This story of miscarriage was shared by one of our Stay at Home Mum community members, Moira. �We thank her for sharing her story with us here at Stay at Home Mum. If you would like your own story featured on the Stay at Home Mum page, please send your unique story to stories@stayathomemum.com.au.�
Being a nurse I was all over the trying to conceive thing, and knew straight away that I was late and pregnant.�We couldn’t have been happier. I was ecstatic, planning away every aspect and dreaming of getting fat and life as a mum. When nausea kicked in, I couldn’t wipe the smile from my face. I booked Doctor’s appointments well in advance and was more than ready for what was to come.
Life was amazing.
I had a dating scan at 8 weeks that didn’t fit with my dates – it showed the baby’s size was almost 10 days off, and I knew that it couldn’t have been right. But my eyes and heart saw that heartbeat on the screen and nothing else mattered.
Shortly after the dating scan,�I began to feel different – �almost better really. The morning sickness was subsiding but I was almost 10 weeks, so I assumed it was all okay.
It was when I had stomach pain I knew that something wasn’t right.
Within a few hours I had blood loss and was having awful cramping in regular intervals. I had several hours of heavy loss, up and down from the couch to the loo. I could feel the gush coming and several phone calls to the doctor later confirmed what I knew was happening. � He said that I was right to stay at home as long as the bleeding wasn’t more than a pad every 15 mins and began to lessen.
Several hours later it began to subside, but the tears flowed. I felt like a complete failure, to my husband, to myself and most of all that little human whose heart I saw beating.
The comments and condolences came next.�I tried to rationalise all the “loving comments” that hurt so much:
“You’ll get pregnant again“…….I don’t want to, I want to be pregnant now,
“There must have been something wrong“…….well that just made me feel even worse. Why can’t I make a baby that will grow, why did I make a baby with a disability?
“Better for it to happen now than later”….. well I didn’t want it to happen at all.
“One in three lose a baby”..…… I didn’t lose it, it was taken from me. All these well meaning words didn’t help; they made me feel worse at the time.
I had hopes and plans and dreams and a life mapped out for the little human in those 10 short weeks.�My husband didn’t really have the same feelings as I did, but he is a very literal man, which was good. His standard line was that we didn’t do anything to make it happen, it’s out of our control.
I had a scan a few days later as the bleeding hadn’t stopped, and it showed an incomplete miscarriage, which meant I had to have a D & C. This brought all of those feelings of failure back to light. Not only could I not�make a healthy baby, but my body couldn’t even clear it properly. I was completely devastated all over again.
We then had to wait for 2 cycles which felt like an eternity. On my third cycle we got pregnant again, and I was a nervous mess, just waiting for it to happen again. It was a tough, emotional twelve weeks, and I really don’t think I relaxed until I had the 18 week scan. Thankfully it didn’t happen again and I have a healthy 8 year old. She was born the same month that we miscarried a year later! �I’m sure that meant something.
Well it did to me.
Anyone who has experienced a miscarriage, whether complete or incomplete, whether at 5 weeks or 10 weeks knows this pain. And if my little story can make someone feel less alone in their loss, then it’s worth having online.
Thanks for listening to my story.
Moira
Please, share your thoughts in the comments below and if you would like to share your story about the life as a parent, please email stories@stayathomemum.com.au. We look forward to reading them.�
Responses to ““I Felt Like a Failure”: One Mum’s Story of Miscarriage”
I just suffered my second m/c in a row both at 8 weeks only 4 months apart. The first is very upsetting…the second is devastating! Young girls fall pregnant without wanting to and I cant even carry 1 baby that is very much wanted. (I’m 30) It may not be within my control and I understand it happens all the time, but it doesn’t make the loss any easier, just more confusing.
I know its irrational but every pregnant mother makes me upset and angry for what i couldn’t achieve. Maybe in the future I will have a baby, but the thought of freaking out for 13 weeks just to get past the ‘danger zone’ scares me the most…
Thanks for sharing your story Moira, i understand all the pain and suffering you went through.
I felt the same – I lsot my entire ‘friendship’ group because they thought I should be over it within a week – it took 6 months of coounselling and I still shed a little tear on both the date of losing and the due date. Rest well angels.
I hear you Moira. I lost a pregnancy 39 years ago. I didn’t actually miscarry, I had to go in for a curette because a heartbeat couldn’t be heard at 14 weeks. No ultrasound in those days. I was gutted, terrified, devastated, every adjective one could think up. I felt just like you, and also felt the same fears when pregnant a second time, again, no ultrasound to tell me everything was ok, just waiting until doctor could feel the top of my uterus in my belly. I gave birth to a healthy boy, then a second son. I will forever wonder whether my first pregnancy was the daughter I never had, wish I had, but I know that I will see he or she again in heaven because I believe in a loving God and that when he creates a life it is eternal.
Yup. Had 3 missed abortions myself. 1 healthy beautiful baby with no problems at all arrived with my 2nd pregnancy. She is 14 now. A sense of blurry all consuming failure enveloped me with each loss. The fact that I was placed in the delivery ward in the middle of one of my losses, next to a woman being introduced to her newborn after a Caesarian, amplified the feelings to an extreme level. It is a pain I still carry deep within today. Life has moved on though thankfully.
Hi my name is Shaye my 2nd pregnancy ended in a miscarriage but i didn’t know about it until my 12 weeks scan. I thought everything was ok had had not symptoms of having a loss still had morning sickness the works. Then I went and had my 12 week u-s and the tech kept asking me all these questions about the due date and then he walked out of the room. When he came back in he said he would like to do an internal u-s to have a closer look and he found that our baby was the size of a 9 weeker it had no heart beet either. My heart sank and i couldn’t even talk to my husband the tech had to ring him to come and pick me up. I ended up having to have a DnC as it wouldn’t expel itself it was really hard to go through but we now have another little boy and are hoping for more. I don’t think that i will be comfortable in any pregnancy though until after 12 weeks and I know that everything is ok.
I did find that people had no idea what to say to me or how to act around me for a long time so i kept a lot of what i was feeling to myself.
Thank you for sharing your story, I just had a miscarriage on February 11 2013 I had been 9 weeks pregnant. I had always told myself that if this ever happened to me I wouldn’t take it hard and that there had to be a reason for the miscarriage.But boy was I wrong it hurt emotionally for me and my husband, to make matters worse my brother and sister in law had given birth to a healthy baby boy just two days before my miscarriage. Although I love him dearly it hurts when I look at him to think this could of been me seven months from now holding my own baby, and having the comments from co workers and friends saying oh you could be next or doesn’t it make you want to have a baby does not make matters better. but the stories I have been reading on people going on to have a healthy baby after 1,2 or even 3 miscarriages helps me to stay a bit positive
Just letting those who have been through this experience or are in fact going through this right now, I’ve had a healthy baby, followed by 2 miscarraiges, it then took us a year to fall pregnant for the 4th time. I’m now 27 weeks along, so hang on in there girls….it can happen, just keep trying !! xxx