Trying to cope with late miscarriage at 18 weeks😪

[MomLostInTheClouds]

Hallo there,

I've been here for a while and read hundreds of similar stories like mine...
It helped me not to feel so alienated with my loss (never knew there's such a thing like late miscarriage!), but still - it hasn't soothed my pain.

I literally can't understand what had happened (it's raw, just 2.5 weeks ago, with burial on last Friday and follow up appointment with the consultant still to be scheduled after my bloods and placenta results come back; we didn't opt for PM).

I'm 39, have 2 healthy boys (thank God, they keep me sane!) and generally healthy. Before getting pregnant I had my bloods done too and everything (but low vitamin D which I supplemented) was fine. I used to be treated for hypothyroidism, but my TSH and whole thyroid profile came good too. I also lost some weight before (I have always been big, but managed to stay fit and did my zumba workouts religiously).

Got green light to get pregnant and couldn't believe it happened so fast. In a month we saw 2 lines! I was over the moon imagining a little dumpling joining our family, reorganised the rooms up to have space for nursery and dreamt of a newborn's smell...

Everything was like in the 2 previous pregnancies: intensive morning sickness up to 13th week, food aversions, fatigue, etc. The only thing different was yellowish discharge, but since I had no itching, burning or any other symptoms, I was told it is normal.

I was putting on weight, bump was becoming more visible and I could feel his first flutters. What a feeling!

Wednesday, 1st of June (International Children's Day)... things started to get weird.

I woke up very tired and in the night felt pain all over my tummy and found it hard to breathe - like pain in my lungs. Put it down to sleeping too long on the right side and getting bigger. Went to the toilet to find light pink discharge on my panties. Again, a bit puzzled, but when I wiped, there was nothing so again, tried not to worry and spent time with kiddos watching cartoons, playing, eating. Seemingly a normal day of a pregnant tired mommy...

Now I think that it wasn't normal as my gut feeling kept on telling me I haven't really felt baby flutters in a long time (put it down to feeling under the weather and being busy with kids). Then period like cramping started to creep in making me unable to stand. I also felt some pressure in my pelvis which was quite familiar from previous pregnancies, so again, went on with my day. By the evening, I was knackered and went early to sleep even though I wiped a lot of brown discharge during my last toilet visit.

2 am. Sharp abdominal pain and literally labor like contractions coming and going made me jump out of the bed, get dressed and grab my pregnancy file. I ran down to my husband to arrange going to the hospital. Just wanted to visit the toilet thinking it was a sudden bowel movement... but after sitting there for 2-3 minutes, no pushing... a baby and blood popped out of me. I could not believe it. Shaking I looked down and felt the umbilical cord and another gush of blood. Then I just remember my husband calling for ambulance and being rushed to the hospital with a paramedic holding my sleeping bundle of joy.

The reality hit me in the hospital bed. I was struggling to deliver my placenta when my little boy (perfect!) was brought to me in a tiny white basket covered with a crocheted blue blanket, and when they started to take his foot prints and our photos, and handed me a memory box. Holding this memory box and my wee boy on my chest shouted out loud to me that IT IS OVER!

Why?
Why... how?
So fast...?
With few warning signs?
In 1 day?
All over?
All my hopes, dreams...taken away.
Buried.

WHAT'S WRONG WITH ME?
WHAT DID I DO?!

Was it because I have a cat?
Did I get toxoplasmosis? (Was cleaning her litter box)
Was it that Mc Donald's meal I had few hours ago?
Or was it the last coffee? (I SHOULDN'T HAVE DRUNK COFFEE!)
Was it my age?
My weight?
Some other infection in the womb?
Placenta?

...

There are days I still feel pregnant.
I still rub my tummy.
I see my baby in front of my eyes and cry everyday.
I see his little coffin.
I see his little clothes (his first clothes for the hospital arrived just the day before! He was supposed to leave the hospital in them...Alive!)
And I don't know when I'll get over it.
Even if I should get over it.
When I laugh, I feel guilty.
But for my kids, I smile and wipe my tears on my sleeves so they don't see me down.
And I feel terrible to be wanting another baby, to even try to ttc again...
If I could, I'd love to be pregnant now...(?!)

Don't know how to cope, really.
The feeling that I should have gone to the hospital just to check, hunts me and produces 'what if' scenarios in my head.

Venting here...
Trying to calm down...while waiting for my results (and maybe some answers; hoping it won't be 'one of these bad luck cases').

Feeling 100kg lighter.

Anyone else going through this?

@Vie8126 point taken...for now!

I'll be sending baby dust ..... .... ...... until I have 2 more rainbows from you and @Monkhouse2022 !!

So get to work now...!🤗

I mean @Monkhouse2022 is waiting so I'm having everything crossed 🤞 and you, well oh well...work it baby !😏

@MomLostInTheClouds oh my lovely how I yearn to say the words ‘I’m pregnant’ - AF due next week though my last AF I was delayed like @Vie8126 with AF arriving week later than usual and only bled 3 days when normally I bleed 6 days.
Could it be peri-menopause kicking in now?
I am so happy you have your little rainbow baby in your tummy, makes me smile!

@MomLostInTheClouds @Monkhouse2022 AF arrived! Another month to tick off.

@Monkhouse2022 you know that with our history "just being pregnant" means absolutely nothing... until the baby is in our arms, we can't assume anything and anything can happen anytime...😑

I do hope you'll say "I'm pregnant 🤰🏼!" soon.

And as for cycles, mine before the pregnancy were 2 or 3 days only, but Professor Simpson reassured me that after miscarriage cycles can vary for few months.

Don't think about peri-menopause ...please...not yet...

@Vie8126 it sucks, I know...but to another month...

I'm here for you.
And I'm hopeful for all of us...to get to the end of the Rainbow.

@MomLostInTheClouds oh we know my lovely we know. How are you? How’s the boys? How’s dh?

@Monkhouse2022 have you had bloods done to check your levels? I don’t think you are perimenopausal at all! I’m not sure why our cycles are up the creek though either! Maybe our bodies are still adjusting?

@Vie8126 can I have tests/checks done then to see if I am peri-menopausal other than the usual symptoms which internwt state such as of long/short periods, heavier/lighter bleed, hot flushes at night.

@Monkhouse2022 absolutely you can my bereavement midwife did them for me - call your gp say what you went through you’re ttc your cycles have got shorter and you’d like to know what your hormones are doing at our age they say 6months of ttc anyway and we had loses well over that. Call them call them!!! Do you still have contact with your bereavement midwife?

@Vie8126 yes I am still in contact with my bereavement midwife, so can she arrange it for me other than gp?

@MomLostInTheClouds @Vie8126 I’m feeling ever so upset. Its been over 6 months since I lost my baby girl due to the cruel hands of the NHS. I never ever want to replace my baby girl but I don’t think I will ever get my rainbow baby. Its too late for me. My golden egg (golden girl) was snatched away from me by the nhs. I am sitting here crying uncontrollably. The world has moved on but my pain & anger is still as strong as the day the doctors decided not to save my healthy baby. There were so many elements of discrimination during my short lived pregnancy. I feel so low.

I’m so so sorry @Monkhouse2022 the sadness and loss is enough to deal with all by itself without the anger and injustice on top of it all too. I’m sorry that there is nothing I can say to make it feel better or to lessen the pain. All I can do is say that this is all just so unfair and that I’m sending you big big hugs. X

@Lillygolightly thankyou! You hit the nail on the head….. on top of grieving over my loss I have the triple blow of ‘why didn’t the doctors save my healthy baby’. Its the one question that goes round in my head and eating me up inside. NHS have washed their hands with me but do not realise the serious impact this has had on me. Not a single thought of the after affects of their actions (or non actions in my case!). How do I move on from this? Everyone says time is a healer but I still feel exactly the same - I feel so lost, feel suffocated, feel numb. I’m a changed woman & not for the better :(

@Monkhouse2022 I do think the saying that time is a healer, but time doesn’t ever erase what happened and nor do you forget. In my opinion all times does it lessen the initial acute feeling, so things dull and fade over time but never disappear.

Even though I haven’t suffered the injustice that you have in some ways I don’t want to let go of my grief and pain, the grief is what connects me to my son and my pain is deserved because I should have known I was pregnant and I should have saved him. Letting go of it all feels like letting go of my son and I don’t want to do that.

I am very lucky in that I already have my rainbow twins and I feel so blessed and it has softened my broken heart but a part of me is still gone with my son and I think always will be. I think of him all the time, he is in my thoughts constantly and if anything I think of him more now that I did before the twins were born. I feel like he will always be missing from my life, it’s changed my feelings on death, in no way do I want my life to end sooner than it should and leave my children but in a strange way I also welcome it in the hope that I get to see and hold my son again.

Grief is so complex, especially the grief of losing a child, and then when you add on top of that the medical negligence you suffered it is so so much to deal with. I think you are expecting a lot of yourself, your right in that you or I will never be the same again, this loss is not one to recover from, it one we just learn to live with. It’s ok to feel every single thing you are feeling, all of it! because what you have been through and continue to go through is truly devastating. Have compassion for yourself just like you would for anyone else who has been through what you have. I wish I could tell you how to move on, and to be honest anything I could say would be hollow as I haven’t exactly moved on myself. I also don’t think we consciously move on from this, more like time passes and goes forward and drags us along with it and at some point (probably not even a point we notice) along the way we stop dragging and start moving with life because there isn’t really any other choice.

I am sorry if that wasn’t very comforting to read, what I’m trying to say or what I hope I’m saying is that it’s ok to be broken, and it’s ok to not be the same, we are changed forever, but for as terrible and awful as things feel right now I promise you won’t feel like that forever ❤️

@Lillygolightly I am sorry for the loss of your son, and such lovely news about the twins.
I do thankyou for your kind relatable words. I know exactly what you are saying x

@Monkhouse2022 my bereavement midwife did my bloods herself she said at so many months after they needed to be redone so she did all the hormones also. Contact yours and ask.

I have no words other than apologies and resonating with your feelings. I have no answers no reasons. I feel like it’s a conspiracy that I don’t even know or have results back. I didn’t go into labour she just died. With no reason one minute healthy the next gone. I have no faith anymore in the health system in the Uk. I had a uti that was missed - did that kill her? Ofc the nhs say oh no it couldn’t possibly be that but how do we know? How can they say oh it’s definitely not that but we don’t know what it is. Here I am 8 months down the line from her birth. Still wondering. Still puzzled. Still hurt and still grieving. I’m sending you all the love and hugs and know your girl is with you all the times xxxx

@Vie8126 chased my bereavement midwife and no surprise there I was directed to go speak to my gp - will try that!
I don’t understand why you have no results back, I thought you had post-mortem - apologies unless I am mistaken. If you want results keep pushing, why is your bereavemnt midwife not helping with this. It just angers me when they leave you in limbo.

@Monkhouse2022 sorry she directed you to your gp but call them Monday to book in explain your age, ttc and that you want your hormones checked for perimenopause. I would be shocked if they said no.

ah I know I chased this week for told the following:
”I am going to email the team at gosh again- the last email they sent me said "test in progress" so I hope soon! I will chase it. So sorry about this.”

Post mortem wasn’t offered. They have taken placenta samples and cord blood.

I have read that an untreated uti can cause infection in amniotic fluid and of course be fatal. So if it’s that that’s another nhs negligence issue like you. I have also been reading about covid placenta and links between vaccine (I have only had one dose however) and late miscarriage.

@Vie8126 , @Monkhouse2022 and @Lillygolightly we all lost our babies so unexpectedly and we all have no answers. We can just assume/suspect/guess...
God knows...

We're all hurting, grieving and life goes on...with our babies forgotten in the previous year(s) as if they never existed.

I feel it's only me who makes my baby boy live in my heart.

I don't want him to be a dim and distant memory...but it's what's happening.

@Monkhouse2022 I hope your GP will be kind enough and won't refuse you tests (I had terrible refusals in this rainbow pregnancy and honestly if I didn't argue, push, chase, cry (!!!), I wouldn't be even prescribed progesterone!).

It is what it is on nhs.

I'm also a bit puzzled ladies.
Got glucose test at 16w now.
I'm asking why (it's usually 24-28w!) and I'm told just now that my sugar was very high the night I lost my boy!
Mind you, I have my report from the hospital where it states everything was OK, sugar too! Then how come?
I wasn't even told that during my follow up with my consultant so what am I supposed to feel now?

Sugar and diabetes are toxic to the placenta. A well-known reason for late miscarriages too...so yeah...I'm still processing these news...

We're all in this together so please take care, hang on in there and hopefully you'll get your answers.
@Vie8126 your waiting time is outrageous. I'd be gutted to say the least.

Sending love...😘

@MomLostInTheClouds I would do a full DSAR request for your medical records to see what the truth was. How can one tell you fine ans the other not fine? However I have to have the GTT test in all pregnancies I have a couple of triggers (family history for diabetes and a baby over 4.2kg) and when I had my ds in 2021 I was told it didn’t really matter when you had it and had it alongside 16wk bloods and then after a growth scan showed him to have a large sudden growth on his tummy. Hope that helps a little xxx

@MomLostInTheClouds how are you my lovely with yr pregnancy?
AF in full flow today, heartbroken all over again. Just when I am nearing towards my rainbow baby this happens. Onto next month but I am going to have to stop obssessing otherwise it will make my mental health deteriorate, not good!!!
Just like @Vie8126 will have to bite bullet and say thats it but so difficult.
I am going to therapy but its not helping in the way I thought :(

@Vie8126 and @Monkhouse2022 good to hear from you.

Oh, @Monkhouse2022 I wish I had something smart to say, but it's like I'm stuck for words... I feel your pain and I wish I could help...
Next month is new hope...
I still believe it can happen for you. I do!

I'm knackered today.
Had 16w 1d midwife appointment, doppler, bloods and urine tests.
Later, I had cervical scan length.
Cervix length is 4.1cm, closed, no funnelling still. Another one in 2 weeks.

Tomorrow glucose test.
On Thursdays, I have doppler for reassurance.

So yeah, it reassures me, but at the same time makes me go back to possible reason(s) of my miscarriage at 18w.

Yeah...in 1w 6d...I'll hit 18w...

And yeah, I'm scared.
And I have crazy dreams of miscarrying literally everywhere...
My anxiety is through the roof.😥

Knock, knock ladies🤗
Are you there?

How's life going for you?

I've just wanted to share that I'm heart-broken.
Yesterday my glucose tolerance test results came back and it worse than anybody has expected.
Sugar levels were both so high that they diagnosed me with Gestational diabetes and gave me a meter immediately.
There's a possibility that I'd need to take meds soon.

I was informed that in last pregnancy (told you last time) on the night I lost my baby, my sugar was also very high (it just came out now)...

I'm so sick worrying.
Got all these leaflets and scary info about premature birth, stillbirth, big baby, Neonatal Death, and it really put me down...

I'm already high risk, BP under treatment and now this ...

Inside I felt it wasn't IC (although it is still to be confirmed till week 24 by preterm birth clinic), but it really scares me I can lose this baby anytime coz of GD...
😥

Has anyone of you had it?
How did the pregnancy go?

@MomLostInTheClouds don’t be heartbroken even though gest. diabetes levels are high it can be controlled & if you control it & keep in range then you should be fine. I know you have lots going on but try not to overthink everything. Take a deep breath and not stress. Yes there are risks involved in pregnancy at any stage but positive thoughts please.
With my ds my levels were high but was controlled by eating right and levels not going over range. My ds was born premature at 35 weeks but discharged same day. He was perfectly healthy.

@MomLostInTheClouds I am sorry to hear about your GD but like @Monkhouse2022 it can be managed deep breaths. How are you feeling now? What’s the treatment plan?

@Monkhouse2022 how are you?

as for me another fertile period been and gone and over 2 weeks since we dtd. We exhausted both working all hours. Dps birthday is in September and I wanted to book a weekend away but found myself thinking but if I get pregnant we won’t be able to go and not booking it. This is why I need to cut off the ttc idea. Life feels permanently on hold. Dp has booked a lovely spa break for my birthday next month so we will at least get some time then.

@Vie8126 I know exactly how you feel about cutting off period otherwise plans will always get postponed / cancelled altogether thinking ‘what if’ I get pregnant. Each month AF turns up with my dream if rainbow baby going further away from me then that always brings me back to my loss of my baby girl. She would have been just over 2 mnths. Why do I torture myself & think about the ‘what if she waa here’.

Im doing counselling for the way I feel but not sure if its helping. I wish I could just accept what has happened & look to the future smiling but its so so hard. Time has stood still for me the day I gave birth to my beautiful baby girl.

@Monkhouse2022 I am with you and just not in a good spot. My world changed. I get up go through the motions slap a smile on my face. Struggling with dp I don’t even want to talk to him half the time. I’d rather sit in silence. Something is missing. Part of me is broken. Our girl would be 3 months old now. I’ll never be the same will I. This time last year I had my period and February found out I was pregnant. I stopped my counselling months ago as was too triggering on other matters. My ADs have come down but clearly need to go back up. I’m living in limbo not making plans for 9 months time ‘just in case’ it’s not a good way to live is it! It’s just not fair on anyone. I’m exhausted from nursery runs commuting I don’t think it’s even fair to add another child to that. Ds is 18m and getting hard work - although settled in nursery. My weekends are trying to make sure we see grandparents spend quality family time together catch up on washing house work prep for the week and it’s killing me. But with all the facts there laid bare am I going to use contraceptives? Nope why can I not bring myself to this final step?

@MomLostInTheClouds how are you??