Jess & Craig’s Story – On Rainbow Baby Day, Jess and Craig tell their story, in memory of the four babies they miscarried and for their beautiful rainbow boy, Luca. 

Our journey started in January 2022 when we unexpectedly found out we were pregnant, with twins! We saw their little heartbeats on an early scan and, although extremely shocked, were overjoyed with the news.

Our world soon crumbled the following month when another scan showed we had miscarried them both. A missed miscarriage. My pregnancy symptoms had been progressing, and we had no reason to believe that our babies were no longer growing. Craig was abroad with work and I was suddenly making decisions about our pregnancy that a few hours before were completely alien to me.

We opted for a D&C, and a week later we left the hospital with a post-op care leaflet and two memory boxes. Our world was at a halt and I found myself struggling to complete even the most mundane everyday tasks. I was full of anxiety, leaving the house seemed impossible, and I couldn’t see a way out.

Our bereavement team referred us to Petals, and this is where our journey began with them. Our Petals counsellor gave us hope and helped us see the light out of a tunnel that at the time was bleak and dark.

We then went on to fall pregnant again – yay! And again, everything seemed to be going lovely and well. My symptoms were in full swing, and although heartbreaking, I was at peace with how common genetic abnormalities can be, and therefore miscarriages are in the first trimester.

We were confident this pregnancy was going to go well and we would be holding a perfect baby nine months later. Our world, however, came crashing down again during a scan which showed I had yet another missed miscarriage. Craig was again away with work but soon made it home so we could make our decisions jointly.

The process of miscarrying our second baby took weeks. My body was refusing to let our baby go, so we opted for medical management, only to be told two weeks later that this hadn’t been fully effective and, after everything, I still needed surgery.

After this, I went into productive mode. I was aware in England that tests aren’t completed until you have had three consecutive miscarriages, but I wasn’t willing to go through this again without at least trying to find an answer. I had blood tests at my GP, Craig had tests with his GP, and we went to a private gynaecologist who prescribed us progesterone pessaries and steroids to take when we fell pregnant for a third time. I was feeling hopeful and in control and that we were doing everything we could to make this work for us.

In November 2022 we fell pregnant for the third time. Again, everything seemed to be going beautifully. I even had sickness at work – double yay! I was taking the medication I’d been prescribed and we had no reason to think things were not okay. Again, we nervously went along to a scan, and again we were told that we had experienced another missed miscarriage.

Our third completely shattered us both. We lost all confidence and hope that our time would ever come, and we isolated ourselves as much as we could from our friends and family. It’s a grief and a feeling that I still cannot put into words, and one that I wish didn’t exist. Anger, jealousy, guilt, bitterness; we were feeling all the feels and felt completely out of control. I took a significant amount of time out of work and felt as if I wanted to go to bed and not wake up.

We had all the NHS tests with our last miscarriage, and four months later, sat in the same room where we had been given the news of miscarrying, we were told they had all come back normal, and our last miscarriage was a healthy baby boy.

There was nothing more that could be done, and we were told to keep trying and that one day we would welcome a baby into the world. Our world was pretty small and bleak at this point and we both felt so lost. After picking ourselves up, we took it upon ourselves to invest in a range of private tests, and within weeks of starting we had a number of factors to increase our chances of a successful pregnancy, and had more than likely found the cause for miscarriages.

In April 2024 we welcomed Luca, our beautiful rainbow boy, into the world. I still look at him and wonder how different life could be, what our other babies would look like and about their personalities. I watch our nephew, who had the same due date as our last miscarriage, and wonder what boy mischief they would now be up to.

Petals have taught me that this is OK. It’s okay to simultaneously love Luca with every ounce of my body, whilst also wondering. All our babies have been such a huge part of our journey, and, without this journey, we wouldn’t have Luca in our arms.

Petals have supported us throughout all our miscarriages, and throughout our recent pregnancy. There have been times when our counsellors have been our complete lifeline, and we have been counting down the hours until our sessions, and others where we have been happily ‘plodding’ through a good period and they have been a ‘check-in.’ They have validated our feelings and taught us how to live alongside our grief.

Our babies will never be forgotten. They have shaped who we are now and made us the parents we are today to Luca. We’ll be forever indebted to Petals for walking alongside us through our journey and helping us to smile again.