Jessa Duggar Details Life-Saving Abortion in Emotional Video
The '19 Kids and Counting' alum found comfort in teachings from The Book of Job while recovering from a recent D&C procedure.
Jessa Duggar Seewald revealed she's recovering from a "D&C" or a dilation and curettage–a medical procedure commonly used to remove uterine abnormalities or tissue in the case of an incomplete miscarriage, a non-viable, dangerous, or unwanted pregnancy–also known as an abortion.
The 19 Kids and Counting alum, now 30, detailed her difficult journey with pregnancy loss in a new video shared on Youtube on Feb. 24.
In the video titled "Heartbreak Over the Holidays," Jessa explained that she had recently visited the hospital for a D&C following a series of unusual symptoms during the first trimester of her pregnancy.
Friday's post began with a clip of her and her husband, Ben Seewald, first sharing the news that they were expecting with the couple's four kids–Spurgeon, 7, Henry, 6, Ivy, 3, and Fern, 1–before it documented her heartbreaking loss of pregnancy.
While the former TLC reality star held out hope after singing devotional hymns with her family and her symptoms of spotting seemingly stopped, after reviewing the ultrasound with her doctors, she was told the pregnancy did not "look good."
"Nothing could have prepared me for the weight of those words in that moment," Jessa said. "At that moment, I was just in complete shock. I didn't have words. I just immediately started crying."
She also noted that she had almost gone to the doctor's appointment alone and was incredibly grateful to have her husband by her side, who wrapped his arms around her after the technician left the room to let the couple begin their "process through the loss."
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"We were just sitting there holding hands and crying, like, 'what do we do from here,' she grieved.
"I feel like in some ways 'missed miscarriages' can be so jarring because you don't have clear signs of something going wrong," she added. "I had minimal spotting for 24 hours, and that was it."
In Jessa's case, she explained the D&C was deemed medically necessary given her history of hemorrhaging. She said doctors were concerned about letting her "take something that would let [her] pass the baby at home," citing a list of potential health risks that she decided "wasn't something that seemed like a viable option."
She also recalled thinking about the teachings in The Book of Job, a section of the Old Testament, as a source of strength. "I was thinking of Job and how when he lost everything that he held dear–his kids, everything–in that moment, he was still able to say 'God is good.'"
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Jessa continued, "I remember reciting those words of Job that says," before nearly breaking down in tears, "'The Lord gives and the Lord takes away, blessed be thy name of the Lord,' and I was able to thank God in that moment for giving us this life, even if we would never be able to hold this baby in our arms."
"There are some things we just won't understand, sometimes," she said.
As the 19-minute video continues, Jessa explains that even though she's accepted that she may never understand why she lost this baby, she still has a lot of questions, "Is it my fault? What could I have done differently? Those [types of thoughts] can be endless."
"I don't know that we can always rule everything out," she says, "but we can know that we didn't purposefully do anything wrong to harm our baby," Jessa concluded, also noting that she will be continuing to monitor her health with her doctor, as well as getting screened for blood-clotting disorders that "run in the family."
For the time being, the proud mom of four said she plans to take a break from social media to allow herself time to heal.
