To hate the term - ‘chemical pregnancy’

[Salss45]

Why on earth do people use the term ‘chemical pregnancy’ it was a conception which implanted but just didn’t make it for very long for whatever reason, but if you know much about embryonic development then it actually did a lot to get to even that stage. There was maybe a a few days or even longer of excitement, working out due dates, making plans etc. Why refer to these short pregnancies with such a horrible name.

I think I've had one or two. I'm not offended by the term. I was always against abortion until the last few years or so as I thought of all pregnancies as a baby no matter how early but my friend recently had a blighted ovum and I went to the scans with her. There was nothing there at all in the sac and there never had been. I see it differently now.

So there’s an embryo and a sac that has implanted and with the right equipment it can even be visualised, that or not just some random hormone surge, what nonsense

I’ve also seen 6 week pregnancy scans (2 weeks after the missed period) with a little heart beating away. I’ve known people to lose their baby soon after. Most are not all ‘never anything there’ pregnancies. I’ve known people to casually ask me if ‘I’m keeping’ the pregnancy, as if early pregnancy is disposable just because you have to drop out of uni, would delay you buying your hour or any other inconvenience. I’ve known people to terminate at 23 weeks for social reasons, we all view pregnancy very differently but it doesn’t mean it’s not a pregnancy

It’s not about healing as felt sad and disappointed of course then acceptance quite quickly and have since gone on to have 2 more beautiful children. It’s about it not being an accurate term and one that purposely seems to aim to imply that the pregnancy didn’t really exist when it did. I know for some people that wouldn’t bother them as they never attached much emotional meaning to their pregnancy in the first place, even at later stages

But how is the term inaccurate? It’s a pregnancy you would only have known about due to a chemical reaction causing a positive pregnancy test. It is accurate, you might not like it, but it isn’t incorrect.

It's a pregnancy yes, I agree and I completely understand why someone would be upset going to a scan expecting to see an 8 week old foetus and seeing nothing. It is a pregnancy loss, but it's not a baby. There was a potential life and it's sad but it's not the same as a miscarriage when the baby has started to develop or a still birth.

I think it’s an accurate and realistic term.

Only a few years ago, it wouldn’t have even registered as a pregnancy.

I totally agree with you OP. I think people are talking about two different things - what we are able to know about a pregnancy, and what is actually going on inside the uterus.

Well that's not true is it, early pregnancy tests have been around for at least 14 years (thinking of how old my dc is).
Go back further and people wouldn't know till they'd missed two periods - would you still say that was not a miscarriage if she didn't know she was pregnant?

That's very single minded and rude of you.
They are miscarriages, early ones yes but a pregnancy that is subsequently lost is a miscarriage
Go be unpleasant somewhere else

I’ve seen scans at 6wks with heartbeats, then the next week nothing, I’ve had blighted ovums and chemical pregnancies, I’ve miscarried late first trimester. Personally I don’t think of chemical pregnancies as a pregnancy, because to me pregnancy means something different (even if it’s the correct medical term). I’m not ‘pretending’ anything to myself, all have been much wanted, but I think of chemical pregnancies as just a cluster of cells, not a potential baby. Possibly because I’ve previously had testing on the product of some of the miscarriages and the results showed that there was no way that cluster of cells could produce a baby. We just all think differently and we don’t have to agree with each other, but I would never tell someone else they are wrong for how they feel.

I hate it too. It’s a miscarriage. People often use chemical pregnancy to describe a pregnancy of less than 6 weeks, as if losing a pregnancy before 6 weeks somehow makes it any less of a miscarriage.

They didn’t use this phrase at the recurrent miscarriage clinic I was at. They called very early miscarriages ‘very early miscarriages’. Plain English.

I have to inject myself with blood thinners from a positive pregnancy test to give my pregnancies a fighting chance. Take a cocktail of pills throughout. And then keep doing that if no heartbeat appears, for at least another week, because until it’s over then it’s a pregnancy, not a chemical reaction.

I especially hate the phrase when it’s used to minimise the grief caused by miscarriage.

You could say that about any pregnancy where you haven’t yet had a scan to confirm it 🤷🏻‍♀️ ‘chemical’ implies that it just produced a chemical reaction in your body that the pregnancy didn’t really exist when in fact conception had occurred and there was an embryo that had grown and implanted itself in the womb (pregnancyfor 5+ days but then the pregnancy had been lost

My grandmother didn't have any scans or tests - in those days doctors detected a pregnancy by three consecutive missed periods and then feeling the bump to detect the size of the uterus and the baby.

There are ways to determine a pregnancy without chemical testing and ultrasounds - particularly after 12 weeks.

And lots more babies (and mothers) died back then because there were no scans to pick up life threatening problems.

Luckily we aren’t still in the dark ages like this, otherwise I’d have had 6 miscarriages instead of 4, and my 2 kids wouldn’t be here.

I had a heck of a lot of scans in my last pregnancy. 4 in the first trimester. 2 12 weeks scans because I moved house. 4 in the last trimester. Growth scans. 3 anatomy scans because they couldn’t check everything because she was a hider. A detailed placenta scan. Another scan in foetal medicine because a potential anomaly had shown up on another scan. If I’d had a scan when I went in for reduced movements the day before delivery, they might have spotted the umbilical cord was wrapped around my daughter’s neck 3 times. Good job I was having a c section instead of an induction.

Thank goodness we don’t have to have a quick poke in the belly and keep calm and carry on anymore.

Personally, I've always tested early when TTC, but it is a bit of a double edged sword - you want to know if you fall pregnant early, but it does maximise the heartbreak to know about very early pregnancies imo. My mum got so upset about miscarriages that she actually choose not to test until she'd missed two periods. She had a couple of "late periods" in between falling pregnant, and found that much easier to deal with emotionally - not knowing if they were miscarriages or not.

Thank you x I remember in my last pregnancy (of the beautiful baby I now have beside me 🥰) experiencing significant pain/cramping and some spotting a week or so after the positive test (which had never happened in previous pregnancies, even the early miscarriage) and waiting for what felt like the inevitable proper bleeding to start, which miraculously then didn’t, if it had it certainly wouldn’t have just been ‘not much more than a ‘late period’ to us. I know we don’t use terminology like chemical pregnancy or spontaneous abortion in our health records, I’m very glad to hear the miscarriage clinic doesn’t either. People can scoff all they want about women now being able to detect their pregnancies earlier but in actual fact what happens in those very early weeks has significant health implications

I suppose everyone is different, I would prefer to know if I’d been pregnant or not, rather than have a ‘late period’ and always wonder if it had been. I’ve always been very much on tenterhooks until 6 weeks knowing how common the very early miscarriages are so definitely never taken it for granted that my babies will make it through, even after 6 weeks

Even years ago if you had a very regular cycle and then were a day late and there was a chance you could be pregnant then you would have a fairly strong suspicion you were, by 2 missed periods I can imagine most women felt fairly certain plus would if had some other symptoms (always exceptions)

Exactly this. If you have to know to follow your medical protocol, theres no denying the importance of those early weeks is there. I had to take progesterone from 3dpo then up the dose from earliest positive, and up thyroxine dose immediately.
'my grandmother didn't know until the baby kicked' just doesn't stack up for me

It appears you have your mind set on the topic op.
Which is fine, you have a right to your own opinion, but I find it odd you'd make a post just to argue a point that is clearly marmite?
Personally I don't count my chemical pregnancies as miscarriages as the chances of them having actually developed into an embryo is very limited and is a pregnancy that is not compatible with life. Hence no heart beat. Nor in my experience have any healthcare providers considered my chemicals as miscarriages.
Also, the heartbeat starts around 5weeks (not always seen however) which is when a chemical pregnancy turns into an early miscarriage.
I'd imagine many women who have had "early" mc and had to actually pass a gestational sac containing an embryo or later gestation miscarriage would see somebody saying their chemical pregnancies are the same as a miscarriage to be quite upsetting and just not true.
That's not to say a chemical isn't just as heart wrenching to some, just as not conceiving at all is heart wrenching.
But the fact is, it did not develop into a baby with a heartbeat and never would have. Whereas miscarriages actually have developed and you lost a baby.
But again, that's just my opinion based on my own experiences with mcs and cp which I'm entitled to just as much as you being entitled to disagree.

I think you possibly don’t remember it because the general population didn’t know if they’d had a chemical pregnancy. It was a late heavy period. A combination of super sensitive home pregnancy tests and a trend towards very early testing has necessitated a name for something women didn’t even know had happened 50 years ago.

I know what you mean to an extent, I’ve had one, but in a way it would just be viewed as a late period in the ‘olden days’ so in a way it being acknowledged as a pregnancy at all feels validating to me. I kind of see it the opposite way to you.

How can people say so confidently that it never could develop into a pregnancy?
im still interested in knowing what a chemical pregnancy actually is from the physical point of view, not to do with how or when someone can tell they are pregnant but in terms of implantation/ embryo development.

This is based on an outdated and incomplete understanding of miscarriage, that most are caused by issues with the embryo and hence was 'never meant to be' and is rejected. Sometimes I think it gets said in an attempt at kindness but it downplays the significance and complexity of potential causes-which are not always a bad egg or random chromosome issue.