sparklela
2 Girls, trying...
- Joined
- Apr 23, 2012
- Messages
- 55
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hey gals...
sorry to have been in absentia for awhile... things have been hard around here.
the basic news: the baby is gone. I had to have a D & C. We are obviously crushed.
you all know that we had a big scare at 7.5 weeks: doc couldn't find the baby and we thought we were having a blighted ovum, but then they found it, with a super-strong heartbeat, the next week when i went into the hospital (dehydrated from severe nausea.) We were overjoyed. so we thought the crisis was over. told most close friends over the course of the next couple of weeks.
i started to feel a bit better sometime between 10 and 11 weeks-- still puking a bit on and off, and still tired out of my tree-- but definitely improved. could even sometimes stand the smell of coffee.
things got a bit chaotic with work-- there was waay too much stress on me once back at the office, but i tried to stay on to finish a project that no one else could finish for me before I agreed to let my doc write me off sick again. (Living in germany, thats relatively easy to arrange, since the population here is in decline, so the country is SUPER protective of pregnant women.) anyway, it was stressful but since i'd started to feel somewhat better and we'd moved on from nausea to constipation, we were convinced the end of the first trimester was just approching and i was improving as the physical symptoms changed.
then 3 days ago i had a little brown blood. just a tiny clump, not much. but our next scan wouldn't be until the middle of week 13-- about a week an a half away-- so like any neurotic first time pregnant woman, i went to the doc. my partner came with me, just in case there was something amiss. we fully expected that we'd just have another scan to confirm that all was well, and the doc would say i just had a little blood from a difficult bowel movement or something. lord knows the constipation has been causing some of those. (sorry if TMI.)
but the doctor's face as he looked at the ultrasound was terrifying. apparently the baby hadn't grown at all since our last ultrasound. and despite the strong heartbeat he'd found at 8.5 weeks-- he wasn't sure he if could find one or not. he thought not.
he didn't want to jump the gun and say it was bad news, but i asked outright if there was any chance the baby was okay, because it was pretty clearly not. he said there was a very, very small chance. we all essentially knew at that point it was over.
he drew blood and said he'd do it again wednesday-- they'd check HCG levels and if they didn't double like they are supposed to in that time, we'd know for sure the pregnancy wasn't okay. after which point we'd need to go to the hospital for confirmation.
i tried not to sob while they were taking my blood. the lab technician gave me a hug. i went to starbucks with my computer when my wife went to work, had some hibiscus tea, and attempted to alert all the relevant people at work that i was going to continue to be out of commission for a while longer-- didn't know how long.
then i got another call from the doctor at about 5pm. he told me that my HCG levels were at 9100 instead of the 36000 that they should be in the 12th week. basically, there was no way this was a viable pregnancy any longer. that there was no need to wait until wednesday, i should go to the hospital right away.
i walked to my wife's work-- i needed to move-- and told her all of this. she arranged to leave. we went to the hospital.
the doctor at the women's clinic there did a really thorough scan-- she was incredibly gentle-- and confirmed the small size of the baby. then she tried to find a heartbeat. obviously a baby that small was too small to be developing properly, but the issue was whether or not it was still alive-- because there are a different set of decisions and options if the fetus is alive than if it has already passed away.
in any case-- she did the scan for ages. she asked me to hold my breath a bunch of times, and at long last, she reported that she couldn't find a heartbeat. my wife watched, clutching her hands, and i could see in her eyes that she couldn't see any movement on the ultrasound machines, either-- despite monitors that were much easier to read than the ones at the doctor's office. apparently the hospital doctor did see some small movements-- but they were basically from my own heartbeat and breathing.
in Germany, the only options this late in the game are either 1) to have a D & C or 2) to wait to miscarry naturally. The second option is pretty dangerous, too, because with a "missed abortion", as they call this sort of miscarriage, you don't know how long the wait will be-- and the placenta and blood mass can continue to expand in the time, making the eventual miscarriage harsher on your body when it does begin. They also don't give any oral drugs to induce miscarriage after week 9, because the blood loss and process can already be pretty dangerous this late in the game.
We went home to think, as it had been an exhausting day. Interestingly, my wife had tended to want me to have the D & C beforehand, while I had been more into the idea of letting it start naturally, but then when they explained all the risks, I was leaning more towards surgical removal, and my wife was suddenly terrified of me contracting an infection or a puncture or something and losing me, too. (This risks aren't high, as they do these surgeries on a daily basis-- tragically enough-- but at the same time, the possibilities are always there for sepsis or bleeding out or sterility or puncturing the uterus....) that was when my partner just lost it and broke down, talking about it in the car on the way home. i held her and told her it would be fine, and we decided not to decide yet.
we went home and held each other, and just cried. the thought of starting this whole process over... of losing this child to whom we are already so attached... of travelling again to try and conceive with our donor, of temping and testing and making sure we have all the right conception supplies, to waiting through the damned two-week-wait and then the nausea and exhaustion of the first trimester. so overwhelming.
but i guess that's what we're in for.
we ordered thai food and made rum and cokes. we calmed down and tried to talk about the options. she basically let me decide what i felt most okay with. i decided that it was probably best to get on with it and have the surgery. but i wanted to have an extra day with my pregnant body, with my breasts swollen... it all felt so rushed, and i felt like i needed to say goodbye to the child.
we called the hospital in the morning to try to arrange that, but Germany had holidays at the end of the week, which make scheduling hard. i could either have surgery that same day (tuesday), or next tuesday. a week away seemed like an impossible weight to stay pregnant, to still have pregnancy symptoms, and not to have the baby alive an longer. we agreed to come in later that morning and have the surgery that same day.
we cuddled in bed tuesday morning--- said our goodbyes to the baby. imagined our grandmothers taking care of him someplace in the beyond... packed a bag and went to the hospital.
the surgery was fast, not bad. i was there for a few hours as my body was prepped. the whole thing was outpatient and the hospital was clean. the nurses and doctors were all exceptionally kind, and explained things to me as many times as i needed. And went over it all slowly, since it's all shocking enough that it's hard to comprehend, particularly when you have to absorb it all in your second language.
On the upside, nobody in the hospital said boo about us being a gay couple. it was clear that my wife was my wife, and nobody looked at us sideways or tried to exlude her.
the anesthesiologist was a sweet man with warm eyes and a soft gray beard who reminded me of my childhood pediatrician, and knew that my birthday is the same as charlie chaplain's, which made me smile.
We had a good enough experience there that i think we'll consider delivering at that hospital when we are able to get pregnant again.
And on that note... sigh. I guess I sign off now. I guess the next weeks will be healing from the surgery, and trying to put myself back together... to start temping again, but take a couple of months off from actual trying until i start to ovulate regularly again. And then start again. at least it only took a couple of months to conceive this last one. hopefully my body will spring back quickly and a pregnancy will come easily the next time around...
thanks for listening, and hope you don't mind the long message.
i am thinking of all of you and hope everything goes well for you guys. JD, i'm so glad you've made it out of the critical phase!! hopefully the little munchkin grows and asks you for lots of healthy food
and i guess with the odds being as they are... they rest of you will be in the second trimester soon enough, too... ;-)
hugs, love, and luck to you all...
sorry to have been in absentia for awhile... things have been hard around here.
the basic news: the baby is gone. I had to have a D & C. We are obviously crushed.
you all know that we had a big scare at 7.5 weeks: doc couldn't find the baby and we thought we were having a blighted ovum, but then they found it, with a super-strong heartbeat, the next week when i went into the hospital (dehydrated from severe nausea.) We were overjoyed. so we thought the crisis was over. told most close friends over the course of the next couple of weeks.
i started to feel a bit better sometime between 10 and 11 weeks-- still puking a bit on and off, and still tired out of my tree-- but definitely improved. could even sometimes stand the smell of coffee.
things got a bit chaotic with work-- there was waay too much stress on me once back at the office, but i tried to stay on to finish a project that no one else could finish for me before I agreed to let my doc write me off sick again. (Living in germany, thats relatively easy to arrange, since the population here is in decline, so the country is SUPER protective of pregnant women.) anyway, it was stressful but since i'd started to feel somewhat better and we'd moved on from nausea to constipation, we were convinced the end of the first trimester was just approching and i was improving as the physical symptoms changed.
then 3 days ago i had a little brown blood. just a tiny clump, not much. but our next scan wouldn't be until the middle of week 13-- about a week an a half away-- so like any neurotic first time pregnant woman, i went to the doc. my partner came with me, just in case there was something amiss. we fully expected that we'd just have another scan to confirm that all was well, and the doc would say i just had a little blood from a difficult bowel movement or something. lord knows the constipation has been causing some of those. (sorry if TMI.)
but the doctor's face as he looked at the ultrasound was terrifying. apparently the baby hadn't grown at all since our last ultrasound. and despite the strong heartbeat he'd found at 8.5 weeks-- he wasn't sure he if could find one or not. he thought not.
he didn't want to jump the gun and say it was bad news, but i asked outright if there was any chance the baby was okay, because it was pretty clearly not. he said there was a very, very small chance. we all essentially knew at that point it was over.
he drew blood and said he'd do it again wednesday-- they'd check HCG levels and if they didn't double like they are supposed to in that time, we'd know for sure the pregnancy wasn't okay. after which point we'd need to go to the hospital for confirmation.
i tried not to sob while they were taking my blood. the lab technician gave me a hug. i went to starbucks with my computer when my wife went to work, had some hibiscus tea, and attempted to alert all the relevant people at work that i was going to continue to be out of commission for a while longer-- didn't know how long.
then i got another call from the doctor at about 5pm. he told me that my HCG levels were at 9100 instead of the 36000 that they should be in the 12th week. basically, there was no way this was a viable pregnancy any longer. that there was no need to wait until wednesday, i should go to the hospital right away.
i walked to my wife's work-- i needed to move-- and told her all of this. she arranged to leave. we went to the hospital.
the doctor at the women's clinic there did a really thorough scan-- she was incredibly gentle-- and confirmed the small size of the baby. then she tried to find a heartbeat. obviously a baby that small was too small to be developing properly, but the issue was whether or not it was still alive-- because there are a different set of decisions and options if the fetus is alive than if it has already passed away.
in any case-- she did the scan for ages. she asked me to hold my breath a bunch of times, and at long last, she reported that she couldn't find a heartbeat. my wife watched, clutching her hands, and i could see in her eyes that she couldn't see any movement on the ultrasound machines, either-- despite monitors that were much easier to read than the ones at the doctor's office. apparently the hospital doctor did see some small movements-- but they were basically from my own heartbeat and breathing.
in Germany, the only options this late in the game are either 1) to have a D & C or 2) to wait to miscarry naturally. The second option is pretty dangerous, too, because with a "missed abortion", as they call this sort of miscarriage, you don't know how long the wait will be-- and the placenta and blood mass can continue to expand in the time, making the eventual miscarriage harsher on your body when it does begin. They also don't give any oral drugs to induce miscarriage after week 9, because the blood loss and process can already be pretty dangerous this late in the game.
We went home to think, as it had been an exhausting day. Interestingly, my wife had tended to want me to have the D & C beforehand, while I had been more into the idea of letting it start naturally, but then when they explained all the risks, I was leaning more towards surgical removal, and my wife was suddenly terrified of me contracting an infection or a puncture or something and losing me, too. (This risks aren't high, as they do these surgeries on a daily basis-- tragically enough-- but at the same time, the possibilities are always there for sepsis or bleeding out or sterility or puncturing the uterus....) that was when my partner just lost it and broke down, talking about it in the car on the way home. i held her and told her it would be fine, and we decided not to decide yet.
we went home and held each other, and just cried. the thought of starting this whole process over... of losing this child to whom we are already so attached... of travelling again to try and conceive with our donor, of temping and testing and making sure we have all the right conception supplies, to waiting through the damned two-week-wait and then the nausea and exhaustion of the first trimester. so overwhelming.
but i guess that's what we're in for.
we ordered thai food and made rum and cokes. we calmed down and tried to talk about the options. she basically let me decide what i felt most okay with. i decided that it was probably best to get on with it and have the surgery. but i wanted to have an extra day with my pregnant body, with my breasts swollen... it all felt so rushed, and i felt like i needed to say goodbye to the child.
we called the hospital in the morning to try to arrange that, but Germany had holidays at the end of the week, which make scheduling hard. i could either have surgery that same day (tuesday), or next tuesday. a week away seemed like an impossible weight to stay pregnant, to still have pregnancy symptoms, and not to have the baby alive an longer. we agreed to come in later that morning and have the surgery that same day.
we cuddled in bed tuesday morning--- said our goodbyes to the baby. imagined our grandmothers taking care of him someplace in the beyond... packed a bag and went to the hospital.
the surgery was fast, not bad. i was there for a few hours as my body was prepped. the whole thing was outpatient and the hospital was clean. the nurses and doctors were all exceptionally kind, and explained things to me as many times as i needed. And went over it all slowly, since it's all shocking enough that it's hard to comprehend, particularly when you have to absorb it all in your second language.
On the upside, nobody in the hospital said boo about us being a gay couple. it was clear that my wife was my wife, and nobody looked at us sideways or tried to exlude her.
the anesthesiologist was a sweet man with warm eyes and a soft gray beard who reminded me of my childhood pediatrician, and knew that my birthday is the same as charlie chaplain's, which made me smile.
We had a good enough experience there that i think we'll consider delivering at that hospital when we are able to get pregnant again.
And on that note... sigh. I guess I sign off now. I guess the next weeks will be healing from the surgery, and trying to put myself back together... to start temping again, but take a couple of months off from actual trying until i start to ovulate regularly again. And then start again. at least it only took a couple of months to conceive this last one. hopefully my body will spring back quickly and a pregnancy will come easily the next time around...
thanks for listening, and hope you don't mind the long message.
i am thinking of all of you and hope everything goes well for you guys. JD, i'm so glad you've made it out of the critical phase!! hopefully the little munchkin grows and asks you for lots of healthy food
and i guess with the odds being as they are... they rest of you will be in the second trimester soon enough, too... ;-)
hugs, love, and luck to you all...
A new year's baby is exciting!
