A friend of mine recently miscarried her baby in the first trimester. That reminded me of a story I read about Spirit Babies. It was something like this: All of the spirits of the babies a woman could have in her lifetime are in a circle. It rotates, so that every cycle it is a different baby's turn. If she doesn't get pg that cycle, it is the next baby's turn. When a woman gets pg, and then loses the baby, that baby goes back into the circle, but the other babies let it go first every time. So as soon as the woman gets pg again, it is that baby's turn again.

This fits in nicely with reincarnation. It depends, of course, on when you believe the spirit inhabits the body. Is it at birth, or somewhere midway through? I don't know. There are a few different anecdotes that tie into this, and I'll see if I can thread them together.

* I read a book called Old Souls, where the author collected all of these stories from children who remembered past lives. A couple of times in there, the person died, then felt themselves being sucked into a body right at the moment of birth. If this is typical or atypical, I don't know. The Spirit Babies story holds true if the spirit inhabits the body sometime after the first trimester, but prior to birth. Those souls could have been an "emergency" sort of case, so they got first dibs on that baby. Does this happen? The new soul would have to supplant the spirit of the baby that was already present, and that's a little disturbing to me - unless in that realm, it's seen as fair and all right in certain circumstances.

* I had a friend in Seattle who lost a baby in the 8th month. They had to induce her to give birth, although he was stillborn. They named him and buried him, and then she got pregnant again and delivered a healthy baby girl. So his spirit was already present, at that point in her pregnancy (thus was unable to rejoin the circle, and his spirit went to the Summerlands, or whatever afterlife you envision).

* I'm a big fan of John Edward (Crossing Over) - I think he has a very special gift. Sometimes when doing a reading for someone, he'll mention that someone on the other side is holding a baby, and it turns out that the person had had a miscarriage. So that would mean that the soul moves on to the afterlife right away, and the Spirit Babies story doesn't apply.

I guess I believe that the baby has to develop to a certain point in order to support the soul. However, the spirit of the child knows that it is her turn, so would be very in tune with the mother and the growing baby inside.

Obviously, I don't know what happens in all of this. But if I ever had to suffer through a miscarriage, it would give me some comfort to think that the baby I'd just lost is waiting for another chance to be born.

This is a big mind-dump, so I'll think on this some more and try to refine my thoughts.