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Grief.

Ale's POV

We took a break from trying after the miscarriage, both of us were exhausted from the whole process and the emotions of the weeks that followed after each transfer. Hoping and praying for a positive result only to be absolutely crestfallen when it was negative.

Loosing the baby had affected us both so much, but more so Isy than me. She hardly spoke about it at all for weeks, acting like nothing had happened, until I came home from a media event one evening to find her curled up on the sofa in the dark, crying her eyes out.

"Cariño, what's wrong? What's happened? Are you ok?" I asked full of worry, crouching down beside her and wiping the loose hair away from her face.

"Isy, please..."

"We lost our baby" she spluttered in between sobs, barely able to catch her breath.
"Our baby was growing inside me and now they're not"

"I know" I whispered, placing a kiss on her forehead and wrapping my arms around her as tightly as I could in an attempt to calm her down.

"It was my fault. I- I- knew something didn't feel right... it didn't feel the same as with it did with Jordi"

"It's no one's fault cariño. It just happens sometimes. There is nothing that either of us could have done to stop it. It's heartbreaking and incredibly sad, but we couldn't have stopped it"

"I feel so empty Ale. I had our baby growing inside me and now they're gone"

"I know"

I gentle wedged myself in between where she was lying and the back of the sofa, pulling her in close to me so that her head was resting on my chest.

"I just wish we could have met them" she sobbed into my neck.

"Me too cariño"

The weeks that followed were hard, we were both grieving the loss of our baby while having to continue with daily life. We still had Jordi to look after, I had training and matches to go to and Isy was keeping herself busy taking Jordi to baby groups and catching up with friends.

It was just over two months after our loss when Isy brought up the topic of trying again as we laid on the sofa together watching tv.

"I think I'm ready" she turned to look up at me as she toyed with my hands.

"Ready to what?" I asked, half knowing what she talking about, but not wanting to jump to any conclusions.

"To try for a baby again"

"Really?" I smiled cautiously, intertwining my fingers with hers.

"Yeah, if you are? I'll forever be heartbroken that we lost our little pea, but I don't want to give up. I still want another baby"

"I'm ready whenever you are" I smiled, leaning down to kiss my wife.

We went back to the doctors a couple of weeks later and talked it through with them. We spoke about the miscarriage, what we wanted to do now and the steps that we were going to take to try and have the baby that we had both been wishing for for so long.

"How are you feeling?" I asked Isy the morning we were due to take the first test after trying again.

"Nervous" she said quietly as we laid in bed.

"Me too"

We took the test later that day when Jordi was down for his nap, knowing that whether it was positive or negative we would need some time to get our head around it without our little tornado running around.

"Can you look?" She asked when the timer on her phone went off, the three minutes felt like a lifetime each time we took one of these tests.

I looked at her and nodded gently before picking up the test and turning it over so that the result was facing me.

Negative.

"It's negative" I said gently, turning the test around to Isy and looking into her eyes the disappointment obvious.

"What am I doing wrong?" She sighed.

"You're not doing anything wrong. I don't know why it's not working, but it will. We'll get our baby I just know it"

"We'll try again next month then I suppose" she faked a smile, throwing the negative test in the bathroom bin before giving me a hug.

We tried again the following month and the month after that and each time ended in a negative test result, we were both growing more and more downhearted about the never ending rollercoaster of hope and disappointment, which lead us to the point were were now. Sat in the bedroom discussing whether we wanted to continue with the dream of having another baby.

"Maybe it's just not meant to be, maybe we're only supposed to have one baby, maybe Jordi is meant to be an only child"

"We were so lucky when we tried for Jordi, getting pregnant on your first try doesn't happen very often, but we'll get there. We just need to keep trying"

"It's been nearly a year Ale" Isy sighed.

"We will have our baby, It'll happen, I just know it..." I tried, but I could tell that Isy had already made up her mind. She didn't want to do this anymore.

"I don't know if it will"

"What does that mean?" I asked, apprehensive of the answer that I was going to receive.

"I think I'm done"

"If you need a break then we can take a break, let's enjoy the summer with Jordi and maybe try again in a few months."

"I mean done with this whole thing, we lost our baby Ale and I don't think we are getting another one, it's just not going to happen and I can't keep putting myself through this every month"

"O-ok"
"What if this month has worked?" I asked. We'd done our 9th embryo transfer a couple of weeks ago and were just waiting until it was the right time to take the test, so all of this was coming a bit out of the blue.

"It hasn't"

"How do you know, have you got your-"

"No, I just know that it hasn't, I know my body and I don't feel pregnant. I knew with Jordi. I feel exactly the same as I have every other month for the last year. I'm not pregnant."

"If you want to stop then we'll stop"

"I do, I'm sorry. I just can't keep doing this anymore. I feel like this whole process has taken so much out of me, and us"

"You've got nothing to be sorry for. It's your body, if you don't want to do this anymore then I understand"