Faces of Loss, Faces of Hope

Angela
First Baby, Miscarried @ 5.5 weeks, September 2009
Second Baby, Miscarried @ 7 weeks, January 2010
Paislee Ann born still at 24 weeks, September 2nd, 2010

Louisville, Kentucky

Nick and I had been happily married for nine months, when we decided that children were our next step to becoming a family. So in August of 2009, we started trying to conceive and lucky for us we were immediately pregnant. I had never even thought about miscarriage. My friends had never talked about it and I thought, it can never happen to me. Well I was wrong. I started having brown spotting about a week later after getting our BFP and went to a festival five hours away only to start bleeding heavily. That night I stood in the shower crying and crying over again.

We went to the doctor and she told us to wait one cycle, so that is exactly what we did.  We got a BFP in November of ’09. We were pregnant again, but this time tried not to get to excited. I read the odds of reoccurring miscarriages weren’t too high so I was expecting a healthy August ’10 baby. Not so much. At 10 weeks I started spotting brown again and went in to the doctor where they told me the baby died a 7 weeks and 1 day. I was scheduled for a D & C five days later. I woke up the day before by D & C to horrible cramping and sat on the toilet only to pass so much blood I wasn’t sure what to do. I ended up having an emergency D & C due to the heavy blood loss and drop in blood pressure.

Again we sat at the doctor’s office where we were told, wait a cycle and you can try again. We ended up getting our BFP April 2010. I would go to the office very three days to get blood work to make sure my HCG counts were doubling and they were.
 

We went in for an US at 7 weeks and there she was beating heat and all. At 8 weeks I woke up from a nap only to be welcomed by bright red blood. I remember crying and calling my husband home to go to the ER. The baby was healthy and had a heartbeat of 181. Every week after that until 12 weeks, our doctors brought us in to do US to make us feel better. Baby girl was moving every time we saw her. She looked perfect!

At 16 weeks we went in, only to find out our baby had a birth defect known as an omphalocele. This basically means her intestines did not go into her abdominal cavity but in a sac on the outside of her body. They sent us to a high risk doctor and he said everything looked good and was not concerned. She was moving as always and even rubbing her head! He did a quick 3D and she looked up waving her hand and I knew this one was it.

Four weeks later, we go in to look at the organs as the omphalocele can be associated with chromosome disorders and organ defects. They said everything looked great that they could see and they sent us on our way.

At 23 weeks, I still had not felt the baby move (at least I don’t think I did). I called the doctor only to be told wait until your appointment next week. So I did as I was told.

We went to our 24 week appointment only to be welcomed by an US picture that showed my baby girls body laying there limp with no heartbeat. We were told she stopped growing at 20 and 1 day. We here told we had to deliver her that same week. We went in on a Wednesday and delivered her on her great grandma’s birthday (09/02/10). This day was truly an amazing day! Even though I had to walk out of that hospital with nothing, I realized that we created a life and that life was precious!

Well, there are truly no answers on why we are having so many problems. The doctor believes that our stillborn was due to trisomy, which means the baby had an extra chromosome causing organ defects. We know Paislee had club feet, clenched fists, and cleft lip, but no one can say it happened before she passed or after from being in there so long. Either way, I believed it was Edwards Syndrome and extra chromosome on the 18.

We are now on our path in genetic testing and hopefully one day we can give these lost children siblings.

Angela blogs at www.paisleyannbibelhauser.blogspot.com