I feel ready to share my ectopic pregnancy story. Not sure why today in particular I feel ready to share it in its entirety, but I do. There’s a pull to share and hopefully, by sharing, I can assure others they aren’t alone if they had an ectopic pregnancy. On October 14, 2022, I tragically lost my baby to an ectopic pregnancy.
UPDATE AS OF AUGUST 2023: I am pregnant again after my ectopic pregnancy. You can read about my pregnancy after ectopic pregnancy loss here.
According to ACOG an ectopic pregnancy is, “when a fertilized egg grows outside of the uterus. Almost all ectopic pregnancies—more than 90%—occur in a fallopian tube. As the pregnancy grows, it can cause the tube to burst (rupture). A rupture can cause major internal bleeding. [Ectopic pregnancy is] a life-threatening emergency that needs immediate surgery.”
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Table of Contents
Finding out I was pregnant (before I knew it was an ectopic pregnancy)
Early in October, I was testing my LH with the Premom ovulation test that I have always used. I had been testing ever since-what I thought then-was my period in September to catch my LH rise and find out when I was ovulating. I had been tracking meticulously my cycle since I got my IUD at the beginning of the year to begin trying for another pregnancy.
My husband, Steven, and I made the choice to try again after a traumatic pregnancy with preeclampsia, prematurity, and the NICU after years of going back and forth about another pregnancy (let me know if you would like a post on how we decided!).
My LH never rose back down after I saw a positive ovulation test, which was odd. I did a quick google search and it told me that sometimes if you keep getting a positive ovulation on a strip test, it is really a positive pregnancy test. So I decided to dip a pregnancy test in my pee cup and see what it said. Sure enough, it was positive. I dug out of my bathroom cabinet some positive digital tests and took the test the next time I needed to go to the bathroom, it was also positive.
I was so excited, after months of tracking and months of negative tests, it finally happened. Steven was still at work when I found out. So I kept it to myself for the day. I put a shirt on my daughter that said “Big Sister” that I bought months before (and hid from Steven) right before Steven got home.
My daughter and I looked out the window of our house to wait for his arrival. As soon as he walked in the door, my daughter ran and hugged him (like she always does) and said, “Look at my new shirt dad!” Steven looks down and takes a few seconds to read it. His eyes looked back up to me, smiling, and said “Really?” I nodded and we all embraced in a hug. After dinner that night, we went to a local ice cream shop to celebrate.
Am I miscarrying?
The following day, I felt some cramping but nothing major. I called my doctor to schedule an appointment. According to my periods, I would only be barely 3 weeks along (which you don’t get a positive test at this time, as you barely conceived) so I explained that to the receptionist and also gave my last menstrual period before that in September. They scheduled a visit with an ultrasound in a few weeks recording both of my period dates.
I didn’t think the timing was weird, I just thought maybe when my period was it was actually just some implantation bleeding instead. My periods were off ever since I got my IUD out and were not like my normal, but I was told my periods would be off a bit since I had an IUD for 3 years and no bleeding with it.
Things were normal the next few days, and we enjoyed our little secret over the weekend. On Sunday night, at about 9 pm, I had severe cramping and nausea and started to bleed severely. I sat on the toilet, crying my eyes out because I knew what this led to since I have experienced a miscarriage before. Steven held my hand and I cried, thinking we were losing our baby right then and there. I had cramps the rest of the night, but the bright red bleeding eventually stopped and turned into a dark brown when I would wipe after using the bathroom.
Seeing the doctor for the first time
The first thing the next morning, I called my doctor and asked if I could be seen by somebody that morning because I was bleeding the night before. The receptionist told me a time and I then called my parents and neighbor to ask if they could watch my daughter (my husband had work that day). I dropped my daughter off and went to my doctor’s office.
I ended up seeing a midwife (let’s call her Sally) I hadn’t met before there that day. She asked me several questions about when my last period was, when I got the test, what the bleeding was like, how the cramps felt, etc. I also had already given a urine sample and according to my last period, I also shouldn’t have tested positive for them either.
She told me that bleeding could be normal in early pregnancy but still wanted to check on things. She thought I was further along than my last bleeding (period). They took some blood to check my HCG levels and had me come back in a few days to get another draw to see how it was progressing.
I also shared that I felt what I described as “early pregnancy flutters” but knew it couldn’t be that because I wasn’t far enough along. But I would feel a lot of swishing around especially when I lay down.
I was a nervous wreck for the following few days. Originally, Steven and I wanted to keep the news to ourselves as long as possible, because no matter what, due to our previous experiences, this pregnancy was going to be mentally, emotionally, and physically taxing on us both. We needed time to process it ourselves. I reached out to my parents, because they lived close by, and explained what was happening and ask for help to watch my daughter.
2 days later, I went into the office again. This time for only a blood draw. I got a call later that day from Sally with the results. My HCG went up, but not enough to show it was progressing how it should. The blood draw also showed them that I was further along than originally thought and they would be able to find the baby on ultrasound. She asked me if I was able to come in within the hour for an ultrasound.
The Anxiety I Experienced
I was so anxious driving to the doctor. I just felt like something was wrong. I had bad anxiety (which isn’t completely abnormal for me) about the pregnancy from the moment we decided to get the IUD out and TTC. I told my doctor the day my IUD came out, “I just feel like something bad will happen. I know it’s because it’s all I ever have known.” I was reassured that it was okay to feel that way but to remember it is a new pregnancy and new baby so it could be a different experience.
In the following months of TTC, I told tell Steven constantly, “I just feel like something horrible will happen. I feel like we are going to have a stillbirth or another kind of loss. I just feel like that is what will happen.” I knew this was my anxiety talking because I was scared to experience preeclampsia or the NICU again. I knew getting pregnant again was putting myself in the exact same position that brought me so much trauma 3 years ago. We both were willing to roll the dice, but hoping for the best.
The Ultrasound
I didn’t have to wait too long to be seen. Looking back, it’s probably because they suspected something was wrong. I saw the ultrasound tech before the midwife. She led me into the ultrasound room. She told me they would do a vaginal since I was early pregnant and asked if I wanted to put it in our have her do it, which I thought was very kind. I laid back and took a deep breath as I watched the TV screen in front of me.
Because I had an early ultrasound before in my life, I knew what I should see if things were okay. But there was nothing there. I still silently hoped I was looking at things wrong, but deep down I knew there was something wrong. The tech spent a lot of time searching and taking pictures but was silent. She eventually told me she needed more pictures of my ovary and was going to use the over-the-stomach ultrasound wand. I thought it was odd, but didn’t know what to really think.
Eventually, she told me Sally would speak with me about the ultrasound and helped me wipe up all the goo and led me to a room.
Sally came in, her expression was soft with her eyes full of empathy. She explained I had a 4 cm cyst in my ovary that appeared to be bleeding. And my uterus was empty. She said they couldn’t find a pregnancy. Sally suggested it could be either, an ectopic which was typically in a fallopian tube but could be in the ovary or the cyst was secreting HCG. I stared at her blankly. And asked, “So I’m not pregnant?”
She paused and explained the symptoms of an ectopic pregnancy: (ACOG)
- Abnormal vaginal bleeding
- Low back pain
- Mild pain in the abdomen or pelvis
- Mild cramping on one side of the pelvis
- Sudden, severe pain in the abdomen or pelvis
- Shoulder pain
- Weakness, dizziness, or fainting
She then told me that if I started to bleed again, or felt off in any sort of way to immediately go to the ER and tell them I have been watched at [name of office] for a suspected ectopic pregnancy. She told me to come in first thing the next morning to talk to my high-risk ob-gyn (we’ll call him Doctor). Sally couldn’t tell me much, because she is only a midwife and needed to counsel with Doctor, who was in surgery.
I left the office and walked toward my car in the parking lot as pregnant women walk past me, heart heavy.
Telling my husband about the ectopic pregnancy
My husband, Steven, had been at work each time I went in the middle of the day because he commutes he was unable to get back to come with me to the last-minute appointments. He had just gotten back from work and was on his way to pick up our daughter from my parent’s house. I called him and through tears attempted to explain what was told to me. All I knew for sure it was not a viable pregnancy and a suspected ectopic pregnancy.
Steven was quiet at first and assured me it was going to be okay. After we picked our daughter up and explained to my parents what was learned and got settled at home. We held each other and cried.
The beginning of the end
The next morning we hurried and dropped our daughter off at my parents’ house and went to the office. We had to wait a while because it wasn’t explained to the next midwife on call what I was in again for. So she had to call both Sally and Doctor. Doctor was in surgery all morning, so he wasn’t even at the office. They decided to take blood draws again to see where HCG was and would call me as soon as the results came in. They told me again if anything changed to immediately go to the ER.
So Steven and I left. We picked our daughter back up and just waited around for a call. We ate lunch, took her to a park had some frozen yogurt, and just waited for any news. Around 2 pm I finally got a call from the office asking me to come in an hour to see Doctor and if anything changed. I called my parents to ask if we could drop off our daughter again and then we headed to my doctor’s office.
We didn’t wait long, I was taken back almost immediately. Doctor came in with a nurse and explained everything cut and dry (which is one of the things I love most about him–he tells it how it is).
“You have what we call pregnancy of unknown location. All we know is it isn’t the uterus. The cyst has started to burst, which is what the blood flow was on the ultrasound. And I suspect the pregnancy is in your tube, which is an ectopic pregnancy, based on your HCG levels and the ultrasound.” Later explained that it was possible it was a ruptured ectopic pregnancy and that the treatment for ectopic pregnancy he recommended was surgery.
“Okay.” was all I said.
He explained to me how the surgery would go. It would be laparoscopic with 3 incisions if my tube was too damaged he would take it out but would try to keep it and he would do a d&c to make sure everything was out and recovery would be about 6 weeks.
I nodded while slowly putting the pieces together, “Oh like this is happening today?”
He nodded. “Yes, like right now.”
I then burst into tears, and in between sniffles tried to explain that my daughter’s birth was an emergency surgery too. His eyes were very kind and said, “Surgery is scary. I would be more concerned if you weren’t scared.” The nurse chimed in, “This surgery will be in a more controlled environment and it’ll be an outpatient procedure.” I nodded shaking, and they handed me tissues before leaving for a moment to get the paperwork that needed to be signed and done in the office and call the hospital to let them know I was coming.
I called my parents and quickly explained we would be longer and that I was going into surgery at the hospital. And Steven would call with updates when we are done. Quickly, we signed the paperwork and drove over to the hospital.
At the hospital
We checked in at the reception and the woman there asked what we were there for, through tears, I somehow muttered, “I have an ectopic pregnancy.”. She led me to Labor & Delivery and explained to the nurses. A nurse took me to a labor/birthing room. It brought back flashbacks of the many hospital stays I had with my daughter, even though at a different hospital, it looked the same to me.
A short time later, what was I assume to be the charge nurse, came in and apologized saying I needed to go somewhere else because they don’t do ectopic pregnancy in L&D and the reception woman was new so she took me to the wrong place. The second I stepped into those hospital doors, I was a waterfall of tears. This sweet nurse handed me a box of tissues and wrapped her arms around me saying how sorry she was and she wished she could take care of me. She wrapped her arms then around my shoulders and she lead Steven and me where we needed to go.
While waiting to be taken back to pre-op, Steven texted his boss that needed some time off the next week and to be able to work from home because of the ectopic pregnancy surgery. Kindly, his boss messaged back words of comfort and how sorry he was.
Pre-op for ectopic pregnancy surgery
Soon enough, I was given a wristband and taken back into the pre-op doors. The nurse asked if I needed to go to the bathroom before. I nodded. While there, I said a quick prayer of strength and comfort as I tried to stop crying.
As soon as I got into the hospital bed, it was all hands on deck. One nurse was taking blood work, one was getting information from Steven, another was getting vitals and an anesthesiologist came in to talk about going under. I was shaking, and crying, and somehow between tears, I could answer the questions they were asking me.
“Yes, I have been under general anesthesia before.”
“I get nauseous with anesthesia.”
“I last had food at lunchtime. It was a sandwich and frozen yogurt.”
“I am sorry I am crying so much.”
As I answered each question, everyone there was so kind to me. Told me it was okay to be sad and scared. I was losing my baby and possibly my tube. They were going to take great care of me. Then, a nurse asked if it was alright a student was in on ectopic pregnancy surgery. I agreed, jokingly saying, “Well I’ll be completely out so who cares who’s in there.”
Doctor came in and told me a dad joke. It made me laugh through tears. And told me it was going to be alright. He turned to Steven and told him as soon as he was done, he would tell Steven everything that happened. It was then ready to go–I kissed Steven goodbye.
In what seemed like seconds from getting onto the hospital bed, I was being moved quickly down the hall to the OR. I squeezed the anesthesiologist’s hand with my left and the nurse’s with my right hand as my crying turned into full-on sobs. They helped me slide onto the OR table and went right to work. The anesthesiologist was so kind and tried to help me settle down and breathe. Because I had food recently, another nurse was holding my esophagus closed (which I believe is what she said) so I didn’t puke. Another nurse checked on things, and I immediately grabbed her hand.
She looked at me and said, “Honey, squeeze it as tight as you want. I won’t leave you.”
I felt claustrophobic but tried to listen to the anesthesiologist as he instructed me to breathe. Which was the last thing I remember.
Post-op from ectopic pregnancy surgery
The next thing I remember, I was in recovery. Steven was holding my hand and I felt like I was going to puke. I kept drifting off to sleep because my eyelids felt so heavy. I asked Steven, “Is our baby okay?” As he shook his head the nurse, which wasn’t any of the same ones who prepped me for surgery, immediately piped in and said, “It wasn’t baby.” and left, but quickly came back with, what looked to be the size of a large pill bottle, “See? No baby.”
As we both looked at it, I recognized the formation of an early pregnancy inside, of what was part of my tube, and looked to be about 8 weeks. I understand that the nurse might have not thought it was a baby, medically, just a “product of conception” but I really wasn’t coherent enough to say anything different to her and just accept that it was our baby we lost due to an ectopic pregnancy.
I’m not sure how much time passed, but eventually, I was okay to head home after discharge instructions. A wheelchair was brought over to me and I slowly got out of the hospital bed. I thought it would feel like a c-section, where it felt like my insides will spill out, but it surprised me how easy it was to move.
I was wheeled out while we waited for Steven to bring the car to the front doors. The nurse made small talk with me as we waited. She was nice, but I was grateful she was not one of my pre-op nurses while I was crying hysterically due to what she said earlier about our baby not being a baby.
After Steven helped me into the car, he handed me a folder inside, with pictures. The doctor took pictures during the ectopic pregnancy surgery so we could see. I couldn’t believe how large the cyst in my ovary was and how much it was bleeding. I also saw our baby inside my tube. It looked the same as we saw it in a plastic tube, which made me feel better that it truly was our baby.
We called my parents and they met us at our house. My dad and Steven helped me out of the car and up the stairs to our front door and got me settled on our couch. They chatted with us and we talked about how ectopic pregnancy surgery went. Showed the pictures and had to keep reminding our daughter that she couldn’t touch mommy’s tummy because “she had a boo-boo”. My parents bought us some pizza so Steven could finally eat and then left with a promise to check on us the next day.
Steven got Cora into bed because at this point it was late into the night. And we just sat next to each other, in silence as we cried. He soon fell asleep and I googled, “ectopic pregnancy” all night long.
The realization we lost our baby to an ectopic pregnancy
I didn’t sleep that night. I was still wired from anesthesia. I messaged a few friends to tell them I had an ectopic pregnancy, and what happened with it and just watched Netflix on the couch. Steven slept on the couch with me to be with me and also help me with whatever I needed. I was just so sad and kept crying.
The next morning, we explained to our daughter that there wasn’t a baby in mommy’s tummy anymore. And answered all of her 3-year-old mind questions we could. As we explained we cried and held each other. Our daughter said much after we talked about the baby that was no longer, “It’s okay baby is in heaven.” Which made us cry even more. We cried for hours and hours, realizing our baby died. We discussed names because it felt wrong to not give our baby a name.
Sharing about ectopic pregnancy publicly
We decided later that day we didn’t want to keep the ectopic pregnancy to ourselves. We were so lonely and empty with our daughter’s traumatic birth 3 years ago keeping to ourselves at first, that we wanted as much support as we could get. We hoped that if we shared, we would be able to get support. We wrote a post together to go on our personal pages, as well as this blog’s social media. As shown below,
“We lost our baby.
Friday I had an emergency surgery due to an ectopic pregnancy and a large bleeding cyst in my ovary.
Baby was in my Fallopian tube and my tube is gone too. I had also a d & c.
We are devastated. It took us a long time to be able to think about having another pregnancy. And took a long time for me to be medically able to and months to get a positive test. We kept the pregnancy to ourselves and my doctors until we had to reach out for help.
Steven and I are so grateful for my doctors who listened to me when I first bled on Monday and had me come in. Who ran lots of blood work to check my hcg and when that wasn’t going up, gave me an ultrasound where it was all discovered. I was sent to the hospital from my appointment with my doctor to have the surgery. We got to see our baby when I woke up from surgery.
We are numb. We are sad. We are blessed and grateful for my medical team and all the nurses and nurse antheisologist who held my hands in the OR while I was going under and comforted me because Steven couldn’t be there with me. We are blessed there was time for Steven to give me a short priesthood blessing before and I know Heavenly Father was there during the surgery helping and comforting.
It feels like a cruel joke that this happened during October, which is Pregnancy and Infant Loss Awareness Month. And the night before the awareness day (Which is today) where everyone lights a candle to honor babies lost. But also during my birthday weekend (my bday is tomorrow).
We will be okay eventually. Right now we aren’t. We miss our baby. And we are working on a name for our baby so baby smith will be remembered. We were so excited to have a second chance of a better outcome for a pregnancy and birth and for Cora Belle to be a big sister. She will always be a big sister, but our baby is in heaven. And she will not be able to realize this until she’s older.
I’m sharing because we are grieving. We miss our baby. And tonight we are lighting a candle for our baby for Pregnancy and Infant Loss Awareness Day.
Please send us prayers we can get through this. We are not okay right now but we will be.”
The kindness and support we got was incredible. This community through my blog, really showed up for me, and it meant so much. Others in my personal life privately messaged me with comforting words. Flowers came to our door, meals, gift cards, books, etc. Our church gave us meals for a week, which relieved a lot of burden on Steven being the sole caretaker.
It meant so much to see the people in my life show up for me when I needed comfort. I will never forget all those who gave us some sort of comfort or help. Some friends messaged me weeks and months later which meant a lot. It meant so much to see that those who I kept close in my life, showed up when I needed them. It was a night and day difference of help and support from when our daughter was born prematurely and in the NICU. We were treated much more kindly, which sometimes felt like it was because our baby died, so people felt bad for us. Either way, we felt supported.
The next day, was also Pregnancy and Infant Loss Awareness Day. We lit a candle in honor of the baby we lost. I still really not believing ectopic pregnancy happened to us.
2 days after surgery, I had my birthday. It was the worst and saddest birthday I ever had. My parents gave me a sweet gift though, which was a painting I found the night we lost our baby online of a baby being held up toward heaven.
Beginning recovery from ectopic pregnancy surgery
By 6 weeks post-op, I felt pretty recovered from ectopic pregnancy surgery. I visited my doctor again (I saw him 3 times since surgery) and he cleared me for everything. I asked him what the cause of ectopic pregnancy was. He explained there were several risk factors, such as endometriosis, pelvic disease, etc.
I did not have any major risk factors. He kindly told me that it isn’t much of an explanation, but I just had bad luck. Because he took out my damaged tube, my risk for reoccurrence was much lower. Learn more about risk factors from the Ectopic Pregnancy Trust here.
I could do everything on my own. I was back to work with my full hours. I still felt (and still feel) not as strong physically or with as much endurance as before in my workouts, but each day I feel more like myself. Emotionally, it comes and goes. I don’t feel as traumatized as I did with my daughter’s birth, mostly because my medical team this go around explained things very clearly and were very supportive and sensitive to me. My doctor is incredible.
In the beginning, I was crying all the time. It was all I could think about. I wanted everybody to know I was so sad and hurt and that I lost my baby. And I lost my baby by an ectopic pregnancy. To me, that carried more weight than “miscarriage”. I also felt like was different than a miscarriage.
Once my hormones leveled back down to non-pregnant, I felt more emotionally stable. The emotions still come and go. We have photos hanging in our home that memorializes our baby and we had our own little memorial for some closure. Each day that passes, I feel more and more okay.
Several weeks, after we lost our baby to ectopic pregnancy. My friends from high school surprised me with a box at my door filled with incredibly thoughtful gifts. One of the gifts was a picture my friend drew of our family:
Don’t get me wrong. I will always wish an ectopic pregnancy never happened to me. I will always miss our baby, whom we named Abel Faith. But I felt like I was moving through the grieving process, much faster than I did with my traumatic birth 3 years prior.
By the time this post publishes, it’ll be 3 months since we lost our baby due to ectopic pregnancy. I should be getting close to the third trimester by now. We would know if we were having a boy or a girl. We should be preparing a nursery and getting ready to be a family of 4.
Instead, we have a memory box.
A memory box filled with all the hopes and dreams we had for a baby we will never meet.
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