Brittany’s Story

When I began having painful contractions at 13w1d with twins, I was confused and chalked it up with "pregnancy pains." I was at work and decided to take a short walk to see if it eased the pain. Along my walk, I had a sudden urge to use the restroom. My life changed from that point forward. I ended up delivering one of the twins in the restroom and the other at the hospital with an emergency D&C as I was losing too much blood. So much blood in fact that I was not far from losing my own life and required two blood transfusions back to back. 

 When meeting with my OB and even an MFM to discuss what happened, they ruled out IC because of the contractions being painful. We went on to become pregnant with twins again and while we were cautious, we hoped for the best. At 17weeks I noticed that my bump had dropped significantly. I mentioned it to everyone and they all tried to comfort me with it's nothing. But at 17w4d I started having painless contractions. Just a slight tugging sensation really. I went into my OB that afternoon and as the OB performed a cervical exam I knew right away something wasn't right. She took too long to respond and let me know what was going on. She finally shared, "I'm sorry but you are 3cm dilated and your membranes are bulging." 

 I cannot begin to describe the feeling I had from that point on. Dread maybe. Utter heartbreak. We went to the hospital where I was admitted immediately, placed in a slightly upside-down position in my bed to hope gravity would help. The plan was to perform an emergency cerclage but the outcome wasn't promised. We knew it would only buy us a few weeks, at the very best. 

 The TVC (transvaginal cerclage) placement went well and we were discharged the next day. But again, I knew something wasn't right immediately before we even left the hospital room. I didn't say anything except to my partner. After a day and a half of having a leaking sensation we went back into the hospital (over an hour away due to their gestational age) and I tested positive for amniotic fluid. We were faced with a very difficult decision. Ultimately, we decided to have the cerclage removed and we delivered both twins exactly 2 hours from the removal at 18 weeks. 

 I was diagnosed with IC and while I felt relief that there was an answer my heart broke because had I been diagnosed with our first twin loss, we wouldn't be going through the pain of another twin loss. A lot of healing needed to take place and through that healing, we discovered the transabdominal cerclage procedure.  I am currently pregnant, scheduled to deliver in 5 days. I spend a lot of time split between excitement and sadness to have experienced all that loss in order to be here. There needs to be more advocacy and standards for women who've experienced one loss.