Pregnant Again After Miscarriage
by Lori Ramsey
Pregnancy After Miscarriage
Is it possible to become pregnant again after miscarriage? The answer is overwhelmingly yes. Fertility often returns immediately after an early miscarriage and makes conception even more possible immediately.
Having a miscarriage whether it's an early or later one can be devastating. Especially if you were trying to conceive – I'm sure the number one question on your mind is "How soon can we try again?"
If you ask your physician you will likely hear the answer, "Wait 6 weeks to 3 months." They say this to give your hormones, uterus, and body a chance to recover from the miscarriage. It allows the uterine lining to rebuild, which is especially important if you had a D&C.
However, it's possible to become pregnant immediately if you miscarried naturally. This happened to me, and here's my story.
I took chemical birth control pills from the time my first baby was born in July 1995 up until March 1997. My body had a hard time adjusting to the pill. I would take one strength and end up not having a period at all to bleeding all the time. I suffered headaches and mood swings.
When my husband and I decided that we'd try for baby #2 in summer of 1997 I quit the pills on March 4, 1997. Thinking that my body would need about 3 months to balance my hormones, I didn't even think about becoming pregnant at that point.
On April 3, 1997, my husband and I were in New Orleans having a mini-vacation. My belly began to hurt. The pain increased over the day and by that evening I was in such pain that he took me to the ER at Tulane University Medical Center. They ran a battery of tests and x-rayed my abdomen 5 times. The lab made a mistake, and the blood hCG test was indeed positive.
Imagine my surprise and horror that this happened. First, this may explain the pain I was in. Second, the 5 x-rays weren't good. They sent me up to labor and delivery to run more tests. After a night's stay and receiving IV fluids, the doctor came in to tell me the bad news.
He said I was pregnant but was going to miscarry. He didn't say why – just that my "numbers" didn’t look good. It explained the pain. He sent me away with instructions to go see my physician back home, see them if I didn't start to bleed within a week for a D&C, and see them if I did start to bleed to get care for the miscarriage.
I walked around New Orleans for 2 days knowing I was pregnant and fearing the impending miscarriage. The day we left (April 6) I began to bleed. I bled and cramped heavily for 8 long days. I went to see my doctor who said there was nothing that could be done, that these things just happen. She put me on prenatal vitamins and told me to take it easy for a couple of months.
For the entire month of April I was so sad – sad that I lost a baby that was supposed to be born that December. But we were still so busy and had another out-of-state trip to Houston toward the end of the month. I remember when we arrived I had this unusual craving for anything meat. I couldn't get enough of it. When we arrived back home, I remember thinking that it was strange that my usual PMS wasn't showing.
My sister-in-law called me on May 7, early that morning, getting me out of bed. I raced to the phone and she was calm and said "Lori, how are you feeling?" I was puzzled and told her fine – in fact so fine I didn't even have PMS. She asked if I had a pregnancy test, and I did. She said, "Go take it, and call me back with the results."
I told her if she didn't hear back that it was negative, which I fully expected it to be. Afterall, I just had a miscarriage 4 weeks prior. I figured conception was impossible at that point.
I took the test, and was so surprised to see those double lines! I was pregnant again!
I called my doctor who told me to go on to see my OB, and he got me in the next day. I had a transvaginal ultrasound the following week that showed a very healthy sac and a tiny heartbeat.
My baby was due on January 13, 1998. But my daughter was born 4 weeks early on December 16, 1997 – just 5 days past the due date of the miscarried baby! I had my December baby anyway!
What amazed me was that I conceived about 2 weeks after this miscarriage. My pregnancy was uneventful, except for the breech position of my daughter and the caesarean I had ended up with. She was just fine.
My 2nd miscarriage happened on February 1, 2005. I was just over 6 weeks along, and my doctor said, "These things just happen sometimes. It's nature’s way of dealing with an inferior pregnancy." I became pregnant again in September of that year (with my 5th baby) and carried my daughter to term.
It is possible to become pregnant again after miscarriage. The key to success is to take good care of yourself. Don't try to conceive immediately after a D&C or after a miscarriage that occurred later than around 6 weeks. Give your body time to recover and the uterus time to rebuild a good lining. If you do get pregnant immediately, see your doctor as soon as possible. Chances are good to carry a pregnancy to term and deliver a healthy baby.
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