Hello derangedcandy, I sure hope you see this reply to your OP. I do understand. Everything you have written.

I was joyfully pg with my third child - this was 13 years ago. There was something "off" from the first. You put it so well - I didn't "feel" pregnant...not like I had for my first and second pregnancies. It was as though my body would yes, be pg...then no, not really. And my state of mind was very odd, as though subconsciously I knew something was wrong. For example, I had bizarre nightmares, symbolic and frightening. I had heard the sweet baby's heart beat, though, so kept telling myself that everything was okay.

The night before my second trimester began I began to miscarry. June 9th. I will never forget that cursed date. By the morning the bleeding was really scary. I went to the hospital. And so on.

My entire world feel apart. Every single thing I looked at, my mind told me, "That baby will never see a flower"..."That baby will never walk in the produce isle of a grocery store and see a shiny apple"....on and on. I was crazy from my thoughts, my feelings. Everything. I had been young for my age, and vital. After the m/c I felt that I had aged 20 years. Nothing meant anything. My usual ability to create was entirely absent. All there was was flatness. Flat line. A horrible, ghastly nothingness.

Finding a support group (online) of women who had gone through pregnancy loss and stillbirth saved my life. I mean, seriously saved my life. Those women really understood. No one, I don't care how compassionate, understands pg loss unless she has been though it. It's a strange thing...it seems that women think, "Oh, big deal...it wasn't even a 'real' baby", or something like that. But women who have been through it - we know exactly how it feels, and why it feels like it does.

Please, please find an online group or an IRL group specifically for women who have experienced pg loss. I will never, in my entire life, be the person I was before that June 9th. My baby had been due on Christmas Day, 3 days before my own birthday. No Christmas will come again that feels like a day of joy. I will never again have a normal Christmas. But, I am still friends with the core group of women I met 13 years ago. We are going through our lives, together. And always, always, we support each other. That caring support makes all the difference.

I wish you the very, very best.