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Miscarriage & Me.

1
So here is a blog post that I never thought I’d be writing.

In fact, for the past 12 weeks I’ve been keeping a diary, a log, if you will, of pregnancy symptoms & the experience so far, the second time round. I was anticipating the publish of that blog post this week (I’d tied in lots of information about Pregnancy & Endometriosis). (After of course, we’d gone up North and surprised our families!).

Yes, you heard read right. I was pregnant. Kind of.  No, I was definitely pregnant. Or at least my body thought I was… and had began

SelfishMother.com
2
the fruition of our second pregnancy. I had alllllllll the symptoms: extreme fatigue, nausea, sickness & diarrhea, runny nose, cough, lightheadedness,  headaches, body aches, hot flushes, scattiness (god, the scattiness was insane), I’d gone up at least two cup sizes and had that lovely bright blue vein swooping across my left breast; just like I did with Eli. I had it all, in abundance. I was around 5/6 weeks when I finally got a positive pregnancy test result.

I’d had a big, scary, bright red bleed during our holiday last week in St. Ives.

SelfishMother.com
3
The first rule of Instagram? Don’t give the honest, real life view! Why would you ever do that?! Except, I really wanted to be honest. Believe me. To me,  honesty is the best policy, I try to be as honest and real as possible across all social media – so here is what’s happened since.

I wanted to scream about how bloody marvellous it was to be pregnant. To be sat on the this beautiful beach, with my little bump! But the reality? I was indeed sat on the beach cradling my little baby bump, but it was upon a maternity pad, and I was silently

SelfishMother.com
4
crying while my boy’s went rock-pooling. I knew deep down that a bleed of this amount was bad news. I was 11 weeks. But I had a proper full-on baby-bump. I still had some symptoms going on. I was feeling pretty good! So, I spent the majority of our little ’break’ Googling. Oh wonderful Google…

”Can you still have a baby after a bright red  bleed?”

”Does a bright red bleed really mean miscarriage?”

”Symptoms of endometriosis during early pregnancy”

”Can endometriosis cause bleeding? 11 weeks pregnant”

”11 weeks pregnant

SelfishMother.com
5
symptoms”

”Symptoms of miscarriage”

”Baby moving or miscarriage?”

”What to expect miscarriage 11 weeks pregnant”

I read SO MANY positive outcomes across forums, blogs, in the press and via medical case studies. I’d almost convinced myself that it was fine. I was fine. The baby was fine. I’d had terrible cramps with Eli and spotting at around 6 weeks. In a lot of cases, women who experience bleeds in early pregnancy do go on to have a healthy baby. Heck, sometimes women bleed throughout the WHOLE pregnancy. Which I imagine is both

SelfishMother.com
6
frustrating and worrying in equal measure.

On Tuesday 5th September, Eli went back to school – as a big Year One boy. Super proud parents, we went from the school drop off to Broomfield Hospital for what would have been our 12 week scan. I’d felt a pang of excitement – the secrets we’d been harbouring for 12 weeks could finally come out. We could finally announce our bloody brilliant and exciting news, our darling boy was going to be a BIG BROTHER! (I’d even bought him a tee… did I jinx it?!). Doubtfully.

As we drove along that over-familiar

SelfishMother.com
7
route to Broomfield Hospital,  I was getting closer to the feeling of doubt. My stomach was in knots and I felt lightheaded and sick.I definitely knew in my heart of hearts, this wasn’t meant to be.  But that certainly does not deflect from the shock of having a Sonographer say ”Are you sure your dates are correct as the sac measures 7 weeks, 1 day…. unfortunately this isn’t going to be a viable pregnancy I’m afraid”.

We’d had so much trouble with Eli during pregnancy, that anything I could do to help make this pregnancy ’smoother’, I was

SelfishMother.com
8
doing. Including zero intimacy (hoping my Ma ain’t reading this!).  I had my last alcoholic drink (I so need to do a review of non-alcoholic drinks, because we’ve had the best time trying so many out!) and caffeinated drink on my birthday, 1st June. I’ve not eaten anything you shouldn’t. I’d been taking Pregnacare for a few weeks even before that too. My dates were beyond correct. I would have been 12 weeks and 3 days pregnant.

With tears streaming down my face, I somehow managed ”the baby has gone, hasn’t it?”. She then went on to confirm

SelfishMother.com
9
that I’d suffered an Anembryonic Pregnancy and showed us my full uterus with a very obviously empty sac.  An Anembryonic Gestation (anembryonic pregnancy, blighted ovum, or empty sac) is a pregnancy in which the very early pregnancy appears normal on an ultrasound scan, but as the pregnancy progresses a visible embryo never develops or develops and is reabsorbed. How utterly batshit is that? REALLY? The cells of the embryo are ”reabsorbed”. I still can’t fathom it. But I know it’s nothing that I could have possibly done or could have avoided.
SelfishMother.com
10
Medically speaking? It’s ”one of those things”.

After being spoken to in the dreaded, ’Quiet Room’, James & I were then transferred from the Antenatal Ultrasound department to an Early Pregnancy ward a few floors down. By the way, these ’Quiet Rooms’, although decorated in a nice colour scheme and VERY clean, really do just look like 4 walls of bad news. Like, it felt like a funeral home, with a gushing waterfall print on one wall and a totally psychedelic bright mash up of randomness on the other wall. Obviously,  boxes of tissues all

SelfishMother.com
11
around for good measure.

I felt numb. Surreal. Like I was in a bubble and was crying and felt an ache in my chest…. but couldn’t quite digest words. James was speaking but it was like a blurry mumble of nothing. Likewise, when we met with Liz, the Staff Nurse on the EPU ward, she was AMAZING – and went through every step of the process. Answered questions with ease. Was very knowledgable. Incredibly sympathetic and open and supportive. But what she actually spoke about, I have no idea. It’s like I wasn’t even there. An out of body experience?

SelfishMother.com
12
Maybe.

I was given 3 options and it was emphasised that I didn’t have to make a decision straight away:

Expectant management – wait for the tissue to pass naturally out of your womb.
Medical management – take medication that causes the tissue to pass out of your womb.
Surgical management – have the tissue surgically removed.

As I’m particularly phobic of hospitals following my labour with Eli, if I can avoid being near one, I will do my damned best! Without  even a hint of  consideration, I wanted to be at home, in my own bed

SelfishMother.com
13
and I’m keeping my fingers crossed this will all pass naturally. I’m so far, going through the Expectant Management route. I do have a lot of tissue build up and the empty sac to pass. I have been advised to expect a lot of blood loss, tissue loss, the sac and all accompanied by proper contractions. I was given the details of all emergency contacts should I lose too much blood or be in too much pain – if that’s the case, I’ll end up on the EPU ward.

I am currently losing a small amount of blood. WAY less than a normal period, so I don’t even know

SelfishMother.com
14
if this is the start. I hope it’s the start anyway. I just want this whole thing to be over with. I think I’ll feel relief then.

I have waves of feeling completely fine. Like none of this is even happening. Happy, even. But then I notice my tummy… and its soft and squidgy again. I have the ”WHY ME?” and ”WHAT DID I DO WRONG” scenario’s. Then I have the feelings of what it could have been. Us Mama’s have a very easy way of getting carried away – we have excellent imaginations. Too good even. We imagine the nursery. The feeding schedules. The

SelfishMother.com
15
cuddles. The bathtime routine. The newborn smell. The ooh’s and ahhh’s. ALLLLLLL the stuff we need to buy. (I’m all over that Sleepyhead Grand btw).  Is it weird that I’m then grieving the loss of a baby… that didn’t actually exist? It’s like, the house was there, fully furnished, but there was nobody renting. I then feel all strange  – how could I even have this intense amount of grief? The baby hadn’t formed. It was cells. Cells that were absorbed. How am I this upset and feeling so devastated? I guess it’s because it took us 5 years to get
SelfishMother.com
16
to this point. A point where I felt ready. I’d dreamed so many dreams about that baba-to-be and me. And us.  And in between all this, I’m just in absolute awe of the human body – the female form. The things us women go through – its quite extraordinary. I mean, most of us can grow a baby in our tummy from nothingness (well, scientifically, no not nothingness, but you get me). And then when it doesn’t work, your body knows to expel it. It knows the drill. Just utterly bewildering and odd and funny and crazy and bloody brilliant – but also, so cruel.
SelfishMother.com
17
So although, in some ways, I feel like I’ve failed, I also know that my body is pretty epic too.

So to finish up, what has been quite a cathartic blog post, I have 2 weeks for my body to try and pass all that remains. I will have a scan on 19th September to see if the process is complete and we’ll take it from there. If it isn’t, then I guess I’ll have to have some kind of hospital management.

I want to give a shoutout to my darling James. It’s been a tough few days for him too. I know it is just as difficult a situation for a partner – I know

SelfishMother.com
18
he has felt just complete helplessness. I imagine he’s also quite scared about what can/could happen to me (he was told to monitor excess blood loss and symptoms of infection – we live 30 mins away from the hospital and in either case, he might need to call for an ambulance). I also know he is filled with sadness and grief too. This baby was tried for and very much wanted. We were both super excited. But him just being here, to hold my hand, means the world. (Thanks also, FEED family).

Have you been affected by Miscarriage? Please get in touch. I’d

SelfishMother.com
19
love to be able to speak to people now I’m able to. I just feel like I need to talk to others about their experiences and what happens and what doesn’t happen – because all I have in my mind is sheer horror. And even if it is as horrific as I’m imagining, I’m sure words of experience would be very comforting right now.

I’ve found a lot of useful practical information on The Miscarriage Association website – and also Tommy’s Baby Charity, who work tirelessly to obtain funding for the crucial research into pregnancy loss. I haven’t contacted

SelfishMother.com
20
either of them directly, yet, but just wanted to highlight their websites as theres a huge amount of information about the different types of miscarriage (I definitely didn’t know how many different types there are), also details about how to approach your work, how pregnancy loss affects your partner and a shed-load of additional research. Though, I am feeling overwhelmed with all this information, just glancing at paragraphs here and there is easy enough as and when I need to access it. I’ve also read so many stories that families affected by
SelfishMother.com
21
pregnancy loss have shared using the hashtags #SimplySay (The Miscarriage Association) and #misCOURAGE (Tommy’s).

Thank you for reading.

The Briston-Hill’s
✖️✖️✖️

SelfishMother.com

By

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- 11 Sep 17

So here is a blog post that I never thought I’d be writing.

In fact, for the past 12 weeks I’ve been keeping a diary, a log, if you will, of pregnancy symptoms & the experience so far, the second time round. I was anticipating the publish of that blog post this week (I’d tied in lots of information about Pregnancy & Endometriosis). (After of course, we’d gone up North and surprised our families!).

Yes, you heard read right. I was pregnant. Kind of.  No, I was definitely pregnant. Or at least my body thought I was… and had began the fruition of our second pregnancy. I had alllllllll the symptoms: extreme fatigue, nausea, sickness & diarrhea, runny nose, cough, lightheadedness,  headaches, body aches, hot flushes, scattiness (god, the scattiness was insane), I’d gone up at least two cup sizes and had that lovely bright blue vein swooping across my left breast; just like I did with Eli. I had it all, in abundance. I was around 5/6 weeks when I finally got a positive pregnancy test result.

I’d had a big, scary, bright red bleed during our holiday last week in St. Ives. The first rule of Instagram? Don’t give the honest, real life view! Why would you ever do that?! Except, I really wanted to be honest. Believe me. To me,  honesty is the best policy, I try to be as honest and real as possible across all social media – so here is what’s happened since.

I wanted to scream about how bloody marvellous it was to be pregnant. To be sat on the this beautiful beach, with my little bump! But the reality? I was indeed sat on the beach cradling my little baby bump, but it was upon a maternity pad, and I was silently crying while my boy’s went rock-pooling. I knew deep down that a bleed of this amount was bad news. I was 11 weeks. But I had a proper full-on baby-bump. I still had some symptoms going on. I was feeling pretty good! So, I spent the majority of our little ‘break’ Googling. Oh wonderful Google…

“Can you still have a baby after a bright red  bleed?”

“Does a bright red bleed really mean miscarriage?”

“Symptoms of endometriosis during early pregnancy”

“Can endometriosis cause bleeding? 11 weeks pregnant”

“11 weeks pregnant symptoms”

“Symptoms of miscarriage”

“Baby moving or miscarriage?”

“What to expect miscarriage 11 weeks pregnant”

I read SO MANY positive outcomes across forums, blogs, in the press and via medical case studies. I’d almost convinced myself that it was fine. I was fine. The baby was fine. I’d had terrible cramps with Eli and spotting at around 6 weeks. In a lot of cases, women who experience bleeds in early pregnancy do go on to have a healthy baby. Heck, sometimes women bleed throughout the WHOLE pregnancy. Which I imagine is both frustrating and worrying in equal measure.

On Tuesday 5th September, Eli went back to school – as a big Year One boy. Super proud parents, we went from the school drop off to Broomfield Hospital for what would have been our 12 week scan. I’d felt a pang of excitement – the secrets we’d been harbouring for 12 weeks could finally come out. We could finally announce our bloody brilliant and exciting news, our darling boy was going to be a BIG BROTHER! (I’d even bought him a tee… did I jinx it?!). Doubtfully.

As we drove along that over-familiar route to Broomfield Hospital,  I was getting closer to the feeling of doubt. My stomach was in knots and I felt lightheaded and sick.I definitely knew in my heart of hearts, this wasn’t meant to be.  But that certainly does not deflect from the shock of having a Sonographer say “Are you sure your dates are correct as the sac measures 7 weeks, 1 day…. unfortunately this isn’t going to be a viable pregnancy I’m afraid”.

We’d had so much trouble with Eli during pregnancy, that anything I could do to help make this pregnancy ‘smoother’, I was doing. Including zero intimacy (hoping my Ma ain’t reading this!).  I had my last alcoholic drink (I so need to do a review of non-alcoholic drinks, because we’ve had the best time trying so many out!) and caffeinated drink on my birthday, 1st June. I’ve not eaten anything you shouldn’t. I’d been taking Pregnacare for a few weeks even before that too. My dates were beyond correct. I would have been 12 weeks and 3 days pregnant.

With tears streaming down my face, I somehow managed “the baby has gone, hasn’t it?”. She then went on to confirm that I’d suffered an Anembryonic Pregnancy and showed us my full uterus with a very obviously empty sac.  An Anembryonic Gestation (anembryonic pregnancy, blighted ovum, or empty sac) is a pregnancy in which the very early pregnancy appears normal on an ultrasound scan, but as the pregnancy progresses a visible embryo never develops or develops and is reabsorbed. How utterly batshit is that? REALLY? The cells of the embryo are “reabsorbed”. I still can’t fathom it. But I know it’s nothing that I could have possibly done or could have avoided. Medically speaking? It’s “one of those things”.

After being spoken to in the dreaded, ‘Quiet Room’, James & I were then transferred from the Antenatal Ultrasound department to an Early Pregnancy ward a few floors down. By the way, these ‘Quiet Rooms’, although decorated in a nice colour scheme and VERY clean, really do just look like 4 walls of bad news. Like, it felt like a funeral home, with a gushing waterfall print on one wall and a totally psychedelic bright mash up of randomness on the other wall. Obviously,  boxes of tissues all around for good measure.

I felt numb. Surreal. Like I was in a bubble and was crying and felt an ache in my chest…. but couldn’t quite digest words. James was speaking but it was like a blurry mumble of nothing. Likewise, when we met with Liz, the Staff Nurse on the EPU ward, she was AMAZING – and went through every step of the process. Answered questions with ease. Was very knowledgable. Incredibly sympathetic and open and supportive. But what she actually spoke about, I have no idea. It’s like I wasn’t even there. An out of body experience? Maybe.

I was given 3 options and it was emphasised that I didn’t have to make a decision straight away:

  • Expectant management – wait for the tissue to pass naturally out of your womb.
  • Medical management – take medication that causes the tissue to pass out of your womb.
  • Surgical management – have the tissue surgically removed.

As I’m particularly phobic of hospitals following my labour with Eli, if I can avoid being near one, I will do my damned best! Without  even a hint of  consideration, I wanted to be at home, in my own bed and I’m keeping my fingers crossed this will all pass naturally. I’m so far, going through the Expectant Management route. I do have a lot of tissue build up and the empty sac to pass. I have been advised to expect a lot of blood loss, tissue loss, the sac and all accompanied by proper contractions. I was given the details of all emergency contacts should I lose too much blood or be in too much pain – if that’s the case, I’ll end up on the EPU ward.

I am currently losing a small amount of blood. WAY less than a normal period, so I don’t even know if this is the start. I hope it’s the start anyway. I just want this whole thing to be over with. I think I’ll feel relief then.

I have waves of feeling completely fine. Like none of this is even happening. Happy, even. But then I notice my tummy… and its soft and squidgy again. I have the “WHY ME?” and “WHAT DID I DO WRONG” scenario’s. Then I have the feelings of what it could have been. Us Mama’s have a very easy way of getting carried away – we have excellent imaginations. Too good even. We imagine the nursery. The feeding schedules. The cuddles. The bathtime routine. The newborn smell. The ooh’s and ahhh’s. ALLLLLLL the stuff we need to buy. (I’m all over that Sleepyhead Grand btw).  Is it weird that I’m then grieving the loss of a baby… that didn’t actually exist? It’s like, the house was there, fully furnished, but there was nobody renting. I then feel all strange  – how could I even have this intense amount of grief? The baby hadn’t formed. It was cells. Cells that were absorbed. How am I this upset and feeling so devastated? I guess it’s because it took us 5 years to get to this point. A point where I felt ready. I’d dreamed so many dreams about that baba-to-be and me. And us.  And in between all this, I’m just in absolute awe of the human body – the female form. The things us women go through – its quite extraordinary. I mean, most of us can grow a baby in our tummy from nothingness (well, scientifically, no not nothingness, but you get me). And then when it doesn’t work, your body knows to expel it. It knows the drill. Just utterly bewildering and odd and funny and crazy and bloody brilliant – but also, so cruel. So although, in some ways, I feel like I’ve failed, I also know that my body is pretty epic too.

So to finish up, what has been quite a cathartic blog post, I have 2 weeks for my body to try and pass all that remains. I will have a scan on 19th September to see if the process is complete and we’ll take it from there. If it isn’t, then I guess I’ll have to have some kind of hospital management.

I want to give a shoutout to my darling James. It’s been a tough few days for him too. I know it is just as difficult a situation for a partner – I know he has felt just complete helplessness. I imagine he’s also quite scared about what can/could happen to me (he was told to monitor excess blood loss and symptoms of infection – we live 30 mins away from the hospital and in either case, he might need to call for an ambulance). I also know he is filled with sadness and grief too. This baby was tried for and very much wanted. We were both super excited. But him just being here, to hold my hand, means the world. (Thanks also, FEED family).

Have you been affected by Miscarriage? Please get in touch. I’d love to be able to speak to people now I’m able to. I just feel like I need to talk to others about their experiences and what happens and what doesn’t happen – because all I have in my mind is sheer horror. And even if it is as horrific as I’m imagining, I’m sure words of experience would be very comforting right now.

I’ve found a lot of useful practical information on The Miscarriage Association website – and also Tommy’s Baby Charity, who work tirelessly to obtain funding for the crucial research into pregnancy loss. I haven’t contacted either of them directly, yet, but just wanted to highlight their websites as theres a huge amount of information about the different types of miscarriage (I definitely didn’t know how many different types there are), also details about how to approach your work, how pregnancy loss affects your partner and a shed-load of additional research. Though, I am feeling overwhelmed with all this information, just glancing at paragraphs here and there is easy enough as and when I need to access it. I’ve also read so many stories that families affected by pregnancy loss have shared using the hashtags #SimplySay (The Miscarriage Association) and #misCOURAGE (Tommy’s).

Thank you for reading.

The Briston-Hill’s
✖️✖️✖️

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CLAIRE BRISTON – MAMA TO ONE – BORN IN THE NORTH EAST, BASED IN THE NORTH WEST – 30 SOMETHING – 5 FOOT NOTHING – NEVER, EVER CONCISE.

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