12 weeks

Today is a day I had been so looking forward to.  By the due date given to me at my 2nd ultrasound I would have turned 12 weeks today.  My official dating scan was booked for Tuesday 1st December.  Of course I know that I was more like 13.5-14 weeks at this point and baby was measuring behind but it is still very hard.  I miss my baby so much.... 

Not Pregnant

Well today is 17 days post ERPC and pregnancy tests are now showing negative.  I am completely and utterly no longer pregnant.  There are nothing physical remaining to show for the last 3 months.

I feel awful.  Emotionally I am on a rollercoaster, lows, deeper lows and ok moments.  Nothing I would describe as a high though.  I went back to my GP and she has started me on 50mg Sertraline.  I feel like I can't face anything until I have some sort of chemical support helping me along.  Unfortunately I am not doing brilliantly physically either.  I have developed a kidney infection so am feeling pretty rough and particularly exhausted.  

I'm so ready for 2015 to be over.  I was so excited for it to be here.  I entered it fresh from my first loss, but certain that good things were coming instead I have had heartache after heartache.  Hopefully 2016 will bring my rainbow...

Guilt

Ever since I found out that my baby was gone I have wracked my brains trying to understand what I did wrong.

I never felt quite like this with the other two, after all nature has a way of ensuring that only the healthy survive.  

This time though it was different.  I must have had something to do with it, otherwise why else would I have been so unlucky to have had 3 losses in a row.  Is it me?  Do I have some condition that's killing off my babies before they even have a chance?  Is it something I did?

I've come up with 2 things which I will forever berate myself for.  Firstly, I wasn't taking my folic acid.  After 12 months trying I had just about given up.  I stopped taking my prenatal vitamins and my Metformin.  What was the point in continuing them when they didn't make any difference?  Or so I thought anyway...

Secondly, 2 weeks before I got my BFP I started taking escitalopram, an anti depressant.  I just couldn't cope alone anymore and needed help.  As soon as I found out I was pregnant I made a doctors appointment and was advised to stop taking it.  Had I already done the damage by then?

Part of me thinks that these things wouldn't have made any difference, but what if they did?  What if I was that rare case where taking anti depressants did cause me to miscarry?  Or where my low folate levels caused catastrophic abnormalities in my tiny bunch of rapidly multiplying cells?

I haven't cried today for the first time.  I feel like I should but I just feel numb.  How do I move on?  

I started counselling yesterday.  It wasn't even a proper session but it was so hard to bear.  I am heading back to my GP this week to ask for more support.  For meds which will help to lift me so I can concentrate on moving forward.  I'll ask for meds which are safe in pregnancy just in case.  I can't think of any other way I am going to get through this...

In Memoriam...

Ever since I lost Snowdrop I had this thought that I would like a tattoo.  Something meaningful to represent my lost.  In the days following losing Pickle, that thought intensified until I couldn't wait any longer.  I needed something with me all the time.  A representative of my loss or as my husband remarked rather prosaically, something permanent to stay with me in place of what should have been permanent but wasn't.  I needed something to remember my babies with.  As the bleeding slowed I became desperate to have it done as soon as possible, the last traces of my baby we're leaving me.  So yesterday I did it.  I had my first tattoo and I am so, so pleased with it.  It's everything I wanted it to be.  All 3 of my lost babies are represented:

Fly high my precious angels.  Always with me x

Brave? I don't think so...

Over the last 10 days I've been told countless times how brave and strong I am.  I'm not though.  I'm not brave and I'm definitely not strong.  If only they could see how I really feel.  How I wake up crying in the middle night.  How I cry most mornings on waking just at the thought of another day without my baby.  Each day I think to myself now I would have had a 2.5 month old baby, now I could be 25 weeks pregnant.  Now I should be 12 weeks pregnant.  I'm not any of those things though.  I'm not even able to start thinking about trying again - pregnancy tests are still showing as positive, my HCG levels are falling but are still not at pre-pregnancy levels.  I'm pregnant but I'm not.    It's a terrible limbo.

I'm not brave and I'm not strong.  I do what I have to to get through each day.  I have no idea how to move on so every day I go through the motions of living whilst I feel so very broken inside.

Rosie is the sole bright spark in my darkest days.  I do what I can to keep this all from her but it's so hard :(

Why?

Yesterday was a bad day.  I spent much of it in tears.  I miss my baby so much.  I should be 12 weeks pregnant, happily announcing to everyone I know that our miracle is in its way.  I should be planning, what we need to buy, checking through what we have already, looking at baby names.  I should be happy.  But I'm not...

Today I am angry.  Why me?  What did I do wrong?  Why do I have to go through all this?  I did everything I was supposed to.  Lost weight, took my vitamins, tried to get healthier.  We waited for so long after having Rosie.  I hated waiting.  I wanted to have a much smaller age gap.  All my mum friends had their second babies and I was still waiting for the right time.  We decided to start TTC when Rosie was 3.5 years old as we worked out that we could afford it.  We would be able to live our life as we wanted to, to afford trips out and treats.  A lovely new house.  A comfortable life.  Was it so wrongn that we waited for this?  Now we're here 15 months after starting trying to conceive with nothing to show for it but broken hearts, mourning our 3 lost babies.

I don't plan to wait to start trying again.  I can't.  Each month that goes by is a month that I am older, less fertile.  Each month Rosie gets older and the age gap between her and any future sibling increases.  I will be followed up at the hospital for recurrent pregnancy loss and hopefully it will show something simple, something I can take to enable me to carry another baby to term but I'm not counting on it.  This ones on me.  Time to get back to the diet and the exercise.  I have to keep trying...

Drowning

Standing surrounded by people, I feel so alone.  My heart feels like it's been torn in two.  It hurts so much.  Everything seems to be aimed at reminding me that I am not pregnant any more.  A group of friends sent me a gift, to say how sorry they were and that they were thinking of me.  Aromatherapy bath oils - the packaging reads 'not for use when pregnant'.  A sweet gesture but one that hurts so much.  I packed away my maternity clothes this morning.  I hadn't bought much and really hadn't actually needed them yet but it still hurt.  My baby is dead.  My body failed.  I posted a picture on IG saying that I'm hurting.  Drowning in my secret pain.  No one responded.  I guess no one knows how any more.  What do you say after you've said you're sorry?  It doesn't matter, it doesn't help.  Nothing helps.  Nothing stops the pain.

Dates

I have a list of dates indelibly inked on to my brain.

14 December 2014 - the day I first experienced loss.  My beautiful Snowdrop.
25 August 2015 - our 6th wedding anniversary, Snowdrop's due date

29 May 2015 - my 2nd loss, Forget-Me-Not
5 March 2016 - my husband's 35th birthday, Forget-Me-Not's due date

6 November 2015 - the day I found out Pickle had left us
9 November 2015 - the day Pickle was forced from me
31 May 2016 - the day Pickle would have been due

So many dates.  So much sadness.  Each day that passes renews my pain.  I love my babies with all my heart and pray that they are at peace.  No pain, no fear, just peace.

Loss

So Friday 6th November I found out that I'd had a missed miscarriage.  I was 10+6 weeks pregnant but baby had passed 3 weeks previously measuring only 6 weeks.  I was given 2 options.  Firstly, expectant management - wait and see what happens naturally over the next 3 weeks.  Or secondly to book in for a procedure - Evacuation of Retained Products of Conception.  I would have a general anaesthetic and whilst asleep they would clear my uterus.  I opted for the operation.  I was so scared of it happening naturally, of the pain and the bleeding and of seeing my baby. I was booked to have the ERPC on Monday 9th November.

We arranged for my parents to pick up Rosie so that I could have a quiet restful weekend before going in on Monday.  They picked her up and left our house at around 2.30pm on Saturday afternoon.  Within 30 mins of them going I was starting to cramp.  Every few mins I would have a bad one and run to the toilet.  Bleeding was starting to pick up.  About 3.15 I decided it was getting too much and told my husband I needed to go to the hospital.  I was having to breathe through each wave of cramps.  We ran around the house and gathered pyjamas and phone chargers and a few bits.  I changed my pad and we headed to the hospital.  It took about 10 minutes to get to the hospital and to book in.  As I stool at the booking desk I felt a sudden rush.  Running to the toilet I found I had flooded through the pad.  I was taken straight through triage and put in a cubicle.  By this time I was rolling around crying with the pain.  Every few minutes I would feel a gush.  I soaked right through my pad and underwear and was sitting in a pool of blood.  Eventually my husband got someone to come see me, I don't remember much through the haze of pain and the heart rending gushes that I could feel.  I was given gas and air to try and help me through the pain but it ran out.  They were saying something about not giving me anything stronger as I was pregnant but my husband explained that I was miscarrying and booked for D&C and shortly after they gave me morphine. 

I was moved up to a ward soon after, the bleeding was starting to slow and the pain was controlled with a mixture of morphine and cocodamol.  The two girls in the bed opposite were pregnant and eventually I was moved into a side room.  Around 10.30pm I realised that the painkillers must have worn off but I was still not in pain.  The bleeding had almost completely stopped.

The next morning after a very restless night with almost no sleep, I was given another scan.  I was told that my uterus was clear.  It looked like I had passed everything and the lining was already thin and looking good.  Unfortunately though they found the gestational sac complete with fetal pole stuck in my cervix.  The doctor tried to remove it manually but it was out of reach.

Due to the lack of pain and bleeding they said I could head home and just see how I got on or they  said I could still have the ERPC the following morning.  I decided to stay in and was glad I did.  I started cramping again, nothing as bad as before but we kept on top of it with painkillers.  The bleeding came and went.  

I was so scared that I would pass the sac whilst I was on my own.  Thankfully though I didn't.  Yesterday morning I had the ERPC.  It was very strange, one moment I was in the anaesthetic room, next I was waking up with tears rolling down my face.  My baby was gone.

So that's my story.  I lost my 3rd baby at 11 weeks and 2 days.  My heart is broken.

Over

I've meant to update this blog a number of times over the last few months but well things haven't been going smoothly...

I want to log what's happened here, I know it's unlikely that I'll forget anything but I'm hoping writing it down will help to get it out.

I got my positive pregnancy test on Saturday 19th September.  I figured I was about 11DPO.  The week prior I had received a couple of super faint positives but it was so early I hadn't really believed them until I saw the line on the FRER.  Symptoms wise I didn't have many.  Tiredness, backache, headache and just feeling a little off.  I booked in with my GP on Monday 21st September and was given an estimated due date going by LMP of 28th May 2016.

On Thursday 24th September I stepped out of the car taking Rosie to the park and felt a pain low down on my left hand side. It kind of felt like a stitch pain.  More uncomfortable than truly painful.  It hasn't gone by the following morning so I went to see my GP.  She thought that everything was most likely ok but wanted me to get checked out at the hospital to rule out an ectopic.  I spent 5 hours sitting on a ward waiting to see the doctor, eventually they took bloods and sent me home. They ring later to tell me that my HCG level was 158.  Lower than they would like for around 5 weeks pregnant.  They repeated the bloods 48 hours later and they rose to 358.  The hospital reassured me that they were rising well but still on the low side.  8 days later on Monday 5th October my bloods had risen to 5180 and I was told that this was really good and indicative of an intrauterine pregnancy. My first scan was booked for Friday 9th October, first thing in the morning.

On Friday 9th October at an estimated 6+6 I went for my first scan.  It didn't go well.  Transvaginal ultrasound showed a small gestational sac measuring 11.8 mm, around 4 weeks of pregnancy.  I was immediately very upset.  There was no way I could only be 4 weeks.  I'd had my positive test 3 weeks before and was certain that my dates were correct.  The consultant was very positive, said it looked just like it was too early and booked me in for another scan 1 week later.

On Friday 16th October, a week later (7+6 by LMP) I went for another scan.  This time there were changes.  A small fetal pole measuring 3.1mm (5+6) with the flicker of a heartbeat.  I was so happy to see this but still worried that it was measuring so far behind.

I spoke of my fears to my sister who is a GP trainee working as an OBGYN at the moment.  Her registrar at the hospital offered to scan me again to try and allay my fears.  So a week later on Saturday 24th October I went to visit her and she took me to be scanned.  It didn't go very well.  The registrar said the sac had grown but he could not clearly see what was inside it.  It was not reassuring and very inconclusive.  My sister tried to tell me that the equipment that they were using was not as good as the scanner that I had been scanned on previously.

Over the next week or so I tried to decide what to do next.  The hospital did not plan to see me until 1st December when they had me booked in for a nuchal scan.  I decided to book a private scan at around 9 weeks (going by my scan date) for reassurance.  At that gestation I knew that I should have a clear answer either way.  I booked to be scanned at a private clinic on Saturday 7th November.  I was nervous but since I had no other symptoms of miscarriage was praying that I would be lucky.

On Tuesday 3rd November I went to the theatre with my friends.  We had an amazing evening and I felt so relaxed and happy.  Morning sickness was making itself known and I was starting to feel more confident that everything was OK.  However it wasn't.  When I got home I went to the bathroom, wiped and there was blood.  Not a huge amount, but enough that I knew something was wrong. I wiped a few times until the blood was gone and then went to bed.   I saw the GP the following morning.  She said that as I wasn't cramping and was still being sick these were very good signs.  She tried to tell me that it would all be ok but I wasn't at all confident.  She booked me in for another scan on Friday 6th November.  I didn't bleed all day until suddenly I started again around 7pm.  This time it continued.  Again not heavy, just when I wiped.  I was extremely sick that evening.  Again I went to the doctors the following morning where she tried and failed to reassure me.  I knew this wasn't good.

Friday 6th November I was back at the Early Pregnancy Clinic for another scan.  My world fell apart.  I was told that there was no heartbeat.  I was not surprised by this but they also told me that the baby measured slightly smaller than my previous scan.  It was likely that the baby had died on the same day that I had seen its heartbeat 3 weeks previously.  I'd been given hope but in reality that hope had not been there for more than a few hours...