Pregnancy Loss

Dealing with a miscarriage can be devastating. While many may pass off a miscarriage as a pregnancy that "just wasn't meant to be", these words rarely help to relieve your grief. Although a miscarriage can be an isolating experience, it doesn't have to be. Women who are or who have previously dealt with a miscarriage are often a great resource to those currently suffering from a pregnancy loss. Share your words with us and share your support with other women.

It is best to avoid using stimulants during pregnancy. Amphetamines and dextroamphetamines are powerful drugs and when taken during pregnancy, they can cause miscarriage, early labor or birth defects. You may want to ask other women if they have had personal experience with this.


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my shocking story


I was pregnant for 18 weeks and one day. This was my fourth pregnancy so I was pretty in tune with my body. A few days before my scheduled ultrasound, I started to become aware of no fetal movement. But I was busy with my three other children (4 and under) and of course my mom assured me that nothing could be wrong. Well, they couldn't find my baby's heartbeat on the ultrasound. I started sobbing and grabbing my forehead and demanded she check again and again. I thought, no way is this actually happening to me. But the doctor confirmed it and I was sent on my way to deliver my baby that had passed three weeks ago inside me, through the Christmas holiday. I delivered my precious baby boy, Brian, and proceeded to get a D & C.

This is only a nightmare I said to myself. This isn't me. But it was and is I. I only can look back at the days of my pregnancy with Brian and reach for them like I am in a dream. I want them back. I want my baby back. All I can do is pray that God takes my little baby into his arms and holds him safely until I can join him once again.


Elayne






Our Loss

I found out I was pregnant at 9 weeks on Dec 4th, and today is Dec 30. That means for the first 9 weeks I had been smoking and drinking. I totally turned around when I found out, but was scared that I may have already caused something bad to happen to the baby. My boyfriend and I were really the only truly happy ones and even still I would still think about all the things I couldn’t do anymore.

My first doctor’s appointment we couldn’t hear the heartbeat but my doctor said it might be just a little too early. So one Thursday afternoon I had discharge and I called my doctor and she said it was normal and that it could’ve been caused by intercourse; but my body just felt different. So Friday night everything was going normal and then I started not to feel good. I thought I just had gas and so I went to go lay down and then cramps came and then bleeding. I freaked out and told my boyfriend and my parents and called my doctor. He told me to take 3 Aleve and that a miscarriage may or may not happen but that there was no way to prevent it and no real cause. That was 2 days ago. So last night was the longest night of my life.

I passed the fetus this morning and I feel like everything of inside me is missing. And I never realized how much I wanted a baby until it was taken from me. Why me? I don’t get it. I want to blame myself and then the doctor and then everyone else because they were that supportive. I keep thinking maybe that wasn’t the baby I passed; maybe it was just bad blood clots. Maybe it will be one of those miracle stories.

I think I've read everything on the Internet that it could be instead of a miscarriage. But to tell you the truth I feel different. Not a good different. Since it’s New Year’s weekend my doctor won’t be open until Tuesday. My boyfriend’s not home from work and all I’ve done today is sleep and cry off and on. How can something be giving to you and then just taken away like nothing? I've already bought maternity clothes, baby books, calendars, and all that and now I really don’t know how to feel. I’ve heard people talk about miscarriage and never thought it would happen to me. I thought I was strong. And now I feel so weak.


Jennifer J.






15 miscarriages.........

I writing this as I feel my experiences will inspire people not to give up hope. I’m a fit and healthy 30 year old woman and to present have suffered 15 miscarriages (at 6-12 weeks). After endless tests and consultations with specialists, I was told the reasons are unexplained, but I still continue to miscarry, but I never gave up on my dream.

I eventually read about this new field regarding your 'NK Cells' count. I found a private specialist who was researching this field. He carried out tests and my results came back that I had a high level of NK Cells. This is said to be the cause of 80% unexplained recurrent miscarriages or even infertility. My next stage is the treatment to bring my level down to a normal level so I’m able hopefully to have a successful pregnancy.


angie






Dream Deferred

My husband and I have been married for 8 years, and after trying for only one month, I became pregnant with our first child. My husband and I were so thrilled--even though I was trying to be cautiously optimistic, I allowed myself to get carried away with my hopes and dreams. All of my happiness was poured into our little one. All of it. Our baby was always on my mind, and I would smile just thinking about her. (I was sure the baby was a girl...)

We found out yesterday that I lost our baby. I was getting my second ultrasound to see the heartbeat, and my husband was with me because we were both so excited to see our little one. I was supposed to be measuring at 7 1/2 weeks. While the doctor was doing the ultrasound, I couldn't see anything inside the sac like I did the first time, and the sac was only measuring at 6 1/2 weeks. He told me that he no longer saw a pregnancy. The doctor was very kind, but nothing can help after news like that. Then we had to ride home on the train for 45 minutes trying not to sob in front of the world.

It was surreal. I felt completely dead inside--numbness and darkness. Lost, hopeless, removed.

And now I sit here, waiting to actually miscarry. Because of the holiday weekend, the doctor wants me to wait until next week to take the pills to empty my uterus. So I have to anticipate actually seeing the death of my child pass from my body. The thought of it horrifies me. I don't know if I can do this. Everyone says I am handling it so well, but I feel broken. My husband is being really sweet, but I don't even know how to help him feel better. I am sure he needs as much support as I do, but I have always been really selfish.

I believe my baby is in Heaven.

I already loved my baby, and when she died, so did all of my happiness. Will it ever come back?

K






A star in heaven

“I will help myself to feel comfort in the knowledge that there is a star in heaven that belongs to me. “

Having a miscarriage, losing a baby, whichever way you want to say it, has been a life changing experience for me.

When I look back a year ago almost to the day, when it all started, I look back on a different ‘me’; a ‘me’ that although had had her fair share of difficult times, was in no way prepared for the sheer despair and devastation such a loss would bring.

It all started at the end of September. I had been feeling unwell for a number of weeks and had put it down to stress at work. I had not had a ‘normal’ period at the beginning of the month, and after my cycle was running like clockwork for years, I knew there was something not quite right. I knew somewhere deep inside that I was pregnant and I began to have every pregnancy symptom going.

Feeling pretty sorry for myself, I took a couple of tests on the Monday, one of which had shown a really faint second line. I wasn’t aware of how significant that faint line was to be until later that week. I took another two tests on the Tuesday and both were negative. I went to the doctors a bit confused and she told me that looking at my symptoms I was probably pregnant but too early to get a reading on the tests. I was unsure how I felt about it all, but knew that although it was all a bit unplanned and not at the right time, it would be ok. I began to feel a little bit excited.

I took some well-earned time off work, as I was still feeling pretty unwell with it all. By Thursday I was having quite piercing lower back pains and went back to the doctor, a different one this time, who gave me an internal examination with no real explanation. She told me I probably wasn’t pregnant, but if I was it was too early on, although judging by my dates she thought I probably wasn’t anymore, if I had been before. It was the first time I had even considered that I might have been starting to miscarry. I had only just started to get used to the idea I may be pregnant. I went home and phoned my husband. I was upset and unsure about what was happening. The pain continued to get worse and on Friday night I began to bleed. I was in quite a lot of pain so I phoned NHS direct and they referred me to casualty. I was examined and sent to another, bigger hospital where they examined me for a possible ectopic pregnancy.

I waited for 3 hours for the test results, but they came back negative. It wasn’t ectopic and they told me that I was having an early miscarriage, but these things happen and I wasn’t to worry. I was told the bleeding would probably get worse and it would last for over a week. I felt numb. Saturday was spent in bed crying and feeling very uncomfortable. Sunday I went back to casualty and was given antibiotics for a kidney infection that wasn’t even real and told it was probably a heavy period. I felt numb.

On the Monday we traveled to Edinburgh to a five star hotel where I relaxed and tried to put to the back of my mind the baby I was losing. The bleeding continued through 2 days of room service, 5 star dinners and an aromatherapy massage. I felt drained and confused. I was somewhat relieved that I hadn’t had an ectopic pregnancy and had to endure the pain of an operation, but I also felt guilty that I wasn’t as devastated as I should have been because I had lost a baby I had hardly known about.

I carried on and went back to work the next week. In hindsight I know I went back too early but you learn from your mistakes.

Unfortunately there was a very unsympathetic colleague who was only 2 weeks further on than I would have been. Whenever I saw her all she talked about was being pregnant. I wanted to scream at her that I knew how she felt- I had also been pregnant. The gossips all knew what had happened and I had no choice but to talk about it with colleagues and say I was fine because I didn’t want them to feel awkward or overcompensate for me.
It probably wasn’t until the staff Xmas night out that I began to feel something of the devastation I was to endure. I saw my pregnant colleague in maternity wear, talking about the baby’s taste in music, and being congratulated by the DJ on the dance floor. All that kept going through my head that night was that it could have been me.

I found it difficult to talk to my husband about it as he refused initially to talk about having been a baby. It was too early- it was never developed properly. It hurt.
I found a friend that I could talk to. Although they had never had similar experiences, he was a good listener and a neutral ear.

I began to talk for the first time about how I was really feeling. It helped sometimes. I began to feel overwhelmed with feelings that I didn’t know how to explain or deal with. I began to cry for the first time in the three months about the baby that I lost. I think watching someone else go through a pregnancy so close in timing to my own was the hardest part- but at the same time it helped to make it real and bring to the surface a lot of feelings that I had been hiding.

In February I attended a drama therapy workshop weekend hoping to get some ideas to improve my drama work within the special school where I worked. I was also through all this time trying to complete years 2 and 3 together for my MA in autism. This involved writing a dissertation of 18000 words on an aspect of drama therapy. The motivation for going on this course lay with my dissertation. I was however surprised at the effect the weekend had on me.

The activities and stories in which I participated opened doors to emotions I had not dealt with yet. It was during this weekend that I realised I was on a journey- through grief and toward healing. It helped me acknowledge the need within myself to recognise that I had lost a baby, that no matter how many weeks pregnant I had been, it didn’t take away from how I should let myself feel. I felt free to grieve for the first time. The journey home on the plane for me was a powerful and moving experience. It is one that is hard to explain, and maybe one that doesn’t need an explanation- it just was. As I looked out of the plane window into the clouds and the sunlight I thought of the visualisation we had done in the therapy sessions. I had been asked to go on a journey from a safe place to another place. I had also been asked to think about the obstacles that were in my way. In my mind I had chosen to go back to the ‘safe place’ having realised that my obstacles were too big to get past at that moment. As I thought about the ‘safe place’ I had chosen, my mind wandered to the beach there and a favourite spot out on the rocks that I had visited with my grandfather when I was small. He was my best friend and although he was frail and older he had taken my brother and I for a walk along those rocks one evening all those years ago. The picture of that place was so vivid in my mind. As I looked I saw my granddad standing there, he turned around. In his arms he carried a baby boy.

I have no explanation for this picture. Whether it was subconscious, or spiritual, I don’t want to analyse it. For the first time in months I felt at peace.

I began to feel that I needed to do something to acknowledge that there had been, even for just a short, fleeting moment, a baby that could have been. It took me a number of months to grieve and with the stresses of work and my MA I failed to find time to plan an event to acknowledge my grief, in order to move on.

I still felt painfully out of control of my emotions, and as I began to accept what had happened I started to feel sheer despair. I can think of no other way to describe it. I felt I had experienced death and was maybe partly responsible. Was it that glass of wine, that tantrum I had, that 1 cigarette? I felt that I no longer knew what the point of anything was. I had always been a control freak, someone that needed to be in control of everything that affected them all the time. The miscarriage had taken something away from me. I had been unable to control it and I felt completely helpless.

I began to really question what life was about and didn’t understand why life sometimes ended like this, why was it life in the first place for such a short time. Why were any of us here? What was the point?

I reached my lowest point around 9 months after the miscarriage. I watched as the colleague brought her newborn baby into school. I began to realise that the baby would have been due around now. I broke down.

I had reached my limit, having pushed myself along for such a long time, telling myself that one day soon I would wake up and it wouldn’t matter anymore. I was very wrong. Around what would have been my due date I had what was as near to a break down as I can explain.

I took time off work and decided with my husband that I needed to do something to acknowledge our loss in order that I could move on. We traveled to the special place that I had thought about on my drama course, where I had some happy memories and where I had pictured my granddad holding my baby. We went to a local craft shop and bought 2 silk flowers, one for the baby and one for my granddad. We traveled to the exact spot where I had imagined them to have stood. It was on the rocks next to the sea. We sat for a long time looking at the waves lapping on the rocks, and I silently placed the flowers one at a time into the sea.

Since then I finished and passed my Masters, I applied for and got a new job in Scotland and moved away from the house where it all happened. I started going back to church and have made a fresh start in everything. I know I will never get over this completely, and the sheer despair that I felt only a few months ago is hard to put into words and even harder to forget. I have not forgotten, I still think about what and who could have been. How different my life would be now if I hadn’t lost the baby; maybe if I had been more careful; all the ‘what ifs’.

I have however moved on. I have accepted what happened by finally giving myself time to grieve and time to reflect. I allowed myself to take as much time as I needed and do whatever it took to get some kind of closure. My husband found the whole experience hugely painful, but in different ways. We talked and talked and came to the decision and the acceptance that the way we felt and what we felt about it all was going to be very different. We respected one another’s very different feelings, but supported each other in our own individual grief. It was hard but I know we are stronger for it. I am stronger for it; it has changed me.

As a year passes, I look back and I remember the pain, the grief, the despair that I felt and I remember and acknowledge the baby that never was. But life goes on, and for the sake of those that are to come, I carry on.


Ruth







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