I'm at 40+2. Like many other prospective mums I am spending a great deal of time thinking about signs of labour. This pregnancy has been very normal so far, and thankfully I don't have much need to worry unduly about labour and birth.
When and if I get to 40+4, though... Well, there's a story behind that. Two years ago, I was pregnant for the first time. I got a scan at 9 weeks and all looked normal; so when I went for the 12 week scan and they found a problem it was a real shock. After a long scan during which the sonographer called in the consultant, DH and I were ushered into a private room. The sonographer told us that she thought the baby had a form of spina bifida. I asked how severe we were talking about, how would it impact Baby's life? I'll never forget the answer -- "It's incompatible with life".
To be sure, we were invited back for a second scan a week later. I won't go into the week we suffered in between. And indeed, the diagnosis was confirmed: the baby had anencephaly, a neural-tube defect which affects the development of the skull. Babies with this complaint rarely spontaneously miscarry, generally they die either during childbirth or shortly thereafter.
So at 14 weeks gestation, on 26th November 2008, I had a medical termination. There is no doubt that this was the most terrible thing I have every had to do, and even now I remember almost every day. It was a boy; they let me hold him, and gave me a card with his tiny footprints in it to remember him by.
I'm two days from the second anniversary of that first child's loss. And my current baby is due any day. I don't know exactly how I feel about the idea that I could have my current child on that anniversary. To part of me it feels a betrayal of the child that couldn't live, as though he's somehow being replaced. Perhaps the more rational side says that whatever day my current child is born, I won't forget my first baby, even though I couldn't give him life.
But I will say I'd be very glad if my current was born on some other date...
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Pregnancy
"Bad obstetric history" - may be distressing to some
13 replies
Jobob80 · 24/11/2010 15:06
OP posts:
LunaticFringe ·
24/11/2010 20:06
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LunaticFringe ·
26/11/2010 19:38
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