Surviving the toll of recurrent loss

[Alicia870]

I know there are people out there who experience much more loss than I have, but want to reach out and see if there is anyone out there who has been through miscarriage more than once and how you deal with it.

I had a baby 2 years ago with a fairly straightforward pregnancy, and it's only now after this year that I truly realise how bloody lucky and blessed I am.
I fell pregnant with second baby at start of year but sadly we lost him at 5 months - I was 22 weeks pregnant when he was born. Tests showed no abnormalities with him or me. No reason for his death.

We plucked up courage to try again a few months later but that ended in a miscarriage/chemical at almost 6 weeks.

It has all just hit me like a tonne of bricks. The anxiety in the recent pregnancy was seriously bad even though it was short lived, I couldn't imagine suffering that fear for 9 months. Even worse to suffer the fear then suffer another loss I think would really push me over the edge!
I desperately want another baby, but am so so afraid of more loss. I just don't know how to do this. I'm having counselling which helps to some extent but at the end of the day nature will always take its course. It's unbelievably scary and feels like such a hard road

I"m so sorry for your losses. It is a devastating thing to have a baby you'll never get to hold. I have had 4 miscarriages in the last 3 years and the grief can be overwhelming. I've had times when I can't see how I will ever be happy again. Like you, I found counselling helped to some extent but ultimately nothing makes it 'better'. When it comes to deciding whether or not to keep trying - it's an impossibly hard decision, because you can't know the outcome. For me, now I've been through the loss, and know how hard it is, I know I can survive it, and when I get to a point where I don't think I can, I will stop. I have to say though the first two losses nearly broke me and I had to take time to re-build and focus on my other children before trying again. You've been through an awful lot so give yourself time to grieve and heal.

@Onedayatatimer I'm
So sorry for your losses too. To go through 4 must be so so hard.

It's such a devastating thing and the repercussions of it are so huge. It takes away any joy from pregnancy. I honestly don't know how I'll cope with another loss. To lose my baby so far along was beyond traumatic and I really don't think I could get through that again. It's so full of fear because there's no safe zone. Everything was absolutely fine in my pregnancy, I'd had multiple scans all fine until he died for no reason. So nothing can ever reassure me.
I really hate the feeling of inadequacy and the resentment toward others and that it seems so easy for so many people. Also that it's just so isolating and I really don't think people are that able to support me the way I really need to be.

You’re right. All of my losses were missed miscarriages, so I’ve also lost all faith and trust and I understand the resentment you feel. For a while it definitely made me someone I didn’t want to be. I hated that I felt angry when other people were pregnant and the unfairness of it all made me very bitter. People say such stupid things too which makes the isolation even worse. What I would say is that although all of these feelings are awful, they are totally normal after everything you’ve been through. For now you need to allow yourself to feel whatever you are feeling. In time you will feel strong enough to move on from those feelings enough that they won’t define you xx

I am so sorry for the loss of your little boy @Alicia870 and for your more recent loss. I have had 4 losses all in the first trimester. I can relate to that awful anxiety and that has stayed with me, particularly after my most recent loss in October. That was the one that hit me the hardest and nearly broke me. I have been having specialist baby loss counselling and that has really helped me talk about my babies. I am not 'better', I will never get over losing them but I am starting to feel stronger. I think about them every day.

I am so sorry for your losses too @Onedayatatimer, 3 of mine were missed miscarriages.

Sending you both lots of love ❤️ xx

So sorry for your losses @VenusStarr. It’s good to hear the counselling is helping. I’ve found the more losses I have the less people want to talk about them. My most recent loss was in March of this year and sometimes I find myself wondering whether it even happened, it seems to have been overshadowed by everything else for everyone around me.

I lost 6 babies after my DD.

In terms of coping mechanisms it's very specific to the individual - I hated counselling - 2 of my losses were ruptured live ectopics and I lost both my tubes and my babies and I didn't feel that the counsellor had any clue what it was like to be 36 and completely infertile.

For me routine is what saved me - not to say I didn't think about it because I did but with having DD I wanted to protect her from a lot of it. I'm open about my losses but I'm aware it can make people uncomfortable. I have a little note book I wrote things down in and then put it away so as not to allow it to consume me all the time.

I don't let it make me bitter or jealous as it becomes a slippery slope into loneliness which can then be hard to recover from - infertility takes so much from us already. So I didn't hide and I didn't mute posts from pregnant friends on Facebook, I went to the baby showers and met the newborns.

Planning for the future also helped. Lockdown 1 showed me that actually if we were always going to be a family of 3 then we'd be more than ok. I was in the middle of multiple IVF rounds at that time and set a timeline to stop and say no more and get back to giving DD 1000% and book the holidays we hand t taken and move to the bigger house and do the things we'd always planned to without trying to conceive constantly being on our agenda x

This isn't for everyone, I appreciate that. I'm on my 4th pregnancy after 3 losses, and after the first two that is how I've tried to think of it. As a 'pregnancy' rather than anything more. But all my losses have been early, I can't imagine having one at 5 months

Personally I found the first two the hardest. My mindset for the first one was 'this could end in mc'. Second one was 'it could, but surely we won't have two? This one must be ok'. So by the time we got to 3rd pregnancy we almost assumed it would end. Of course now it has we are faced with the very real possibility that there is something wrong that is causing this, and the 4th is likely to go the same way (currently waiting for RMC referral for any answers).

So that's how I prefer to think about it, I lost pregnancies, not babies (easier said than done when we've seen two heartbeasts). It may sound harsh but I just couldn't go on if I thought of them as anything more, but as I say these have all been early losses so it's different.

I'm sorry you are going through this, and all the other PPs, it really is shit

Iv had two early miscarriages and now I'm pregnant for the 3rd time I'm terrified. Doctors say that most people after miscarriage go on to have healthy pregnancies. That's what I was told after the first and again after the 2nd. But I can't get excited and I don't want to tell my closest friends or family because I'm afraid of them being too happy for me and then having to explain that I lost it again. Iv found it too hard to even say the words out loud until a few weeks after the miscarriages have happened. I can't imagine how hard it must be to loose your baby as late as 5 months. After the way I coped the first two miscarriages, I don't think I would be strong enough to cope with a later miscarriage. My DH was also devastated and I would hate to see him like that again. Sorry, not really coping strategies there. I guess I just had to tell myself that it's just a blip and I will still have a baby one day. X

@VWLolabunny9119

I think a lot of us detach ourselves when we get pregnant again. I know i did. I'm pregnant with twins and now 28 weeks. I only started buying things in the last couple of weeks and haven't been able to buy 2 of everything - I still feel like I won't bring 2 babies home. I'm in hospital now with a threatened 3rd trimester loss of one or both and part of me feels like I knew I shouldn't have got my hopes up x

@ivfbeenbusy you are so right about detaching ourselves.

I've seen you on various threads and I'm so sorry to read the situation you're in right now. I really really hope everything goes okay for you and you being two beautiful babies home ❤️

I'm so sorry you're in hospital @ivfbeenbusy, we've spoken before on many threads. I hope this is nothing serious and that all is well with your little ones ❤️ x

I'm so sorry for your losses. I cant imagine how hard it must have been to lose your baby at 22 weeks, absolutely awful. I had a miscarriage at 10+4 in Sept and still trying to get over it so cant imagine so much later and then another loss after. It's so cruel. Wishing you all the best for the future xxxxx

I'm sorry to read about everyone's losses. I had an ectopic pregnancy in June which was resolved by methotrexate injection.

I found out I was pregnant again 4 weeks ago and we were delighted. A few days ago I began lightly bleeding and last night had a really heavy bleed passing clots and tissue. Scan this morning confirmed a miscarriage sad we are gutted as thought everything would work out this time

Just looking for reassurance from anyone that has been through similar is there a chance I will go on to have a healthy pregnancy in the near future? I know if I fall pregnant again there's no way I can be excited or settled for the 1st few months in fear of something happening again