tormenting thoughts that haunt me at times. Why me? Why must I go through this? Why couldn’t I just have a normal pregnancy? Is this because I didn’t hear You? Is it because Ben and I chose to wait? Or even further back in my past… Is this punishment for being sexually promiscuous before marriage? Am I reaping what I sow? These thoughts swirled endlessly. My prayers were messy and desperate: Lord, please hear me. Please spare me from this pain. Please heal our baby.
The night before our follow-up appointment, I had a dream. Though the details are fuzzy now, I remember talking to the Lord in that dream. There was this overwhelming sense of peace—a quiet assurance that wasn’t from me. When I woke up, I turned to Ben and said, “I think the baby’s heart has stopped.” It wasn’t a premonition of doom but more of a calm acknowledgment that God had prepared me for what was coming.
At the appointment, the doctor confirmed, the baby’s heart had stopped beating. Strangely, I wasn’t shocked. I had already begun to process my emotions, though that didn’t lessen the weight of the loss. For Ben, however, the reality of the news hit him all at once, and he broke down. Watching him grieve was heartbreaking in its own way, knowing there was little I could do to ease his pain.
My body wouldn’t miscarry naturally, so I was given medicine to start the process—a medication that induces labor by activating contractions. The association with abortion made me hesitate, and I wrestled with the decision, asking God for clarity and peace. Before I took the medicine, I asked my doctor to double-check and confirm that the baby had indeed passed. She was so compassionate and understanding, agreeing to do another ultrasound for my peace of mind. Seeing the stillness on the screen brought a finality that was both heartbreaking and reassuring—I wasn’t imagining it, and my body truly needed help to move forward.
Trusting her compassion, I took the medicine, and what followed was one of the worst days of my life. Within 30 minutes, the contractions began—relentless and far worse than anything I had been prepared for. They were constant and unyielding. I was writhing on the floor, moaning in pain, with Ben helplessly watching, unsure of what to do.
After hours without bleeding, I began to worry something was wrong. I developed a fever, and the pain only intensified. Finally, we decided to go to the ER. The morphine they gave me barely touched the pain, but after nine hours, I began bleeding. They examined me and found I was nearly five centimeters dilated, assuring me I would pass the baby soon. They referred to it as “tissue,” but for me, this was no mere tissue—this was my baby, a life created in the image of God.
So they let me go home. I bled for about five days, assuming that was normal. The pain eventually subsided to feel more like a period. But during this time, I had a corporate trip to Chick-fil-A, where I was working and rediscovering my dream of operating a store. One of the first nights there, my back pain intensified. I ordered a heating pad to my hotel room, hoping it would help.
On the last day of the conference, it happened all over again—that same intensified pain I had experienced the day I took the medicine. Hunched over the table, I couldn’t sit still. I excused myself to the bathroom, grateful they had one with private stalls. There, I literally laid on the floor in pain, passing blood quickly. The pain would lessen temporarily, and I would try to return to my seat and listen again, but it was unbearable.
Feeling so lonely in a room filled with a hundred people, I knew my face must have shown everything I was trying to hide. I kept frequenting the bathroom, and eventually, one of the staff asked if I needed medical assistance. Embarrassed but too exhausted to hide the truth, I explained that I thought I was experiencing the final part of my miscarriage. They were so kind, though I can’t remember all the details through the haze of the pain.
Finally, I passed what I assume was our baby. The pain began to lessen, though people had told me this moment would bring physical relief. I still had pain, but it was different now. Since it was the final day of the conference, I had to fly out, but I could barely walk through the airport. Noticing my condition, someone kindly escorted me in a wheelchair. Sitting there, I thought to myself, I must be the weakest person. How could this be me? I’ve endured multiple kidney stones. Why am I so weak?
I had so many questions: Why did this happen here, Lord? Why didn’t this happen before I came? I’m so embarrassed. Why would I miss part of the conference if this is the job You are calling me to? None of it made sense. The only thing that did make sense was that, the year before, I had read a couple of books on lament, including Dark Clouds, Deep Mercy.
I thought I was doing fine for a while until the drop of the rollercoaster happened. I went from reading the Bible regularly to trading it for other distractions, avoiding the lingering questions I didn’t want to confront. And then, bitterness crept in.
You know the verse in Mark 9:43 that says, “If your hand causes you to sin, cut it off. It is better for you to enter life crippled than with two hands to go to hell, to the unquenchable fire”? We often hear these words and assume Jesus is using shocking imagery to make a point, never considering He might be entirely serious.
Sin brings pain—to us and those around us. Sin makes us deserving of death, “the unquenchable fire.” Maybe if we saw sin for what it really is, we would better understand the urgency of Jesus’ warning. I didn’t stop my thoughts. I didn’t take them captive. Each day, I let them wander further. God could have saved my child, but He didn’t. God created the life in my womb. He didn’t have to allow a chromosomal abnormality, but He did. God, where is the good in this? And slowly, I began to wonder: Is God truly good? Do I even believe that?
Thankfully, as believers, we have the Holy Spirit alive in us—the same power that raised Christ from the dead. What incredible news! By the Spirit, I began to realize I was sinking into a dark place and needed help. I started searching for books that might speak to my soul. The only book that truly does that is God’s Word, but I also sought stories from people who could relate to what I was feeling. That’s when I found the book Just Be Honest: How to Worship Through Tears and Pray Without Pretending, who opened with the story of his own terrible loss.
During an anatomy scan, they learned their baby had a life-limiting condition. Unlike me, who lost our child early, she carried the baby to term, only for their child to die shortly after birth. Their story reflected the depths of grief and trust in God’s sovereignty even when the outcome was unimaginably painful.
His honesty and rawness resonated with me. He wrote, "I never had such intense conflict with the Lord. I still believed He was sovereign and good, but His good promises seemed hollow, and His sovereign plan seemed harsh." He asked the same questions I was too afraid to voice: "How could I find refuge in the One who could have saved my son but chose not to?" and that "it was not well with my soul." Wow. I thought, I’m allowed to say these things out loud? This was exactly what I was feeling.
I devoured that book. I listened to chapters repeatedly. Questions I once felt guilty for even thinking now became a bridge to deeper faith. I began to see that the Bible itself is filled with lament. It’s in the Psalms—prayers that were spoken aloud, even corporately, without fear of judgment. As someone raised in the Bible Belt, where appearances can take precedence over authenticity, I had struggled with this. But real Christianity is messy, and we are all needy people.
We need a Savior every moment. None of us have it all together this side of heaven—not even the so-called experts. And if we did, why would we need a Savior at all? This realization brought freedom. I wanted to break free from the "I’m okay" facade. When someone asked me how I was doing, I started to say, "Actually, I’m not okay. I’m navigating the tension between grief and joy." And God gave me the grace to be honest.
Maybe you’ve never heard this yourself, so let me provide some scriptures to show that confessing your struggles isn’t a sign of weak faith. He is the God who authorized lament. We tend to think strong faith equals composure, but the Bible tells a different story. The Israelites, for example, began their journey with "faithful groaning" before slipping into sinful grumbling. The difference? Faithful lament takes our questions to God directly rather than gossiping about Him to others. David’s psalms show us this raw honesty: "How long, O Lord, will You forget me forever? Why are You so far from saving me? My eyes grow dim waiting for my God."
Through these dialogues with God, I found true healing for my soul. I could finally reach the place where I not only said, "God works all things for good," but truly believed it. My suffering was not wasted, and I began to see glimpses of His purpose.
But it wasn’t the last hard thing I would go through in this season. I faced more health scares when doctors found something wrong with my pancreas on an MRI scan. They suspected autoimmune pancreatitis, but I feared the worst—pancreatic cancer. So I continued to cry out. Through that experience, I learned life was too short to let the devil steal my joy. If my days were indeed numbered, what good would it do to waste them worrying or complaining? As scripture reminds us, worrying doesn’t add any hours to our lives. In fact, I’d argue that it steals them—hours we’ll never get back.
The Lord used that frightening moment to shift my focus. My eyes had been so centered on myself that I needed to fix them on Jesus. Thankfully, the follow-up scan revealed no concerns, but God still used that scary moment for His glory.
And you may be wondering how this ties into our journey to have children. Well, during that time, the doctors advised us not to try for kids until I could be cleared, so months went by where we couldn’t try. Before that, in the in-between of tests, we did try but didn’t conceive. Then starting in August, we consistently tried without success. That’s where we are today, navigating these four days out of the month...
So, what days are they? It’s 10 DPO (days past ovulation). My periods felt completely different after our miscarriage, and it’s only recently that they’ve started to feel normal again. But I’m also one year older now, at 33, and my hormones are naturally declining. At first, I tracked every day with the Inito monitor. While helpful for some, it wasn’t good for my heart. It made it feel like I had control, and for a woman who struggles with wanting control, that wasn’t the best way forward.
Those first months of trying were actually more painful because it was constantly top of mind. I found myself angrier when my period arrived. Now, I just feel more sad. The anger, I think, came from the illusion of control. But as we know, control is just that—an illusion.
At 10 DPO, I’d take a pregnancy test, see it was negative, and still convince myself I might be pregnant. I’d take another test. Negative. And then the thoughts would begin: It’s because you took it in the afternoon; take another one tomorrow. It’s because you took it too early; Google how often people find out at 10 DPO. I’d see the lower percentages and convince myself, See, I can still be pregnant.
The emotional pain I put myself through was overwhelming until 14 DPO, the start of my period. There were months when I was a day or two late, and my hopes soared—only to come crashing down. But then, something shifted. I started thanking God for my period. Yes, thanking Him.
When you’re trying for kids, that might sound counterintuitive. But I realized I was grateful that my body still functions as it should. There are women who don’t get a period regularly, and this perspective helped me see the gift in what I once resented.
I’ve since stopped tracking altogether and changed my prayers. While I never would have said it out loud, I think part of me believed I could control the outcome through prayer—that if I prayed every day, God would answer. Or worse, that if I didn’t pray enough, it meant I didn’t truly want a child. How our thoughts can become our enemies.
Sometimes I use the Psalms that speak of "my enemies" to pray over my thoughts because that’s what they feel like at times. I wanted to reach out to my church family for prayer, but pride told me, They already know; don’t bother them. Thankfully, the Holy Spirit nudged me to push past that pride. When I confessed my struggles and asked for prayer, my heart found peace.
It doesn’t mean I won’t have moments of doubt in the future, but for now, I thank God for the peace and joy I have in Christ. I’ve also learned to retrain my thoughts. During a sermon, the pastor challenged us to examine whether we allow negative thoughts to dominate or actively retrain our minds. I realized how often I let negativity infect me internally.
For example, I’d think, Well, I’m not getting pregnant this month, so why try? Fighting that looked like replacing the thought with: Even if I don’t get pregnant this month, God is still good. Eventually, I’d think: God knows exactly what I need and when I need it. He withholds no good thing from those whose walk is blameless. He is good.
I was also encouraged by a friend who shared her own struggle. She prayed, God, You know my desire to be a mother, but I ask to be satisfied in You no matter what You choose. That became my prayer and my heart’s cry: O Lord, help me to see and taste Your goodness, restore the joy of my salvation, be my desire, satisfy my soul alone.
Thankfully, I can say today that the Lord satisfies my soul. But friends, it is a battle. There’s a reason Paul tells us to put on the full armor of God. I wanted to write this so that when I look back in the future, I won’t romanticize this season or forget the hard moments and the lessons I’ve learned. So often, you hear from people whose stories have already changed—they’ve had their child, and they’re able to reflect on their past with a sense of completion. But if you’re still in that season, I want you to know I’m still in it with you as of right now.
The reality is, this may be my story. I wasn’t able to say that before, but I am here today, and I can accept it. That’s not to say I won’t “relapse” in the future and find myself bitter. I don’t have the power to know that. But I do serve a God who has knowledge and wisdom far beyond my understanding. Through my pain and through my waiting, I haven’t just read the scriptures that tell us to trust Him—I’ve experienced the side of pain that allows me to say, through it all, I trust Him.
If you aren’t there yet, I want you to know it’s okay. I pray you have people who can walk with you and pray for you. If you don’t, please reach out—I would love to pray with you. God is far more patient with us than any human ever could be, and He is faithful to meet us in our waiting, no matter how messy it looks.
So here is my messy story. I pray there’s at least one thing in this mess that encourages you today or in the future. Our suffering is never wasted, and I pray God uses ours for His glory.
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