I was so anxious in my pregnancy after loss

Tommy's charity fundraising story 2021

I met my husband met at high school and, after a lot of growing up, we got engaged at DisneyLand in 2017. We fell pregnant around 9 months before our wedding. It was crazy to think that we would be weeks away from giving birth on our wedding day!    
                                
All the same, we were extremely happy – and of course we thought pregnancy leads to taking a baby home, so excitement set in.

Then the pain started 

The next thing I knew I was in horrendous pain. I called the doctors and they booked me in for a scan the following day at 12pm. I then went to work because that is what I do, no matter how poorly I feel.     
                                            
It got to around 11am and I was unable to stand and could tell I was sweating a lot. My husband picked me up and off to the hospital we went.

I was terrified that something was wrong and just couldn’t shake this gut-wrenching feeling.

We waited for what felt like an eternity before going in for the scan. They didn’t really say much at that point, told us to wait for the doctor.

The next thing I knew I'd been admitted

They thought that the pregnancy was ectopic. I was bombarded by doctors and an anaesthetist. I signed bits of paper which would allow them to do whatever was necessary and off I went to wait for surgery.

It turns out I had ruptured cysts and they assured me that the surgery should not affect the pregnancy. But, 24 hours later, we lost our baby.                          

The process was long and painful. I wanted to miscarry naturally, as I don't like hospitals, but it took a while for this to happen. We were heartbroken.

Our wedding was a good distraction

Once we'd picked ourselves up, we got married on a lovely day in October 2018, before flying to New York and Orlando for an amazing honeymoon. We stopped the pill on our wedding day and a month and a half later when we got home from our trip we found out we were pregnant again! 

More heartbreak

We got further into this pregnancy and we were 8 days away from our 12 week scan when the spotting started. The uncontrollable crying and irrational emotional outbursts started again. My husband was so strong although I know how heartbroken he was.

This time everything was more painful. I couldn’t get a grip on reality. I went through days without really realising I was losing time. Again, my body didn’t do what it should have done. Being a woman, I felt like I should have been able to be a safe place for a baby.

We again heard the dreaded words of "I’m so sorry – there’s no heartbeat” as my mum held my hand in a pitch black room, with the blinking little light in the ceiling.

This time, I had the operation and took the pain relief they offered me.

We gave ourselves some time to recover

The mental strain was too much for us both and we took a break from trying.

After 6 months, we finally decided we were ready to try again. Then came the pandemic. 2 weeks into lockdown I missed my period. 

We had longed and waited for this baby, and prayed that everything would be okay. Still there was this feeling of panic as we thought of the possibility that all could be lost once again. 

We were placed under the care of a consultant. We were supposed to be scanned every two weeks up until 16 weeks. But, due to the pandemic, we were told this would not be happening.

We paid for early scans

The fear of not having the regular scans checking in on our baby was terrifying. So, we paid for the scans to check our little one was safe. It was so lucky we did!

The first scan went perfectly, our little one was so tiny at 5.4 weeks, but we knew they were there and, at that moment, safe. We went back a few weeks later and they found an issue with my cervix. My cervix was slightly open and they could not tell me what was causing it, so they sent me into the hospital.

We were terrified

The consultant placed me into the high-risk category and said there was a chance we would have a miscarriage. They put me onto progesterone tablets and sent me on my way to wait and see if we could get to 12 weeks, which felt like a lifetime. Being in full lockdown and unable to see family at that time was hard, but we wanted to make sure we stayed as safe as we could.

We hit 12 weeks and had a scan privately. Once we made sure the little one was okay we then told family. Lockdown lifted slightly and at 14 weeks I could hug my mum, which was pure bliss as I was terrified that something was wrong.

With my regular calls to the midwives, panicking something was wrong, they decided to give me weekly heartbeat checks. This helped for a 24-hour stint, but the panic would set back in and build until the 7 days were over. This cycle went around and around our whole pregnancy.

There was a feeling of loneliness being pregnant at the time of a pandemic. No classes or meeting other mums, and people not really understanding the worries of a family that longed for their rainbow – but were scared their dream would be threatened by a virus – was heart-breaking.

It definitely took a toll on my mental health. I was extremely lucky that my husband was so supportive.

At 41 weeks our beautiful baby Remy was born and our world was complete. We're so excited to be taking part in Splashathon with Water Babies and fundraising for Tommy's.