There was a tear in my membranes, which caused the amniotic fluid to leak and slowly deplete

October 29, 2018

I had to be at the hospital early. I was one of the first to be assisted. A few days before, we had seen on the ultrasound that there was no heartbeat. I was about 8 weeks pregnant. Around 6 weeks, I had no pregnancy symptoms all day. Since I had a miscarriage before, I was very alert to this. I had shared this with my husband. So we both knew that it probably wouldn't be good at the ultrasound, but it still hits you when it turns out to be true.

The curettage went well. The blood loss was minimal. As soon as I could urinate, I was allowed to go home. Fortunately, I was able to urinate quickly and was allowed to leave early in the afternoon. Once home, my husband took care of me and we picked up our son, then 2.5 years old, from my mother's. I had my emotions fairly under control. Only the question "why", kept playing through my mind. Why again? With renewed hope, we decided to try again.

May 11, 2019

It's Saturday and today we are celebrating Mother's Day. Our son won't be home Sunday morning because my husband and I both have a bachelor party tonight, so we're celebrating today. Before I get breakfast in bed, I'm taking a pregnancy test. I'm a few days late. I don't really believe in it, but since we're going to a bachelor party tonight and there will be alcohol, I want to make sure. To my surprise, it says I'm 1-2 weeks pregnant. Words can't describe how happy we are! But at the same time, I'm also worried. We've had two miscarriages before. Will it go well this time?

First ultrasound: around 10 weeks pregnant

In the afternoon, I go to the bathroom. There, I discover reddish-brown discharge, a lot of it. I start to panic! "Is it not okay again? Are we going to have another miscarriage?" I call the midwife. I manage to just get my story out before I burst into tears. Fortunately, I can get an ultrasound within an hour. That hour feels like a day to me. I call my mother to ask if she can look after my son while I go to the midwife. She can. When I arrive at my mother's place, I can't stop crying. I am so afraid that this will go wrong again. My son keeps saying 'sorry mommy', because he thinks he has done something wrong and that's why I'm crying. I try to tell him that I'm not angry with him. My mother decides to come with me to the midwife. I'm fine with everything and can't think straight anymore. The midwife asks if I want an internal or external ultrasound. I immediately say: "Internal, so we can see everything clearly right away". Fortunately, we immediately see a heartbeat! Phew, so glad you're still here! With a sense of relief, I can go home again.

Furthermore, my pregnancy is going well

I do have a gut feeling. I pray every night that you may be born healthy... When I am 15 weeks pregnant, we have a fun ultrasound. We see that you are a boy! How happy we are! A little brother for our son, a playmate! We are over the moon! We keep the gender a secret for a while, so we can enjoy knowing that we are going to have another son. You look wonderful in the 3D photos. We are totally in love! You look exactly like your brother!

Monday, August 5, 2019: 16 weeks and 6 days pregnant

I've had a lot of discharge all day. This can happen during pregnancy, so I'm not immediately worried.

Monday into Tuesday night

I wake up and go to the bathroom. My underwear is a bit wet and I put on a clean pair. At that moment, I have no worries and go back to sleep. Around 6:30 am, I wake up again. My underwear is completely wet again. I find this strange and call the midwife. I am told to come in immediately and to bring the wet underwear. I am starting to worry now, but hope that the midwife will say that nothing is wrong. My husband stays with our son and I go to the midwife. Once there, she takes a swab and performs an ultrasound. Both turn out to be not good. The ultrasound and the swab show that it is amniotic fluid and that there is much less amniotic fluid than there was during the previous ultrasound. The midwife refers me to the hospital. She calls to ask when I can be seen. The person on the other end of the line tells me that I can come in 1.5 hours. I say that I really can't wait that long! The midwife relays this, upon which the person on the other end of the line says: 'At 17 weeks of pregnancy, we really don't do anything, you know.' The ground falls away beneath my feet... She didn't know that I could hear her too. I want to go home, to my husband, and tell him that things are not good.

I don't remember how I got home or how I told my husband

We got in the car and took my son to daycare. My husband got back in the car and said: 'It's not good, is it An?' I couldn't remember anything. I so desperately wanted to go to the hospital and hear that everything would still be alright. We arrived at the hospital way too early and had to wait in a small room. Minutes felt like hours. I think we spent the whole time just looking at the clock and the door, hoping someone would come in.

The nurse finally came to get us

We had to move to another room. The resident doctor explained to us what she was going to do: perform an ultrasound and take a culture to test for amniotic fluid. If this was positive, she would call the gynecologist. If she was going to do this after the ultrasound, we knew for sure that it was bad news and that at 17 weeks, they wouldn't do anything for us... After the examination, all I heard was: 'I'm going to call the gynecologist.' My husband and I cried a lot together after everyone left the room. A few minutes later, the gynecologist came in and repeated the same examinations that the resident doctor had already done. Then we all went back to the first small room. The gynecologist took all the time for us and our questions. They could no longer do anything for us and our little boy. The chance of our son surviving was 1%, our world collapsed... Without amniotic fluid, there was no chance for a baby in the womb, at 17 weeks, to develop and grow. I wanted to go home, as soon as possible. The next appointment was scheduled for Thursday. The gynecologist explained that in this situation, babies were born between two and five days after the amniotic fluid had broken. I couldn't imagine it yet and still clung to that 1% chance of survival.

Once home, I didn't know what to do with myself

My husband called my mother to ask if she would come over. She could tell by his voice that something was wrong. When asked what was wrong, my husband broke down and started to cry. I told my mother that things were not well with the baby. She immediately came over to us. I told her what had happened, while it felt like I was talking about someone else. It was so surreal. I don't remember much about how the rest of the day went. It was all a blur. At the end of the day, we went to my in-laws to tell them. We also had my sister and two sisters-in-law come over to share the news. It was so strange to tell them while I hadn't even fully grasped what was happening myself. Some of the reactions were: 'You can't be serious?'. I understood the reaction, but what did you think? That I was joking when I said that our child was probably going to die? I texted my friend with the unbelievable story. She didn't hesitate for a moment, got in her car, and was at my doorstep within half an hour. This was so incredibly comforting! There are no words for friends like these. This was exactly what I needed right now. So nice! We informed the rest of my family via text. The reactions varied, from sympathy and astonishment to interference (with the best intentions, but not very helpful), like 'You should go to a different hospital' or 'You should go abroad, they can do something there'. All the reactions were well-intentioned, I know that, but unsolicited advice in such a situation made me even more insecure. 'Could there still be a chance? Could the hospital have got it wrong?' My husband and I wanted to do everything to save our son. But there was nothing we could do to save him...

TO BE CONTINUED…

ANGELA