Lauren’s story: missed miscarriage
Lauren shares her experience of missed miscarriage, medical management, and surgical management.
I had so many unanswered questions and wanted to know why this had happened and if it was my fault. It’s easy to blame yourself worrying about that one coffee you consumed or day you didn’t rest. Sadly there often isn’t an answer and it’s important not to blame yourself, but in the moment that’s what I did.
17/05 This was the day I did my first positive pregnancy test, I was so excited, i remember crying on the bathroom floor feeling excited and full of joy and was working out ways to surprise my partner with the news. I quickly booked us in for a private scan as couldn’t wait to see our baby. It’s all I could think about and talk about and me and my partner were talking nurseries, maternity leave and even purchased an outfit.
Although over the new few weeks I’d constantly felt nauseous but so hungry and totally drained I had never felt so good. The joy overtook everything and was so happy all the time.
14/06 At 8 weeks we went for our scan and the sonographer asked if I was nervous, I said I was just really excited. He advised it would take around a minute to perform the scan. After what felt like an eternity I realised something was wrong. He told us he was sorry but there was no heartbeat and i had had a missed miscarriage.
Everything after that was a blur, I couldn’t keep in the tears and was in such a state. I had never felt so much emotional pain. I had so many unanswered questions and wanted to know why this had happened and if it was my fault. It’s easy to blame yourself worrying about that one coffee you consumed or day you didn’t rest. Sadly there often isn’t an answer and it’s important not to blame yourself, but in the moment that’s what I did.
They gave us a scan picture in an envelope with some leaflets and booked me in for an NHS scan on Monday for a second opinion.
I cried all the drive home, I barely said a word to my partner. We were devastated. I had never heard of a missed miscarriage before that day. My body thought I was still pregnant showing no sign anything was wrong, suddenly I felt so empty and knew we had lost our little blueberry.
On 17/06 we went for our NHS scan which confirmed measurements stopped at 6 weeks 5 days, just over a week ago, and there still wasn’t a heartbeat, they confirmed our loss.
The nurse gave us some leaflets and information from the Miscarriage Association and advised to go home and think about our next steps.
After lots of research and reading others stories on the Miscarriage Association website I opted for the medical management to induce the miscarriage. I didn’t want to risk the surgical management option and impact on my body but couldn’t just sit and wait. It felt too painful mentally and we wanted to be able to grieve. The reading and resources really helped us process things and sadly showed us we were not alone in what we were going through.
On 18/06 I took my first tablets at the hospital to start the medical management and on 20/06 took the remaining tablets at home, after a few hours things started happening quickly.
The pain was so bad and I had some awful side effects. The next few hours were agony and such a blur. The pregnancy sac finally passed along with some bleeding. After a day or so the bleeding stopped and I thought it was all over. I was advised to take a pregnancy test 2 weeks later to confirm a negative result. We felt like we were finally able to start grieving and recovering from this awful experience.
On 02/07 I went back to the EPU after some symptoms of infection. I couldn’t believe something else had gone wrong. I had some tests and swabs and was given antibiotics. I was also booked in for a scan the following day as the pregnancy test came back positive.
On 03/07 I had my scan and that identified 2cm of pregnancy tissue remaining. I felt devastated my body still hadn’t done what it was supposed to and blamed myself not knowing how I was going to get through this mentally. I’d lost count of how many times we had been up the hospital and of all the things that had gone wrong. We felt cursed, and that everything that could have gone wrong did. What did we do to deserve all this.
I decided to take the surgical management under general anaesthetic. I was so scared about the risks of this but couldn’t take anymore.
Surgery day was on 05/07 I was booked for 7:30. We were out of hospital by 12:30 and everything had gone well. It was finally over. I had little pain and rested for the day. The next day I was feeling more myself and praying that that was the end of it. A week or so later I had my first negative pregnancy test and my first period the following week. I had a call from the hospital a few days later confirming the test on the tissue they had removed came back normal confirming it was all pregnancy tissue and everything was ok.
I was so relieved and me and my partner were able to properly grieve now and process things. I wanted to share our story as talking and reading others story really helped us get through things. We felt so unlucky and alone and that everything went wrong. But just like you will, we got through it and my body has recovered now. We will never forget and I’m still triggered by things and have down days/tears for our loss but the days do get easier and talking about it really does help.