Today’s post is going to be very difficult to write so please bare with me if I ramble, also, please excuse the lack of video but I don’t think I could get through it without crying. Also I warn now that this post could be upsetting.

My partner and I have now been together for the best part of 2 and a half years so although the timing isn’t perfect, when I thought I might be pregnant several months I was scared but thrilled, especially as I wasn’t sure I would ever be able to catch as I have PCOS. However, I took a test and it was inconclusive. In early Feb I went to my GP and said that I was having breast tenderness and was late on my period and was experiencing some nausea- could I possibly take a pregnancy test.

He felt my stomach, said that he couldn’t feel any little life and told me that my nausea was probably due to all the medication I’ve been taking over the last few months as well as some liver problems I’d been experiencing. He refused to do a pregnancy test for me.

A couple of weeks later, after having missed my period entirely and continuing to experience breast tenderness, nausea and now food cravings I was pretty positive I was pregnant. I took another test, which was a false positive (taking about ten minutes to show) so I took another, which was negative. But, still sure that something was up and wondering if maybe my increased male hormones were effecting the test results I pulled myself off of my Cerazette, Spirolactone and Ibuprofen- all which can be harmful to a baby- and booked another appointment at my GPs.

This time I was seen by a woman, I explained the situation, and my worries about my hormones butchering the results and she gifted me with a little plastic bottle and instructions to drop the sample in the next morning. I did so and rang up three days later, as instructed and was told that my sample had been misplaced.

Frustrated, I picked up a new bottle and dropped in another sample. This time, when I rang up, they told me that they had accidentally contaminated the sample and could I drop in get another. This time I picked up the bottle first thing in the morning and quickly used my GPs bathroom to fill I up and hand it back in on the spot.

It was wednesday and I had to wait over the weekend for the results. On Monday, a quick phone call pronounced me NOT pregnant and at this point I was a little confused but accepted It. I was now a day late for my next period but put it down to the stress I’ve been under this last year finally getting on top of me. I began once again to take ibuprofen, Cerazette and Spirolactone the dosage of which they then doubled after my six month check up a few days after I was pronounced not pregnant.

I was disappointed for the loss of the child that, in my head, I’d been so positive I was going to have. Ever since I was a young teen, around 14, I have been dying to one day be a mother and when I found out at 17 that this may never happen for me I was gutted. In fact, knowing that it could be the case my partner and I have discussed the possibility of one day adopting (something I’d love to do, regardless of whether or not I have my own biological children and I’ve never understand how people can love their adopted children less. I child is a child and biologically mine or not I’d be that child’s mother, I’d love that child until the day I do).

So I hope you can understand how desperately I want children and how the mental loss of this child I’d been prepared to have was quite a blow to me, as strange as that may sound to some.

At this point, a severe bout of depression hit me. It was likely a combination of everything else I’d been going through as well as this new ‘loss’. I cried a lot for no reason; became wildly overtaken with anger and a desire to break things; I became, for the first time, self destructive, taking a razor to my thigh, and contemplating, quite seriously eating sunflower seeds which I have a severe allergy to. It was this last thing that, even through the fog of anger and upset, scared me enough to confide in my partner and parents and, before that, the Samaritans.

As hard as it was I began trying to pull myself together, taking solace in my writing for the most part and channelling my negative feelings into poor, sweet Cole. It worked quite well and I managed to dig myself out of this pit to a small degree- enough that I didn’t scare myself.

One day, I bought a writing magazine which, in the centrefold had a calendar for May in. I pinned it up by my computer and decided to dutifully fill it in each day. Now this was about a week ago- last Sunday or Monday. At the same time I heard of a writing workshop for 8am to 6pm in the conference room of a hotel about half an hours drive from my home. I wasn’t particularly inclined to go, but figuring it would a) help my work and b) help me mentally if I could get out of the house for once I asked my parents if they wouldn’t mind driving me. Glad to see me being proactive they gleefully agreed.

I looked the place up on google maps and found that it was opposite a hospital, within hobbling distance even for me. For about three days I’d been having awful back and lower abdominal pains so I figured I’d pop into A&E on my hours lunch break and see if I could ask about it.

To be honest, on Thursday the 2nd I was feeling quite chirpy and my morning was a lot of fun, as I broke for lunch I dropped my partner a text to let him know I was doing well and was just heading across to A&E before I grab a sandwich.

Half an hour in A&E they finally saw me, a pleasantly short wait, and I explained to a clinic consultant who wrote me up a slip for an ultrasound and sent me off elsewhere in the hospital. Thinking it would be just my luck to have an ulcer or cyst or something I sat in wait for my ultrasound. Eventually, lying with my stomach sticky on the table and the display turned away from me the woman announced, ‘Oh! You were pregnant!’.

This absolute delight hit me like a brick, I was pregnant, I was going to have a beautiful little boy or girl all of my own and I’ve never loved anything so much in my life. Then a quarter of a second later I realised that she said ‘were’. Past tense. In shock and horror I sat in silence as she explained that I was 14 weeks and 1 day, that the placenta had mostly ripped away from the uterus and that I was bleeding into myself in a life threatening manner.

I was very quickly whisked away, given a pill to stop nausea and medicine to stop acid reflux and prepped for surgery. It was only when I was lying in a thin gown on a bed, ready to be wheeled into the next room, a painful needle in the back of my hand that it suddenly slammed into me what was happening.

My partner had a late shift and wouldn’t have his phone on him until his break at 4pm so I rang my mum, getting no answer, then I rang my home phone twice and again received no answer. Thinking my dad was also at work I called my brother and in a desperate, sobbing panic I asked him where our mum was. He took the phone through to my dad who it turns out was working from home but who is half deaf and couldn’t hear me through the crying. He gave me back to my brother and I desperately explained that I was scared, that I needed them to come for me, that I’d been pregnant and was bleeding, that’s what the stomach pains had been, and that I was going into surgery.

My brother told my dad and I heard him yell that he was on his way then the nurse told me to give her my phone and they wheeled me into the next room. They pumped anaesthetic into the needle in my hand and the ceiling instantly began to swim.

I next remember half waking in a daze in a different room. I asked the nurse if everything had gone right and she said yes and then I was asleep again. The next time I woke she gave me my glasses and dizzily I rolled onto my side when instructed and was told to cough several times as she cleaned up blood between my legs. She passed me my glasses and I fell asleep again. The last time I woke up I burst into tears as they brought me tissues, my underwear and a thick sanitary towel. The nurse was telling me that it was just the anaesthetic making me emotional, as though having my baby ripped out of me and discarded whilst I lie unconscious on a bed had no part in my sudden desire to scream and sob.

She told me to wrap a blanket around my shoulders and a different nurse led me off to sit down and have a drink and a biscuit and to dress. I was told to go to the toilet before dressing and to tell her if the blood seemed clotted or had already soaked through the towel. Once she assured that (physically) I would be fine she cheerfully (chatting about her kids the entire way whilst I grit my teeth behind her) led me down to a waiting room where a few minutes later I was collected my a doctor who gave me condoms, antibiotics and a booklet explaining everything I would need to know. She explained that I would bleed and be in pain for at least two weeks as they’d not had time to soften and prep my cervix properly before surgery due to the internal bleeding.

She discharged me and I wandered outside and sat on a low wall near the hospital’s car park. I was sobbing into my hands so hard that several nearby road workers stopped and came across to me to ask if I was alright. Finally, my father’s car pulled into the car park and I jumped up and raced towards it- a strong pain killer and the last of the anaesthetic dulling any pain that I was due to feel until much later than night- my parents parked and clearly saw me as they got out the car as they both broke into sprints towards me. Once home I rang my partner and his mother, who lives close to his work, raced him home.

These last few days have been full of tears, bleeding, severe pain- even contractions- and a desperate attempt to distract myself. Every time I stop to think I can’t help but cry again. The woman who had done my ultrasound told me that I was 14 weeks and 1 day pregnant. My due date, had my little boy or girl lived would be October 30th.

I somehow feel scared of being alone. As though it was because I was by myself on Thursday that’s caused this. The first few nights my partner stayed up until I fell asleep, I’ve begun taking Tylenol now and that’s helped a little. My mum and partner have been amazing, taking turns to stay with me and today I left them to go out with my dad who took me for lunch. We were only out of the house an hour but I was so glad to be home with my hot water bottle and my mum again.

I really don’t feel I can carry on right now but I just needed to get this out there. Cole’s story has been lying untouched, and, suddenly, I would prefer to write stories of Salem, Cole’s young, faerie crew mate: I’m not sure why, but I suppose on wednesday when I update with my next ROW80 blog post we’ll find out which way I have gone. So from this point onwards I’m going to attempt to write again, to keep myself strong but it’s one very long, slow day at a time.

Becky.