My Ectopic pregnancy journey and road to recovery...

Apologies for being slightly MIA recently, things have once again taken over in the life of Jess, work has been very busy since the lockdown 2.0 jazz started over and really I have just been taking a lot of time out to focus on myself and my little Olly.

That being said, with a difficult date coming up, that being Sunday 29th November, I gathered I would put my feelings into words and create an extra special blog piece direct from the heart. Before you start reading, I must just make it clear that if you have been through a similar experience recently, this may be a slight trigger and the last thing I'd want to do is cause any upset onto anyone. So please just make sure you're emotionally in a positive place, sometimes reading others experiences can be a real positive, but on the odd occasion they can also dig up some buried down feelings.

The Experience

So my journey began at the end of September 2019, when I found out I was pregnant. No, not planned and I was in heavy shock, having lost a pregnancy previously as well as my ongoing medical conditions, and despite being in a bad situation I didn't feel there was any other choice but to continue. In October 2019, I had several scans for the only reason that they couldn't find the embreyo in my uterus - every week I was going back and forth for scan after scan, still no luck. Later in October, I had a heavy, but short bleed. This literally lasted around an hour and that was it, at this time I was rushed into A&E and after having bloods taken and they told me that I was miscarrying. I refused to believe this, I'm pretty sure I screamed at the doctor who told me as he told me he was far to busy to spend any longer explaining and to just go home and rest. Usual Jessica move, tell the dickhead man to "fuck off" and storm out. I remember in detail, the walk from the consultant room to the car park felt like I was walking in slow motion, I had left my nan in the room as she was probably apologising for the way I had spoken to him, but I didn't care. I didn't feel supported, listened too, or as if I had the chance to ask any questions as a man, was "too busy" on this Friday evening. Too busy with the drunks that filled the waiting room, too busy to speak about my baby.

As I stood in the carpark that evening at MK Hospital, I felt numb, totally and utterly numb. I didn't shed a tear, I just felt nothing, entirely broken. My mum and her boyfriend came to pick us up and the whole drive back to my nans, noone said a single word. I remember my nan just rubbed my arm, and told me I was going to be OK. I didn't feel like I would ever be OK. That evening, my cousin rushed over to my nans, and I cried more than I think I ever had done previously. I felt broken, I didn't sleep for days on end. I forced myself after 2 weeks to get back to work, and I threw myself back into the hustle and bustle, also during this time I think I went from not leaving the house, to suddenly attending every social event going, because I feared being alone. Normally, I think women who experience this have the support of their other half, or father of their baby (well, I'd certainly like to think most men would) but in my case, I simply had my friends and my family to tug me through it.

Fast forward 3 weeks and I became very poorly. I had collapsed so many times in excruciating pain, the worst was at work, when I was due to deliver a group workshop and 10 minutes before I collapsed in agony and couldn't even stand up. An ambulance would pick me up each time, and take me to the pregnancy ward (this was even more insensitive considering I was already grieving), I was given morphine via a drip and told I was experiencing "a bad miscarraige" or "a water infection". Each time, sent home with bed rest and paracetamol.

On the morning of 29th November 2020, I was sent for a routine scan. As my HCG (Pregnancy hormone) had not dropped below 140. This was unusual and they were unsure why, I was still in agony and laying on the floor of the ward screaming in pain, again they gave me morphine and agreed to scan me. Throughout this whole process I kept hearing the possibility of "ectopic pregnancy" and if your any expectant mother, you'll know how scary those 2 words can seem. That for me is one of the worst things that you can be faced with. At every other scan, I always heard "I can't find a viable pregnancy" (and I had over 11 scans). Well, on this day, the most wonderful lady was scanning me, she listened to where the pain was coming from, and it's safe to say that when she did really look, her face dropped. And at that moment, I knew exactly what that meant.

For any woman who has had a pregnancy scan, you'll know that they aren't allowed to deliver bad news during the scan, and you have to wait for the consultant to tell you. Well, I begged this woman to tell me, I wanted to hear those words leave her mouth and sure enough she turned to me and said "I'm really sorry, but I've found the pregnancy, and it's in your fallopian tube." That same numb feeling I'd experienced 7 weeks prior filled every inch of my body all over again, if I wasn't lying down, I probably would have collapsed. Part of me was glad, and although it pains me to say that I finally felt like someone had listened to me, that I hadn't just been that "overworried, oversensitive woman" and that my gut was right. I had heard so many times over those weeks "you're just being paranoid" "just man up and get on with it" "you're just being so over the top, it's just a normal pregnancy". And now, I had the closure that I could always trust in my gut.

When I had this scan, I was alone. I was placed back into the waiting room (in agony, and once again on morphine), with the other happily pregnant women and their partners. My mum arrived soon after to support me and we were called through to see the consultant. During this time, I had endlessly googled to see if there were any chance my baby could survive. Sadly, no ectopic pregnancy survives and that was heartbreaking.

When we spoke with the consultant, she told me I was going to be going home, and that it was uncertain whether this was ectopic or a cyst on my tube. I am so glad I had my mum with me at that time, because I was in no fit state (morphine high) to argue with what this woman was saying to me. But, we demanded a laproscopy (camera surgery) to ensure this wasn't going to harm me further. She agreed and I began the wait for surgery. In this time, I had actually decided to contact the father and tell him what was happening, the response was what I should've expected and I cut it short. I remember going into surgery, it was around 5pm, being pushed into that room, crying my heart out. I felt so alone, numb and broken. I was experiencing this all alone in my eyes and noone knew how I was feeling. They gave me the mask to put me to sleep, and got me counting down from 10 to 0, the whole time I was crying, barely able to speak the numbers....

At 9pm, I came around. Once again, I was alone, I had no idea what had happened during the surgery or what had been found. I laid there crying and crying, I felt utterly broken, sore and in pain.

10am on the 30th November, my consultant that had performed the surgery came to visit me. She told me that she had some bad news, and I braced myself. During the surgery, they had found my almost 14 week pregnancy at the end of my tube, my tube had ruptured and I was bleeding internally. They told me they had to remove the baby, along with my right fallopian tube. I was in shock, again alone at this time, I sat crying and the consultant turned to me and said "why are you crying?", I had no reply for such a stupid, insensitive question, I had so many questions running around my mind, but my mouth wouldn't move, I could not verbalise a single thing. They all left, left me laying there alone in a room full of expectant mothers, those who were happy, those who were having scans or awaiting to be induced. Whilst I lay at the end of this room, once again grieving my baby. My family visited me after, and I spent another 2 nights in there as they needed to make sure I was stable.

The day I was told I could go home, I thought I'd begin to feel better, in actual fact, it was the worst day. The walk from the hospital to the car, it was bright, and sunny. Olly was doing all he could to make me feel better, he knew I was poorly and upset but didn't know why. I sat in the car and my nan and grandad dropped me home so I could shower and collect some bits. I opened the door of my flat, and collapsed into a heap on the floor. I lay there for the next 3 hours. Broken, crying and feeling nothing but emptiness. The pain continued, but the mental pain was even worse. Each day I felt more and more alone.

This is the story of the time of loosing my baby. Baby Sketch as I had named them. I was convinced the baby was a boy, as everything was exactly the same as with Olly. I didn't feel much sickness, I was feeling really warm, in my heart, I think I thought this baby was a boy. So Baby Sketch is as I will always remember them.

The Recovery

Now this bit is something, that I hope I can help someone with. I hope that if you've suffered pregnancy loss, that this will in some way reach out to you, give you hope and fill your heart with nothing but love.

As the anniversary approaches, I can reflect on the recovery journey as I have experienced it. And although I don't feel like I have "recovered" as such, I feel that I am almost through the dark and stepping into the light. I have been able to type this without any tears (so far) and that for me is a step in my journey.

Grief is a very difficult thing. They say there are 5 stages of grief, these include: Denial, Anger, Bargaining, Depression and Acceptance. As I speak about each of these, I'm going to put this in the context as they happened for me.

1. Denial

Now for me, I believe the denial stage happened twice in my experience. First, being told I'd miscarried, I refused to believe it, I didn't want to listen, or hear it. I cried, but somewhere in me kept the hope that this was wrong. I remember telling myself "but I haven't bled anymore, perhaps my baby's OK and they got it wrong". This again I felt when I was told it was ectopic, I searched google for ages looking for something else it could've been mistaken for.

2. Anger

This stage comes and goes throughout the whole time. You blame yourself, you blame other people, you become angry at others, at yourself. You begin to think "I could've done this" or "perhaps if I had done this". I beat myself up for months on end, wondering if I could've changed the outcome in some way. I was angry at life, I was angry at myself, I was angry at everyone.

3. Bargaining

This is the "what if" stage of grieving. You question everything, personally this linked in a lot with the anger stage for me. This is where you temporarily escape from whats happened, like you begin to merge into some sort of strange non-reality. But you equally, begin to think "OK this is happening, and I have to start dealing with this".

4. Depression

Now because I had a million other things happening during the months after, I became heavily depressed. This all reached tipping point in June when I almost took my life. This was the depression stage for me in all it's glory. I don't believe this was just grief that caused this, it was many other factors, I was trying to deal with so much and genuinely I have never ever felt more broken.

5. Acceptance

This is where I am at now. I gave myself the anniversary date as my "acceptance date", I didn't do this for any other reason, that I wanted to remind myself on this day, of how far I've come, how much I've grown, and that despite everything that's been thrown at me, I am able to now remember my baby, realise that I will always have a special place in my heart for them, but that without this happening, I wouldn't have grown. My accepting is not only of whats happened, but accepting that without this, I would still be in that dark place, still in an on/off situation. This period of feeling broken allowed me to transform who I was, to dig deep and find every inch of strength and keep striving forward.

I am now at acceptance.

To finish this long blog, I would like to include a poem which I have written especially to remember my baby by. This has been submitted for an award, and accepted. And the date of drawing the winners, is, you guessed it the 29th November 2020. So I really hope this holds a special spot, to mark a special day, and be published.

Baby Sketch

Becoming a mother is scary,

Each pain, flicker or twitch makes you ever so wary.

Maternal instinct starts early on,

And quite soon you know if something's wrong.

All the pains as much as they hurt,

Really made me become so alert.

All along my body was telling me,

Despite all of the doctors in disagree.

From six weeks to fourteen,

Constantly living on morphine.

They all ticked by, all such a blur,

But a different outcome, is one I'd prefer.

Sixteen trips, tons of nurses,

Still none of which converses.

With me and my mum by my side,

Ready to tell me my baby had died.

Over that 7 weeks,

A million critiques.

From no heartbeat to miscarraige,

Then finally surgery to mend a haemorrage.

No one noticed until my surgery,

In my eyes, an unreasonable, systematic perjury.

Awakening from the knife,

To tell me they'd taken their life.

Pulled away from me far too soon,

All in one cold November afternoon.

I cried and I cried with no tears left,

As well as my tube, my baby they'd theft.

That journey back home,

Once again feeling alone.

The only words to describe me were broken and numb,

Would better days ever seemingly come.

A few months later and I opened my eyes,

It was time for me to leave and to rise.

My baby had taught me and given me strength,

To never allow someone to hurt me at length.

See my baby lives on, inside of my heart,

And that way noone can tear us apart.

I wouldn't be the woman I am today,

If things didn't happen as they did that day.

I love you forever my sweet baby sketch,

And one day we'll meet and that isn't a stretch.

Although I wish I could hold you and not let go,

Just know my love for you, made me grow.

Lots of Love, forever your mummy x