I can see from a lot of people’s posts the emotional trauma which unfolds after miscarriage, which is completely accurate, however the pain and anxiety for me came from not understanding physically what was happening to my body. I am a very practical individual and for any problem I like to form a path forward for myself.
I first miscarried January 19th, at 4 weeks and 4 days. It passed like a slightly heavier period. Obviously I was upset, but relatively okay – seems I was optimistic this wouldn’t happen more than once and to just try again.
I then became pregnant two weeks later. The pregnancy was intense, I bloated up very early, and knew I was pregnant about 2 days after I conceived. I had a 6 week scan – all okay except with a haematoma. But at another scan at 9 weeks, unfortunately there was no heartbeat. This hit me far harder than the first.
I went to the Early Pregnancy Unit (EPU) the next day for them to confirm the scan, which they did. I decided to use the medication to start the process instead of waiting for it to happen naturally or the D&C surgery. For me, I couldn’t hold out waiting maybe weeks for my body to get rid of the baby, but then I also wanted to stay as close to it happening naturally as I could. I had to take one pill to stop my body producing the pregnancy hormone HCG, then two days later put 4 tablets into the vagina.
The pain was far worse than any period I had ever encountered. My partner had to hold me on the toilet as I felt so dizzy. Blood clots, tissue, and the sac fell from me into the toilet, while suffering diarrhoea and projectile vomiting. Once the sac had passed the bleeding stopped significantly. Just needed pads, but in myself I felt better.
The bleeding carried on like a period for a week and a half. I knew it wasn’t all out. Then I was jumping and playing with my dogs and I felt something come out. It was the last clump of tissue. To warn, the smell was horrible and nothing like I’d smelt before. By this point it had been inside me for 2 weeks, so I could understand. After that the bleeding stopped for a week and a half.
A week later I had a private scan. My partner and I decided to get the once over from a fertility unit. So I had a blood test to check my eggs, and an internal scan to check my uterus and ovaries and he had his sperm checked. It was an opportunity to talk about if they thought there were any risks in us trying again. The EPU did explain this to us, but at the time I was more concentrated on the treatment to miscarry than getting pregnant again. Anyway, the scan showed my right ovary was normal with 8 follicles, my left had some hormonal cysts that were totally common and would pass. They also said there was no risk to us trying again. For my health they suggested a Mediterranean diet, a Yakult a day for gut health and exercise. They reiterated that there was no reason why they would think we’d miscarry again, and that we could try as soon as we wanted. No reason to wait at all.
A few days later (a week and a half after passing the tissue, and 3 weeks after the first day of bleeding from the miscarriage), I started spotting. I carried out a pregnancy test and I had the most faintest positive line. The next day I was passing blood clots the size of a teaspoon and the bleeding was heavy. The blood was dripping out and was slightly watery. This happened every three hours.
I rang the EPU again and explained all the above. They said I could still be passing the pregnancy, though unlikely because they knew the private clinic we visited and said they would have noticed if anything was still there. Maybe the ovary cyst passing, or more likely it was my period coming early. To clarify the timeline, it had been 3 weeks since I took the medication at this point. They said to ring back in the morning if I had another positive test or if the bleeding got worse.
The next day I had smaller clots, still bleeding, a positive test and now tender breasts. I rang the EPU and they said they predicted it was a period and my body was still getting rid of some residual HCG. This period was far heavier than any other period I’d had. The menstrual pain was very mild, I had sharp pains in my nipples and swollen breasts (which I never have). I had read on the internet, that my cycle would resume once the bleeding had stopped, but it seems my body started as soon as I started miscarrying. I didn’t know due to me being 9 weeks, that it would work like this.
This made me very panicky obviously, when massive amounts of blood started coming out of me. If I’d have known that this could happen, I probably wouldn’t have been so worked up. Questions about my ‘next period’ didn’t occur to me until it was happening. All I kept reading was that your period will resume 4-6 weeks later. But when was that starting point? The answer is – could be anytime!
I wanted to share my story as I’ve read so much about the physical and emotional toll a miscarriage has on someone, but I’ve not heard much about what’s ‘normal’ after a miscarriage. And I just want to point out, there is no normal.
I, like everyone, get caught in the net of googling every question about miscarrying and end up having more questions than answers. I found reading stories from women that somewhat resembled what I was going through really helped. It is so common. And I decided to tell work the second time and the amount of people that had/knew similar stories was incredible.
The subject is so taboo due to not wanting work to know or getting hopes up of loved ones, so many go through first trimester miscarriages alone, anxious and scared.
Please talk to anyone and everyone if you need to and make it seem more normal in your head. I was lucky to have such a supportive partner, family, friends and work colleagues. But I encourage talking because it makes you feel less lonely, and the whole situation ‘normal’ and more calming. It’s like a problem shared, a problem halved.