Joy & Austin 28: loss and mourning

[sableduck]

58 minutes ago, viii said:

I think we need to be careful with statements like this, because we have ZERO idea what kind of medical attention Joy received this pregnancy. Her instagram proved that she had done a lot of things different this go around (more exercise, healthier eating, etc) and I just think assuming she had no doctor care isn’t fair to her. 

Also, most women don’t get multiple ultrasounds.  They do one in the beginning to make sure it’s not an ectopic pregnancy and everything looks okay and then one at 20 weeks, which she got.  From what we know Joy was receiving appropriate care.   She likely had no idea going into the ultrasound that she’d lost the baby.

My mother lost a baby at 21 weeks.  He was beautiful and perfectly formed.  My parents held him, dressed him and had a small funeral.  It’s been decades and my mother still mourns that baby.  My children know about my brother and leave small toys at his grave.   It was a difficult loss even though she went on to have more children.

edited to add: I sincerely hope that Michelle, who clearly grieved Jubilee, will step into the motherhood role for once in her life and use her own tragic experience to help Joy through this.

Edited July 4, 2019 by sableduck

[hethamahay]

My heart breaks for Joy and Austin. I told my mom about this and she said it best, "this is a tragedy that will always be with them." I hope their families are helping in anyway they can, watching Gideon, bringing meals over, praying with them or just being a shoulder to cry on. I do think the various social media posts by the siblings are just a formality though, something to let their fans know that they publicly acknowledge what their sister is going through. Also, I think Lauren deleted her post. The last Instagram post I see from her was their anniversary post. 

 

[meee]

Someone asked in the last thread about them saying "Annabell" means "God has favored me." It actually kind of makes sense; it sounds to me like they are using Anna = ultimately from Hannah = favor/grace (synonymous in the context of the name, as far as I know), and el = God, as Jill and Derick have done.

Edited July 4, 2019 by meee

[SassyPants]

7 minutes ago, hethamahay said:

My heart breaks for Joy and Austin. I told my mom about this and she said it best, "this is a tragedy that will always be with them." I hope their families are helping in anyway they can, watching Gideon, bringing meals over, praying with them or just being a shoulder to cry on. I do think the various social media posts by the siblings are just a formality though, something to let their fans know that they publicly acknowledge what their sister is going through. Also, I think Lauren deleted her post. The last Instagram post I see from her was their anniversary post. 

 

The fact that anyone needs to “publicly” acknowledge something so personal and life altering just rubs me in the worst way. I hate this-

[brookeb82]

Did anyone happen to screenshot Lauren's IG post? I missed it. I feel terrible for Joy and Austin.

[The Wanderer]

This is so devastating. And with three other girls coming the same month and not even a month after Grandma Mary’s death too. I hope Joy and Austin are getting the support they need right now.

[Cleopatra7]

I don’t even see how anyone can properly process any trauma inducing experience while being a member of a group that essentially forbids you from having negative emotions about anything. I suppose much of the appeal of Gothardism is that it promises the perfect life of you follow all of these dumb “life principles,” but that’s just not possible in real life. As mentioned up thread, not all pregnancies result in a healthy, live infant, and I don’t think Gothardism, with its blatant disregard for fact based medicine, understands this. 

[QuiverFullofBooks]

I don’t think they waited a week to tell exactly. I think they had to wait a few days for Joy to go into labor and deliver a stillborn baby. Something similar happened to me in my last pregnancy (it was just at the point where a heartbeat might or might not be visible) and the waiting is awful. I’m sure it’s much worse when the baby is big enough to feel. There’s no way they would do a D&C or even induce labor - they have Michelle’s example with Jubilee and it would be too much like an abortion (even for many women who are less rabidly pro-life than they are).

Personally, I was in the ER with high blood pressure last night (I’m fine, thanks) and I slept in this morning. I’m very glad I did not see this play out in real time. It has not been FJ’s finest hour.

[HarleyQuinn]

12 minutes ago, brookeb82 said:

Did anyone happen to screenshot Lauren's IG post? I missed it. I feel terrible for Joy and Austin.

There are screenshots on reddit, - 

And now Jill is in there with her exclamation marks and emojis. 

 

 

[viii]

Jill needs to learn some goddamn tact. Using hashtags like rip and 20weeks is absolutely awful. 

[xlurker]

my heart breaks for them.  I had a loss at 20 weeks also, and heard those exact same words. It's been too many years ago to count.  I still mourn the child that may have been.  Now, had I not lost that child, I also would not have the amazing ray of sunshine my youngest has always been....so the emotions are crazy and jumbled.     My entire pregnancy with my youngest I was terrified of losing her, and that fear is why we never added more children to our family.  My deepest sympathies are with them, and I hope they are being cared for, and caring for each other during this time.

[HermioneSparrow]

1 minute ago, viii said:

Jill needs to learn some goddamn tact. Using hashtags like rip and 20weeks is absolutely awful. 

She's incredibly tone deaf. I saw it and lowkey wanted to slap her, sorry not sorry.

I hope both Joy and Austin are getting the support and love they need right now.

[SassyPants]

23 minutes ago, Cleopatra7 said:

I don’t even see how anyone can properly process any trauma inducing experience while being a member of a group that essentially forbids you from having negative emotions about anything. I suppose much of the appeal of Gothardism is that it promises the perfect life of you follow all of these dumb “life principles,” but that’s just not possible in real life. As mentioned up thread, not all pregnancies result in a healthy, live infant, and I don’t think Gothardism, with its blatant disregard for fact based medicine, understands this. 

That’s why these folks do not live in our world and isolate themselves away, even to the point of not working outside their own family or family business. The principles, Beliefs and ideas they endorse are incongruent with our healthy world and society in general. 

[HerNameIsBuffy]

19 minutes ago, xlurker said:

my heart breaks for them.  I had a loss at 20 weeks also, and heard those exact same words. It's been too many years ago to count.  I still mourn the child that may have been.  Now, had I not lost that child, I also would not have the amazing ray of sunshine my youngest has always been....so the emotions are crazy and jumbled.     My entire pregnancy with my youngest I was terrified of losing her, and that fear is why we never added more children to our family.  My deepest sympathies are with them, and I hope they are being cared for, and caring for each other during this time.

I could have written this.  I had the same experience and fee the same way.

[itqitc]

How devastating for them.  :(

[Cleopatra7]

I was thinking about how on TV, the Duggars describe everything as “neat” or a “blessing.” I wonder if they even have the vocabulary to discuss adversity and negative emotions.

[Glasgowghirl]

I had no issue with Jill's post itself but the overuse of emoji's and the hashtag's make it look insincere. I don't think Jill and Lauren are intentionally tackless but both of them seem to get offended when people point out how they are coming across on social media, instead of taking it on board. Amy made it known online how she felt about some of their posts when Grandma Duggar died and now a few weeks later they are doing it again. Not everyone is good at conveying how they feel, especially when talking about tragedy and maybe instead of posting things that come across the way they do, they should not post anything at all or a basic post saying thoughts and prayers with Joy and Austin at this time.

[VelociRapture]

32 minutes ago, viii said:

Jill needs to learn some goddamn tact. Using hashtags like rip and 20weeks is absolutely awful. 

Personally, I wouldn’t like seeing something like that in regards to a loss I had just experienced. I definitely wouldn’t do it when commenting on another person's loss, regardless of how close I was to them or not. We don’t know how Joy or Austin feel about it though. They could be genuinely hurt and upset by it or they could find it comforting. I don’t think it’s really up to us to decide that it was wrong for her to use hashtags and emojis in this very specific case. The only people with that right are Joy and Austin. 

[metheglyn]

2 hours ago, sableduck said:

Also, most women don’t get multiple ultrasounds.  They do one in the beginning to make sure it’s not an ectopic pregnancy and everything looks okay and then one at 20 weeks, which she got.  From what we know Joy was receiving appropriate care.   She likely had no idea going into the ultrasound that she’d lost the baby.

Agreed. Per their Instagram, they had an ultrasound at 10 weeks. They shared both a picture (as part of the announcement) and a video. Admittedly it was from a boutique ultrasound location not a doctor's office, but this wasn't the first time they'd had an ultrasound. 

[jillsdopplerofdoom]

Despite what I think of this family; my heart breaks for Joy and Austin. Losing a child at any stage of gestation or life is awful. Joy seemed to be doing so much in this pregnancy in terms of exercise and eating healthier. She must be devastated and wondering what she done wrong. It's awful that she won't get real counselling or support that someone outside of her faith would get. She will have no time to grieve and probably just want to try and get pregnant again ASAP and will be pregnant by the end of the year. 

I don't see anything wrong with Lauren's comment, I think she was just saying how she would want someone to say to her. It can be difficult to know what to say at times like this.

Jill shouldn't have used the hashtags and emojis as they were totally inappropriate. I hope she doesn't do a blog post, this is neither the time or place. 

With the loss of Asa, Mary and now Anabell, the Duggars have not had an easy time lately.

[sableduck]

I don’t think Lauren meant any harm. I am not going to tell a woman how she should or shouldn’t grieve a miscarriage, or how long they should feel sad, or that they shouldn’t feel as bad because it was only six weeks.  I do think there is a fundamental difference between a six week miscarriage and a 20 week fetus that you can see and hold and bury; but I am not going to tell Lauren her grief is less than.

I think it is bringing Lauren a small measure of comfort to believe that her Asa has a cousin in Heaven, and she thought the idea would bring Joy some comfort too, the idea that Annabell is happily playing with her cousin.  And maybe it would; I also believe in an afterlife, and when I thought I was going to lose my unborn child, I did have a small measure of comfort that I believe my brother would be there to welcome my baby.  We don’t know if it brought Joy comfort or made it worse, but I think Lauren was trying to be kind.

Edited July 4, 2019 by sableduck

[AtlanticTug]

2 hours ago, sableduck said:

Also, most women don’t get multiple ultrasounds.  They do one in the beginning to make sure it’s not an ectopic pregnancy and everything looks okay and then one at 20 weeks, which she got.  From what we know Joy was receiving appropriate care.   She likely had no idea going into the ultrasound that she’d lost the baby.

Most women get a first trimester screening at 12-13 weeks in addition to those.

Assuming that she is under the care of an OB next time, she will have many scans. I had 6 losses, all at various points from early first trimester to second trimester and by my last viable pregnancy, I had biweekly scans all the way until 28 weeks and then weekly thereafter. I really hope that she goes down this route because it does a lot to help with anxiety to know that you will see the baby moving, etc every week or two. For me anyway, it was a lifesaver.

13 minutes ago, sableduck said:

I don’t think Lauren meant any harm. I am not going to tell a woman how she should or shouldn’t grieve a miscarriage, or how long they should feel sad, or that they shouldn’t feel as bad because it was only six weeks.  

Believe me, I get it, having had 6 miscarriages myself.

But this isn't about her grieving, it's about inserting herself into somebody else's grief in order to draw attention to her own. I have never, EVER offered solace or comfort to a friend or SIL who had a loss by talking about my own #angelbabies. It's just in poor taste. There are other women who commented, like Erin and Whitney, who had heartwarming messages without bringing attention to their own stories. It's really not that hard.

[Beermeet]

Thank you all for sharing your baby losses.  I'm finding it difficult but healing for myself.  I hope you are all feeling comforted as well as we share together.  We'll always love #2. That's what we call our baby.  It's ultrasound resides in my son's baby book. My son was 9 months old at the time. I've prayed to #2 to watch over its siblings.  I haven't felt this deeply about it in years.  Feels nice to connect deeply again.  Be well, sisters. 

[BrandoBarks]

This is so terrible and every pregnant woman’s worst nightmare I think. My heart goes out to them! Oh my, poor Joy and Austin. I was so terrified that that would happen to me (two medium risk pregnancies) and I checked with my fetal doppler every day for a heartbeat. I know that sometimes those things give false alarms or be confusing especially if used improperly but I was really really anxious. I had something like 5 ultrasounds in the first trimester plus 3 in 2nd and 3rd. Not planning to get pregnant a third time for that reason, to me pregnancy means anxiety...

[luv2laugh]

Lauren has a problem with inserting herself into other people’s grief and into other people’s lives, in general.

She makes everything about herself and discusses Asa through the lens of a pro-life political agenda rather than genuine grief. She comes across as competitive. It’s almost as if Lauren fears the public will forget her.

Edited July 4, 2019 by luv2laugh