Recurrent Miscarriage Support - tests, treatment, trying again - thread 10

[bakingtins]

Welcome everyone - pull up a chair! A thread for anyone who has suffered multiple miscarriages and is in need of information, moral support, tea or sympathy. Newbies very welcome.

Can we start the thread with a recap of where we are all up to again, please?

I knew I'd not manage it!

Leon sorry you're here, but as you've already seen you're in good company. I hope you get the support you need to try again!

Twilight how was the move? Exciting times, and keep those legs crossed!

Longest I've never heard of women having a non clotty thing! Ooh, how exotic! When is your appointment?

It's so nice that there are a few of us here together, iykwim.

Hey there folks.

Currently en route to St Mary's - eek. Feeling terrified for some reason. [DH would like me to tell you he's being very calming]

Am on phone and the underground so I'm going to struggle to nsay hi to everyone as eloquently as Tanny has!

Tanny - glad to hear things are going well. Annoying about the prescription though. I hope your booking in goes well. Moves gone reasonably well though will be finishing off today after our appointment.

Cat - very sorry to hear about your grandpa. Has he been referred to his local older persons cmht?

Waves at everyone as pulling in to station. X

Gosh this place is efficient. Since we spoke last I've been diagnosed with subseptate uterus and booked into surgery. Staff are lovely too. Very impressed.

Anyone had this?

Hi Twilight, glad your appt went well. I had the same, septum removed at St Mary's, back in October. It was very straight forward. They operate quite a 'old school' ward, so your DH will be sent off for the day and you will be in a gown on the ward all day. This took us by surprise a bit as other hospitals let you wait together and then get you dressed (undressed) just before you are taken down to surgery. Take a good book, you may have a wait. I had 2 coils fitted during the op and then a month of HRT. Prof Regan removed the coils a month later. You can expect a heavy AF from the HRT and then the month after, but all returned to normal after that. Now I'm 'good as new'! Hope it's all nice and straight forward for you, too.

Glad your camping was fun, Tanny. How annoying about the prescription! Is it the claxane that's causing the problem? Such a pain in the hole!

Went for my first meeting with my hypnotherapist yesterday. She seems sensible and we talked a lot about my fear of getting pg again and my mistrust of my body (MMCs etc.) and we're planning to work on making me feel secure about the past not necessarily repeating itself. My head and heart are in conflict, apparently. As long as it can get sorted out, that's all I care about!

Waves to everyone! xx

Thanks for the info Just. Can I possibly ask you another couple of questions about recovery time? How long did you have off work and do you think we'll be ok to go on holiday (relaxing, sightseeing) 6 days later? Glad hypnotherapy went well. Your description makes me want to try it out too.

No worries, Twilight, the recovery is fine. No worse than an ERPC if you've ever had one of those? You'll have spotting for a few days, you might feel a bit crampy, and your first AF might be uncomfortable, but that's it. You'll have had a general anaesthetic, you expect to feel like you're thinking through a wet sponge for a couple of days afterwards.

I had 3 days of work in total, including the day of the op, but that was mostly because work wanted me to recover (and working with kids, be totally free of the after affects of the general - they said that their insurance wouldn't cover me for 48 hours).

I felt physically OK the next day, to be honest. The most painful part was when I came round in recovery; they had packed me full of wadding to stem the bleeding and it was quite uncomfortable to 'sit' on IYKWIM? I got dosed up on morphine and had a nice sleep and was fine after that. It was better to lie down than to sit up because of the pressure from the wadding. It was like the most macabre magic trick EVER when they pulled it out (there seemed to be yards of it!). Now there's an image!

By the way, I assumed that the HRT would totally override my cycle, but AF still came on schedule.

I should think a holiday and sightseeing will be fine, just take a supply of sanitary towels with you ;)

*off work (oops)

Hi barking not tried Angus Castus. My acupuncture lady told me not to but I might get it anyway if this cycle doesn't work.

Thanks all for being kind. My grandad is doing a bit better again today. Family above are so precious but it feels all the more so when you know there might never be children behind.

bootles how are you feeling today? Hope you're resting up?

Xx

tanny glad things are progressing well and you're feeling very pregnant! Can't understand why your GP won't help though. It's maddening that they won't help good people! Not long until your scan now. I'm keeping everything crossed for you.

X

Tanny It all sounds good. Glad you enjoyed camping. 9 weeks! Mr Rai told me that 8 weeks is actually a much bigger milestone than 12. 12 just happens to be when they can do the screening scan. My appointment is on the 13th. Have got quite into the idea that there is a treatable cause now. Will be disappointed if he says that is just the result of the pregnancy hormones,which is a distinct possibility. I asked if I could bring my appointment forward and they offered me next Wed but I am away. How annoying!

Dd is playing next door. Is weirdly peaceful. Luckily she has left a trail of destruction to remind me of her, including a soiled chair. Nursery have threatened that if she is still having accidents in September they will call me home from work as they are nit qualified to deal with it at pre-school. Bit worried. Curse of an August birthday as she will be the youngest in the class.

Twilight Sorry you have to have an operation but glad it was all dealt with well. How is your dh after his op? Will he make a good nurse?

twilight sorry to hear you've got to undergo surgery but it's really good they may have found a reason for your losses. I have never heard of this condition before. Could you be so kind as to explain what it is? I assume once corrected you have a very good chance of a healthy pregnancy? X

Cat, I was advised that the septum won't, in all likelihood, have been the reason for previous losses (it wasn't in my case, anyway). It might do if it was a total bicornate (two separate chambers), but if it was partial, it probably wouldn't affect early pg. It might cause issues in later pregnancy if it restricts space for the baby to grow properly. The only thing I did hear what that there is a chance that the baby might have attached to a part where the lining was thinner, possibly leading to implantation issues, but I am told that that is rare. The main issue that the septum caused me was that that every time I had and ERPC, I ended up with retained products and long protracted recovery times because they were missing half my uterus when they did the scrape. I was glad to have the damn thing removed as it will mean that, in the (hopefully very unlikely) event that I need an ERPC in the future, I should recover much more quickly from it. Twilight, did they suggest that yours was a cause of early losses?

Tiny, is it you? (If it is, that will make sense. If not, don't worry!) :)

Bingo! (sorry for a little in joke with Just and Tiny and I promise I won't do it again)

:)

Yep it's meeeeee.

And still no news from Coventry and Kerri hasn't replied to my email chasing it up.
I wonder if she is on holiday.

But I have no email for prof Brosens... Only Kerri...

:) I'll pm you with Prof Brosens' email address.

Thanks. Might give it to the end of this week and then chase again...

just I hadn't heard of it before twilight's post. When did you have your operation? It's good we can all share knowledge and learn from one another on here :) x

Cat, I had it done in October last year. Sorry if I came across as a know-it-all. :)

Hello everyone. Not visited for a while- but been popping in to see how everyone is.

I'm so sorry to hear of your loss triple. And those others new that have had sad news bootle and cat and are going through painful times.

Tanny, I hope booking in went ok- that's a hard one not to lose it a little bit at, but hope your nerves held up and are holding up and you get time to pamper yourself a little :)

Baking how is your little one?

I'd like to 'dedicate this post' to all women that have ever mc'd or been sent by their RMC or a doctor to have a scan and sit in a waiting room full of pregnant ladies. I'd read about this happening to others- but I got the same on Thurs They were quite nice when I refused and found me a room and said how crap the set up is. And then I just felt like I looked like a proper diva (was wearing shades for the tears). Didn't be-grudge any of those other ladies their bumps- not at all... was hoping they would all have happy news- but I didn't want to give them the shivers by wearing sunglasses and dabbing my cheeks in a corner. Anyway. For anyone else who has been in that situation, I now have even more heartfelt sympathies for you.

On a positive note, nothing unusual found in the scan (that waited since March's op for) that might be a cause. That's a good thing.

Wishing everyone on here a hug. And a thanks for being here too. If you know what I mean.

x

Can't sleep - feeling really stressed. About work as opposed to anything baby related. My jobs really hard going at the mo

Just - thanks so much for all the advice. Had worried slightly about the holiday. Cat - can't really add much to what Just has said, although in my case they did appear to be differentiating what I have as a subseptate uterus from a bicornuate/heart-shaped uterus which seemed to be something slightly different? I can't explain how without a diagram but it seemed to be to do with whether the external wall of the uterus dipped down at the top as well as the having a septum inside the uterus. They also did seem to think it could be associated with first trimester losses, which I seem to have confirmed from Dr Google. I also found some stat which estimated a 80-90% miscarriage rate pre-treatment, though that was from Dr Google so might be rubbish. Cat - if you want more info on different causes there's a really good miscarriage association leaflet about them and the different treatments - I can't link as in my phone but if you google it it will come up. It's really helpful.

Longest - DH is now doing fine. I'm sure he's looking forward to 'repaying' all the excellent nursing I've put in over the past few weeks come September! My niece was the same re. toilet training and she sorted it out in pre-school nearly immediately. She also has an August birthday and has flourished in pre-school proud bragging Auntie. Just to reassure that being the littleist isn't necessarily a problem. I'm sure your dd will be great.

Betty - really sorry you had to go through that. Those set ups are shockingly insensitive aren't they. I think mumsnet are fighting against it (miscarriage code if conduct?) - I wonder if it's worth writing a complaint/feedback to the hospital talking about your experience and discussing how it's increasingly being acknowledged that such a set up is not actually ok? It might help you feel like you're doing something? Glad nothing unusual was found on the scan.

A reply from prof Brosens (thanks just for the email)

• - -

I am sorry to hear that you haven't had your results as yet. I am aware that there has been a delay in the lab and I will follow this up.

I will also ask Kerri to contact you as soon as the results are available

Please accept my apologies for the delay.

• - -

So I have to wait...

Due on (or BFP) in a week, so hope the results come before then...

Hello,

I'm new - I've been avoiding message boards for the last few months because I really don't want to talk about babies while all this was going on but it's got to the stage where I really need some support.

We started TTC in April and got pregnant right away. I had really strong symptoms from 7DPO, but had a chemical a few days after my BFP.

The following month we tried again and, again, got pregnant. This time I lasted just less than six weeks and then lost the baby on our wedding anniversary. It was the longest I'd been pregnant, so I was pretty devastated.

And then we got pregnant straightaway again. I got a BFP on Friday, but started bleeding on Monday.

I am not upset about losing the baby as much this time as what it stands for. It just seems to say loud and clear that there's a problem and it's going to be a long road ahead.

I feel really sad, fed up and scared I'll never have children. My partner is being supportive, but I don;t really feel like I can share this with anyone else and I feel really alone. I feel like a completely different person since I had my first MC; everything feels so much darker and more serious.

To make things worse, it feels like everyone in the world is having babies and I really don't want to wait to try again. I'm definitely giving myself a month off, but I know we might have to wait much longer while we're waiting for tests.

I'm 30 so I know time is on my side at least. I'm off to the drs today to get a referral to the EPU for tests and I'm going to try and start acupuncture. But I really don;t know what else to do. It feels like a hopeless situation.

Any advice or support is very welcome!

Tiny, no worries. Glad he got back to you. Hopefully you'll get your results soon. Good luck for next week, whatever happens!

Welcome Francine, so sorry to read of your losses. You are in good company here; between us we've tried and tested almost everything, so I'm sure that we'll be able to advise. Getting support is very important, and I find the support of the ladies on here invaluable. Hopefully you will get all the information you need to get the help you need in real life. I've been blogging about my experiences, too, if you are interested: getting referred and tested
There is lots of support out there in internet land (as well as the double edged sword of Dr Google), and we'll do our best to help you find your way through it.