I miscarried this week in my 9th week of pregnancy.
It all started on Monday evening. I was getting ready for bed when I noticed some brownish discharge in my underwear. I wasn't overly concerned because I'd heard that you can have a show like this when your period would have been due, which mine would have been.
Tuesday morning I saw my midwife who said it was a normal thing to happen and probably wasn't anything to worry about. In retrospect I wish I'd asked for an early scan.
By Tuesday afternoon, the brownish discharge was beginning to look more like fresh blood. Since there was only a small streak of it I didn't worry too much, but decided I would pop along to my local A&E the following morning just to reassure myself.
However, on Tuesday evening at around 7.30pm I went to the loo and whilst having a wee I passed a clot (around 2 or 3 inches long) and started bleeding, as though I was having a period. I called my husband and told him I thought we were losing the baby.
Half an hour later we were at my local A&E and that's when it all became a bit more serious. In the space of 2 hours I'd lost a significant amount of blood (I thought my husband would pass out when he saw it) and a number of large clots. In total I believe I experienced 99% of the miscarriage and 95% of the entire blood loss in those two hours. My jeans, coat and underwear were literally soaked in blood; quite a frightening ordeal as I had no idea if or when the bleeding would stop.
Once seen by the A&E doctor, I was admitted and immediately hooked up to a drip. I was then monitored and booked in for a scan to establish if I was having a miscarriage or an ectopic pregnancy since my pregnancy hormone (HCG) levels were still high.
By now the bleeding had slowed right down, although an examination showed that I was holding a lot of clots internally.
The following morning I was given a transvaginal scan which showed that I was no longer pregnant. My body had expelled almost everything. However, since the sonographer could see some unidentifiable material (she couldn't tell if it was clots or foetal tissue) she classified it as an incomplete miscarriage and I was given a D&C (ERPC) the following day.
I had very little pain throughout the whole miscarriage. At most it was like back ache and minor period pains. No major cramps.
I spent two nights in hospital being monitored and I have now been home for three hours.
Right now I feel sad (obviously) and worried (what if it happens again?) but thank God for my little boy (13 months). Througout the whole ordeal I reminded myself how lucky I am to have such a gorgeous, perfect little child waiting for me at home. I think I would have gone into meltdown if this had been my first pregnancy.
Apparently 1 in 4 pregnancies end in miscarriage. In some ways it's a scary fact. But for me right now it's a comforting fact because at least I can say the odds were always going to be high so it's pointless blaming myself. Unfortunately I was simply the 1 in 4 this time round.
