Not long ago I had one of the hardest times of my life dealing with pregnancy loss, more specifically an ectopic pregnancy, where the fertilised egg implants itself outside of the womb, and therefore the egg will not develop into a baby. It mostly occurs in the fallopian tubes, but the egg can implant in other places; I had an abdominal ectopic pregnancy (in the Pouch of Douglas), which is very rare. When the egg implants in the tube it can cause life-threatening internal bleeding if the egg continues to grow and ruptures the fallopian tube.
It was very personal and painful to talk about it for a while, but I feel ready now to share my story and raise awareness about pregnancy loss. I have done a very open and honest (yet, long) video, pouring my heart out about my experience and talking about how having an ectopic pregnancy made me feel physically and emotionally. If you would like to watch this video, press the play button below or click here.
Thankfully, my story had a lovely happy ending with the birth of our rainbow baby, James, but through this video I want to raise awareness about ectopic pregnancies, and how dangerous they can be if not treated with some urgency. Pregnancy loss, in general, is something that people tend not to talk about very candidly; understandably so, because the pain sometimes is too much and talking about it makes it real, but I have found that talking about it helps me heal and try to make some sense of this whole thing.
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When I was dealing with my ectopic pregnancy, information was sparse and I had not even heard of this term before being told it could be happening to me. I turned to Google and YouTube to find people who had gone through the same thing, in the hope that I would find some comfort in knowing that it wasn’t just me, but there weren’t very many videos and posts about the subject. That made me realise I had to share my story and, hopefully, my video will help someone who is going through an ectopic pregnancy.
Pregnancy loss can be a very lonely place in our minds and in our hearts; I remember spending many-a-night crying myself to sleep, and although I had an amazing support network, I felt like people didn’t really know what to say to me when I talked about pregnancy loss, so instead of facing an awkward conversation, I kept my feelings to myself and tried to put on a brave face.
It took me a long time to heal; some days I still catch myself thinking about what I went through in disbelief. But having had our lovely little baby boy was the best thing that could have happened to us! It gave me hope that I wasn’t doomed and that I was still able to have that family that I so wanted!
If you’re still waiting for your rainbow baby after a loss, my thoughts go to you. Stay strong, stay positive.
If you have had an ectopic pregnancy or any type of pregnancy loss, and you want to share your story, please feel free to use the comments section, and share this video if you think it may be helpful to someone you know, who’s going through pregnancy loss.
We’re all here to support one another!
It is so liberating to talk about it, i found talking about my losses helped me deal with them and get some form of closure but it took a long time to do so. I had a ectopic pregnancy 9 years ago, i found out quite late and the result was a damaged fallopian tube. I still get pain there from my surgery when i have my time of the month, reminding me of it every time. At first it was a bad reminder, now i see it as a blessing, because if it would have been a few days later i could not be here! Only having one tube i was told i would find it difficult to have children ( i already had one 2 year old daughter at this point ). However 7 months later i managed to conceive again but sadly i lost it 3 months along when i got into a bad car crash and it died in me on impact when i had internal bleeding and whiplash. It left me with a lot of cysts on my ovaries which i had to have surgically lasered off. I felt so lost and dead inside for months. My marriage was already bad so after that it completely fell apart. I got divorced and moved to england where i had family only to find out a month after i arrived that i was carrying a little blessing ( my now 8 year old daughter ) who was born on my nans birthday, though she is partially blind she is my miracle who changed my life. I continued to have another 2 miscarriages before conceiving my son almost 6 years ago who was born on the day my nan passed away, giving positive meaning to such a sad day. When i met my recent partner i fell pregnant unexpectedly and once again had another miscarriage, i told myself i already had three children so was extremely blessed and fell pregnant 3 months later with my last and youngest child who is just shy of 2 born on valentines day. I have been told having my children has caused some damage to my uterus and i have permanently damaged my pelvis which is now registered as disability but i have 4 beautiful healthy children, i try to tell myself if i had carried the babies i lost i wouldn’t have the children i have now.
I’ve not personally been affected but one of my best friends has been. We went away together for a few days with some others friends and over that weekend she complained about really bad period pain. I’m not sure how long after that it was but I received a call from her boyfriend saying she was in hospital with an ectopic pregnancy. I’m not sure exactly what happened because I wasn’t with her at the time but I assume she was in a lot of pain and so was admitted to hospital. She had a keyhole operation and the damaged tube was removed. She split from her boyfriend a while later (nothing to do with the ectopic pregnancy) and is now married to someone else. They don’t have any children but I’m not sure she is intending to have any x
I had a ectopic pregnancy.
I found out I was pregnant at 6 weeks. It wasn’t a total surprise, but it was not planned either. I had taken about 4 pregnancy tests along the way because my period was 1 day and so light- but they all said negative. then my next period was due- I was late… I’m never late, pregnancy test that time showed pregnant, it was Wednesday! So excited and had to tell someone so I told my boss. The next day told my boyfriend in a super cute way. That Friday & Saturday we told our parents. We were so excited!!! Called the doctor Monday, she said we will wait till closer to 9 weeks to do sonogram. I did the math, baby is due on my dads birthday- this is so meant to be! We waited… I started to understand the signs better- I was extremely tired, bloated and my boobs were taking over! We started a registry, I went and got a few maternity dresses, bought a cute first onesie and we started planning the babies room…. like we were ready and were overjoyed! We went to a few weddings in between finding out and doctor time, it was fun and hard to try and ‘drink’ without people noticing I wasn’t actually drinking.
Its Wednesday- Sonogram day. Went in- there’s nothing there- WTF! Well there’s a mass near my ovary about 3-4 cm. Doctor came in- she explained ectopic to us, she then said maybe its just not big enough to see and sent me to the lab. I have NEVER in my life felt so empty and alone. I felt like God had ripped my heart out and just shredded it. We knew the conception date as I keep track of everything, and there literally was no other date- I was almost 10 weeks, absolutely no doubt, we should see the baby. we went home crying. Spent Thursday crying. Went in Friday morning to do another hormone lab test. My doctor called me 4 hours later said I’m at 18,900, I was 18,500 Wednesday- it should have doubled and said we need to emergency surgery before it ruptures. There was no time to process, no time for a second opinion and no time to make a plan. We drove straight to doctor, where she explained the TWO options: Medicine, which I was really to far along for or surgery… so basically I have one option… surgery, like right now…. literally right now. We got in our truck and drove a block to the hospital. I got in the gown, got my IV’s going and about 10 minutes later after fifty people came in and asked me the same questions, I was being wheeled off. For some reason that’s when it hit me — my baby is being ripped from me because if it stays it will kill me. I cried, hard and I mean panic attack hard until the anesthesiologist put me out. Spent the night in the hospital because I was so nauseous and dizzy when i woke up. The next week was terrible for me: I cried because my belly hurt so bad, I seriously farted like every 5 seconds from all the air still in my belly from surgery- so that was kind of funny. and I cried from a broken heart. I had to have help to pee, to get up form the bed, to shower. It brought us even closer though, it definitely secured our bond and ensured our love for one another. We told so few that I was even Prego, so it wasn’t so bad to tell those that it was over- but I wanted to be alone. The next week, I was back to work- well working from home. I started telling my close friends, it felt nice and like a weight was lifted to tell my story. I now had a bigger support group. I can tell you that ‘it wasn’t mean to be’ and ‘next time wont be like this’ was annoying and pissed me off- I wanted to reply F off, but I didn’t. One person said, well I know a lot of people that have fertility problems…. uh, I didn’t see it like that at all… I mean we are clearly both fertile… baby just decided to not swim to the correct location. This wasn’t a miscarriage- my body was changing just as it should have been for a pregnancy, it was perfect actually- except baby was in the wrong place. Some people say that they don’t feel like it was a baby- but it was my baby- this was our little child- gone. Time will heal, but we did decide to not, not try until we get married next year— mostly, I didn’t want to be a cow on my wedding day.
Here I am on my third week from surgery. My belly hurts from the cuts, my boo boos… My heart is also healing, I think anyway… I mean I don’t cry for hours, just minutes now. I need closure, I need a reason as to why this happened to me. The doctor said I’m overly healthy, I have no risk factors and that this was just really bad luck. I want to think that there was something wrong with the baby, something, like anything other than bad luck as the reason.
Most often, ectopic pregnancy happens within the first few weeks of pregnancy. You might not even know you’re pregnant yet, so it can be a big shock. Doctors usually discover it by the 8th week of pregnancy, you can check the symptoms – http://rocketparents.com/ectopic-pregnancy-symptoms/
Thank you so much for sharing your story. I too just suffered from an ectopic pregnancy.
My husband and I just started trying to get pregnant last month. I had my regular cycle but it was two days late so I thought nothing of it. I felt fine until I woke up one morning with a pain in my right side that radiated to my lower abdomen. The pain started getting worse but I thought it was just gas. Bought gasx, took it, two hours went by with no relief. Then I went pee and noticed blood. I knew something was not right.
I called my OB doctor and they said to wait a week and call back if it’s still occurring. I ended up calling them back later in the day because the pain got worse. Thank God I did. The nurse told me to take a pregnancy test just in case and go straight to the ER if I’m pregnant. I did, and it showed positive but it was very faint. I kept debating to go in but we thought it was best.
Once we arrived to the ER, they did blood work and explained that I’m either 3-4 weeks pregnant or my last period was a miscarriage. I didn’t know how to react. My husband and I were so shocked. I remember feeling a little happy at the fact that I’m pregnant and everything is fine.
They did a pelvic exam next and ruled out an ectopic pregnancy. I started becoming more optimistic and my pain was diminishing. Could everything really be okay?
As it turns out, it wasn’t. They decided to do an ultrasound but almost didn’t which determined that I had an ectopic pregnancy. They saw so much blood in my abdomen and was so shocked that I seemed fine and not hurled over vomiting.
They paiged the OB Surgeon and rushed me into surgery. I was nearly having a panick attack and couldn’t stop shaking. I’ve had an appendix surgery before but it wasn’t nearly as bad as this.
They did Laparscopic surgery and had to remove my right tube because of how damaged it was.
The most difficult part of this is thinking about trying again. I don’t ever want to go through this again but at the same time, it’s all worth it for the baby.
Much love to those who had and is going through this. I love hearing success stories of future babies so please share.
Sincerely,
Kelly Foley