After Lou was born, I had the usual pains and bleeding associated with birth. However, my bleeding stopped before I even left the hospital. The midwife told me this was likely due to how I was letting her nurse around the clock, and that we were doing a great job at helping me heal up quickly. Unfortunately, this was not true.
When baby was a week old, I noticed that I was having some abdominal discomfort. Nothing severe, but just a nagging, deep feeling, almost like a cramp that doesn’t let up. After 24 hours, I called the nurse’s line for advice, but they suspected it was diastasis recti, since I had no other symptoms. I accepted this advice and tried to move around a little more, thinking I just needed to work through the pain.
The next day, the pain was more severe. I called the nurse’s line again, and received the same “weak stomach muscles” diagnosis. I really didn’t think they were right though. This seemed like something internal, not muscular. I insisted on an appointment and they fit me in that afternoon. When the midwife went to press on my belly, I yelped. I was sent to ultrasound, where they found my uterus filled with blood and tissue.
I had two choices at this point. I could take a few pills and experience labor like pain and contractions at home, to try and expel the leftover tissue. If that didn’t work, I would need to get a D&C. I would also be caring for a newborn during all of this. Or, I could just go for the D&C. I chose the latter. I felt better about being in a controlled hospital environment. By this point, I didn’t trust anything my midwife said and I really never wanted to see anyone from that practice again. I had a really traumatic birth due to them, and being told I had diastasis recti when really I could have hemorrhaged… that was it for me. I chose the D&C and we scheduled it for a few days away.
The hardest part of this was leaving my tiny newborn baby for the 4 hours I would be gone for the surgery. This sounds a little extra, but I didn’t leave my oldest Ace with anyone until he was well over a year old. I didn’t even leave him home with my husband until he was 6 months old and I had a dental emergency… he wouldn’t take a bottle and he was such a high needs baby. So leaving Lou had me in tears. It was the middle of a bad flu season, so the hospital wouldn’t let my husband keep her in the waiting area. We dropped her and Ace off with my in-laws and headed to the hospital.
Since this was considered an “elective” procedure, I had to pay out of pocket for surgery, which was my entire deductible of $3000, as it was the first week of January and everything had just reset. We paid, got checked in, and I had to scrub down with those pre-surgical giant wipes. I got into bed and pumped, because by then I was used to nursing every 45 minutes or so. They gave me all the good drugs and the surgery itself was less than 25 minutes long. They found several pieces of placenta, including one large piece that was blocking the “exit,” which is why I had stopped bleeding before we even left the hospital after Lou’s birth.
After the trauma of my birth experience, and the trauma of the surgery, I was relieved to be home with my baby, but anxious thinking about what else could possibly go wrong. After the D&C I had a much more typical 3 weeks of bleeding, before I began to feel better, relax, and enjoy the time with Lou.
Did you have any birth complications that required help days or weeks later? I hadn’t realized the severe issues that can come with a retained placenta!
pomelo / 5621 posts
How scary! I’m glad you went with your gut and insisted on being checked. Has everything been fine since then?
I had to go for emergency surgery whe DS2 was 3 weeks old and I was in the hospital overnight. That was stressful for all of us. DH did great with both kids at home on his own.
wonderful kiwi / 23653 posts
I’m so glad you got it checked out and taken care of right away, but it must have been so much to handle after a traumatic birth and having a newborn to have to do this too. Btw, I just love the name
cherry / 194 posts
I had a very similar situation unfortunately! About 10 days postpartum, I suddenly started to bleed heavily. I didn’t have any abdominal pain but in the couple days leading up to this, my bleeding had nearly stopped and I was feeling great, so when I started to bleed heavily, I was pretty concerned. When it started to get worse, I went into the ER (per on call nurse’s advice) to get examined and had to bring the baby with us as I was breastfeeding and had no idea how long I’d be there. It was awful – every bathroom I used after an examination looked like a crime scene from the amount of blood, although the OB swore it was nowhere near as bad as a postpartum bleed could be. I ended up being in the ER for over 12 hours waiting for my OB to be free to do a D&C, and it busted one of my stitches from a tear, so it felt like I basically restarted postpartum recovery after I got home later that night. Pretty awful but I’m glad I got checked and didn’t just wait it out to see if the bleeding improved on its own since they did find free floating tissue and a lot of blood in my uterus.
pear / 1767 posts
I also had postpartum complications. My placenta broke into pieces at the delivery but the doctor assured me she had gotten it all. However, 6 weeks postpartum I was up in the middle of the night nursing and starting bleeding heavily. I called my OB that night and she told me to come in the next day for an ultrasound if the bleeding wasn’t too heavy the rest of the evening. The ultrasound showed a chunk of retained placenta so the OB I saw suggested taking misoprostol to try to dislodge the remaining tissue. That proved to be horrible advice because my placenta was attached still due to the fact that I had placenta accreta and thus there was active blood flow to the placenta still. I began to bleed very heavily and had to rush to the ER to control the bleeding (like @CASTILRM, I also had the crime scene experience). I was admitted to the hospital and was separated from my 6 week old baby for 2 days after finally hitting our stride with breastfeeding. The floor of the hospital I was on had no refrigerator to keep my breastmilk in and I wasn’t allowed to store it in the postpartum floor refrigerators. My kind sister came to the hospital a few times to bring my breastmilk to my mom and husband who were home with my two kids. My OB referred me to an RE who specialized in accreta and he suggested monitoring the placenta rather than removing it via a D&C. This was in December and I went every month or so for an ultrasound. Then one day in June, the placenta just dislodged itself and came out on its own when I was using the bathroom (sorry for the TMI!). I was fortunate to be able to avoid surgery but the whole ordeal was very stressful as I was expecting to have a surgery after my period returned since the RE seemed to this there was only a small chance my period would help expel the remaining tissue. I’m in the market for a new OB since they botched my treatment and caused a lot of unnecessary stress and a hospital stay that could have been avoided.
blogger / grape / 99 posts
@ALV91711: I’ve had a follow up ultrasound and everything looks ok now, luckily. Thank you for asking!
blogger / grape / 99 posts
@castilrm: @Shantuck: It is shocking to me how often complications like these happen. Glad you are both ok!