To mark Baby Loss Awareness Week, Laura shares her story.

Baby Loss Awareness Week is a wonderful opportunity to bring us together as a community and give anyone touched by pregnancy and baby loss a safe and supportive space to share their experiences and feel that they are not alone.

Baby Loss Awareness Week – My Story

It’s that time of the year again when we remember all those beautiful babies missing from our lives.

This is an incredibly difficult time of the year for me, but I really feel the need to share my story, if for no other purpose than getting the daily thoughts from my head and on to paper.

I appreciate that not everyone wishes to read this, and I respect that, but given that is it Baby Loss Awareness Week and World Mental Health Day took place this week, both are intertwined within my story.

Going back to 17th September 2019, the day started off with butterflies and excitement, today was the day that we were going to see our baby for the first time on screen for our first scan.   We get to the Hospital with a full, painful, bladder, waiting for our name to be called watching people come and go, happy smiling faces.

We are eventually called in.    The scan starts off as normal, that cold gel before the prodding.    After a while of silence from the sonographer she asks if it is ok for her colleague for come and have a look at the scan.   From then on it was almost a blur.   Alarm bells went off in my head, knowing this was not a good sign.   Then the questions come, are you sure your dates are right, of course they are right, could you go and empty your bladder.   The long walk to the toilet thinking everything and not knowing anything.   Back in the room they wish to carry out an internal scan, that never sounds good.

Within a few minutes our whole world is torn upside down.   Today I was 13 weeks and 5 days pregnant, or so I thought.   But no, my baby’s heart had stopped beating at 9 weeks and 4 days.    I was having a silent miscarriage.   My baby was lifeless, but my body was sure I was still pregnant.   After various questions of can you check again, my husband, asking if we could come back another day to see if it was just too small at that stage, maybe the dates were wrong, they assured us that, they were positive.   You are then escorted from the room and put in a side room, as heaven forbid you walk back through the waiting room upset.   You are in a room, no bigger than a cupboard with a box of tissues on the table.    Waiting for answers, that you never get.

We are then escorted from that room and taken through Ward 11 (maternity ward), for which they apologised as all you could hear was a baby crying.   You are then taken to another cupboard to speak to somebody about your options.   Obviously, this person deals with this day in day out, my heart was breaking and all I heard was “what do you want to do” natural or surgery.   I had no idea what was to come.   Then we get, it happens to 1 in 4 pregnancies, why, there is no answer for that, it is just one of those things, it wasn’t meant to be.   We were then told we could go home and call tomorrow with what we have decided.

We left the Hospital knowing that we needed to tell people.   This is the bit I never really understood about pregnancy, keep it quiet up until the first scan, just in case, but at the time of miscarriage, more people know you have miscarried than knew you were pregnant.   It makes no sense to me.

The next day was still a blur, but I got out of bed in the morning, life had to go on, did the school run and then remembered that I had a meeting with the Educational Psychologist who was going to be assessing my son at school that day for his EHCP.  I remember going into the room with him and he apologised for being late, as he was looking for a pharmacy on his way to the school because he felt awful and had a cold.   I wanted to jump up and down and shout at him about how I was feeling, but no, being the person I am, I said I hoped he felt better soon and carried on with the interview anyway.   To this day I cannot remember a question he asked me or the answers I gave.

After that we called the Hospital and said we would wait it out to see what happened.

On Friday 20th September 2019 my body had finally accepted that my baby was lifeless and started to reject it.   I had at that time carried my baby for 14 weeks.  I won’t go into too may gory details but I was haemorrhaging and after 2 hours at home, my wonderful neighbour called the Hospital and eventually an ambulance arrived.   Off to Hospital we went.   The next few hours went by and the haemorrhaging had not stopped.

It was decided that I needed another scan to see what was going on.   The only problem was the area where the scanner was would not accommodate a bed and therefore, I would need to go in a wheelchair, that in itself wasn’t really a problem until I needed to get in the wheelchair, I passed out, and then a further three times before getting back on the bed.  That plan went out of the window.   Early that evening the haemorrhaging stopped and I went home with an appointment to go back on Monday morning for a further scan.   At that point I left the Hospital with no idea whether I was still carrying my baby or not or any idea what was going to happen.

The weekend was odd I felt like I was physically at home, mentally I was anywhere but at home.   The events of the past few days were on a constant replay, and I was reliving the whole thing over and over.

On the Monday I went back to the Hospital for the scan to be told that although the baby had gone there was still a load of stuff in there (whatever that meant).   Go home and come back next week.

By Monday evening I was haemorrhaging again and again felt as if I was going to pass out, I could not stand up at all.   The ambulance was called again, and they said they were very busy.   They called me back within a few minutes and I explained what had happened and what was happening now, and I was upgraded to blue light response, lucky me.   The ambulance arrived from Norwich and took me to the Hospital where we were kept in the back of an ambulance for 3 hours until a bed was available.

The room in A&E where I was examined was effectively a storage cupboard with people coming and going to collect the equipment they needed.   I was then told that my blood levels (I believe haemoglobin) were very low and if they dropped much more, I would need a blood transfusion.   By then it was 2am and they told my husband to go home.   I was then there all alone, not having a clue what was happening.   Still in the cupboard the next morning it was decided that I needed another scan.   At this stage they then decided that I needed emergency surgery.

I then had to wait in the Early Pregnancy Unit until lunchtime watching expectant mothers coming to have early scans.   This was heartbreaking but there was nowhere else to go as they had no beds, and I had to be there so as soon as a bed became available, I could have the surgery.

I eventually went into surgery at around 5pm, then I had an overnight stay.   I went home the following morning with some iron tablets and a sick note for three weeks.    The only follow up care was to go and have a blood test with your GP in a few weeks to check your iron levels.    That was then end of the maternity care.

The next few days the morning sickness had kicked back in, night sweats and all sorts, there is no aftercare and after googling it, it was all side effects of the miscarriage and the hormone levels being all over the place.   Nobody tells you anything about that.

Over the next few weeks when I eventually returned to work, it was the most difficult thing I had done.   Driving past the hospital would take me right back there the flashbacks were so realistic it is untrue.      Getting to the office door and my husband leaving would give me that sinking feeling all over again, that I was on my own.    The flashbacks would happen more than once a day.

Now, at this present time, there isn’t a day goes by when I don’t think of my baby, what they would be doing now, what they look like, what they have done at Nursery today, and I know that will stay with me forever.

During that week in September even now I find it difficult not to relive those days, I feel most days around that time I am going to pass out and effectively have to stop myself from passing out.   I don’t think that will change any time soon.

This is why Baby Loss Awareness week is so important.   It raises awareness to a subject that is still such a taboo and really should not be.   It is difficult for a person to go through, and you will never completely recover from it, but it is also difficult for the people around you, not knowing the right thing to say, there is no right or wrong, a listening ear is all you need.

If just one person reads this and gets something from it, then I am glad I have shared my story.   This is by no means a pity party but if is the first time I have felt able to share my story.

By Laura B