1. A Challenging Year

Warning, this page contains details of miscarriage. 

Incase you hadn't guessed by the title, we are expecting triplets. This chapter is going to talk about our journey up to finding out about the unexpected little bundles growing inside my belly. 

Our son, Jack, was born in November 2021 and we had hoped to give him a little sibling, sooner rather than later. We were both closing in on 37, so decided to start trying for baby B No.2 a couple of months before Jack turned 1. It took 4 months (same as when we were trying with Jack), and we found out we were pregnant in January of this year. A few days later we found out that James's sister was expecting just 2 days before our due date! We were over the moon!! 

However, a few days before our 12 week scan was due, I started bleeding. We tried to stay positive, but the hospital kept advising that I monitor it for 48 more hours. I was getting more and more stressed, so we opted for a private scan. Our worst fears were confirmed for the first time. The pregnancy had started, but ended around 5 weeks, my body, however, had continued acting like I was pregnant.  Hence the (mild) symptoms and trousers getting tighter.

The reason I said "first time", is because this miscarriage was a surprisingly long journey. We needed to visit the early pregnancy unit where I was scanned again (internally this time, yuk!). They confirmed what the private sonographer had said, but they couldn't completely confirm for another week. It had been 4 days since bleeding started and 2 days since our forst scan. The reason being is that the little cluster of cells which would've been our baby, was too small to detect a heartbeat. I would need to return in a week to see if it had grown. 

I was told to stock up on pads and painkillers and brace myself for sickness and pain. I felt empty. I knew we weren't pregnant, but there was still that teeny, tiny little glimmer of hope? 

I continued to bleed and had a night of excruciating pain. At the following scan, they confirmed that there had been no growth and that I will now need to either, hope that my body will continue with the miscarriage naturally, have some medicine to force the miscarriage, or have a medical procedure. I opted for the first and in a few days it was all over. 

When it was finally gone, it was a relief. I felt betrayed and angry with my body, but in the same breath, I knew there must've been a reason for the loss, and because it had been so early on, there had been no development and no trauma for it. It was just my stupid body that hadn't picked up on the fact. We were of course, devastated,  but we were healthy and well enough to get up and try again. It took me a few weeks to recover, it was much more physically demanding than I had expected. Mentally? Who knows?!

We started trying again and amazingly, I got a positive pregnancy test immediately! It was an early test, so I did another (different brand) a week after. Yep, definitely positive! I was very apprehensive about it, but relieved...... until I started bleeding again. I was 9 days late for my period so still very early days and the early pregnancy unit kept telling me to wait 48 hours again. Back to the private scanner. 

He told me that there was no evidence that I had been pregnant at all, and that I could've had a bad test, or two. 

It was like my head snapped back into place. I was reading symptoms in my body as pregnancy. Surely I would know what they are as I had only been pregnant a few months earlier. Apparently not, I can't trust my symptoms or my brain. I wasn't pregnant, even though, in my head I KNEW I was. From now on, I didn't know what to think, so wait for a late period and go from there. 

Which is what we did. 2 more positive tests, followed by my period 6 days late. 

WHAT???? 

Time for some medical advice. 

Before our miscarriage,  I knew that they were common. 1 in 5 pregnancies ends in miscarriage. Not one in 5 women experience it, 20% of ALL pregnancies end early. They think possibly even higher as many people won't know they were pregnant in the first place. My false positive tests have been marked on my record as 2 more miscarriages.  I'm still not convinced they are, simply because I have spoken to everybody about what we have been through, and so many people said they had an early miscarriage and experienced a lot of pain, blood and illness. I had none of these symptoms after the first. But what do I know about what's going on in there? I felt like I needed to talk to people about what we had been through, but I totally understand why others don't. I do feel like it should be more talked about so that women can be more prepared. 

The doctor saw me a few days later and I talked her through every gory detail. She explained how my reproductive system should be working, in much more detail than I remembered from GCSE Biology and told me the next steps. She would take about a gallon of blood a week after I ovulate, and test it for everything under the sun, including pregnancy. The reason it needed to be 7 days after ovulation was to check that my body was releasing the egg and the correct hormones. She also sent a referral to the fertility clinic. 

My bloods were taken on a Friday so I would get the results on the Monday. I had no call on Monday so called for the results on Tuesday morning. The receptionist told me the results were all clear and no action was needed. I was so confused and asked to speak with the doctor, but she was unavailable for the next 3 weeks. I was devastated to be honest. I wanted a reason for all these false positive tests, resulting in a huge amount of emotional stress. I had also taken the results as not pregnant. 

Until my period was late.... again. I did a test and again, it was positive. What??? I called the doctor back to confirm that I am not pregnant, and they confirmed just that. Another glimmer of hope, dashed. 

My husband had his referral appointment with the doc later that week and had a word with her about how worried he was about me. I had become an emotional wreck by this point and just didn't know what to do with myself. She kindly agreed to see me a few days later.

I really was in a state. I had the miscarriage at the front of my mind, and our due date was creeping ever closer. When we had the miscarriage, I had really hoped to be pregnant before my sister-in-laws little boy arrived. At the time, I had been positive that we would get there. But now we were just a few weeks away from his arrival and I knew I wouldn't be far enough along to be confident. And that would only be if we managed to conceive in the next month. I think I was grieving on top of all the stress we were going through. 

I walked in for my appointment and burst into tears. I told her I didn't know what to do with myself any more. By this point I was 2 weeks late had 3 positive tests, but negative bloods. 

She talked me through all my blood results in detail and said she didn't really know where to go from here, because I wasn't pregnant according to her screen. She had already referred me to the clinic so I would just need to wait for that, but what about these tests and late period? Oh, and sore boobs that had just started that morning. 

She offered to do another pregnancy test, so off I went to pee in yet another pot (not a stick this time), she dipped her stick and it was an instant positive result. She looked baffled. 

Just to clarify pregnancy tests. Some are not very reliable, and some will show negative, but start to show positive later on. This is not a positive result. They need to be used and timed,  then thrown away. Many people had asked me about this, so I was very careful about doing it correctly. 

So the doctor offered me another blood test. I said I didn't really know what I wanted to do anymore, but let's do it just to triple confirm that I'm definitely NOT pregnant. 

I expected to hear back the next afternoon, if at all. To my amazement, my phone rang at 6.15 that evening and it was the doctor. She was picking up her bag to leave when my bloods came in. She told me that the bloods they had done a couple of weeks ago showed the pregnancy hormone HCG at 3. Now they read 26,400. 

"What does that mean?"

"You're definitely pregnant!"

OK, well I'm obviously not holding my breath this time and I won't be symptom spotting or getting my hopes up in any way. 

So this blood test was on a Tuesday and we were going on holiday the following Monday for the week. If the bloods were correct this time, it would make me about 6 weeks pregnant. If we get a private scan the week after we get home, that would be around 8 weeks. Hopefully, my body and fingers crossed, baby, will have made up their minds about whether to stick together or not. I would rather find out sooner than 12 weeks if it was another no go. 

The Saturday after the positive blood test, I had the most unbelievable heartburn. Something I never suffer from. "Don't symptom spot". I had also started feeling like I had a horrible hangover. The way I felt in my first few weeks of pregnancy with Jack,  and for a few days with the miscarriage. "Don't symptom spot". By Tuesday I was feeling really unwell and starting to go off food because of nausea. "STOP SYMPTOM SPOTTING". And from Wednesday, I was needing a 2-3 hour nap during the day and bed time was soon after 8pm. 

These are definitely symptoms, and strong ones! And they continued to get worse. I won't list them but you get the idea. 

We booked a private scan for September 15th. Weirdly, our EDD for the lost pregnancy. Not intentional at all, just the most convenient to have somebody to watch Jack.