Antenatal support thread for women who have chosen to terminate 7

[mrsbigz]

May this thread continue to offer support and friendship to all who have found ourselves knocking at its door. May the door stay firmly wedged open - to be a comfort to those who have recently lost a little one, and welcoming back those who have longer memories of their loss. May the tea always be brewing and the millionaire shortbreads always freshly baked.

And may our all little ones find each other in a magical place, where they can run, laugh and play together with no boundaries

ifrustrated everything you feel is normal, and its what makes us human. I don't think anyone could do what you are having to do, and what we have all done here, without it hurting - I would worry if we could. ghislaine has put everything so eloquently, and mirrors my feelings too, especially about almost wishing for something worse so that the decision feels better. You're not alone in what you're feeling, we understand and hopefully in time we can help you though this.

Deciding whether or not to see the baby, and indeed to know the sex, is a very personal choice and there are no right or wrong answers and no right or wrong things to do. Trust your heart. We chose not to see our baby or to know the sex - I felt that it would always haunt me. But lots of other people have felt that they wanted or needed to see their baby and to say goodbye. Don't be ashamed of your feelings, whatever they may be. You have to get through this the best way you can and just be guided by gut instinct.

I really you are as ok as you can be today, and will be thinking of you x

Thank you both very much.

I'm updating while waiting for the tablets they have inserted into the womb take effect. I just hope it's all over soon.

Feeling strangely calm today, then again I don't think I have any tears left.

We (I) have decided to not see the baby but to find out the sex. I think I would also be haunted by seeing him/her but I suppose when the time comes I may feel different.

Thank you again for the much needed support.

ifrustrated - thinking of you today hun. if you choose not to see the baby, but are not 100% sure you can always ask the hospital staff to take a photo for you - just in case you change you mind or regret it at a later date. they should do that for you if you wish xxxx

Ifrustrated, thinking of you today. I hope it goes as well as it can, sending virtual hugs xx

Dear all, please help me, since I feel devastated. I've just got my preliminary results of a CVS (at my 12th week). I decided to have CVS only because I'm turning 35 next month, but not because I had anything wrong in my previous sonograms. The preliminary results showed that my baby girl has a missing cromosom, and she was defined as 45X I'm not sure what this means, but our genetic counsellor told us to wait the final results, in about a week/10 days from now, in roder to have a more certain answer. She also said that the final results of CVS can diverge completely compared to the preliminary ones and be perfectly fine. Have you ever heard about cases of final CVS results completely different (good versus bad) compared to the rpeliminary ones? Anybody can tell me more on whether CVS results can change during amniocentisis a month later?
Please, help me, since I feel desparate, and crying all day.
Best,

Poor you, Manderina - I don't know much about syndromes other than trisomy 21, but 45X sounds like Turner's syndrome to me. Does that sound familiar? I have to say I have never heard of a cvs result changing from the fast results to the full karyotype, only that sometimes the all clear from the fast results doesn't mean there isn't a problem when the full results come through (the initial results only look at a few chromosomes).

As I understand it, Turner's can vary considerably in its severity. Is this perhaps what the geneticist meant? You might need further scans (particularly heart scans) to determine the extent of the impact of the missing chromosome on your baby. Thinking of you.

I just wanted to pop back and thank you all for the support last week. It's been a tough week and still up and down with my emotions and grief but it has helped to know I am not alone

I'm not up to reading the whole thread as it will be to emotional for me but I'm wondering what everyone did with ttc again?

Part of me thinks I can never go through this again so won't try again and another part of me feels I can't move on until I have another baby.

When is it "safe" to start trying again? Is it possible to fall pregnant between bleeding from losing the baby and my 1st period?

I think I would struggle to use contraception at the moment, in my mind it would feel wrong iykwim but the hospital did not give me any advice about what I should do.

ifrustrated - good to hear from you, i was wondering how you were doing. the first few days/weeks are a rollercoaster, but i think that from memory, one thing that us 'older' thread members all had in common was a desire to ttc again. as for falling pg, yes it is possible to fall before your first period, although most doctors i think would advise to wait until you've had your first one (more for dating purposes than anything else) but also to make sure that everything is 'working' again and back in order.
i personally waited for my first period and then started ttc straight away. the fear of something similar happening again was huge, but i knew that for me the fear of not having another baby was even greater so i was willing to take the risk.
i wish you the very best of luck on your ttc journey when you decide to start - and we'll still be around to support you if and when you want it xxxx

Hi Manderina. 45X is Turners Syndrome. We had the same diagnosis back in August. We had a fab geneticist who explained things in detail to us so if you're unsure about anything, I'm sure you could call your counsellor and they would go through things again. There are varying degrees of Turners so I promise you it's not all doom and gloom for you right now although I can understand that it feels like it as it's a terrible shock to learn there is something wrong with your little girl. The initial results just show up that there is a problem with the chromosomes but the full results give a better picture of what type of Turners it is. I'm not sure about whether it can be totally ok as I can't remember them telling us that to be totally honest with you but it might not be fatal.
My best advice is to hold on to some hope until the full results are in. They should give you a cardio scan at 16 weeks to have a look at her heart as Turner's girls can have heart problems but many can be fixed. They should also look again at the levels of fluid around her neck, back, stomach and lungs as this is a key indicator to survival. Given that you had no fluid showing in your 12 wk scan, i would say that is a really good sign.
I'm crossing my fingers and toes for you that you get a good outcome. Unfortunately our little Cora had fatal levels of fluid around her lungs and we had to take the decision to end the pregnancy but there are so many good outcomes and lots of girls with Turners who live a normal life. Feel free to ask me anything you want and have a look at www.tss.org.uk/ which gives more details about the syndrome.

Hugs to everyone else and sorry I haven't been around much lately. I promise to catch up properly soon.

xxxxxxx

Hi ladies. Just wanted to ask how long you have all waited for pm results. We have been told by the hospital 3 months and are putting off any thoughts of ttc until we have them. This is mainly as we dont yet have a specific diagnosis for our dd's condition. In your experience does the pm generally come back with specific diagnosis or "just one of those things"

hiya long time no post, back story, baby aborted 2nd march 2011 due to edwards T18, got preg in april 2011 now 3 weeks away from having my baby, so it can happen straight away, i wasnt even trying

Hi chunky, we waited about nine weeks for the post mortem results, and they came back confirming all the physical problems that were apparent at the scan but without a specific name for the suspected genetic condition. We're now waiting for a referral back to the geneticist who saw us during the scanning process to investigate further and get results from the fetal blood tests she did. We're not ttc as we're not sure how we feel about it all at the moment and our obstetrics consultant advised waiting till we've seen the geneticist but I believe some people do start straight away regardless. I hope your results come soon.

Thanks purcellfan

I'm not sure whether we will ttc again. Since we got to 34 weeks this time I don't think I'd ever feel confident of having a baby at the end of any pregnancy. Would like to have the results and then consider next steps. Three months seemed like an eternity when they said it.

Hi
We had our nuchal today and it was great! 1.4mm everything else looked good. With bloods risk of t21 1 in 25000, of t13/ t18 1 in 50000.
We are so happy!
Hope everyone has a happy Christmas and 2012 is a better year for all of us!
Xxx

Ladies, just popped on to your thread, as an 'old timer', there at the beginnings of this area. I wanted to say that I am thinking of you all, and wish you a very happy Christmas. I am peeling sprouts in the kitchen, listening to carols on the radio, and spending a bit of time thinking of all the ladies who supported me through the loss of my babies and subsequent pregnancies. My two are now 5 and almost 2, and I am thankful every day for their wonderfulness. Big hugs to everyone trying to make a little life, and those on the rollercoaster of pregnancy. Very special thoughts to those who have recently lost someone so precious. A peaceful New Year to you all. Lins. xxxxxxxx

Hello to Bee, Tree, Mishtabel, Justa, and those who may still lurk after all this time. Love to you all. xxx

At the risk of sounding a little bit bah humbug, has anyone else found Christmas a little bit hard this year? I sort of wish that we had just run away somewhere instead of having to do the usual family rounds!

I've tried very hard to not get to down but I've really missed our little Cora over the last few days. I keep thinking about what it should have all been like. We should've been full of excited expectation with only 4 weeks to go and be getting everything ready and sorted for her arrival. Instead I've been crying loads and to top it off my SIL has had some bleeding so they think she is going to have her baby any day now. Lots of talk of this hasn't helped the matter either! Plus an aunt in Malaysia got us muddled up on the phone and started to go on about how excited we must be and how was I feeling etc etc. Perfectly honest mistake as we have the same name but it was hard as I wanted to be able to answer her questions!!

Am I just being a bit too self absorbed and wallowing a bit? I try very hard not to but this time of year seems to have brought that out in me

treacle I'm so glad to hear that your scan and results came back so positive. Well done for braving the scan. I hope it wasn't too traumatic.

I hope you have all had better Christmasses and that 2012 brings us all some happier times.

xxxxxxxxxxx

Hello ladies,

Hope you all had a good xmas.

Had no internet for a week, so just a v quick catch up.

Wombled I know just how you feel. I keep thinking I should be 8 months pg now, and looking forward to our baby coming in a few weeks. I've booked a night away next month just to give me something else to focus on for now. Not sure how we get though this. Hope you are ok xx

Hi folks, not posted for a few months as I found out I was pregnant again in October and was focusing on that, but it's happened again (t21 instead of t18 this time) and I'm terminating tomorrow. The CVS results took so long I'm having to go through another delivery as I'm 14(1). I feel like some kind of bad luck magnet. I'm hoping knowing what to expect tomorrow will make it easier as fear of the unknown was a big factor last time.
Hope you're all ok and congrats Blacktreaclecat.

Eggletina I am so so sorry I don't know what to say. Hope tomorrow goes as well as can be expected.
Take care xxx

Oh egglet I am so so so sorry to hear that and am absolutely gutted for you. You gave me so much help (was previously endogirl) when I was going through everything so I hope I can return your kindness in some small way by helping you through this. Remember we're all here for you if you need anything. I hope tomorrow goes ok. As you say, hopefully knowing what happens will make it a bit more bearable but I can appreciate that must be a very small blessing right now.

Big hugs xxxxxxxxxx

Hi, I'm really glad I was of some help to you then, RW. I'm sorry your Christmas was not so good but it's still very recent for you and Christmas always makes things worse. You will have happier ones in future, I promise!

Lily, it's good to get your due date over with as it's another step overcome, a night away is a good idea. We did similar and just tried to be a normal couple rather than a traumatised mess and we managed it, just a walk on the beach and a posh meal. I am thankful this time that I wouldn't let them calculate my due date so I will be spared that nastiness this time.

I have not kept up with the thread that well as it scared me to read of new losses. What did you and RW decide about ttc?

It's odd as I was utterly terrified before the last induction whereas this time I am calm and just want it over. A shorter gestation time helps though as it can't possibly be as bad at 14 as 22 weeks, plus this pregnancy has been failing for weeks which will hopefully make things quicker. I hope. This is not an area I wanted to develop such extensive experience in.

Hi ladies, haven't been on here for a while, we had ds2's burial just before Xmas and that brought us a kind of peace, although little things catch us out, like the texts of Christmas carols (never realised how
many of them are about the baby before) and all the newborns and bumps at the shops etc.

egglet I just read your other thread, I'm so sorry you have to
go through this again, I hope things go as well as they can today for you.

Thinking of you today egglet. I hope it all goes as ok as it can do. You're right that 14 has to be better than 22 so i hope it's quicker and physically easier than last time. I think you're being amazingly brave about the whole thing. I would be a pathetic mess!

We still haven't started ttc yet. Am trying not to panic that time is not on our side (am 37) but we're still not in the right place. We're waiting until after Cora's due date on 24th Jan and then we're going to have a serious conversation about everything. I think you're right not to have a due date this time round. I wish we didn't know either as it's become such a focus!

Lily I'm sorry to hear you've been a bit down too. Somehow we will both get through this month and then be able to focus on something other than our due dates. I like your idea of getting away and have now persuaded DH to take some time off work and we're going to go somewhere. Just need to decide what to do as I want to be distracted by something nice all day without too much time to think or dwell!!

Purcel I'm so glad that the burial went ok and that you've found some peace. I sympathise with the bumps and newborns everywhere. The strangest thing I've found is that on programmes like Grand Designs and Location, Location, Location, the people always seem to fall pregnant during the build or house search! I'm fed up with the presenters saying " and we hear that circumstances have changed since we started....". Arrrrrr! I said to DH that we should go on them as it seems to be the perfect way to get up the duff!!

Love to everyone else and egglet please keep posting whenever you need to as I'm around all day so here if you need anything.

xxxxxxxx

Going on Grand Designs is clearly the best fertility treatment available.

All done here. 14 weeks is not much easier than 22 and certainly the pain was worse as I didn't have morphine from the off. I've never seen so much blood either. I'm hugely relieved it's over and I hope to get home later.

Very wise taking time to consider ttc Wombled. We went straight into it and I think only now this pregnancy has gone wrong too, have issues reared up that we need to address as a couple. Some hard talks ahead - although even the strongest partnership would be rocked by a tfmr. Another reason why it's all so unfair...

I'm so glad you survived today egglet and hope you've gone home by now. I'm sorry that it wasn't any easier physically and I hope the bleeding calms down really soon.

Take some time to look after yourself over the next week or so and be easy on yourselves. You've just been through hell and back and then there and bl**dy back again so the fact that you're both still talking is amazing!

I hope you get some rest tonight and don't forget the healing qualities of chocolate!

xxxxxx