It’s a harmless enough question when people ask about the age difference between my children. It’s almost 6 years. Nothing extraordinary about that is there? My standard answer is “that’s just how it happened” and that’s true enough for most people. After all, when someone asks “How are you?” do you give them chapter & verse. No, I thought not.
November 5th 1999 I had a positive pregnancy test. Six days later I was in hospital with a suspected miscarriage.
Please tell me why they scan you in the same department as all the pregnant women with their swollen bellies? You hang your head, unable and unwilling to make eye contact with anyone. There is no joy in your heart or womb, just emptiness. You failed. I was sent home to let nature take it’s course. Miscarriage, even early on is bloody, painful and cruel. But that’s only half the story.
I thought that I was verging on insanity, you see, after years of infertility treatment I was fairly in tune with my body and its cycles. I felt pregnant. I felt crazy. I had seen what was flushed down the toilet. I honestly thought that if I mentioned it to my GP that he would have me sectioned. I didn’t mention it, I went back to work.
A week after my miscarriage I had a routine blood test to make sure that “the products of conception” (Hey! That’s my baby you’re talking about!) had not been retained by my faulty, failure of a womb.
I took a call at work – I was working evenings – my GP said that I needed to go to hospital. I said “I’ll make an appointment in the morning”. He said no, that I needed to go immediately as my pregnancy hormones were still rising. What the hell did that mean? I think it meant that I wasn’t going crazy.
I’ll cut a long story short. More scans. More swollen bellies. More disgust with my own body. More failure. Nothing. There was no trace of the pregnancy, a “complete miscarriage” they said. That’s it then.
But it wasn’t, there was an ectopic pregnancy. This was a heterotopic pregnancy, a rare situation when there was an intra-uterine and extra-uterine pregnancy occurring simultaneously.
I then had to sign a consent form to have the foetus and fallopian tube removed. It broke my heart. This is a very different kind of grief.
A healthy, very unexpected pregnancy followed very soon afterwards. My son is my Child of Hope. Even his name means gift. If I had to go through it all again just to hold him, I would.
Challenges Choices Changes 
We go through so much to bring these babies into the world. It is wrong how they house women together like that with no thought of the psychological effect.
But you are right, it is always worth it once you have your baby in your arms 🙂
You are so right!
Of course you would. I would too. 😉
That had to be a difficult time. I had a strange thing happen myself after going off the pill when we started trying for a baby. We waited the 4 months and after being 5 days late, I had a bloody occurrence one night and went to the ER. The Dr on call was not too bright and never did a blood test. He sent me home saying he wasn’t sure what happened but it was probably from going off the pill. I went to my regular OBgyn the next morning and he was furious at what occurred at the ER. He examined me and there was no evidence of a pregnancy but I still felt the loss. I became pregnant the next month with my first child so whatever did happen was meant to be. I wouldn’t have changed a thing and it made me appreciate my son even more.
Many many pregnancies end this way often with people not even knowing they were pregnant. If you are in tune with your body, then you just know. I am very pleased for such a positive outcome for you x
Thanks Jane! I guess I will truly never know but we both grieved nonetheless. I can’t imagine being much further along and going through a miscarriage once others know. I had a dear friend who had an ectopic pregnancy and it was just so sad and overwhelming for her however she went on to have 2 sons. I was blessed with a son and daughter who share a birthday even though they are 3 years apart! I said it was God’s sense of humor when WE tried to plan out our children! He knows best!
What a great way of looking at things 🙂 x