45 and unexpectedly pregnant - GP less than helpful, am I harsh?

[StandFirm]

Bit of a shock this morning! We truly thought this was not on the cards and we had been very careful (well, obviously not enough). I can't take hormonal contraception and frankly pregnancies are always complicated for me. DH is older than me as well making this whole thing is even more of a surprise. Irony was that I had an appointment booked to discuss sterilisation as my cycles were always extremely reliable up until now but I've been worried about perimenopause making that method unreliable. Nature got me first.
Beyond the practicalities - I work for myself so on the one hand I have autonomy, on the other it's brutal chasing up clients at the best of times - I am really concerned about the health risks to the baby of course but also to my own health. We still have a young child (elder two are adults, one of whom is self-sufficient) so I have that to consider. I don't want to be reckless with my health and so I went to the GP to get the facts. All I got was 'it's your choice'. Not what I was asking! I need to know the likelihood of miscarrying (again, I did once after our third, and I was younger) and the full facts on the implications on my own health. Again, all I got was: things can go well, no one can tell anything and no one will tell you to terminate because you're 45. That was not my question. I'm clear it's my choice, but I thought his job was to give me the medical facts. Is there a reason why he would have been so unhelpful? I got out of the appointment absolutely none the wiser and just as anxious as before. I've self-referred to my local maternity but are GPs not qualified to give pregnancy facts? He didn't even test to make sure it was correct.

GPs haven't tested to confirm pregnancy for at least 10y when I worked as a trainee in a practice. Chemist pregnancy tests are as good if not better than gp ones so if someone says they're pregnant I'll believe them

Agree - we weren't offering routine pregnancy tests when I was a GP trainee and that's over 20 years ago.

This is a useful answer and I can see the perspective from a GP.

Definitely put in a complaint about the GP who didn't have a crystal ball and wasn't able to tell you exactly what would happen.

Incidentally, as a GP I haven't known a woman be sterilised for years. Gynaecologists favour Mirena coils these days. Or better still, your husband should have a vasectomy.

I'm sorry you have this dilemma but there is a lack of logic in your own posts.

I have the impression you were using the 'safe period' when you had sex. You mentioned very regular cycles 'being careful' and going to discuss sterilisation as you expected your periods to become irregular.

If you had asked your GP or done some simple research online you'd have seen than the 'safe period' is rarely effective.

No one can tell you how you will be medically. You have added risks .

But you can easily find the stats online for birth defects for women your age.

Many women have easy pregnancies at 45 - in the past that was normal when birth control wasn't around.

BUT the big question is how you feel about a child that could have physical and mental disability. They should come first in your choice.

You really need counselling - not a GP- and the best place to start may be a clinic offering terminations so they can counsel you on both options - terminating or not.

Might be wrong on this, OP, but in addition to the risks involved in being an older mother, I think there’s also a higher chance of a child having autism when the father is over 50.

Can you make an appointment to see a female GP, and/or send your question to them ahead of time, perhaps? I completely understand (as do you, it’s clear!) that no one can tell you exactly how things will pan out for you if you go ahead with this pregnancy, but your GP does seem to have been spectacularly unhelpful. Even if he couldn’t given you the statistics there and then, I don’t see why he couldn’t offer to follow up with the information you were asking for.

This isn’t a gp issue. They don’t deal with pregnancy. You need to contact Bpas for domestic impartial counselling or the midwife.

GPs have better things to do than provide stats when they are available online.

Anyone who can use the internet to post here has the ability to google and read ChatGPT- which is usually pretty accurate.

If not, there are lots of other resources from pregnancy charities.

Why do do many people expect GPs to do things they can do themselves?

But she wasn’t asking to be told what would happen! She was asking for statistics so she could make an informed decision as to the likely risks. No crystal ball required.

Stats on what exactly?

If she weighs 20 stone, then yes, diabetes is more likely.
Ditto if she is unfit- high BP more likely.

Honestly, the dependency culture is alive and well here today
Take some personal responsibility and do some research..

Or, you know, discuss risks with an actual health professional rather than that very reliable source, the internet…

How do you feel in yourself? I got pregnant at 46, went to the doctor because I was being violently sick, thought I was quite ill. I did a pregnancy test because I thought it was an impossibility, but hey ho. I had bad sickness with my first child, 10 years earlier too.
Was offered CVS, which I did at 11 weeks. Results came back as normal. Appart from horrible sickness for over 20 weeks, eat puke, drink puke, repeat, I had an easy pregnancy, not even high blood pressure or swollen ankles. I did let them scare me into being induced on my due date, which I wouldn't recommend.

DS is now 13, healthy, intelligent and happy. I ebf him too. It's definitely doable, but obviously it's your choice. The accepted wisdom on MN is you shouldn't, but who cares, we're all fine. Me, DH, older son and and DS.

According to some on here, we should just cut out the middle man (GP) and use Dr Google instead! Which btw, I have been told not to do on more than 1 occasion.

I agree. If it's the facts, these are available online, if it's support, pregnancy charities are best suited for this. I understand OP is panicked and in shock, but I'm unsure why anyone is suggesting she uses more NHS time for something which definitely doesn't require a doctor.

I mean, there are plenty of reliable sources on the internet. The NHS has the information. So does Tommy’s. Most literate adults are able to navigate between these sorts of sites and Psychic Amanda’s Blog of Thoughts and Feelings.

Google is totally unreliable, and doctors hate hearing that someone has consulted Dr Google. While the GP may not be the right professional to discuss this with, he is the correct starting point and should be able to refer the OP to the someone who can advise.

Sterilisation would however be my preference. I can't decide for my husband if he's not ready yet (after all I haven't done it myself either - and here we are!) and I don't want the hormonal coil which I tried many years ago.

I'd definitely have to have a C section (already had two sections). It may not be super straight forward. Let's say I'm not really built for natural delivery.

Female sterilisation has a failure rate of 0.5% (higher if done at the time of C section) compared to 0.05% for the contraceptive implant.

I despair of anyone thinking ChatGPT is a reliable source of medical information.

Surely just wait and see until 10 weeks, if still viable then do the NIPT and go from there, the thing is you can look up statistics but that won’t actually tell you if your particular baby is going to be healthy. I had my second at 44 and no issues whatsoever, easy pregnancy, easy birth (c section), easy recovery and baby was perfectly healthy but I was well aware of the stats and I would have terminated if for example the NIPT results showed a genetic condition. Separately, there are many other things that can go wrong that can’t be tested for so in a way pregnancy and having a child is a massive gamble regardless of your age and you need to be prepared for that.

The pp who is a GP is correct though, on this it’s not something a GP is there for

The risk is individual anyway

Most wouldn’t need to go to Gp to ask it’s been in every pregnancy book and magazine for the last 35 years. Not sure wot u were expecting in a 5 min GP appointment.

If you did decide on a termination do you know what services are available in your area? I ask because in my area it's done via a pregnancy advice clinic at the hospital and is run by the obstetricians. If you have a similar service it might be a good idea to get referred and go and talk over the risks etc. Then you are also in the system if you didn't want to continue the pregnancy. Some people go to the first appointment and don't go ahead with a termination after talking it through.

45 had a baby this year and I’m fine baby is fine.
don’t panic. there are ladies in their 20’s with children that have life limiting issues.
what will be will be