Pregnancy after miscarriage -support thread

[cori]

As some of you already know I am currently 5 weeks pregnant after having had a missed miscarriage at 17 weeks in April of this year.
I am very pleased and excited to be pregnant again but at the same time full of fear and anxiety.
Their seems to be a lot of women on mumsnet at the moment who have experienced a recent miscarriage and are pregnant again. We all have the same worries.
Hopefully we can use this thread to offer each other mutual support and help keep each other positive.

RedZuleika,

Thanks for the advice. DH has already asked me to go to the pub with him tonite. I DON'T THINK SO!! Typical bloke has no idea of the pain or amount of blood loss. He did make me laugh though.

Have just taken my first painkiller. I still have the ones from my first m/c and op last September. Only have 6 left though. Will ask the prof for more tom.
Did the packing this morning as I know what the next few days are going to be like. Had to pack all my big knickers. Grrrrreeeattttt.
Speak in a day or so ladies.x

I feel so sad for you, peepee. Take great care. And thank you for all your good wishes - that is very generous and warm-hearted of you, in the circumstances.

xxx

peepee, I am so sorry... It just seems hard to believe with all that you have endured. Please take care of yourself and try to enjoy your holiday. Do not hesitate to post any questions or concerns here. I doubt if you will make any of us worry any more than we already do. I will be looking for your posts again when you return.

Nemo: I have rented a doppler and although I had immediate success, I am now finding it challenging to find the heart-beat and I am thinking that I should have run with my initial instinct telling me to stear well clear of the things! ARGH!!! Sometimes I have to try 3 times a day to find it and by then myheart-rate has soared to nearly 120 as well!!! I haven't found it once when DH is in the room. It is lovely and reassuring when I do find it but not so fun when I don't.
Poor DH is convinced that I am going to either give myself ulcers with the stress or end up cooking the baby with the ultra-sound... I know that in theory, there is no evidence to suggest that they do any hard but I avoided having scans with our first two and insisted on a stethescope or pinard from 20 weeks for them. With our third, I opted to have all of the scans and was delighted to hear his little heart beating away when the mid-wife used the doppler, only to be reduced to a mad-woman weilding her own doppler with this baby. I can't believe that it has come to this.

I really wish that I could hit a Fast Forward button for the next 7 weeks because I hope to feel much better once I can feel the baby kick. My plan was to take it one day at a time and enjoy being pregnant for the last time but being sick and tired all day is putting a kink in that plan so far...

Cadmum: a midwife used a doppler on me around 15 weeks - and warned me beforehand that it was very difficult to find it at that stage. So - no need to stress. By the time you can find it easily, it will be making its feelings felt on the subject (my midwife just uses a Pinnard now as it always started kicking the sonicaid).

Peepee: Yeeees - maybe best to avoid the alcohol for a couple of days... I had a beer once when I got back from an EPU appointment - and my blood pressure promptly went through the floor, I couldn't stand and had to retire to bed.

I had a telephone call from the specialist midwife at the hospital today. She will be looking after throughout this pregnancy. I am really pleased. She helped me through the miscarriage, and told me I should get the GP to put referral straight through to her when I got pregnant again. If nothing else I feel confident that I shall recieve good care this time round. THe midwife has had seven miscarriages and finally went on to have two healthy children. She said she would call me back today to arrange first scan.

Just found I will be having my first scan on Monday. The countdown to first hurdle begins. Will only 6+4 days by then.

Cori- that's excellent news about your scan and it sounds like you're going to get some good care while you're pg. I went to the Drs yesterday to ask for a scan. She wasn't sure whether I'd get an appointment because she said the EPU usually only sees women who are bleeding. But she rang up anyway, and I've got a scan this Friday. I'll be 7+2 then. Not sure it's something I'm looking forward to.

I dont think I am going to EPU. I think I will be having it at the usual antenatal place. Which is a drama in itself as this is the place where I found out about the baby that I miscarried.
I think you will probably be able to get a scan if you tell them that you are really worried, nervous etc. At what stage did you miscarry last time.

I mc at 11wks. It was the EPU who said that they'd do a scan "for reassurance" at 8wks if I became pg again. My midwife didn't want to refer me, saying that they don't like to do scans until 10wks "because they can't see anything." The Dr sort of said the same thing yesterday. But after what the midwife said, I rang the EPU and they said they were happy to do them from 6wks. So it sounds like the EPU are prepared to do a scan but the midwife doesn't want to do the refering. Luckily I got a really nice femail Dr yesterday and she asked me how I was feeling with the pregnancy. Not sure whether a male Dr would have done that. Anyway at least I've got an appointment now.
Not nice for you having to go to the same place. I'd take a "deep breath" before going in. Fingers crossed for both of us in the next few days.

Do you know when you are going to have your scan?
They must be able to see something other wise they wouldnt be referring me for a dating scan so early.
there are so many stories of women going for there 12 week scan and finding out the fetus is not viable. I want to find out before then if this pregnancy has a chance.
I feel a little bit confident, as I do have quite a bit of morning sickness. I know that doesnt mean anything in the long term but I think in these early days it means the HCG levels are high and the baby is growing.

My scan's this Friday and then next Tuesday I've got my booking-in with the midwife. Not sure whether to tell her that I've already gone for a scan as she didn't want to refer me for one in the first place.
I feel a bit more confident about this pregnancy too. I worry though about every ache and pain though, and then when I haven't got any aches and pains, I worry why I haven't!

Hi,
It depends on the equipment - with the newst stuff, they can detect a tiny embryo and heartbeat at 6-7 weeks, but tell you not to panic if there is nothing there. I had a scan then, but to be honest, it only stopped me worrying a teny bit as things can still go wrong. I had some spotting a few days after that scan so am as terrified as ever!

cori,
Thanks for the info. It may come in handy. Am not going to think about getting pregnant at the moment and DH says he will kill me if I get hold of the book and take it on holiday with us!
I will get hold of it and read it on my train journeys to work.

This m/c is going slower than the others. I really hope it sorts itself out soon.

On a more pleasant note......U guys must be excited about the scans. I am sure all wil be fine. I will be on my hols from saturday but will check in to see how u all do!

I think my body is just doing what it's doing for the attention. It has been neglected for a while.. No excercise for ages cos the GP told me to stop at my 3rd p/g. So I did. I wasn't doing much, just swimming. He seemed to think there could've been too much pressure on me therefore it could harm the fetus. THAT DIDN'T WORK!

Thanks again cori. x

I went to epu for my early scan and as they know me quite well there they actually pretended the screen was broken till they found a heart beat then the screen miraculousley fixed itself. It was a relief to me though as the thought of looking up at that screen and seeing nothing again had me terrified. I am now 1 day over my due date and getting stressed.

Good luck to all of you I hope you get your hearts desire.

Good luck mummyhill.

I am sure u will be fine. Don't forget to post back and let us know how u got on.

I have copied and pasted this from another thread (no time to repeat myself today, sorry). I would love your opinions...

New day=new worry. I was up most of the night last night because I really needed to wee but couldn't... I know that I have never had this happened before but it has made me wonder if the reason for my late miscarriages is that my uterus is so tipped back that it doesn't come out my pelvis properly. The sonographer commented last week about how difficult it was for her to take the measurements she needed because of how tipped-back my uterus was. I am now 13 weeks 4 days and I still can't feel the top of my uterus.

At 3:00 this morning I was convinced that I should call the high risk unit as soon they opened at 8:00 but now that the sun is up I think that I would feel silly. (am able to wee now so it certainly isn't an emergercy and I dread being fobbed off again.) I can't imagine waiting until the 30th to find answers but I am not sure what (if anything) to do.

Cadmum, If you feel like you need to wee but cant, sounds like a possible infection. Does it hurt when you pass urine?

I wondered that as well but it didn't hurt at all when I actually managed to go... The wee was also clear (not cloudy) so I don't thinl that it is an infection. It just really felt as though baby was crushing my bladder and I just could NOT go...

Just checking on you ladies.I am on TTC thread and hope to be joining you soon.

Hoping everyone and thier bumps are keeping well.

xxxx

Cadmum: are you saying that you have a retroverted uterus...? I have one which is slightly tipped back and a couple of doctors and a sonographer have said that it shouldn't cause any problem - it just made it slightly more difficult to see what was or wasn't going on when I had a TV ultrasound during a miscarriage. The sonographer said that the only other problem which can sometimes occur is one of fertilisation, as the angle of the cervix can make it slightly more difficult to direct the swimmers the right way. Don't know how much of a problem this is - we certainly didn't have any problem getting pregnant. It does explain why various nurses have complained about my cervix being at a funny angle when they're trying to reach it for a smear though.

My mother had an extremely retroverted uterus and although she thought this was one cause of her extremely painful periods and backache (and her doctor used to perform some bizarre circus trick to 'flip' it back...) there was no suggestion that this was a cause of her rather obstetrically blighted history.

RedZ: Thanks for your reply. I do have 3 children and I know that it is rare for a uterus to become encarcerated in your abdomen. Mine is actually retro-flexed. (Further back than retroverted apparently.?! I think the terms are used interchageably sometimes) It was noted on my DS1scan at 17 weeks so I know that even beyond this 13 week mark it is very obvious. I am not so worried about it except that I really could not wee last night and that seems extreme since I usually always have to go. I was searching the internet (something I usually try to avoid because I don't need any more things to worry about) and I read of a woman who needed to have her bladder emptied with a catheter. I would sooner have my fingernails pulled out than endure that discomfort again so I sure hope it never comes to that.

Do you happen to know when during this pregnancy your uterus was palpable?

Petunia, How did your scan go?

Xena, are you around? How are you feeling?

Cori-Scan's tomorrow at 12.10.
Yes, where is Xena? She hasn't been around for a few days.

OF course, was thinking it was Friday already. Silly me. How are you feeling?

I don't want to say "very slightly confident" in case it all goes wrong, although this pg feels different to the one I mc. I guess at the moment it's a mixture of "OK" and "a little apprehensive!" How about you? Yours is Monday isn't it?
Wish it was Friday! Seems to have been a long week!