Thoughts on Miscarriage

“I know you must be disappointed.”

Let me begin with the warning that this is a dreadfully honest collection of thoughts from a father who has very recently lost two little girls. I see no reason to pull any punches in the interest of theological correctness. Or of being particularly polite, for that matter. If you’ve wandered here casually, you should probably leave now.

One of the greatest misconceptions Natalie and I have run into, both with medical staff and well-meaning friends, is that we are sad because we expected “a baby” and didn’t get one. Oh well, better luck next time, right? It would be a simple matter of getting pregnant again and successfully reaching full term and delivering a new baby. Problem solved.

What people don’t understand is that neither of our daughters was just a “potential baby.” Each was a unique genetic and spiritual blend that existed briefly as a tiny individual, but will never walk this earth. They were our daughters—Aurora Leigh and Abigail Elaine. We could have ten children, but never have them back. They are irreplaceable.

No, Doctor, we have two dead daughters: we’re not ‘disappointed.’ We’re utterly devastated.

“Everything happens for a reason.”

Another ill-informed saying we hear is “everything happens for a reason.”

No, it doesn’t. Nowhere in Scripture does it say that anything happens “for a reason”—unless that reason is that our foolish forefathers ate the wrong fruit the Garden, and we’ve been damned to suffer ever since.

I would propose in its place the more correct (if somewhat vulgar) aphorism: “shit happens.”

God does not cause everything to happen. If He did, what a cruel God He would be. He does, however, engineer solutions. Romans 8:28 says, “we know that God causes all things to work together for good to those who love God” (Rom 8:28). The Apostle John hears a voice say, “He will wipe away every tear from their eyes; and there will no longer be any death; there will no longer be any mourning, or crying, or pain; the first things have passed away.” In the next verse, God says, “Behold, I make all things new” (Rev 21:4-5).

I know God will completely cure the ills of the human experience. But this is a future event. Until then, Natalie and I are doomed to grieve for the rest of our earthly lives. Nothing—NOTHING—can ever fill those two gaping holes in our hearts.

All we can hope is that in this life or the next, the God of All Comfort will somehow forge our indescribable pain into something beautiful. And that He can bring something to our lives—be it His presence, or future children, or anything—that might in some way offset that pain.

He hath made every thing beautiful in His time.

—Ecc. 3:11