Those were three very long days with my husband gone and a fresh bout of light bleeding combined with perpetual nausea at the peak of my morning sickness. I was on the fence over whether to call the doctor about the bleeding—after all, just that Monday the ultrasound with the specialist had shown nothing but our baby looking totally fine, and we had a follow-up with the primary OB on Friday. Ultimately, the bleeding was disconcerting but never seemed to reach an urgent level, so I decided to wait.
That Friday, my primary doctor said that the spotting was likely nothing, but she disagreed with the specialist, insisting that I did have a septate uterus and that we should continue to get weekly or at least bi-weekly ultrasounds. Our happy bubble of being completely out of the woods deflated slightly, but we knew it would be better to err on the side of caution.
Several days later, I had one glorious day with no spotting or brown discharge. For one glorious day, I thought the worst was over. Then the brown spotting picked back up and began to look a little more reddish, like a rust colored discharge. We had an ultrasound when I was at 12 weeks, and despite all my spotting, the baby still looked great. We started to talk seriously about when we were going to tell everyone our exciting news.
This is the point in the story, my friends, when things get really ugly. I am going to give detailed accounts of our first two ER visits and overnight hospital stay, and if you’re squeamish at all, or if a story about extremely heavy bleeding in pregnancy that includes a threatened miscarriage might be triggering, or if you don’t like to hear about blood or bodily functions, save yourself now. Trust me, I will not be offended. It’s weird enough for me to put these details out on the Internet as it is, so I understand if it’s not your cup of tea. You have been warned.
Two days after the ultrasound, in the last hour of my shift while I was daydreaming about what kind of fun announcement we could do for our family and friends, I noticed some bright red spotting while I was in the bathroom. I sighed and returned to work, trying to tell myself once again that it was nothing. But in the last twenty minutes, when my co-worker had gone to take a break and I was left alone, and I could smell freedom, I began to feel the gushing start.
Seriously, I can’t express how uncomfortable it is to be taking someone’s order for mocha frappes and asking them if they want whipped cream all while feeling like you’re completely wetting your pants. Thankfully, I was busy enough by myself that I didn’t have much time to think about it other than—you just have to make it until she gets back, any minute now... As soon as she returned, I bailed. I discovered that I had filled a pad in half an hour, and I couldn’t tell if it was really slowing down or not. When we had gotten home and realized it was still going steady, I called the doctor.
She put an order in for us to get an emergency ultrasound at the hospital. I was told to drink 32 ounces of water and hold it until the scan. My husband had just chugged a bunch of water as well, and he told me he would hold it in solidarity. Major husband points. After waiting in the busy waiting room for an hour, and my husband bugging the receptionist at least once to see if they were going to get me in any time soon, I sent him to the bathroom, and then I finally went myself.
That was when the really heavy bleeding began. I thought maybe it had something to do with the pressure of holding my bladder for so long, but I was gushing blood like I never had before. When I finally thought I would be okay, and was able to mostly clean myself up, I stood up and went three steps to the sink to wash my hands, and immediately filled up another pad with blood. I retreated back to the toilet and heard my phone go off in my purse on the other side of the bathroom. I knew it was my husband asking if I was okay, and that they were probably (finally) waiting to take me back for the ultrasound, but what could I do?
I sat there and waited until I had calmed down and the bleeding had slowed down a little bit more. By the time I opened the door, my husband was standing right outside looking concerned and clearly extremely vexed that the ultrasound tech had taken so long. I felt wobbly, because I was traumatized by the intense gushing that had just occurred. I mean, thank goodness we were in a hospital, but seriously.
We did the ultrasound, and once again the baby looked totally fine, bouncing around doing baby things. The tech couldn’t give us anymore information or insight into the bleeding. I called my doctor and explained to her about the terrifying bleeding experience I’d had, and she put me on the schedule to come in to the office first thing in the morning. She also told me that if the bleeding worsened or continued heavily for another hour or two that we should go to the emergency room.
Two hours later, we went to the emergency room. They did a quick ultrasound to check the baby’s heartbeat since we had done a full scale ultrasound earlier, and the baby entertained them for a couple minutes with its acrobatic antics. The young doctor did an exam, which was quite painful because of the bleeding, but he said that the active bleeding had stopped and all he could see was old blood. He apologized that the exam was so uncomfortable and told me that the exam had hurt him too, to which my husband responded after all the doctors and nurses left the room, “I can make it hurt for him.” I include this anecdote because 1) I found it hilariously exasperating, 2) my husband is my hero, and 3) this is an example of a doctor who does not take women seriously. If you find yourself with such a doctor in a non-emergency situation, find another one!
His supervisor came in shortly after and gave us quite a bit of comfort. He said that they see many pregnant women with bleeding like this, and some much worse. He said it can go either way, but in our situation, since there was no sign of miscarriage, and that I was not crippled with cramps or severe abdominal pain, odds were, everything would turn okay in the end and our baby would be just fine.
The next day, my doctor told me that there was no obvious reason for the bleeding, which was insanely frustrating. She said it was possible though that I had been overdoing it, and that I should take at least the next four or five days off, find a good show or movie marathon and do nothing but relax.
I’d always wanted to watch Gilmore Girls, and now seemed like the perfect time. For the rest of that day and all day Saturday, I binged, forcing myself to watch another episode rather than get up and clean something like I wanted to do. It inspired a level of snark and sass that would be useful in what lay ahead.
(To be continued...)
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