..it is still so painful...

My husband and I could not get pregnant due to his infertility. We did IVF and got pregnant with triplets. At about 3 months, the 3rd just stopped "existing". I don't know how else to put it. There just was no more heartbeat, and the doctor said that one would be 'reabsorbed'. I was on bedrest the entire pregnancy. I gave birth to twins 7 weeks early by emergency c-section. One daughter was born with a heart defect and had her first open heart surgery at 4 weeks. She came home at 3 months old, on meds, O2 and monitors. At 8 months she had her second open heart surgery and it didn't go well. A few days later we made the decision to remove her from life support. Her sister was born 'fine', but developed Hydrocephalus due to prematurity. She had her first brain surgery at 4 weeks and has had a total of 8. She is now 18. It is hard to look at her, and know there are 2 more that should be with her. Celebrating her birthday is bittersweet. I really have always avoided baby showers, those with newborns, a lot of social situations, etc. Mainly because it is still so painful, and also because eventually the conversation comes to me about 'how many kids I have', and 'oh boy could you imagine having twins', and 'so what was your pregnancy like?' I have a choice to lie, keep quiet, or tell the truth and be *that* person who had to drag the party down. After my daughter died from her heart surgery, I was told, "Well, at least you still have daughter E." To which I responded, "Yeah, it's always a good idea to keep a back up baby, a spare, in case the first one fails." I know you're focusing more on miscarriage (which I guess I had, it just never was presented that way) but I wanted to share my story with you too. I actually had an emotionally difficult time hitting the play button for the trailer....took me awhile