Hi Everyone, I'm wondering if anyone has ever heard of a subchorionic hemmorage/bleed. I was diagnosed with this last week Wednesday after having an ultrasound done. My history is that at 16 weeks 4 days I started to spot dark brown. My OB doctor said to keep on eye on everything but she wasn't concerned. Last Saturday night I started to spot light pink blood. I spoke with the on-call OB doctor on Sunday morning who told me to keep an eye on the bleeding, but to call my regular OB doctor on Monday morning. My regular OB doctor had me come in for a check up and to hear the heartbeat on Tuesday and according to her everything was just fine, the baby was growing just fine and not to worry. On Wednesday morning, I passed a very large clot of blood. I spoke with my OB's nurse and scheduled an appointment to see my doctor later that morning. I was already scheduled to go in for my nuchal ultrasound so I was able to see my baby (and my baby looked just fine...well, at least from my ameture eyes the baby looked just fine and was moving and very active and I could see the heartbeat). When I met with my doctor later that morning, she checked the baby's heartbeat again and examined me and told me that everything seemed just fine. However, they had found that I had this subchorionic hemmorage located at the base of the placenta. She told me that I could expect some bleeding, but just to lay low for awhile and not to worry about anything. She said that there was a 95% chance that I would go on to deliver a very healthy baby and that the only risk was a 5% chance of going into preterm labor...but once again, she assured me that the risk was very low and not to worry about anything. We agreed to meet once a week so that I could hear the heartbeat of the baby. Then Thursday early evening, the cramping that I had been feeling for the last week and a half had worsened tremendously, so much so that it was coming quite regularly and right then and there I knew I was in labor. My water broke in our living and my baby was born in our bathroom. I was rushed to the hospital and later that evening a DNC was performed to clean out the remaining tissue that was left inside. I'm devastated by what has happened and I'm trying desperately to understand what went wrong, what happened, what caused this and why I was told that the risk was so minimal, because if the risk was so minimal, why then 24 hours later was I in labor and giving birth to my baby (at 17 weeks 4 days). Has anyone ever heard of this condition? Please, any information or advice is greatly welcomed and appreciated. Thank you.
I do not have personal experience with this but I have quite a few friends who had bleeding while pregnant and all of them were put on complete bed rest.
Hi F.
I also had that happen to me but on my side the doctor was concerned about it and had me on bedrest . But I still lost the baby at 18 weeks . My doctor told me that there is no way to tell how your body is going to handle it . Since then I have had two beautiful babies with no problems .
I am so sorry for your loss. My heart goes out to you. Like other posters have said, just know there was nothing you could have done to prevent it. I am currently 16 weeks 2 days pregnant, and at my 8 week ultrasound was told I have 2 small subchorionic hemmorages. I was already seeing a high risk dr along with a perinatologist because my previous pregnancy ended in a miscarriage at 12 weeks (that miscarriage had NOTHING to do with a subchorionic hemmorage, but with chromosomal abnormalities) At any rate they told me, and continue to tell me, not to worry about it. They said it is very very common, most people just don't know they have one because they don't have early ultrasounds done. I have not bled at all yet, but was told to call them right away if I do happen to bleed. Basically from what I got out of it, the larger they are, the more at risk you are to lose the baby. It sounds like you did everything in your power to combat it, bad things just sometimes happen to good people. Take time to heal and always hold your baby in your heart.
I am very sorry for your loss! I have also had a couple of losses for different reasons but on a good note I have 4 beautiful healthy children!I wish you good luck if you decide to try again. I just wanted to say you are in my thoughts and I pray you will be ok I know what a difficult time this can be in the future you may want to try a different doctor I had very good doctors when I had my losses and a good doctor makes all the difference in the world when you know something isn't right.Good luck to you and your family :) J.
I am so sorry for the loss of your baby. But know that nothing you did or didn't do was a factor.
To be honest, though 5% sounds small, it is actually, statistically-speaking, a very high ratio. A "small chance" is something like .01%...Or 1 in 10,000.
Hi F.,
First of all, I am terribly sorry that you lost your baby. That is devastating and my heart goes out to you.
I too suffered a subchorionic bleed but unlike you was put on bed rest because of the risk of possibly losing my baby.
I started to bleed very heavy at 12 weeks and thought I was having a miscarriage. I went to the hospital where they determined it was a subchorionic bleed. I went to see a high risk doctor, who put me on bed rest until the bleed healed. This took almost another 12 weeks (Strict bed rest the whole time).
I did a lot of reading on the internet and if I remember correctly the risk is more like 50/50 not 95/5 but maybe I am wrong. Regardless, I think your doctor took your situation too lightly. Maybe she hasn't had this happen to a lot of her patients or maybe the risk really is 95/5 and so she assumed you would be fine but still she should have been more cautious b/c even a 5% risk is too high to take chances with in my opininon. I am terribly sorry for you that you have had to go through this but I think that it is important that you know that you are at greater risk of this happening again with a future pregnancy b/c it happened with this one.
Hopefully, your e-mail will save another baby from being lost by someone out there reading about your situation and learning from it that any bleed is not normal when pregnant and shouldn't be taken lightly.
Again, I'm so sorry for you loss, esp. if it could have been prevented by being put on bed rest.
Sincerely,
L.
I just wanted to let you know that I am so sorry for your loss. You are in my prayers. I have miscarried more than once for other reasons and my heart goes out to you. I did have a doctor that didn't take me seriously with my second child, he luckily made it okay but there were terrible complications when I wasn't listened to that I knew something was wrong. I suggest you switch doctors for if and when you decide to have another child you need to be comfortable with your doc.
J.
F.,
I am so sorry for your loss.
I had a SCH (Subchorionic hemmorage) with my first child. I started to bleed at about 14 week. At first the doctor said it is not a big deal unless it is bright red blood, well the next day it was and I went in for an ultrasound that day. I saw the baby was fine but I had a SCH. Mine was small at that point and My doctor said research has not proven that bed rest helps but to take it easy (my husband did the house cleaning, etc) I was told SCH are very common early in pregnancies. I had never heard of it before and gooogle it on the internet I came across a wonderful website angelfire.com stories of women with SCH, some ended in a loss and some ended in a healthy baby. I found this site very comforting when I was dealing with my SCH. I bleed until about 20 weeks and stopped, at that point they said it was resolved. I did have a placental abruption during delivery which was probably related to the SCH. Now my baby is a healthy 2 year boy, so I was lucky. There is truely nothing you did, my doctor told me all the time there is really nothing I could do to make it better but pray.
I am 28 weeks with my second and more problems but I keep praying I will make full term.
My prayers are with you.
M.
First of all, I am very sorry for your loss. I think unfortunately you were one of the unlucky ones this could happen to. Nothing anyone can say will make your pain go away but I wish you the best of luck in the future conceiving again. Unfortuntely Dr's aren't miracle workers but I encourage you next time to get a 2nd or 3rd opinion if you experience complications in the future.
Good luck and I hope you heal quickly!
Oh, F.: I am crying for you this morning. I can feel the pain you're in, and wish I were there to hug and hold you and tell you it'll be alright after awhile. I lost a little one at 8 wks, and I know God is holding him in His arms, until I'm able to. I hope you find peace as time goes on.
I'm so sorry for your loss. I would highly recommend you go to a highrisk obgyn next time. I'm with a highrisk clinic and had my case transferred over as they only take referrals but they don't play around. I'm in the office twice a week with ultrasounds and stress tests. It's not that my doctors can prevent or stop anything from happening as their not God but they are more knowledgable and are experianced with the not so normal pregnancies. If you have more children demand your care be overlooked at by a perinatologist. Again I'm really sorry for your loss that sounds so frightening.
I think it's odd that you called and told them you were bleeding and they told you to wait until Monday. My doctors would have told me to get my butt to the hospital NOW.
F.,
Your doctor was right. You were just part of the special 5%. My sister had similar problems (subchorionic hemmorage) with her third child and did deliver a healthy baby at full term. Every pregnancy carries risk - and truly you never know what will happen. Odds of it happening again - I'd ask your OB.
Lisa (mom of 4 boys)
F.,
I do not know anything about the bleed, however I do know how much it hurts to lose a child. Mine was a 22 week loss and due to an infection in the placenta. My care was very similar to what yours was and I still think of it often and wonder if I had another physician maybe my son would have lived. I just want to say I am very sorry for your loss and there really are no words that can help. I will keep you in my prayers. We as the parents are left with such an emptiness and a bunch of what if's. I was given a book during my grieving time and just wanted to share a piece of it with you that described my feelings. "The worst thing about death is that it leaves the living behind. Maybe that's why I feel so angry about my loss; I have no control over it. I can't follow my son. He's somewhere else, doing something I don't know about. I have to wait for my life to live itself out before I can see him again." The book is called Always Precious in our Memory by Kristen Johnson Ingram. I am a reader and it really helped me through the grieving process. Take care, A.
I don't know anything about what happened. I just wanted to say I am sorry.
This sounds just like what happened to me with my son. My Dr. wasn't as attentive as your seems to have been and your out come was better than mine. I was never told what caused my pre-term labor at 20 weeks or what could have been done to prevent my son's death. It did happen just as fast and with little warning. I guess I should have asked more questions or pushed for a different doctor since mine was not listening to my concerns. Live and learn though. I did have another high risk pregnancy but with a great team of doctors and did have a beautiful baby girl. I am so happy to hear you and your daughter are well.
F., I am so sorry that this happened to you! I want you to know that you did nothing to cause this! You went on your doctor's word and that is all you could do. You have no fault in this. It's so easy when something goes horribly wrong to place all the blame on our own shoulders but you are FREE of blame.
I don't know what else to say to ease this traumatic experience but sometimes it helps to have a visual reminder of your baby. My sister got a "mother and child" pendant necklace when she had a miscarriage and she uses it to know that her baby is close to her heart.
I pray blessing on you and your family. I am so sorry for your loss.
F.,
First of all, I'm so terribly sorry for your loss.... my heart goes out to you. I have a baby boy who was born on July, 19 2008. When I was 13 weeks 0 days pregnant with him, I had the same thing. My doctor called it a subchorionic hemorrhage at the base of the placenta just like yours. I woke up that morning (after having sex the night before) with slight cramping and a small amount of red spotting. I didn't think anything of it since I had read that bleeding can happen after sex when you're pregnant. About 30 minutes after the first bout of light spotting I felt a gush and went to the bathroom to find bright red blood and ALOT of it. I GUSHED quite a bit. I thought for sure I was having a miscarriage and I was hysterical. I called the doctor and got in right away. The same thing that happened to you happened to me. They found the heartbeat right away and saw the baby very active on the ultrasound. I too, saw my doctor once a week for about the next month and they always found that everything was just fine. I continued to spot brown for over a month. I finally stopped for good @ 17 weeks. My doctor told me that this happens in about 30% of all pregnancies. I searched all over the internet for info on this and never really found anything. I do know that a sub. hemorrhage is a tear in the placenta and I was told that you do run a risk of that tear getting bigger (regardless of what you do as far as physical activity), in fact, my doctor never even put me on bed rest. They did notice that my tear had gotten just a bit bigger in one later ultrasound but it was less than one cm. bigger than the original 2cm. it started at. I'm sorry to write you a book. I just know that all I wanted was someone to talk to about this when it happened to me and I never found anyone. Again, I'm so heartbroken for you and I wish you and your family the best, you will be in my prayers. If you have any other questions please feel free to email. PS, my doctor also said that this didn't happen to me because of something I had done, and that it wouldn't help to go on bed rest. Rest assured that this wasn't your fault.
C.
____@____.com
F.,
I am wondering, did they atleast send the placenta in for testing? I ask because my sister had similar things happen to her, she had some sort of hemorage as well, but I don't think it was a placental one. She too kept having cramps and bleeding and ended up in labor at 24 weeks. She had her baby at 24 weeks and 2 days....
After testing the placenta they found out she had an infection in her uterus and that's why she delivered early. It may not be what happened to you, but if they tested the placenta, at least it could be ruled out and also to let you know that it could have some secondary issue, that caused the preterm labor....
I also offer my condolences, and my support to you- I lost a baby at 10.5 weeks after bleeding for 3, so I have an idea of what you are going through...although I do understand it;s not exactly the same.
