Many people suffer their entire lives from the pain of losing a child. This book is a journey through the shattering of loss and the ability to rise above it. Readers are invited to join Corinne Gravenese on this journey that will bring them to a world filled with hope and appreciation for life that most only dream of having, leaving fear behind and keeping freedom at the forefront of your mind. There is a promise of a new life awaiting you and a connection with the ones we so long to have back.

From Loss to Enlightenment

By Corinne Beth Gravenese

Balboa Press

Copyright © 2011 Corinne Beth Gravenese
All right reserved.
ISBN: 978-1-4525-3421-3

Contents

Preface....................................................viiThe Beginning of the End...................................1The News...................................................7Coming Home................................................15The Awakening..............................................21The Emotional Roller Coaster...............................29Here's to a New Life.......................................35Connecting to that Place of Wonderment.....................43Fear or Freedom............................................51Heaven on Earth............................................57Choosing a Thought.........................................65Establishing the New You...................................71Clearing Out...............................................75Buckle Up..................................................79Your New Life Story........................................85Finding Good in Everything.................................93Appreciation Brings Bliss..................................99The Gift...................................................103

Chapter One

The Beginning of the End

I found myself lying on the exam table at my OBGYN's office. When the doctor came around by my side after the exam, I had no idea how my world was about to change. She had a tender look in her eyes as she told me what no mother ever wants to hear in her fifth month of pregnancy. "Corinne, you're two centimeters dilated and your sac is bulging." I had a sinking feeling and couldn't help but cry. I had three healthy pregnancies before, and I knew the seriousness of this situation. How can this be happening to me? I don't have these problems during pregnancy. I have full-term, fairly large babies at 37–38 weeks. This was the beginning of the end—or as I was to find out, the beginning of the most life-changing experience I have ever had.

The next thing I knew, I was being transferred to a stretcher and sent to the hospital. On the way, I was shaking uncontrollably, tears rolling down my face, trying desperately to get in touch with my husband. There was no answer. Of all the times I ever needed him, it was now—and he wasn't there to answer my call. I needed someone to be by my side through this ... I just couldn't do it alone. My next call was to Amy. She was one of my best friends, and we shared our children's birth experiences with each other. She answered right away, and I could barely get the words out. "I'm on my way to the hospital. I may be losing the baby." She immediately got into her car and headed straight to the hospital. Even though the ambulance ride took only ten minutes, it felt like hours. I wanted so badly to be with someone close to me; I felt so alone. I needed a hand to hold, someone to tell me it was going to be okay.

Amy arrived shortly after the ambulance brought me into the ER. In my very brief visit to the ER, I was able to get a hold of my mother and my other best friend Colleen. They too were shocked to hear the news and immediately began making their way to the hospital. Amy held my hand the entire way to the maternity unit of the hospital. It meant so much to me that she was there with me—someone I loved and who I knew loved me. She was there by my side in my darkest hour.

After I arrived in my room (a room you're put in to deliver), there were many nurses hooking me up to monitors and IVs. The next thing I knew, my bed was placed in an inverted position. I was basically standing on my head. We had to do that in order to put the baby back up into its proper place. The hope was to get the baby back up in, high enough to give my cervix a stitch—or cerclage—in order to hold the baby up in there. At that point, I was not ready to accept anything other than, it's going to be okay. I was confident that the doctors were going to get everything back to the way it needed to be in order for my baby to stay in long enough to be delivered normally.

My mother finally arrived at the hospital, she hugged me and we cried together. She had lost two children, a son and a daughter in two separate car accidents. This was a tender nerve for her, to watch as her daughter suffered with the loss of her own child. It brought back a lot of difficult memories for my mother. She just wanted to make everything okay for me so that I wouldn't have to hurt the way she did. Unfortunately, this situation was completely out of her control—and all of ours for that matter.

When my husband finally arrived at the hospital, he really had no idea of what was going on. This was a very unexpected event that had abruptly unfolded. After the situation was explained to him, that's when I really lost it. I cried so hard to him. I just wanted our baby to be okay. He was so strong. Patrick had been in the Marine Corp and had seen many tragic events unfold right in front of his eyes, but this was different. This was his own child. It was a part of him that was at stake. Patrick and I share a very special kind of love—a love that some call soul love. When we first met, we had an instant connection and felt as if we had been together before this lifetime. From the very beginning, my relationship with him was different from any other relationship I had ever had. There in the hospital, his embrace meant everything to me. He whispered softly in my ear, "It's going to be okay."

I somehow knew this situation was not going to be okay though. It was a gut feeling, a deep inner knowing. Yet I was still determined to stay optimistic. This is my daughter, my child, my heart and soul growing inside me. I need her to make it.

The News

The very next day, they were going to check to see if the baby's sac had receded enough to put in my stitch. My husband had just started a new job and wasn't able to stay with me at the hospital that day. My dear friend Colleen, who was more like a sister, was there by my side through the entire process. She stayed with me as they wheeled me down to the room that they would be doing my exam in. I was so nervous, scared of the unknown. This was the deciding factor between life and death. It's interesting what you remember in times of crisis; I can still clearly recall what the nurses talked about as they wheeled me down the hall. They were chatting about what a beautiful ring I was wearing. I couldn't help but think about how unimportant any ring or material object was; those things meant nothing to me! I just wanted to hear the doctor say that everything was okay and we could go ahead with the stitch.

It was a feeling like no other when he said, "I'm sorry, but your sac does have a leak, and there's nothing that I can do."

What? This cannot be! "Well what can we do about this?" I questioned. "There's got to be something we can do!" He informed me that the only thing I could do was go home and wait for the baby to come. I was two weeks shy of the almighty twenty-four weeks that I needed to be in order for the baby to have a fighting chance. So just go home and wait for her to come naturally? It was very simple to him, as it is for most doctors in this situation; this is something that they see all the time. If you're not at least twenty-four weeks into your pregnancy, your baby simply cannot live. The baby is considered not viable up until that point. Even so, I couldn't...