Threatened Miscarriage

Yup, sounds ominous right? Well, I've been having some light brown spotting on and off for about the last week or so when I go to the bathroom and I can see it on my pantiliner. It's about the size of a nickel or a little larger most of the time, and it's not everyday that I see it, and on the days that I do see it, it's like one time during that day. I decided not to worry about it, brown means old, probably implantation spotting that never came out. Thursday night at work, I went to the bathroom around 9pm. Saw the quarter-sized spot on my pantiliner and thought nothing of it again. Around midnight, I started with some mild cramping, like I get before my period comes, but nothing like it is during my period. I ignored it. I went to the bathroom around 1:30am and found more brown spotting, and this time when I wiped, there was more and it was funny looking.

I went back to my room, and of course, googled it. I know, I shouldn't have done that. I read mixed things about it-it was either ok and very common, or, that it's "how my miscarriage started only to go on and turn pink and bright red". Lovely. So, what did I do, but start to panic. I called and left my nurse a message. I've not yet been released to my OB, so I couldn't call them, and I felt stupid calling the on-call doctor for the RE's practice and waking them in the middle of the night for something that if "it" was happening, they really wouldn't be able to do anything about at 2am anyway. I was hoping my nurse would call me early in the AM and I could be seen for an ultrasound to check on things.

As I sat and got more panicked, my friend came in and I lost it. I was crying and obviously upset. She suggested I just go up to our L&D unit and get checked because it would be at least another 6 hours before I could talk to my nurse, and it was only going to bother me more. She was right. So we went upstairs, and lovely friend that she is stayed with me most of the time (I had texted Archie a couple of times, but he had yet to respond to my texts). They got me checked in, drew a CBC, HCG, and a type and cross (I guess in case I needed blood). The resident came in to do an ultrasound. My friend waited on the other side of the curtain to give me my privacy. My nurse was 27 weeks pregnant and told me that of her 3 pregnancies she had brown spotting with two of them-one she miscarried, but this one was just fine. I could have lived without hearing about the miscarried one. The resident kept looking and looking and looking. It wasn't reassuring. She called the fellow in, and he looked and looked, and said, well, we see a gestational sac, but not yolk sac and no fetus. I was crying. The nurse and resident told me not to cry, it may just be too early. I told them at 6 weeks and 5 days, they are telling me that they can't see a fetus which might be ok, but to tell me that you don't see a yolk sac that was clearly there last week is not normal, and no it's not just too early. I felt like saying I wasn't born yesterday, but I just shut my mouth. My friend texted me comforting words. I still had yet to hear from Archie and I'd been in L&D for an hour and a half already.

I told them that my last ultrasound I had a completely empty bladder and since I'd been waiting for this one, maybe I just needed to relieve myself and then they could check again. The resident again couldn't find a hole in the wall and called the fellow. The resident hadn't put the ultrasound probe in far enough or angled it correctly. The fellow found the gestational sac, the yolk sac, and the fetus (which resembled a grain of rice). They said they saw cardiac activity and kept saying, "Don't you see that fluttering?" They didn't have the screen pointed towards me and there was a glare on what I could see, so I told them I couldn't see anything except the gestational sac and the yolk sac. They had to point out to me what the fetus was on the picture they printed out. They said the baby's heartbeat measured about 130 bpm which is great.

The fellow explained that I am having what they call a "threatened miscarriage" and about 50% of those cases will go on to have normal pregnancies, 50% will miscarry. Great, thanks. He recommended rest, said I was doing everything I could already, said it could just be old from implantation. Our next ultrasound was scheduled for this coming Monday. I talked to my nurse at 6:30am and she said we could keep that appointment or push it back to later in the week, and if we pushed it back we'd probably be able to see more change in the fetus at that point. That's what I really want to see to be reassured that things will be ok, so now our next ultrasound will be Friday at 3:15pm. Archie finally called me at 5am (as did my mom who I'd emailed), and turns out he had left his phone at home. I told him what was going on and he sounded deflated, but didn't really say much else. He wishes I hadn't changed the appointment, but I just felt it was best. I haven't had anymore spotting, but I continue with cramping which is annoying. The cramping is mostly mild with an occassional sharper, stronger cramp mixed in there.

I'm not sure at this point when we'll tell Jack about this pregnancy. The plan had been to tell him after our ultrasound on Monday. After the other night, I was thinking maybe I'd just take him with us to the nuchal translucency ultrasound at 9-11 weeks, but that's longer than we'd originally wanted to wait. Maybe we'll feel ok with telling him if the baby is still growing on ultrasound this Friday and measuring correctly.

With our last clinic before our doctor left and went to this one, we were released to our OB's after an ultrasound with a heartbeat, usually around 8 weeks, so I had called to get the appointment made after we had our first ultrasound, and that appointment is supposed to be for June 15th. I asked my nurse the other day when I'd be released and she said they usually do 3 ultrasounds before releasing us, they just don't want a long period of time to go between the last time they see us and when we see our OB's. I may postpone seeing my OB if it means I'll get another ultrasound after the one on Friday (I'll be almost 8 weeks by then) to assure things are good. I've never seen my doc have an ultrasound machine in her office, and I think they make you go somewhere else if you need one, and since I think 8 weeks may be early for her to hear the baby's heartbeat by doppler, it may just be better for me to wait rather than possibly start to worry more at that appointment. Maybe I'll just keep the appointment with her and try to make an earlier rather than later appointment for the nuchal scan. I don't know. Any suggestions? My brain is so clogged, but I'm trying to relax and destress, I just had to get it all out.

***Edited to add that after publishing this post this morning, I had more spotting, similar to Friday. Guess I'll ignore it unless something more severe happens.***