The cruelest thing is hope.

Harriet Shearsmith - 4 Aug 15

I wanted to share my experience with early pregnancy miscarriage with the wonderful Selfish Mother community because it’s something that is such a taboo subject, and until you have been through a miscarriage, you really don’t realise that it touches so so many lives. We know this on a logical level, you see the statistics but you forget that pregnancy isn’t alway filled with happiness or beauty, sometimes it’s sad. Really sad.

I also wanted to share this for all of the women who have had an early pregnancy miscarriage, I know there are thousands of you out there, I’ve smiled sympathetically at you in the past, I’ve offered you words of solace. I’ve also never really known what you are going through. I’ve been the girl who has had two perfectly healthy, happy pregnancies with two perfect little boys as end results. I’ll admit I’ve never been cavalier enough to tell a pregnant woman that their miscarriage was irrelevant because they weren’t really carrying a baby, but the beginnings of one, but I’ve had friends who’ve expressed that opinion to me and I’ve never really thought much to it.

When I announced to everyone that I was pregnant, 6 weeks pregnant to be exact, I was so happy and filled with excitement to be taking this wonderful journey again, I kept checking all of the pregnancy books in stores, falling more in love with the little being that was growing inside me each day, even if it did look like a tadpole or science experiment. I shared pictures of what size my baby is, my little lentil and then my little blueberry, and at the beginning of the week, I began to feel the little flutters that you usually feel around 17 weeks in your first pregnancy, although with third (or more) pregnancies you can feel right from 6/7 weeks when babies heart starts to beat.

A few days later came the bleeding. Only light at first, I thought it was the normal pink discharge that you get when baby is ‘bedding’ in – that’s what the midwife told me anyway, ‘ Don’t worry, don’t panic. It’s all normal, baby is settling in and you are fine. If you have any period style bleeding, go straight to A & E.’ Of course when the afternoon came, I realised I was bleeding heavier and rushed through to A & E, where I was given a scan appointment at the EPADs (Early Pregnancy Assesment Day) clinic the following morning. I went to bed with cramps and heavier bleeding, all the while telling myself if I ignored the symptoms then they weren’t really there. Every time I told my husband I was pretty sure I was having a miscarriage he would stop me and say, ‘ You aren’t a doctor, let’s wait and see’. I think that not knowing makes it worse – I’ve often been told that hope is the most dangerous emotion in the emotional spectrum, because without hope we can grieve and move on but with that little bit of hope we have something to cling to and it puts us in an emotional limbo. Nowadays, I’m not a big fan of hope – it can keep it’s false promises and it’s misleading attitude.

So the following morning came the blood clots and passing of what I believe to be the little life that had been growing inside me, snuffed out. Again, let’s wait, let’s hope.

The doctors at the EPADs clinic were ever so kind, talking me through everything that was happening and all that they were going to do to find out what was going on with my pregnancy, my little blueberry. The scan was inconclusive, there was no foetus in the pregnancy sack and I know I could feel something that isn’t there now. The urine sample was positive. The blood test was positive. Everything pointing to an early pregnancy miscarriage in the process but without any hard evidence, we remained inconclusive. There’s that hope again.

I knew in my heart I’d had a miscarriage. I felt empty and alone. I was so sad, there really is no other word for it, I was just so sad. I had just started to wrap my head around the pregnancy and I was so excited. There had been no signs of trouble, no illness, no pain and then everything went wrong. I felt like my body was betraying me, like it was an enemy that I am stuck with but can’t fight off. A silent, secret enemy that I have placed all my trust in and that was callously ignoring my pleas to just help me out, hold on and protect my little blueberry that I had fallen so in love with already. My head hurt and my heart felt tight and achy.

I knew that it was better to miscarry early than further along, I also knew (on a logical level) that it was probably natures way of telling me there was something wrong with that little blueberry and that it was all for the best. I didn’t care. I still don’t care. All I could think was why me? This kind of thing shouldn’t happen to me, I’ve had two perfectly healthy pregnancies and I’ve never miscarried. Realistically though, why not me? I’m no different to those other thousands of women I’ve offered my words of solace to or smiled at sympathetically.

Harriet Shearsmith

My name is Harriet, I am a mama to three wonderful kiddos, living in the North of England - though I'd really rather be in the South where things actually happen. I am a serious purveyor of all things boutique or stylish for children and I have a fundamental need to share this obsession with people on my blog Toby&Roo. I'm addicted to costa caramel lattes and chilli - though not at the same time, obvs. Oh, and I sometimes use the term obvs... sorry about that.

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