ceve
Member
- Joined
- Jul 15, 2015
- Messages
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Dear mommies,
I have found much solace in visiting this forum, but have never posted until now. Since we lost our 19-week twins (boy and girl) last week (7/7/15), I have received so many emails and notes from people who, although they love me, have never experienced a loss like this one. I really want to connect with women who are going through this, because I am thinking that maybe doing so will offer a special kind of healing
.
So, our story (this may be a bit intense to read - I was as honest as possible): We began TTC two years ago, and it wasn't going very well (I am 30). In the Fall (2014), I started seeing a reproductive endocrinologist and he thought I wasn't ovulating at all, surely from the stress of writing a dissertation (what I was doing at the time). So we went the fertility drugs route, starting with Clomid and then, when that didn't work, moving on to ovulation inductions shots (Bravelle). I took 7 days of Bravelle shots and then, because our insurance wouldn't cover IVF, simply had timed intercourse with my husband.
We got a positive pregnancy test shortly after that and then, at 8 weeks or so, went in to the doc's for an ultrasound. The endocrinologist told us I was pregnant with FIVE babies. The week following the news was horrendous; the doc told us we should likely have a "fetal reduction" but explained precious little about what that meant. Two weeks later, only four viable pregnancies were visible on u/s. At thirteen weeks, I began seeing a reduction specialist. She was lovely and counseled us that keeping one or two babies was the safest route to having babies "to take home." Not wanted to reduce at all but understanding the risks of not doing so, my husband and I decided to reduce two and keep two.
We did first one reduction and then, a week later, another (around 14 weeks). They went well, even though they were emotionally very difficult and physically quite painful (needle in my cramping uterus for at least 1 hour, for one of them). We had signed forms before the procedures stating we knew the risks (5% miscarriage, 5% infection then miscarriage). Nothing happened for the first days after the two procedures. Then, 9 days after the second reductions the waters broke from my two reduced babies. I was terrified that it was from the live babies and spent 4 days in the hospital being monitored and on antibiotics to fight possible infections. The two live babies looked good, moving around and plenty of amniotic fluid. But I continued to leak following that hospitalization (June 13-16th), mostly amniotic fluid but some blood as well.
Then the blood became more profuse and the cramping started. I figured I would take it really, really easy and sat mostly in bed. By early July, I was on self-imposed bedrest, mostly because I was in so much pain. I was going through pads like a mad-woman, but when I went to the hospital around July 4th, they said the babies looked fine and that there was "nothing we can do for you right now."
On July 6th, I had terrible contractions and increased bleeding during the day, which was unusual (contractions seemed to happen more at night). At 9pm, I had terrible pressure around my lower back (as if I needed to have a BM) and then the red blood began. We were so scared, particularly because we were trying to stay so positive around the outcome of all this. My husband called the ambulance and we went straight to L & D. At this point, nowhere in my mind did I think I was in labor. I was just anxious to see how the babies were doing, if they were okay. In L & D triage, I was literally writhing in pain and not too clear-headed. I told the resident I did NOT want a digital exam (risk of infection) but she said I absolutely needed one, and found that I was 4cms dilated. I still did not believe I was in labor and fought them not to give me a medicine that would make me dilate more. After speaking to my sister, who is a midwife, I realized that I was really going to deliver our twins...
I got an epidural (wonderful move) and delivered them one by one, between 2 and 3am. They came out with their sacs intact (their waters had not broken) and their placentas. The nurse wouldn't let me see the sacs, I imagine because the babies were still moving inside of them. She took them out for a bit, popped the sac, I imagine watched them die of lung collapse, and cleaned them up beautifully. We got to hold them for an hour or so. They were gorgeous and delicate and it was so surreal. The nurse had put little crochet hats on them that grannies in our area knit for miscarried/stillborn babies. It was, overall, a very peaceful birth and moment with the babies.
I left the hospital in somewhat of an altered state. I still had my huge belly (the reduced fetuses were still in there, and I pushed them out the day after at home --- terrible docs at this hospital) and I was in a state of shock about the babies. I don't think I really knew they were gone at this point. A day passed and things got really real really fast. I began crying, hard. My breasts hurt so badly and my milk began dripping everywhere. My husband was in so much pain too but didn't know what to do with my crying. We regretted not having given the babies a proper burial in a cemetery (we had signed a consent form to send them to a common plot in a "miscarriage" part of a local cemetery). After a couple days, I was breaking... I called the hospital back a week later and, thankfully, was able to arrange to have the babies buried formally in an individual grave.
So, the burial is tomorrow. I don't know how I am going to make it through this. I think I will write them a letter with all the things I had planned for them and put it in their casket, along with the owl and giraffe stuffies I got for them. The funeral home said they would take their handprints. I am inconsolable.
How are you getting through this, dear new friends?
Cee
I have found much solace in visiting this forum, but have never posted until now. Since we lost our 19-week twins (boy and girl) last week (7/7/15), I have received so many emails and notes from people who, although they love me, have never experienced a loss like this one. I really want to connect with women who are going through this, because I am thinking that maybe doing so will offer a special kind of healing
. So, our story (this may be a bit intense to read - I was as honest as possible): We began TTC two years ago, and it wasn't going very well (I am 30). In the Fall (2014), I started seeing a reproductive endocrinologist and he thought I wasn't ovulating at all, surely from the stress of writing a dissertation (what I was doing at the time). So we went the fertility drugs route, starting with Clomid and then, when that didn't work, moving on to ovulation inductions shots (Bravelle). I took 7 days of Bravelle shots and then, because our insurance wouldn't cover IVF, simply had timed intercourse with my husband.
We got a positive pregnancy test shortly after that and then, at 8 weeks or so, went in to the doc's for an ultrasound. The endocrinologist told us I was pregnant with FIVE babies. The week following the news was horrendous; the doc told us we should likely have a "fetal reduction" but explained precious little about what that meant. Two weeks later, only four viable pregnancies were visible on u/s. At thirteen weeks, I began seeing a reduction specialist. She was lovely and counseled us that keeping one or two babies was the safest route to having babies "to take home." Not wanted to reduce at all but understanding the risks of not doing so, my husband and I decided to reduce two and keep two.
We did first one reduction and then, a week later, another (around 14 weeks). They went well, even though they were emotionally very difficult and physically quite painful (needle in my cramping uterus for at least 1 hour, for one of them). We had signed forms before the procedures stating we knew the risks (5% miscarriage, 5% infection then miscarriage). Nothing happened for the first days after the two procedures. Then, 9 days after the second reductions the waters broke from my two reduced babies. I was terrified that it was from the live babies and spent 4 days in the hospital being monitored and on antibiotics to fight possible infections. The two live babies looked good, moving around and plenty of amniotic fluid. But I continued to leak following that hospitalization (June 13-16th), mostly amniotic fluid but some blood as well.
Then the blood became more profuse and the cramping started. I figured I would take it really, really easy and sat mostly in bed. By early July, I was on self-imposed bedrest, mostly because I was in so much pain. I was going through pads like a mad-woman, but when I went to the hospital around July 4th, they said the babies looked fine and that there was "nothing we can do for you right now."
On July 6th, I had terrible contractions and increased bleeding during the day, which was unusual (contractions seemed to happen more at night). At 9pm, I had terrible pressure around my lower back (as if I needed to have a BM) and then the red blood began. We were so scared, particularly because we were trying to stay so positive around the outcome of all this. My husband called the ambulance and we went straight to L & D. At this point, nowhere in my mind did I think I was in labor. I was just anxious to see how the babies were doing, if they were okay. In L & D triage, I was literally writhing in pain and not too clear-headed. I told the resident I did NOT want a digital exam (risk of infection) but she said I absolutely needed one, and found that I was 4cms dilated. I still did not believe I was in labor and fought them not to give me a medicine that would make me dilate more. After speaking to my sister, who is a midwife, I realized that I was really going to deliver our twins...
I got an epidural (wonderful move) and delivered them one by one, between 2 and 3am. They came out with their sacs intact (their waters had not broken) and their placentas. The nurse wouldn't let me see the sacs, I imagine because the babies were still moving inside of them. She took them out for a bit, popped the sac, I imagine watched them die of lung collapse, and cleaned them up beautifully. We got to hold them for an hour or so. They were gorgeous and delicate and it was so surreal. The nurse had put little crochet hats on them that grannies in our area knit for miscarried/stillborn babies. It was, overall, a very peaceful birth and moment with the babies.
I left the hospital in somewhat of an altered state. I still had my huge belly (the reduced fetuses were still in there, and I pushed them out the day after at home --- terrible docs at this hospital) and I was in a state of shock about the babies. I don't think I really knew they were gone at this point. A day passed and things got really real really fast. I began crying, hard. My breasts hurt so badly and my milk began dripping everywhere. My husband was in so much pain too but didn't know what to do with my crying. We regretted not having given the babies a proper burial in a cemetery (we had signed a consent form to send them to a common plot in a "miscarriage" part of a local cemetery). After a couple days, I was breaking... I called the hospital back a week later and, thankfully, was able to arrange to have the babies buried formally in an individual grave.
So, the burial is tomorrow. I don't know how I am going to make it through this. I think I will write them a letter with all the things I had planned for them and put it in their casket, along with the owl and giraffe stuffies I got for them. The funeral home said they would take their handprints. I am inconsolable.
How are you getting through this, dear new friends?
Cee
it's all new and fresh right now and it hurts so much 
