u/Seeking_peace2808

I am 3 weeks out today from a very sudden and unexpected TFMR at 29 weeks.

I’m so so sad. I cry a lot every day. Some hours I’m alright and continue on with my responsibilities and taking care of my 2 other children. Other times I feel so full of sadness and despair.

In ways I feel like the grief and sadness is getting worse. It feels a lot different than those first 1-2 weeks of getting the shocking news that something went terribly wrong and having the delivery etc.

I do have a history of anxiety and OCD and I’m worried about falling into a deep dark hole and not being able to climb out. I don’t currently feel like that but I’m afraid I’m headed in that direction.

I’ve also had several people who are very close to me insinuate that it’s time to start picking up the pieces and moving on and “being grateful for everything that I do have” and I should return to work asap. I’m a labor and delivery nurse so I know work is going to be so triggering and I’m not ready to go back. And I want to throat punch them because like…. I just lost a child 3 weeks ago??!!! Am I really supposed to be further along in my grief at this point?

Just looking for support and words of reassurance and anything else you have to offer.

I am 3 weeks out today from a very sudden and unexpected TFMR at 29 weeks.

I’m so so sad. I cry a lot every day. Some hours I’m alright and continue on with my responsibilities and taking care of my 2 other children. Other times I feel so full of sadness and despair.

In ways I feel like the grief and sadness is getting worse. It feels a lot different than those first 1-2 weeks of getting the shocking news that something went terribly wrong and having the delivery etc.

I do have a history of anxiety and OCD and I’m worried about falling into a deep dark hole and not being able to climb out. I don’t currently feel like that but I’m afraid I’m headed in that direction.

I’ve also had several people who are very close to me insinuate that it’s time to start picking up the pieces and moving on and “being grateful for everything that I do have” and I should return to work asap. I’m a labor and delivery nurse so I know work is going to be so triggering and I’m not ready to go back. And I want to throat punch them because like…. I just lost a child 3 weeks ago??!!! Am I really supposed to be further along in my grief at this point?

Just looking for support and words of reassurance and anything else you have to offer.

I’m a week and a half out from TFMR and delivery of my 29 week son. Everything was perfect until a routine 28 week scan where they diagnosed severe ventriculomegaly. That led to other testing which revealed a stage 4 brain hemorrhage and catastrophic damage to his brain.

Some test results are coming back now and everything is negative. Amnio was negative for CMV and toxoplasmosis. Genetics were all normal. Placenta was normal. We’re just waiting for the autopsy results which I’m not expecting to give us any answers either.

I’m so angry. He was perfect. We made a perfect baby. He didn’t have anomalies or genetic abnormalities. He formed perfectly “normal”. Something sudden and catastrophic happened and it just destroyed him.

I’m now questioning everything that happened in the 4 weeks between a normal ultrasound and the abnormal one. What did this to my perfectly healthy baby???

He should have been ok.

This was my third pregnancy and would have been my third and final baby. My first 2 pregnancies had some complications but were mainly filled with anxiety. I am a labor & delivery nurse, so I know too much, I’ve seen too much. But, this pregnancy was different. I wasn’t anxious. It was my last baby, I was an old pro at this point. I’d done so much work in therapy to control my anxiety.

Everything was perfect. NIPT, anatomy scan, fetal echo. I walked into my 28 week routine ultrasound appointment without a single worry. I could tell almost instantly that something wasn’t right. The tech told me his brain had lots of fluid and the ventricles were very large. I searched through my brain trying to understand what this meant. His ventricles were measuring 17mm and 20mm. 4 weeks prior, everything was normal. I needed a fetal MRI.

After a full day of testing and consults, we got the most devastating news. He had a stage 4 brain bleed, the entire left side of his brain was dead, his ventricles were already larger at 20mm and 25mm, he had a blockage in his aqueduct between the third and fourth ventricles. The neurologist and MFM predicted it would only get worse. His prognosis was so poor. He would never walk, talk, eat on his own. He would have seizures. He would need a shunt immediately. They also predicted that with the expected worsening, he could be vegetative by the time I gave birth. There really was no choice in that moment. I couldn’t do that to him. I couldn’t do that to us and our living children.

We elected for a TFMR. I had to travel to a different state to have the injection since we were so far along. I came back to my home state to deliver. The induction was rough. I was surrounded by people who knew me (remember I’m a L&D nurse), and that gave me some comfort. I just never could have predicted that a situation I had helped other moms go through so many times would be something I personally went through.

We are now a week out from delivery. I never expected it to be so hard. That first week between the ultrasound and the delivery was spent with such fear, research, scheduling appointments, so many logistics. It’s all over now and I’m left with such an emptiness. This has robbed me of my joy. Watching my 2 living children play doesn’t bring me the same happiness it did 2 weeks ago. I feel disconnected. Some days I’m ok, but today I just can’t stop the tears. My husband is a great support but it’s been different for him. He’s able to pick up the pieces and keep himself occupied way easier than I am.

How do I go back to work? I help women deliver healthy babies every day. My sister had her second baby 2 days after we got this devastating news. How am I supposed to watch her with her baby? This is hard. I’m so sad. I can’t believe I have to live with this forever. One of the only things getting me through is the thought that we’ll try again and get the baby we so badly wanted. But it won’t be him.

We don’t have a cause yet. So far all of the testing has come back negative. I feel like we’ll never know why this happened. It was a split second thing that caused a cascade of terrible events.

I’m not sure what I’m looking for? Support? Words of wisdom? Similar stories? Share it all, please.