An awesome blogger, Johanne from My Hope Jar, asked me to participate in a Blog Hop that features new women writers and celebrates why we are writing. I am super excited and honored that she asked me to participate. For the time being, I am writing a lot and I am currently starting to make a real effort to become a published writer, so to be asked was just such a huge compliment.

So, why did I begin writing? I began on the spur of the moment decision, right after we unexpectedly found out our 4^th baby had no heartbeat. I decided, as hard as our journey to become parents has been, I needed to share our story with others experiencing their first miscarriage or there 10^th. Simply put, miscarriage is a silent and isolating experience that just isn’t talked about in society. Miscarriages are unbelievably hard, and it’s hard to know what to do when you are suddenly pushed into a position where you know you will lose your baby. And at the same time, with hormones and emotions raging, you have to make a lot of hard decision that most women/couples have never even thought about.  So, while, I am not in the medical field and definitely not a medical expert, until this experience, I really didn’t know much about pregnancy or miscarriages, and now I am a walking, breathing infertility/miscarriage/recurrent pregnancy loss expert. I can now predict outcomes of pregnancies just as well as any doctor based on fetal heart rates and beta blood testing. It’s a skill/knowledge base I never thought I’d have, and quite frankly, wish I didn’t have. But, I figure, the least I can do is share what I know based on our experiences. So, my hope is that by sharing, women/couples will have some ideas of what to expect from a human, non-medical perspective.

While, my blog started as an avenue to share miscarriage experiences, in just under 4 months it has grown quite substantially. I now talk about just about anything that is on my mind. While, most frequently, I write about our family journey and the decisions we are actively making on getting to our family (whatever that ends up looking like), I also write about a number of other things depending on the day. I’ve been known to write about the death of my mom and sister, a favourite travel memory, volunteering at a local homeless shelter, household projects (because I always have some sort of home improvement project on the go), my career and work life, or even my addiction to candy crush.

The one thing I can promise anyone who follows my blog, is that I am absolutely always honest and will speak the hard truths (something I’ve always done and has gotten me into trouble on more than one occasion in my professional and personal lives).  I hold my integrity and ethics higher than anything else, and as such I also put honesty above all else. This means, for the time being I have chosen to write anonymously. Very few of my real life friends and family know about this project. Most know that I am working on writing and looking to meet someone in publishing or editing, but very, very few people know about this blog. I have done this very intentionally, because by being anonymous, I am not filtered by my guilt of offending people, or being worried that my honesty will hurt someone close to me. Being anonymous has let me share posts like this one. While, I know there will be a time when I share this blog with my real world connections, for now, I feel a sense of being free and unconstrained by being anonymous.

How the Blog Hop Works

Write a description of yourself as a writer and answer the 3 questions below. Then invite 2-3 other women writers/bloggers to participate.

What am I working on/writing?

I am always writing tidbits for my blog. Always. At any given time I have 10-30 partially written posts on any number of topics. I tend to go on writing blitzes where I complete a bunch of posts in a day, and then I schedule post for the next few days and take a few days off from writing entirely. Funny enough, with the beautiful summer weather, I’m finding my driving to sit in front of my computer slightly lacking.

I am also working on memoir about my life and surviving and even thriving after the deaths of my mom and sister when I was just 14. I am actively looking to find a good editor to help me turn this into something real. Time will tell if it becomes a success, but here’s to hoping.

How does my work differ from other writers in my genre?

While, I know many women will experience one, or maybe two miscarriages in their lifetime, this is not the case for me. Given the number of consecutive miscarriages we have had, we are now part of the infertility community. And even in this community, we do not really fit in as most people experiencing infertility, do not experience recurrent miscarriage rather they struggle to get pregnant. So, my experience is outside the norm of infertility because I exist within the special 1% of people who experience recurrent pregnancy loss (i.e. 3 or more consecutive miscarriages). And, our experience is also classified as unexplained, so there is no “cure” so to say and our chances of a successful pregnancy are at about 50% (the average pregnancy, for a “normal” women is 80%). So, by sharing my infertility story, I am shading light into a more rare condition that is fraught with constant heartache due to dying babies.

Also, although my writing began on the topic of miscarriage and recurrent pregnancy loss, it’s grown into so much more in just 4 months. Most infertility bloggers tend to focus just on infertility, but I’m writing about anything that pops into my mind.

Why do I write what I do?

I write for two main reasons. First, I started writing simply because I think my story will help others out there experiencing a miscarriage and/or recurrent pregnancy loss. As, I’ve experienced 5 different miscarriage, and gone through 5 incredibly different medical processes, I think that my story might just help someone else experiencing a miscarriage and looking at alternative family structures (i.e. adoption and/or living childfree) and showing the emotional process that goes along with all of that.  And, this is enough of a reason for me to share my experience. And as an added bonus, I’ve received such great support through the blogging world. It’s a bit of a win-win situation.

Secondly, I write, for me. I enjoy writing. Whether I’m writing about recurrent pregnancy loss, our thoughts on adoption and/or living childfree, or candy crush, I simply enjoy the process of string words together into something coherent (or at least usually somewhat coherent).

Next Week’s Bog Hoppers

I am totally excited to share with you two bloggers that I love:

Alicia from Lady Love and Baby Dust – I have been an undercover “writer” since I was very young. Always writing poems about the darkest times in my life. I’ve been told for years to write a blog, I just never knew how to start it what to write about. When my wife and I decided to start trying to start a family, through frozen donor sperm, I thought this was my chance! Shortly before starting my blog I found out I did not ovulate regularly and had low progesterone, knowing it was going to be more difficult to conceive right off the bat I decided I wanted to share my experiences with my close friends and family through my writing. Little did I know it would become my saving grace and all the women I would meet through it along the way would change my life so much. We are now 8 months into our journey and have yet to be successful at conceiving.

Katie from The Cat Bed is a typical English redhead who is terrified of the sun but currently resides in the hottest state of Australia with her husband, young son and mischievous cat. Her blog contains anecdotes and stories about her life ranging from pregnancy loss, parenting, homesickness, dodgy DIY and learning how to use a camera. After recently experiencing a third miscarriage after months of fertility treatment she has been regularly sharing her thoughts and feelings on these sensitive topics.

If you like this post, please feel free to share it and please return to myperfectbreakdown.com to follow my journey.