What is it with Sundays!? This is the day of the week that we begin another week of pregnancy and for the past few Sundays it's also been a total shit show. Start of week 17 - abdominal pain. Start of week 19 - big blood clot and a hospital visit. Now start of week 20 - more bleeding and another hospital visit.
Week 20 marks the half way point in pregnancy, well the expected half way mark of course. It is generally an exciting time for us momma's because it gives you a real time line. It's the same for me except that it was certainly overshadowed by yet another unexpected hospital visit.
I've actually gotten so accustomed to this bleeding business that I wasn't even going to go to the hospital but my midwife team recommended that we meet at maternity to talk with the OBGYN on call.
Business as usual, blood work and check on baby. Fetal heart rate was good, baby boy was active and seemed happy enough and not in distress. My blood work indicated low hemoglobin (probably not surprising given that I've been bleeding in some regard for 3 weeks) and now I'm taking an iron supplement which is giving me solid heartburn.
My meeting with the OB was great. He is young and modern and super friendly and warm. Dr. Ng, out of Langley if you ever have the pleasure of meeting him under better circumstances. We talked about a lot. What's going on with my placenta, my hemorrhage, his thoughts about the bleeding and about how fluid my birth plan needs to be at this point. I left our meeting with a lot of information but also feeling confident that I was in good hands. I am now in shared care between my midwives and the OB team.
I was dealing well with the continued bleeding (light flow) and managing it best I could and then literally 2 days later I passed an even bigger clot! WTF body, just knock it off already. There were two this time, a smaller one at about 1 inch by 0.5 inch and a second large one at about 4 inch by 1 inch. I had a good amount of bleeding in the hour and a bit after passing the clot. I found all my positivity quickly leaving myself and I was very emotional that evening. I have a strong ability to cope with stressful situations for a long time but at some point I will randomly break down and then restart the positivity shortly after. Perhaps we all need that breakdown moment to let out the emotions that have built up and to be able to forge ahead.
I had expected that all evening and overnight there would be continued bleeding and the morning would include a large amount after pooling all night. To my very pleasant surprise I had very little bleeding. Maybe just maybe, passing that big clot (which the OB saw on screen and blamed for obstructing the view of my placenta) was the last hurray of this bleeding ordeal. Maybe now, it will slow down and even stop!!! MAYBE?! See the positivity is already coming back.
Wednesday was pretty uneventful with the minimal bleeding but then Thursday hit and I had heavier bleeding all morning. Steve and I discussed and decided that we would see how Friday went and we could always touch base with the OB team just in case. Most of Friday was great. Not much for bleeding and had a low key morning. We took Ella to ballet and then dropped her off to my parents for her first ever sleep over! We had the Peach Arch Hospital Christmas party Friday night and while I couldn't really engage in much activity figured it would be nice to get out and get dressed up.
While getting ready for the evening I started to feel some cramping. Nothing major but defintely not typical Braxton Hicks, there was pain associated with it this time. I wondered if maybe it was from standing for a longer period or time. On the way to the party I had more cramping and by the time we were there it had subsided and gone away. Just before dinner I headed for the ladies room to check on my pad (such is my daily life now) and felt a big gush of fluid. I knew this one was bad.
Sure enough when I got to the ladies room and checked out the situation, I had soaked a whole pad in one gush. Not good. Typical standards are "if you soak 1 pad in 1 hour, go to ER". I got cleaned up, changed my pad and had dinner. I mentioned to Steve that we should probably head out soon. That I had heavy bleeding and was best to get checked out. We ate dinner, stayed a few extra minutes for prizes (which I actually got one, woop woop!) and then said our goodbyes. It's an odd thing to be surrounded by doctors, nurses and other trained hospital staff and to be leaving to go to the hospital for care.
My midwife called to tell maternity that I was coming so they were ready for me when I got there. Let me just tell you, we were the best dressed people in the hospital! One of the nurses who I saw on Sunday for my consult was on shift and recognized me right away. It's nice to have a familiar face but I'd really prefer not to meet these people until April when baby comes!!! Into an exam room we went and I got to meet yet another member of the OB Team. She was also lovely and very helpful and caring. After doing an ultrasound she was concerned that I had possibly prematurely ruptured my membranes (water broke) because it looked as though there wasn't enough amniotic fluid around baby boy. She gave me the option of staying the night for monitoring just in case I began to cramp again or had more bleeding, or I was allowed to leave on a pass to sleep at home and come back in the morning. Since Ella was with my parents, we chose to stay at home knowing that we could leave instantly if we needed to.
I came back in the morning and was booked in for an ultrasound to check on the fluid levels and hopefully get a read on my placenta. The morning was full of very serious discussions about the implications for baby if my amniotic fluid was too low. Not only are we talking about miscarriage but also about intentional termination. Stressful, extremely stressful. A few hours passed of waiting for my appointment and I finally get my scan. The tech was so lovely, very gentle and kind.
It took FOREVER (only about an 1hr) to get the report back. Then my OB, my midwife and another doctor all come in to talk to me. Fuck. It must be bad news if they are all here. Slowly they take a seat, making a circle of support around me. Oh God, oh God.... And the OB begins... well we got the report back and.... we have good news. OH THANK THE LORD! The radiologist feels that the amniotic fluid levels are in a normal range. Now, the ultrasound tech did comment to me that they looked low, but even if we are toward the low end of normal, its still normal! What a relief!
They also finally got an answer on my placenta. More good news! NO previa! It is currently 3cm away from my cervix and should continue to move up as we go forward. Now there is a good amount of pooled blood and clots sitting right over my cervix. So, I'm going to continue to bleed. I will probably pass clots. It's possible that once those clots pass we could be done with the bleeding. Fingers crossed.
Where do we go from here???
I will be going to the Jim Pattison Out Patient and Surgery Centre for a follow up ultrasound for some expertise scanning. They want to do a few extra checks and these are the best people for that job. I will also be having weekly follow ups with either the OB or the midwife for the next while, at least til Christmas.
Christmas is going to be particularly special this year because Christmas Eve marks the day when baby becomes truly viable and each day after we only increase the odds of a healthy baby. A very Merry Christmas indeed.
