Teske Drake - Expecting with Hope: Claiming Joy When Expecting a Baby After Loss

When youve experienced loss, its scary to embrace hope again. But God invites us to hope, to dare to trust Him with our grieving heart and our broken dreams. If youre holding this book in your hands, youve known that loss (or you love someone who has) and yet, the hope of new life is also upon you. Youve come to the right place. Teske is someone who has personally walked this journey. She cares deeply about you and wants to help you sort through all that youre feeling during this time. Shell walk beside you as a trusted friend and shell remind you every step of the way that God is with you and He will not forsake you. May the Lord Himself meet you in the pages of this precious book.

Susie Larson, national radio host, author of Your Beautiful Purpose

I wish this book had been available when I was pregnant after loss! Teske hits on all of the major emotions women tend to experience in a subsequent pregnancyfear, uncertainty, worry, hope, and joy among them. The stories she shares from her own life and from others who have walked this path reassure her readers that such emotions are normal, but she doesnt leave us there. Instead, she points us to Jesus, not our circumstances, as the true source of hope and joy and peacesomething that encourages me as I now parent my two living miracles. I look forward very much to sharing this book with the women I encounter in my Naomis Circle ministry and strongly recommend it to others seeking encouragement in this journey.

Kristi Bothur, MEd, founder of Naomis Circle ministry and contributing editor of Rainbows and Redemption: Encouragement for the Journey of Pregnancy After Loss

Expecting with Hope is a gift! Not many people understand the complex emotions of pregnancy after loss, but Teske Drake has been there and it shows. She guides readers through Gods Word with tenderness and transparency. Both her personal stories and the stories she shares of other real-life moms will encourage and inspire. This book will be my go-to resource when ministering to expectant moms after loss.

Becky Avella, author of And Then You Were Gone: Restoring a Broken Heart After Pregnancy Loss

Teske Drake knows the anguish of losing a child. She also knows where to take her cracked heart in order to make it whole again. Her honest and helpful book will allow you to regain your joyfinding purpose in your pain and grace among the grit.

Karen Ehman, Proverbs 31 Ministries; author of seven books including LET. IT. GO.: How to Stop Running the Show & Start Walking in Faith; and mom of three on earth and one in heaven

Expecting with Hope: Claiming Joy When Expecting a Baby After Loss

2014 by Teske Drake

Published by Kregel Publications, a division of Kregel, Inc., 2450 Oak Industrial Dr. NE, Grand Rapids, MI 49505.

Published in association with the literary agency of Credo Communications, LLC, Grand Rapids, Michigan, www.credocommunications.net.

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The stories shared in this book were collected through interviews conducted by the author. The women whose stories are represented have provided written consent for their stories, names, and childrens names to be published in this book.

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All Scripture quotations, unless otherwise indicated, are from the Holy Bible, New International Version, NIV. Copyright 1973, 1978, 1984, 2011 by Biblica, Inc.TM Used by permission of Zondervan. All rights reserved worldwide. www.zondervan.com

Scripture quotations marked ESV are from The Holy Bible, English Standard Version (ESV), copyright 2001 by Crossway, a publishing ministry of Good News Publishers. Used by permission. All rights reserved.

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For Gabe and Aiyana my two living miracles

There is great joy and reason for celebration when a baby is expected to enter this world. However, I have experienced firsthand that pregnancy doesnt always go as planned. We experienced a miscarriage early on in our childbearing years, as well as the loss of our most recent child, Jubilee, at eighteen weeks along. The pain of pregnancy loss is one that stays in a mothers heart and is an experience that no future child could ever erase. God has made each child one-of-a-kind and graces us, as mothers, with the ability to love each one uniquely.

Throughout the pages of this book Teske Drake shares, with her voice of empathy and experience, words of encouragement in the mix of emotions that you may feel as you experience pregnancy another time around. Like meand like youTeske knows the difficulty of loss and the joy of motherhood, and she faithfully reminds us that God has given His Word and the promises contained in it to help us on our motherhood journey and to point us to the source of all hope, joy, and peaceJesus!

Michelle Duggar
Mom of TLCs 19 Kids & Counting

When do you think youll start to try again? I despised this question. For a time, I didnt know if wed ever try again. To do so meant that wed have to be vulnerable, take risks, and maybe even experience loss again. Fear paralyzed me from the thought of it, and for a season I was perfectly content with having one child to raise. My firstborn son, Gabe, was just four years old when his baby sister, Chloe, died and went to be with Jesus.