Waiting for Myla: Finding Silver Linings in the Hardest Week

Hi Reader,

It’s OCTOBER. Can you believe it!? My little boy turns TWO this month. TWO!

Oh, how time flies…

Bri is 3.5

Kyler is almost 2.

It’s been almost 15 weeks since Myla was born sleeping.

Time is a funny thing…it moves both so slow and so fast at the same time.

Last week I talked about finding out about Myla up to the time we learned she had gone to be with Jesus.
​

This week I want to share a little bit about the time between finding that out and her birth almost exactly a week later.

​

We found out Thursday, June 12.

The first hard moment, after the initial news, was walking to the parking lot. We stopped in front of our mini-van - the one we had recently purchased because we would have needed 3 rear-facing car seats - and bawled some more.
​

It was the first sucker punch of things that we had bought because of or for Myla. It was then I resolved to find the silver lining in as many things as possible in the coming days. Otherwise, I knew I would fall apart.

​

That first silver lining? We didn’t have Myla, but because of her short life, my husband had agreed to a mini-van and I loved it! It’s soooooo much easier wrangling toddlers in a mini-van than it is in a small SUV 😅.

​

Since she was watching the kids, we called Ian’s mom and shared the news. After more tears, we sat quietly for a moment to gather ourselves, still in shock and disbelief.
​

I don’t remember many of the details of the week between the news and her birth, but I remember one of the first things I said to Ian, sitting in the van, trying to compose ourselves enough to drive, was that Myla was in heaven.

​

That was my second silver lining: We would see her again.

And that she was dancing with his Granna and Dad (who had both gone to be with Jesus almost exactly 4 years ago).

We mourn, but not without hope!

We drove the 15 minutes down the road to my parent’s house. We walked up to the door, Dad greeted us, and all I could do was hug him and start crying.
​

My mom had experienced several miscarriages over the years, so although she had never had a third trimester loss, she had had a second trimester loss and several first trimester losses and she knew what it was to lose a precious life you had never met but loved more than anything. We just sat and cried together for awhile. You are never too old to need a good mama hug!
​

The next several days were a blur, and I honestly don’t remember many of the details. Our family was so supportive - between watching the kids, helping us clean the house, and cooking us dinner - we were so so loved and supported!

​

I started having irregular random contractions on Saturday. My hope was that I would go into labor naturally, but not till Monday or Tuesday when we had all our ducks in a row. 🙈 My wish didn’t come true, but more on that in a moment.

​

Sunday came. We were torn. We didn’t really want to go to church, but we knew we needed to, and we wanted to keep everything as normal as possible for as long as possible for the kids.

​
Oh, and did I mention that Sunday was Father’s Day? 🫠

​

So we went. And as hard as it was, we were so thankful we did!

I honestly don’t even remember if we went to Lifegroup. 🙈

​

I do remember walking into service. One of our friend’s baby dedications was that day, and I didn’t realize it, and that was hard. Seeing all the babies and my pregnant friends was also really hard. I cried through basically the whole service - but at the same time, I was at peace.

​

At the end of the service, our pastor always has an invitation and prayer time, and they have a little area you can go to where they will pray with you. As soon as he said let’s pray, we made a bee line for that area. We know and love and have a long history with the pastor, and they were so sweet and both he and his wife held us and cried with us and prayed for us. My dad also came over and joined us.
​

I will forever hold that memory! Despite the devastation, I felt God and knew He was there. And while I didn’t and still don’t understand, I am confident that He has a plan, and I have already seen how he has taken a tragedy and made it something beautiful. And that was the theme that fit the rest of the following week, and honestly every day since. ❤️

​

Now to talk about something NO ONE seems to talk about!

How the heck do you handle a third trimester stillbirth?

Like, is it the same as a regular birth? What should I expect?
​

No one seemed to have any answers, and I didn’t have an OB, so I couldn’t ask the OB. My midwife was out of town, and she helped as much as she could, but no one seemed to have the answers I needed. ​
​

We had been playing telephone tag with various OB offices since FRIDAY, and still hadn’t gotten any clear direction.

​

The hospitalist that we had seen Thursday had said to follow up with an OB, only to find out on FOLLOWING TUESDAY that OB’s won’t take on new patients for the purpose of a stillbirth! So if, heaven forbid, this ever happens to your or someone you love, don’t waste time trying to find an OB if you haven’t already established care. 🙄

​

One of my biggest anxieties, and the cause of many tears that week, was the crashing and burning of my home birth dreams. Hospitals have always given me anxiety, and my last two kids were homebirths, and I know women do it all the time, but one of my biggest fears was giving birth in a hospital.

​

I’ll be honest, I yelled at God. A lot. Like, I already lost my baby. Now I’m losing my homebirth? And even more so, at the rate I was going, I was going to lose my unmedicated birth and would probably need to be induced. I had to make choices as to how to proceed with care, but how do you choose between two options you hate equally? Truly everything felt like it was crashing down, out of control. Which, as a planner, is my ultimate nightmare!

​

But you know what? God can take it. And He did. And through His word and the love and hugs from friends and family, He continually provided peace and reassurance as we navigated the unthinkable.

Now it’s Tuesday, June 17th. I had been having consistent contractions, but I didn’t think labor was imminent 😩. I have a history of prodromal labor, and this time was apparently no different. 🫠

​

We decided that if labor hadn’t picked up, we were going to go drop the kids off at a family member’s house and then head to the hospital Wednesday morning. I had made peace with the situation, I had gotten all my postpartum stuff together, and I felt as prepared as I could be. Wednesday was also the 1 week point, at which risk of infection starts going up, and we wanted to avoid that.

​
​

Well, that Tuesday afternoon, labor did pick up! Contractions were getting closer together and a lot more uncomfortable. I could still handle them fine, but with the emotional exhaustion intermixed with not having slept well all week, we made the decision to leave the kids with a family member overnight so that I could focus and either get labor going or get some rest without little people crawling all over me. 🙃

​

So they went to Ian’s mom’s house that afternoon, and then my brother and his wife picked them up that evening and they slept at their house (cause they had done that before and it was familiar territory for them). Good thing we did. But more on that next week…

​

That evening Ian and I just held each other and cried. We got stuff together, I took a shower, but labor still wasn’t progressing any further, so we went to bed…

​

And that’s where this email ends! Next week I’ll share Myla’s birth story—one of the hardest, yet most beautiful, experiences of my life.

​

I definitely cried writing this. But tears are healing - and don’t let anyone tell you otherwise!

Throughout all of the events I’ve shared, I can’t reiterate enough - God provides.

He loves you.

He wants the best for you, and He can take even the worst tragedy and turn it into a testimony and something beautiful.

And it’s because we are all sinners and live in a fallen world that life isn’t perfect and will never be perfect till heaven. That’s why we need Jesus!

But if we trust Jesus, and make Him the Lord of our lives, we have the PROMISE of the hope of heaven. We have the PROMISE of eternity with Jesus. We have the PROMISE of God’s love and provision.

I have that promise. I KNOW that I will see Myla again.

If you don’t have that promise, what’s holding you back?

​

If you want to know more about God’s love, please reply! I’d love to talk to you.

​

If you want to share anything really, please reply! I’d love to hear YOUR story, be it a story of love, life, loss, or all of the above!
​

I hope this email has brought some healing or hope to your heart!
​

See you next week,

Mrs. Holman

P.S. If you missed the beginning of this series, and would like to catch up, you can read it here.