Hi Ladies, just been catching up today, just a bit of a skim read tho, there's a bit much for me to take in and I don't have much concentration at the mo. I'm not sure I should post this here, I don't want to bring you all down but as I've been talking to you all for the last few months and you have all helped educate me I wanted to let you know what has happened.
Unfortunately my waters broke on sunday night, at nearly 19 weeks. We live very rural, so had to travel an hour to meet my midwife at the birth centre, as per the instructions of the main hospital, in very bad icy weather (we never thought this would be a problem as we were due in December - summer here in NZ). We were allowed to stay the night there, with our DD, luckily there were no women giving birth there that night. An emergency scan was booked for the next morning, which revealed twins, with one right down at the bottom of the uterus, near the cervix. Both still had great heartbeats but there was a peice of cord showing in the cervix so an emergency transfer was booked to the main hospital about 3hrs away. The roads were closed due to the snowstorms so they arranged a chopper, we got there in about 45mins once the helicopter came for us and amazingly they let DH and DD travel as well, they usually don't.
Anyway, by the time we got to the main hospital I was 3cm dilated and was told miscarriage was "an inevitability". I lay in the labour suite for 2 and a half days willing my body to not go into labour, my bloods were coming back showing no infection so I was gaining hope. I was moved into antinatal and quizzed the Ob's on possible outcomes - eventually one gave me a peer review of all the available reasearch on midtrimester premature rupture of membranes which made for hard reading but the one peice of hope came if the leak sealed even partially and some further liquor was able to build up around the twin that had lost his (further scan revealed twin boys, probably identical, but impossible to confirm as I hadn't had the 12 weeks scan as I didn't want the nuchal test. They were sharing one bag, with a bag each within that). I hadn't leaked since but the original one was a massive gush, I was drinking water like a mad woman. Another scan was scheduled for monday to chech liquor levels. The other peice of hope seemed to come from the statistic of ladies who went past a week with no infection, where the threat of infection dropped away significantly after that, so by Saturday with still no infection markers in my bloods I was starting to feel cautiously hopeful. I had been begging them to place a cerclage or use the uterine relaxant drugs to halt labour but they wouldn't as that would lock in any infection (which they said would be the most likely reason for my body to labour - to rid itself of infection) which could kill me, I eventually accepted that to be true, after much more quizzing, and had to consider my existing DD. We also discussed the options for trying to save twin 2, should the worse happen and they said they would cut the chord really short and stitch it and hope that my body would retain the second twin to at least 24wks, then there was more they could do to help maintain the pregnancy.
I had a few painless twinges on saturday afternoon which scared me and I texted my own midwife, who asked if my bladder was full, and told me that a full bladder can trigger the uterus to contract (she knew I'd be drinking water like a crazy woman), so I went for a pee and they stopped. (every journey to the loo involved standing up, which I was scared to do, so was putting it off as long as possible every time.) By that night I was getting pains in my bum which I decided was twin 1 trying to turn himself and move out of where he was so low down, as I wasn't getting any tightenings on my tummy, so I decided to try to help him move up, and went into the open knee chest position that I knew could be used to disengage awkwardly positioned babies and rocked my hips and all the rest for hours. I could feel twin 2 dropped down lower near my pubic bone and thought he was having a harder time to get back to where he needed to be as his brother was lying in his way, so I was trying to jiggle him up with every pain surge. I never admitted to myself that they were indeed contractions right up to the last minute, when I eventually called the midwife to ask if they could do a sterile speculum or a bedside scan to check (I wasn't going to allow any normal VE's to avoid possible infection and my MW had told them the same). They did a bedside scan and couldn't even see twin 1 as he was so low, but twin 2 still was visible and had a HB, though they didn't measure the rate, but it did look abit slower to me than I had seen before. Anyway, they put an emergency line in my arm, took bloods and I asked them to call my DH (who was staying at his mum's with DD). By this point the pain had suddenly got on top of me (probably because I wasn't denying it any more) and they offered me G&A, then moved me through to delivery.
Within minutes I could feel him moving down and he came before DH got there. He had already passed by the time he came, which I was thankful for, as my biggest fear was my body pushing out a live baby and essentially killing it. They wrapped him and passed him up to me, he was so tiny, but perfect, my heart broke. They stitched the cord but told me the membranes of the second twin were bulging into the vagina already. DH arrived and we broke our hearts together, then my body started pushing out the second twin which is the most hideous thing I have ever felt, I fought it with every bone in my body but I could'nt stop it and twin 2 was born in the caul 15 mins after his brother with the placenta immediately following. I asked if he was live when born and they said they weren't sure but they kept him down the bottom for a while so I wonder. He couldn't have survived long with the placenta out anyway and I was in so much pain and distress I didn't ask for him immediately, I wish I did as he may have had more comfort on me. The staff were very kind though, except for the interns I got when we first arrived, they were pretty brutal as they just seem to write you off. But after the event they were great and very sensitive. We're arranging a wee service today as we have to mark their short existence even though they never got to take a breath.
They said my markers for infection were very high but that labour does elevate them and the membranes were very ragged so it was unlikely that any fluid had been able to regenerate around him and I had a subclinical infection - it wasn't detected in my blood until the last as it was probably not fully in my blood yet from twin 1 till then. They were confirmed as identical - we may have had more of a chance if they were fraternal, as they would have had their own full set of membranes and one wouldn't have dragged the other out with him. We had a 3 in 1,000 chance of conceiving identical twins (and we only BD once that month as DH had done his back in, so I recon the odds were even higher than that, once you add in the odds of conceiving in the first place) and only a 0.7% of PPROM, it's been a nasty lesson in statistics, really. I feel stupid now for throwing so many about now in my defense of homebirth, though I still would support it, but it will never be for me now - I doubt we'll try again anyway.
Anyway, that's my hideous story, I'm so sorry if it upsets anyone, that's the last thing I want but I didn't want to dissapear off of here and not tell you why as you have all been so great. The greatest irony is that I was sectioned as I couldn't push my baby out last time when I wanted to and this time when I didn't want to my body did it anyway, I feel so betrayed by myself. I didn't want to post this on the loss section as I don't know anyone there and you ladies are the ones I've been getting to know but again I'm sorry if this doesn't really belong here and feel free to get it moved if need be.
All the best of luck and love to you all, I will be cheering you all on from afar.
Nikki xxx
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and my mum had to call him. I was convinced he would miss it and said 'omg i knew he would miss it, knew it'
As soon as she was born (as in still attached to me) i said 'that wasnt as bad as everyone said it was, id defo do it again' ha.
" one reason for a homebirth if anything so I don't have to listen to him complaining again
