Nina’s story
Nina writes about finding support during her pregnancy after 6 miscarriages.
I felt every twinge, worried about every cramp, got anxious if I 'didn't feel pregnant' that day.
My doctor and specialist never gave up on finding the reason why I was losing my babies. They finally found out killer cells were causing my miscarriages and prescribed medication to help lower my immune system.
After six miscarriages, I was naturally very nervous about falling pregnant again. Even though a cause for my miscarriages had been found and I was now on medication, I felt every twinge, worried about every cramp, got anxious if I ‘didn’t feel pregnant’ that day. I tried my best to remain positive, but every time we went for a scan I feared the worst. I was an emotional wreck for pretty much all scans up to the 20 week one. No matter how far along I was in the pregnancy, it was still an anxious time.
Managing my anxiety throughout the pregnancy was hard. The biggest help was the support of my consultant, midwife, the hospital staff… and most importantly… my husband. He was so supportive, especially when it came to the night before and morning of our scans, when he knew I was at my most anxious. He also agreed to pay for a couple of extra scans (at 16 weeks and 24 weeks), as he knew I would be an emotional wreck having to wait more than four weeks between scans.
The health professionals took our case very seriously in the EPU too and gave us a six week scan, an eight week scan and then the normal 12 week scan. From then onwards we were treated as a ‘normal pregnancy’, until the last couple of weeks when, due to the medication I was on, they gave me special attention to make sure my placenta was not deteriorating.
I had a few occasions of ‘reduced movements’ and was always taken very seriously by both my midwife and the hospital. In fact, for the last week of my pregnancy I was monitored every other day and even given a 39 week scan to just check everything was okay. In addition to all this extra care, I was told I would be induced at 40 weeks to ensure I didn’t have any potential issues with my placenta. In the words of my consultant ‘after waiting this long for your miracle baby, we don’t want to risk anything going wrong’.
During my pregnancy, I would talk to people going through a similar experience on Facebook groups for PCOS and pregnancy after loss. Hearing from others who had multiple miscarriages and still went on to have successful pregnancies made me hopeful that we would also get our miracle baby.
I also listened to meditation music and we did hypnobirthing, to help with my anxiety. We were also put on a concoction of drugs to help us have a successful pregnancy, including metformin (for the POCS), Clexane injections, progesterone pessaries, folic acid, aspirin and prednisolone (for the killer cells). I basically felt like I was rattling a lot throughout the pregnancy, but at the same time, it felt reassuring to take them.
My work was extremely supportive throughout the whole pregnancy (especially the first 12 weeks where I was allowed to work from home for some of it). Their support really made a difference and in the last few weeks, before I went on maternity leave, I was allowed to change my hours to avoid sitting in the rush hour traffic.
Our little Elizabeth is a true miracle baby. We honestly never thought it would happen for us. And even when she arrived, it took a few days for it to sink in that she was mine, and that we had finally got our little baby.
Nina