It took a lot of courage for this woman to share her story with me, and now with all of you. Supportive comments only please. ⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀

“I was young, a mom of an adorable 2-year-old and suddenly divorced. I found the courage one day to leave an extremely abusive marriage and within a week I had my Get and was thrown into a whole new world. Looking back, I wonder how I missed all the signs, but I figure the stress of trying to survive was reason enough. I was trying to put the pieces of my life back together and I assumed my fatigue, lack of appetite and nausea were symptoms of stress. I have had irregular periods due to PCOS for years, and had to have intervention to conceive my first, so I had no reason to suspect my late period was anything of concern.⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀

A few weeks after I got my Halachic divorce, I mentioned how bloated I felt to a friend and she joked, ‘Imagine if you were pregnant?’⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀

I laughed.⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀

And then I stopped laughing.⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀

Bells went off in my head and I thought, ‘Oh my god. What if I’m pregnant?’⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀

That night, I took a pregnancy test. Negative. Phew. For a minute there, I thought my life was about to go from horrible to worse.

Two weeks later I went for a routine blood work and I only remember part of the conversation that I had with my doctor the next day. The words 'you're definitely pregnant' and 'No, I'm not joking' ring a bell. My world stopped. There I was, trying to figure out how I was going to survive as a single mother, while trying to protect him and myself from an abusive man, and now there was another kid telling me to this monster? I laugh. And cried. And cried a lot more. I was ashamed.

I couldn't tell anyone that I was pregnant because I had just told them I was divorce. I thought my friends and family would judge me for having allowed myself to get pregnant when I knew my marriage was over.

I was angry. I was scared. I was lonely. And the worst part is the guilt I felt for wishing I wasn't pregnant. I thought about how desperately I davened (prayed) for my first child and how amazing being his mother felt. I told myself it was a secret gift from Hashem (G-d), granting me another child while there was still a chance. But when the feelings of panic, anxiety and fear said in, I felt horribly guilty for wishing away the baby inside of me. Over the next few weeks I fell into denial and I pretty much pretended at the baby wasn't real, and that there was nothing to worry about. The thoughts were so overwhelming that I didn't allow them to come. I continued working, taking care of my son and going through the motions.

At this point, it was getting harder to hide my pregnancy, and I started avoiding family functions and get togethers. Everyone thought I was depressed because of my divorce. I let them think that. At least that was 'normal.' Being labeled 'depressed' seem better than being labeled 'the divorced pregnant girl.' I was miserable. I was isolated, lonely, and Confused. I even stopped picking up the phone because I was scared the truth would come out and I just wasn't ready for the shame.

I was 18 weeks pregnant when all of that changed. I woke up early one morning, got out of bed and within seconds I felt blood dripping down my legs. Before I even look, I knew what was happening. I started feeling dizzy so I called the neighbor and told her I needed help. She came over, saw me lying on the floor, white as a sheet, and called Hatzolah (the  Jewish Ambulance Service). When they arrived, they asked me some questions including, 'Are you pregnant?' to which my neighbor  replied, 'No she can't be pregnant. she's not married.' I winced.

The Hatzolah member understood. My neighbor was escorted out of my apartment and I was taken to the emergency room where I was told that I had a rupture, potentially do to a large ovarian cyst and needed an emergency D&C. I sent a quick text to a few family members saying, 'I have a large cyst, getting removed' and I was wheeled into surgery. I woke up a few hours later, without a baby, and pain and shock. Suddenly, the baby I so badly wish didn't exist, didn't exist anymore. And it hurt. Badly. My mommy instincts kicked in and I realized how much I love that little fluttering thing inside my uterus. All those weeks of wishing I wasn't pregnant, and my wish finally came true. Except suddenly it felt like a nightmare, not like a wish at all.

The thing is, I also felt the tiniest bit of relief. But littlest voice inside my head kept whispering, 'It's over. Now you don't need a plan. No one's going to know and you can stop worrying.' 

And then came the guilt. The guilt for feeling sad, the guilt for feeling relieved; whatever I was feeling, I was also feeling guilty for feeling it. I was a mess.

A few days  after, when I was home recovering, I realized that I needed someone to talk to. So, I called a friend and told her the whole story. Start to finish. Her response was, 'Wow! Well Baruch Hashem (Thank G-d) you miscarried! That would have been a disaster!' ouch. My baby, a disaster? That didn't feel right. So, I hung up, and vowed myself to silence.

It's now almost 2 years later. I've been doing intense therapy and I'm grateful for the healing I've had. I've slowly shared my story with close friends and people who I knew I could count on for support and love. Today, I know that I loved my baby, and I also struggled with the idea of having another child in my situation. One doesn't take away from the other, and I am at peace with that. Some days I feel relief for not being a single mom of two and some days I feel sad from my loss. My emotions change daily, and I don't let myself feel guilty for experiencing any feeling, no matter how uncomfortable it feels.

I am healing, one step at a time, and I hope that by sharing my story, I can help just one more woman feel a little less guilt, a little less shame, a little more love for herself and her body, despite her loss."