Lucy’s Story

In August 2022 we found we were pregnant for the first time. All was fine for the first 4 months, had check ups at 8 week, a scan at 12 weeks and a heartbeat appointment at 16 weeks. After this, I started to feel weird, having not been pregnant before, I tried to not overthink it… but as the days went by, my anxiety started to rise, the fatigue kicked in, and I felt unwell every time I laid in bed. I was no longer sleeping, I felt miserable and no one was listening… it’s normal, just get on with it, the midwife said unsympathetically, – you’re 36 of course you’re exhausted…I knew it wasn’t me, but I was too stunned to say anything else. The next two weeks I was a wave of nerves, insomnia had taken hold and I didn’t know what to do to settle myself.

The night before our 20 week appointment, I was convinced there was something wrong. Call me crazy, but in my gut I knew, I just wasn’t prepared for what came next. We walked in for our scan, and the sonographer was upbeat for about a minute… and then went silent, deadly silent…

What’s wrong, I asked…
Silence carried on. I’m gonna get someone else to have a look.
My husband and I looked nervously at each other. Another person came in, prodded me silently, before leaving and returning the original sonographer. The scanner machine was turned off and we were ushered to the relatives room.
I didn’t know what was coming next, but I knew it wasn’t good.
You’ve got no amniotic fluid and we can’t see babies kidneys. You’ve obviously had a leak and not told us. This comment was like a knife to my heart. They told us we needed to go to London hospital to see a specialist, if they find a kidney, it will be okay, if they don’t, it wont.

We had a nervous wait for 2 days waiting for this appointment. Scan in London was worse than the one in Frimley. No kidneys, and an ineffective bladder. We were told there was no hope. I was given the choice (it didn’t feel like much of a choice) have a TFMR or schedule an “abortion” but there was a 3 week waiting list. We opted to TFMR and I took medication that day to ease her suffering and bring on early labour, and two days later on 15th Jan 2023 (21 weeks exactly) our daughter Lucy was born, she weighted 0,94bs. People have mixed feelings about TFMR, but being able to hold our daughter, and name her, and have a proper funeral was the right choice for us.

I can’t fault the bereavement team at the hospital, they were absolutely faultless, and I was able to make a memory box and the team took some photos. Sending love to anyone in this position.

Kelly Clark