Perinatal anxiety abortion

[Unreliablenightmare]

Hi, I don't know what I'm looking for here, maybe just to put something down in writing.

I was 9 weeks pregnant and had an abortion and now I can't stop crying. I regret it so so much and im heartbroken. I think i was suffering from perinatal anxiety and now I've done the worst thing. All these thoughts kept circling and i never stopped to imagine how wonderful it could be too. I'm utterly heartbroken and in so much pain. All I want is my baby back.

Nobody pressured me into it. I have two wonderful children already and a lovely supportive husband. We just kept going round and round not knowing what to do and now it can't be undone. I'm just so devastated. All the reasons that I came up seem so insignificant now and so workable. I feel so terrible that I did this to my baby. It's only been two days and I haven't stopped crying. All these awful thoughts kept going round and round and now I feel so empty and broken. I don't know how to pick myself up from this.

I feel so shattered, empty and broken.

In between my two children I miscarried twice and it was the worst feeling. I went to hell and back and now I've done this. I wanted my baby, I was just so scared and that feeling took over.

I don't know what to do with myself.

@Lexaline what a lovely, hopeful message. I love that about appreciating the toddler years and I'll certainly look at that link. Thank you so much. Hopefully when all the hormones leave the body and they're more balanced again, a tiny sense of calm might come back.

It did help being busy. I do find that working days are a bit easier for me where my mind can be preoccupied for a bit.

I've still had a cry today but I'm marginally more hopeful again. I did a test and it's faded slightly which is a relief that at least something is happening. I'm still bleeding but I'm really hoping that the scan goes well tomorrow. If i do have retained tissue then at least I'll know sooner rather than later and I can get on top of it.

@Unreliablenightmare yes, the bleeding going on for ages can really be horrible. I had the surgical procedure and while there is still bleeding it has been extremely minimal since the second day. It helps. All of my miscarriages were missed so I had to have intervention for all of them - I took the pills for the first one and it was awful. I tried to take them for the second one because I was scared of the procedure but they didn’t work. And since then I’ve always gone the surgical procedure route as it’s just over quicker and there is less bleeding. So it’s not surprising that the physical side is really taking its toll. I’ve never been told to take a pregnancy test after losses, I don’t think I could stand it right now so I think you’re very brave. I’m so glad you have your appointment tomorrow. I really think it’s going to help.

Thank you, I’m glad my message seemed hopeful. I think that’s the one thing I have now that the counsellor really gave me - hope. Whereas before I felt completely and utterly hopeless. I’m still scared I’m going to struggle forever but I believe it’s possible to not want to die every day if that makes sense. I’m glad you’re feeling a little bit more hopeful as well.

@Lexaline oh bless you. That must have been so traumatic and pregnancy must have been so so hard for you. Because it took so long for me to get a negative test before I was a bit obsessed with it so that we could try for my youngest. Anyway, it's probably not a healthy way of dealing with things but I'm hopeful that it was slightly lighter today and they might be able to tell me more tomorrow.

I can definitely relate to the feeling of just not wanting to feel anything. I'd like to fast forward a month. I'm sure we might feel quite different then. I'm so glad you're more hopeful. That makes me feel more hopeful too xx

@Unreliablenightmare I totally understand the obsessive ways - after my second miscarriage I was convinced there was something wrong, that I had retained products, that I had ashermans, and trying for my second child made me go insane.

It’s been a week since my procedure and I can’t really believe it. It has gone so slowly and also feels so fast at the same time. This whole week has felt completely surreal and I think my hormones have been all over the place. I felt utterly exhausted today. I’m struggling with the guilt a lot. I never judged anyone who had a termination and never thought they should feel guilty but I feel so guilty myself.

What time is your appointment? Good luck and let me know how it goes xx

@Lexaline I know what you mean about how slow it all is. A week is nothing. It's all so raw still and you're doing well. So well. You understand what you need to support yourself and your children. You're working hard to get yourself well. It's still so new. The guilt is totally understandable.

I read a response on another website about abortion where someone asked the question about whether mothers think about the baby after the abortion in the future and this woman's answer was beautiful. She said she thought about the baby before the abortion. About the baby's future and what it might look like (the future), about how life was challenging now and how she'd find it difficult to provide them with everything they needed including love, energy and time. About how she thought they'd suffer and how she loved the baby and couldn't put them through that. She made the decision through love for all of her children but never felt guilt because of it because she made the decision for them, knowing the pain that she would go through by making this awful decision. She went through that pain for her children including the baby.

Guilt is totally natural. I write alot to the baby, I know that sounds nuts, but I'm the same and mostly I'm apologising about what I did to him and how much I loved and wanted him. Sometimes, when I'm rational, I feel like this is like a miscarriage. The perinatal anxiety caused something in my brain to make me do something that I would never have done and I know I felt out of control and obsessed. I was petrified and asked for help but it didn't come. (My husband has been brilliant and he's lovely) Help from professionals and family but they never helped and so the feelings spiralled out of control. When I think logically and think if I had a friend or family member that went through that, I would feel immense guilt that I wasn't there to support them.

This wasn't your fault. You did this but it wasn't your fault. I know with absolute certainly (and obviously I don't really know you) that if you knew a fraction of how you would feel now, you would never have done this. Something else took over The same with me. I also know with certainly that I'll never feel this way again and once I'm through this I'll dedicate my life to making sure that we're happy.

My appointment is at 1030 (just over 3 hours from now). 🤞🤞🤞I'm keeping it all crossed xx

@Lexaline ** certainty

@Lexaline feeling quite low. Lots of retained tissue.

@Unreliablenightmare I’m so sorry the physical side is dragging out - it’s so good you went to your appointment though and I actually think this is almost a good thing - it shows that the physical side isn’t over yet which will massively impact the emotional aspect of all of this. Your hormones are still going to wild and haven’t had a chance to settle yet but they will once this is sorted. What is the management plan? Are you going to take more of the meds? I don’t know if you’ve ever had the surgical procedure but I would recommend it if you think you can do it. Anyway sorry if I’m jumping again.

I think everything you said in your earlier message is so so true. For me it was absolutely mental health related and it seems like it was for you too. I think I’ve been suffering ever since my second miscarriage and everything just culminated and I didn’t realize at all what was going on. You are right - you asked to speak to someone about perinatal anxiety and you were essentially denied that. You absolutely tried your best. My partner and mum have been reminding me that I made the “right decision for how I felt at the time”. I find that hard to accept but I’m trying to see that I was doing it for the right reasons, and have the belief that there was no wrong decision. It’s really hard to truly believe that now, but beforehand I really did think there was no wrong decision. I think writing to the baby is a great idea and it will help you process the guilt. Once it was also suggested to me to write letters to your anxiety/sadness/guilt. It can help you to not feel like it’s your whole identity apparently.

Time is going slowly but it keeps going and we are going to be doing better than we are in a month, 2 months etc etc. We can hold onto that.

@Unreliablenightmare *jumping ahead

@Lexaline thank you. I'm done with waiting. I've had surgical management twice because the retained tissue wouldn't budge. The last time was guided hysteroscopy and a scan following it two days later. I'm going to push for the same thing and have a doctors appointment today. I'm relieved that I'm getting ahead of it all and it won't drag on for months. I just need to get them to schedule it now.

We got things wrong but we did out best. Your mum and partner are so right. It's so hard dealing with the emotion of it all but I know we'll get there. We're mums. We have to right? The other side of things which isn't that comforting I know, but you have daughters, and you've pretty much gone through everything difficult a woman can go through. You're totally going to be this warrior mum who's going to come out of the other side of this and if they struggle with anything you're this mum woth all this life experience and you'll be thriving. You'll show them your battle wounds and will be there with them every step of the way xx

@Unreliablenightmare everything you said is so true. We’re going to survive this because we have to. And we’re going to be able to support our kids if they end up going through any of this crap. That’s one of my main positives I take from miscarriage and pregnancy struggles - I’ll really be there for my kids if they need it in the future. You will be the same.

Ok that’s great you have a plan for dealing with the retained tissue and you’ve already been through it before so hopefully it’s not so daunting. You’re getting it sorted, this is the first step and it’s really going to help getting the physical side resolved I’m so sure of it. My bleeding has pretty much stopped now and that’s helped a lot. I’m quite terrified of my cycle starting again. I can imagine it’s going to be quite triggering. I haven’t not thought about pregnancy for over a year. Ugh.

Today I’ve been feeling quite sad just thinking about a missing third child and wondering what they could look like. I’m trying to hard to appreciate what I’ve got. It’s just so hard. I need to stop worrying about feeling a certain way forever. Very hard though.

When is your next appointment?

@Lexaline sadly I'm experienced with this. I really struggled to get anyone to help today, despite knowing exactly what I needed but after loads of calls, someone very lovely from the early pregnancy unit called me back and she has given me an appointment for Monday morning. The next job will be to convince them I need a hysteroscopy (guided camera) as d&c did not work before and the woman who did the scan today seemed quite worried about bleeding - I think she meant hemorrhaging as she said there were alot of blood vessels there connected to the tissue. I knew it was there. In just so glad I went for the scan. I can't wait for the bleeding to just finish now and get my body back. The surgery will be within the week.

It is hard. Its so so hard. I've been thinking alot about the same thing as you and how far along I'd be and how little time I gave myself to get used to the idea. I'm cursing myself really. I'm so sorry that you're so sad. My days are turbulent and draining but it's moving forward and I'm sure you will too. I say this with sadness in my heart but we have to heal for these little people that need us. I think there's still an element of shock there at this point and definitely for you. I'm still crying everyday and my eldest seems quite concerned by it all. Poor little lamb 😢

I'm trying hard not to get frustrated with my husband who is doing so much to support us all as a family but I feel so isolated in all of this because I'm the one who has to go through it all. I'm exhausted with it all now to be honest but I'm hopeful after the surgery I can get back to normal. Whatever that is!

Hello,
I’ve just been reading this thread and I feel so much for both of you. I had a medical abortion at 5/6w in 2020 - also a third pregnancy. I had always wanted a third child but it was not planned. Given it was the pandemic I went into total panic mode and both me and my husband could not see how on earth we could cope with another child and could only see the negative impact on our older two.
When I had the abortion I felt sad for being in the situation but mostly relief and that lasted a good few weeks before I actually began to feel like I had missed my only chance for a third baby and felt what I can only describe as desperation.

We talked about it for a few months and Ultimately decided to try for a third. I had a chemical pregnancy/early loss before getting pregnant again with our third little boy who is an absolute joy.

Does he take away the abortion? No. I will always think of that experience and that baby that never was.

Am I glad that we had him? 100% YES. The pregnancy was difficult at the start but once the wave of early hormones had passed I just felt so grateful for another chance and still do.

What I am saying is that it can be so very very hard to unpick your feelings when this happens and you already have children - and you do not need To punish yourself by not allowing yourself another baby if that is actually what you want. But if it isn’t, then I suspect you have your answer that in fact you did do the “right” thing in the first place.

You definitely do need to give yourself time, and also try honouring the reason you did go ahead. Do something fun with your kids you couldn’t do pregnant or with a newborn/young baby, it can be your way to honour both your choice and the baby that was lost, because it has given you and the family something amazing.

I hope you find peace and can move forward xX

@AliceJ2013 thanks so much for responding. There's absolutely no feeling of relief at all for me and I know that I made a terrible decision out of sheer panic and anxiety. I'm so hopeful that you moved forward and had your baby. Me and my husband have realised what we want and that we made a terrible decision. Time isn't on my side but once I'm through the physical side of things we'll be trying again. Your post has given me some hope for the future xxx

Hi ladies,

Sorry to jump into your conversation but I'm reading your thread thinking how I could have written both of your stories. I went through the same experience nearly 18 months ago and finally starting to come out the other side. It's been the hardest, most traumatising thing I've ever been through. I still have so much anger for the counsellors I talked to, who said I'd feel relief when it was all over. I have felt nothing but all consuming regret and absolutely hellish anxiety, the irony being I went through with the termination because I couldn't get control of my anxiety. I have struggled with anxiety all my adult life but normally have it pretty well under control, the unplanned pregnancy however sent me into a spiral I couldn't get control over. I was 40 at the time and also started obsessing about my age, which really wasn't that old!

We have tried for a baby again since and haven't been able to get pregnant, I will probably have to live with the fact it's not going to happen again and I'm never going to get that pregnancy back. I have had a couple of rounds of counselling and didn't find they helped all that much, however I just spoke to someone again the last few weeks and feel like maybe I have a bit of acceptance of what happened now and it doesn't occupy my thoughts every hour of the day. Before this last lot of counselling I was probably at my worst and despairing it would never get better.

Anyway I guess I just wanted say you're not alone and it will get better. I don't think we'll ever get over this but all we can do is partly blame anxiety for this horrible situation. Much love and support

@PaddingtonKiwi thanks so much for your message. They just treat it so clinically at these clinics. It's so maddening and absolutely crazy how you can do this in the post. No one to blame but myself. Life is still very hard and I'm not through it medically yet.

I'm sorry to hear that you have had such a hard time but hopeful that you're coming out of the other side. I'm glad the counselling is helping. Early days for counselling for me and i dont know if it will work but I'll persevere. The hardest part is missing the baby for me. You're right, it's all consuming.

Thanks for the support and encouragement xxx

I'm so sorry you're still going through this, it must be very traumatic to have the retained tissue. I've had a missed miscarriage in the past and it was awful how things dragged on when you just wanted it to be over. I think all of us on this thread have a lot of anxiety around pregnancy because of our past trauma. It's a shame the counsellors at the clinic didn't recognise this but I guess I will never know if it would have changed the outcome.

I guess my advice would be to keep persevering with counselling, it wasn't until my third round that I finally felt like it was helping. I went on antidepressants too which helped with the immediate anxiety but did make me feel very unlike myself. I also put on a lot of weight and struggled with drinking too much for a bit too. I cried every day for over a year and realised it was affecting my kids, worrying about why I was sad. It really has been the most awful time but trying for a third again has helped but also been quite devastating when we haven't been able to get pregnant. I've trying to focus lately on all the things I've been able to get out and do with my two kids that I wouldn't have been able to do stuck at home with a baby.

I hope you're getting somewhere and this nightmare is nearly over and you can focus on recovery.

I forgot to add too that my workmate announced her third pregnancy two months after I terminated and it was like being punched in the gut every day working with her. She got quite upset with me when I distanced myself from her for my own perseverance. It's devastating seeing photos of her baby now. You're totally right in that you would never have done this to yourself if you'd known this was how you feel afterwards or being in these situations. It's like reliving the trauma over and over

@PaddingtonKiwi thanks so much. The thought of anyone I know being pregnant fills me eight dread. I know how harsh that sounds so feel for you with working with someone after such a hard time. I'd do anything not to feel this way but encouraged that you've managed to make some peace. I need this part to move on so we can attempt to move forward but hospital won't see me until the 5th which feels so far away x

@Unreliablenightmare and @Lexaline your stories sound exactly like mine. I had my termination on the 23rd of Jan. We have 2 kids , my eldest age 6 and youngest age 2. I thought I was so done with baby years and just want to move on with my life and stop doing the baby stuff. I terminated at 11 weeks and since then I have felt nothing but sadness and regret. I just feel so lonely in all this. I think I had prenatal anxiety and when I look back I just don't understand what I was thinking. I feel this experience has robbed me from my happiness and I don't know when I will ever be ok again.

@PaddingtonKiwi @Lexaline how are you doing just now. I had to terminate a planned 3rd due to severe peri natal depression and anxiety ant start Jan 2024 and I feel like I’ll never be the same again. I was suicidal at the time so I know it was necessary and I did have an immediate relief when the hormones reduced but that only lasted until my first cycle came around. Currently struggle to see how this living hell I’m in now is any better than where I was prior to the termination

Oh @Poster57 I feel for you so much, what an absolutely horrible place to be. You absolutely did the right thing for yourself and your family, I'm sorry this happened to you. Thanks for asking, it has been 18 months of all consuming grief and regret, I literally only thought about this day and night and have cried so many tears and felt so much rage too. I am on my third round of counselling now with both a counsellor and psychologist and I have to say I feel like I might finally be ready to move on. A couple of months ago I thought it was never going to get better but suddenly I find myself actually not thinking about it nearly as much and feel I know why it happened to some extent. I reduced my anxiety medication too and feel less numb but also okay. So basically it will get better, it is comforting to know that other people are in the same boat and we can support each other despite the shitty circumstances.

@Unreliablenightmare How are you getting on? Sorry I have thought of you often but haven't been on to post.

@Poster57 it is hell isn't it? I had severe anxiety with my pregnancy that I terminated too. It was trauma from previous pregnancies. I never felt like that ever with any pregnancies. I felt like jumping out the window to make the sickness stop. Wasn't in a good place with no one's support. I got pregnant 3 months later and it's taken 75% of the grief away. I know why it had to be done. But that 25% grief I carry with me and it can be upsetting but it's okay there nothing wrong with missing what we lost. It's our grieving process. I hope you're okay. Your brain and thought will play table tennis with you as to why it had be done. Some days you will accept and other days you'll say no I wish it wasn't done. So many women slog through this and if only we had support before we took this decision. All we can do it be there for each other xx

@heartbroken22 Wow you're so lucky to get pregnant so quickly again, how lucky you are to get another chance! A lot of my issues involve I think I threw away my last chance. We've been trying again for nearly a year and I'm not getting any younger. I think all of us on this thread have found past pregnancies hard or traumatic and it's triggered a major "I don't want to do this again" response. Also my kids were only 2 and 3, I went into such a spiral about how I would cope and how this pregnancy was ruining everything for everyone. I think this whole experience has made me realise I really do have a major problem with anxiety at times, it's just something that is always going to be there. Hope you're doing okay xox

@PaddingtonKiwi thanks for asking about me. I'm alright. Ticking over but finding it very hard to be happy about anything. Life is difficult but I'm being present for my children. I'm hoping we can get pregnant again and put some of the pain behind us. I'm lucky that my husband wants the same. How are you? Xxx