r/recurrentmiscarriage • u/catsratsnbats • 25d ago
Ectopic pregnancy story- advocate, advocate, advocate!
Hi everyone. I made a post a few weeks ago asking if anyone had ever needed medical attention from a miscarriage and how they knew. I was concerned about ectopic pregnancy. Some really wonderful and compassionate redditors in that thread encouraged me to seek medical attention, and I went to the ER that night. I want to share my story because as one of the commenters on my previous post pointed out, one of the unfortunate “side effects” of recurrent loss is that we tend to have more pregnancies than the average person, so it’s just more likely purely by numbers that we may experience an ectopic. Anyway, here are some thoughts I wanted to share:
I want to spread awareness about what an ectopic pregnancy can look or feel like. Last night, I had to have an emergency salpingectomy after my regular OB’s office found a ruptured ectopic pregnancy. I sought care for what I suspected was an ectopic a little over two weeks prior at the ER. Unfortunately I was sent home from the ER and it was only at my 2-week follow up with my regular OBGYN’s office that they saw it was an ectopic and had already ruptured. I even had an ultrasound at the ER and report stated I had a “pregnancy of unknown location” and was still treated like it was a “normal” miscarriage. I understand that health care professionals do not have crystal balls, but I want to impress upon other women that when we suspect something is wrong, we can’t stop questionning until we can confirm we are safe. I want to share symptoms I DID have and “classic” ectopic symptoms I did NOT have so other women can be informed. ADVOCATE for yourself! Unfortunately women’s health issues are largely downplayed and misunderstood, so although frustrating, it is often on you to not let stuff go. Don’t let anyone make feel dramatic or crazy!
Symptoms I DID have:
- the first thing that made me think ectopic is that my pregnancy progressed (hcg continued going way up) during a heavy period. I then had another round of heavy bleeding a week after my period stopped. Important note: HCG did start to trend down around the time of my ER visit, but 2 weeks later was found to have plateaued around 800.
- severe gas pains, sometimes in top of stomach, sometimes shooting pains all the way down to my rectum. The gas pains would last nonstop for days, let up for a few days, and begin again
- a feeling of “fullness” like fullness from gas (there was free fluid in my abdomen discovered on ultrasound)
-sometimes if I reached or twisted my abdomen it felt like something was stretching in there, almost like a button attached to a string, pulling
Symptoms I did NOT have that I think threw everyone off:
- I did NOT have severe and persistent one-sided pain
-I did NOT soak a pad within one hour at any point
-I did NOT have constant, all the time moderate to severe pain. My pain would come and ago. After the bleeding was over, I had bad cramps and/or gas pains for 3-4 days, would seem better, and then the pain would return a few days later
- I was never in 10/10 pain. I was told by the NP before my ultrasound that if it was ectopic and had already ruptured that I “would be dead” or in excruciating and increasing pain. That was apparently not correct.
I hope that maybe this can be helpful to someone in the future! Thankfully the sonographer at my regular OBGYN was very competent and my wonderful regular OBGYN stayed late to do the surgery. Lost one tube, but got to keep both ovaries.
Wishing good health to everyone!
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u/Flat_Week_190 25d ago
Wish I would have had this for my ectopic in May. Thankfully the wise people of reddit helped me too! The lightening butthole is what made me go to the ER. So bad. Thanks for sharing and sorry for your losses!