Stillborn baby 24 weeks

[Lolla8686]

Hello,

I'm wondering if anyone out there has experienced something like me and van offer me any advice on how to survive.

It took 2 rounds of ivf to fall pregnant. At 6 weeks pregnant, i had a big bleed. Amazingly, one of the 2 embryos held on. I thought this was the worst experience I'd have and that it would be plain sailing from here on.

At my 20 week scan, they couldn't see the 4 chambers of my boy's heart. We were eventually referred to St Thomas's in London. Two different professors identified multiple complex issues with his heart; so complex that surgery wouldn't be an option. He could either live a few weeks in pain or we could terminate the pregnancy.

We made the impossible decision to have a medical termination out of love for our son. We didn't want him to be born into a life of pain, never leaving the hospital.

Last week I gave birth to him. I was given medication to induce labour. My body resisted and I needed multiple doses. In active labour, I vomited with each contraction despite multiple anti emetics. It was traumatic and terrifying.

Now, I'm trying to survive. It's his funeral on Thursday. I don't know how my life has changed so drastically in the space of a few weeks. I don't know how to live any more because I feel like my old self died with my baby.

I have support from my husband, family, bereavement midwife, SANDS etc. I just don't know how to keep going.

@Lolla8686 That’s quite the range! He goes where you go, he always has and always will. You go to those gigs and festivals and he’ll be there with you too.

I’m so sorry for your loss. I think the hardest thing is you will never get over this, it does get easier but it’s one of the hardest things to do. I’m a fellow TFMR mum and I felt like I was in a rock and hard place. I also made the same decision as you and like to tear myself apart with what if this and that. I’ve just had my year anniversary of the decision and didn’t cope well.

ARC are amazing: https://www.arc-uk.org/
They are specifically for TFMR and medical issues with the mother or baby.

I am so incredibly sorry you have been put in this position and it’s perfectly acceptable to be angry / cry and just generally be pissed off at the world. It does get easier but we will never forget our very much wanted and loved babies 💐

I’m so sorry you are here OP.

I want to tell you that I think you’re amazing for making the choice to spare your beautiful baby pain and suffering. We had to the same once many years ago.

Take things a minute at a time. I struggled to sleep but the worst was when I woke up it was as if for a split second I’d forgotten and it then came rushing back ripping open the wounds in my mind and I couldn’t cope. I wrote myself a note and stuck it on the wall so I’d see it immediately as I woke saying ‘take a deep breath. He’s gone. It’s ok’ plus some other personal details about my baby that I could just read almost as a distraction and almost as a way to process it and dh always made sure if I was sleeping he stayed nearby for when I woke .

people will say ‘time heals’ that’s not really true . I believed it at first and never felt better . The depth of my pain and grief stayed at the same level so I thought ‘what’s wrong with me ?’ The I realised one day that the time between the feelings of pain and grief got longer. So maybe that’s what they mean.

I had a strong urge not to replace my baby but to be pregnant again . Having another baby did help (but it took 3 years and that was hard ) I knew I wasn’t replacing him but I needed to have a baby to hold and live but it did for a while make me more emotional again about firsts.

please know you’re not alone and take all the support you can get , emotional , practical etc.

Lots of love to you ❤️

@Tellyaddict123 yes I forgot to say ARC. They've been helpful too, I haven't actually called them yet but maybe I should.

@Darktowers thank you. Every morning I forget or pretend that none of this happened and I'm still pregnant. Then reality crashes down and I sob.

I'm really sorry that this happened to both of you. It's the hardest thing I've ever experienced. The fact that both of you can offer me comfort despite the pain gives me some hope for my own future.

I am so very sorry for your loss. I couldn’t presume to give you any advice, but what you went through for your boy was the definition of a mother’s love.

@Lolla8686 i promise that living with the pain gets easier. Like @Darktowers said I don’t think it ever goes away, it still hurts daily and people saying time heals were wrong. We will never get over the loss of our babies. And you know what I’m happy with that, I’m happy that I think about them daily, that someone remembers them.

However i can say that sometimes now I smile when I think about my baby, it’s not all that horrific grief in the first few months when you can feel your heart breaking. I’ve never felt pain like it, I remember doing that uncontrollable screaming, it was like primal screaming.

Sometimes little things will knock you sideways and take over your day and special dates. Just be easy on yourself when this does happen.

I have a lot more good days than bad and I have actually laughed and enjoyed myself which when I first lost my baby I was unsure would ever happen again.

There isnt a magic cure but I wish there was, that I could offer to take your pain away. Definitely ring ARC they have been amazing for me and I sometimes just ring them and cry down the phone for 30mins. They are great and very understanding.

Hoping today you can get outside, sit somewhere in the sunshine and have a little cry.

Sending you huge huge hugs. I also had to have a tfmr at 26 weeks after fertility treatment. Feel free to send me a message if you'd like to talk, but for now just take each day at a time xxx

What a lovely name, I am sorry for your Loss.
I will remember Rowan x

What a lovely name for your perfect boy. I'm so sorry.

Jan 2019 we reluctantly terminated at 21 weeks following a diagnosis of severe spina bifida. There would have been zero quality of life for my darling girl.

I agree with PP that her labour was harder. The midwives were amazing. They looked after her as well as me.

Everyone on here said to contact SANDS. I hated that advice because it meant I had become a member of a 'club' that I didn't want to be in.

What SANDS did do was make me realise that I wasn't alone.

The shock and trauma will subside eventually but you must take it at your own pace. Let your husband also grieve at his own pace and in his own way as well. You must both lean on others outside of your relationship to ensure you can support each other as well. I can't stress this enough.

My heart goes out to you. Nothing helps but time.

Ps I used to get really angry at the world as well. In the car, parked at the side of a country lane was the place I did most of my raging and screaming.

Lots of love and care for you x

I am so sorry for the loss of your precious boy. These early days are so raw and the pain truly unimaginable. It's unfair and everything you feel is valid. You're in the earliest days of this grief and I hope that you are being surrounded by gentle support and love.

My first baby was stillborn in 2020. I genuinely didn't think I was going to survive the early weeks and months, every day felt relentless and I couldn't see how we could live again. Time hasn't made the pain less as such but you learn to live alongside it, I didn't think it would be possible to feel joy or even laugh again but we do.

There are no rights or wrongs with how you navigate this path, every individual is so unique. The most helpful thing for me was baby loss counselling - it was truly life changing and helped me believe that there could be a future. There are various charities which provide it; Teddy's Wish, Petals and probably more. I have found our local Sands support group helpful and have made someone I imagine will be a friend for life through this. There's a big baby loss community on Instagram, reading some of the posts and words has helped me feel less alone in this at times. Have found The Worst Girl Gang Ever's podcast really helpful too and they have notes on each Podcast which tell you what the topic is, The Other Mothers podcast is great too.

Sending you strength in coming days and weeks.

Hello OP. So very very sorry for your loss. I also had a stillborn daughter, 9 years ago now. It was such a lonely painful loss. I found my way through although for me support groups with others who had experienced similar didn’t feel at all helpful. I found looking after my health was the number one thing that helped. I swam a lot and walked a lot and signed up to a course I wanted to do to fill some of that emptiness. I guess what I am trying to say is you’ll find your way, don’t put pressure in yourself to be ok quickly, it might take time. And if something you try that other people suggest doesn’t help you, don’t feel you need to keep trying it. Your way of processing this loss and remembering your baby will be right for you.

I had exactly this same scenario fifteen years ago. Our little daughter had multiple heart defects and her stomach and bowels hadn’t formed properly. I always remember the consultant at the Evelina drawing a picture making it plain that she was incompatible with life. I gave birth when she was 26 weeks and we were heartbroken. It’s like the future you have only just got your head around all of a sudden swerves and becomes bleak, the person you were planning all this life with suddenly isn’t there. The termination happened on NYE and I recall hearing someone at midnight screaming ‘happy new year!’ whilst I sobbed inside. It was hell and I recall thinking if I don’t go insane during this experience nothing will send me there.

Fifteen years later I’m so busy with the two that came after that the sadness is there, but it’s shoved to the back of my brain. My future was all the things that I thought of, but it was with a massively wanted little son and then five years after him my daughter (I’d assumed my chance of a daughter wasn’t going to happen).

Its a shattering bereavement, you feel your body has let you down, you feel you must’ve done something to deserve it, but nature is random and sometimes gets things wrong.

Things will get more bearable and please remember this pregnancy proved you can be pregnant, there’s every chance you’ll be exactly the same as me and go on to have much loved and very much alive children.

You’ve been incredibly brave opting for the termination, it’s a horrible thing to endure but it meant your lovely son didn’t have to suffer additional pain. In this scenario it was putting his welfare first. You might get some ignorant people who don’t understand that, and it’ll break your heart, but please remember how unpleasant a choice you had and how you opted for the lesser suffering.

There isn’t anything that makes this get better, give yourself time to really grieve, but you will move forward. We are proof of that.

I’m so sorry that you’re having to cope with this, I really am.

PS I’m not advocating this for everyone and it sounds daft, but I got a puppy a few weeks after we lost our daughter, she’s still alive at the grand old age of fifteen and a half and she saved me. Gave me a focus and someone to care for.

I realise that to anyone who doesn’t like dogs it’s a absurd concept, but it really did help me because I really love them and needed a distraction from the pain of such a loss.

@bozzabollix funnily enough I have a dog, he's almost 2. I'm living for him currently. Seeing his joy when we take him for a walk is the only reason I'll leave the house at the minute. I have even thought about getting a puppy so your post just confirms that it could help!

@Tellyaddict123 @iamloading @Senseofsomething @sunshine423 @mellongoose @AnnaTortoiseshell @Kittylickingplate
Thank you to everyone who replies again. Reading your responses males me feel less alone x

I am so very sorry to read this :( I have had 2 miscarriages and while not the same the pain was awful so I can only imagine how you must be feeling. Minute by minute, hour by hour lots of fresh air, rest, crying, warm baths, cuddles, biscuits and hot drinks. Keep talking about him. He is and always will be your son, your beautiful boy. Treasure the photos and say everything you need to at his funeral, perhaps write him a letter? That can be quite cathartic? Sending you a big cuddle and a hand hold. 💕💐

Oh I am so, so sorry for your loss

I'm so, so sorry you've had to go through this. It was March 2019 I also had to make the heartbreaking decision to TFMR my very much wanted baby girl. We had a very late and devastating diagnosis confirming severe brain damage which would have meant she would have had a very poor quality of life and so the drs gave us the choice to end the pregnancy and we did, I was 31 weeks when I gave birth to her. It was the hardest thing I've ever had to do and the following few weeks were a blur and the funeral was hard but I chose the music and poems which helped and my husband carried her coffin which was hard for him but his way to say goodbye.

We were lucky we had our son who was two and a half at the time as he was our main focus and distraction. I also found it helped to get out and about and keep busy, days out and meet ups with friends (I know this might not be for everyone but it helped me to be busy) you might find friends and family will be awkward around you but they just don't want to say the wrong thing or upset you but I just said "I'm already upset, you can't say or do anything to upset me more" it's been four years now and the pain never leaves you but you manage to live with it. You will get though this, it'll be long and hard and you'll cry and scream but you will survive. Sending you lots of love 💐

Just to add, we got a rose bush named after our little girl and it's in the garden and I love watching it bloom in the summer - maybe something in your garden or a keepsake that you could look at when you're feeling low might help for later on. I also listen to her funeral songs sometimes to have a good cry then I feel a bit better xx

@Lolla8686 aw I’m so glad you’ve got a dog to get you out, they have such joy in life that it does lift you. As for the puppy, it’d be lovely!

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