On telling early or not. Warning: happy ending but some traumatic details.
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D told us as soon as the strip showed she was pregnant the first time. Told a very few others in the weeks to come and through the first visit(s) which were early and they kept telling her maybe too early for heartbeat. When it never showed, she had three months of trauma because of non-complete miscarriage, a lot of complications. There was no way to keep that secret to friends, job, etc because she missed so much work (several chemical treatments, two D&Cs). Upshot was, she had to tell others about pregnancy and loss at the same time, which was awful, and those she didn’t tell wouldn’t know the depths of grieving she was going through. (People were guessing she had cancer…)
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Second time–told many right away. Same sad result except first D&C was successful, thankfully.
Third time–extremely circumspect, did tell us, and her very bestest friends, but no one else till first trimester passed. Beautiful baby born this November.
Not sure what the right approach to telling is, but she definitely was happy for support going through the beginning each time (even the third, because there was bleeding right around the same time, and she was devastated she might lose that one too. But grandbaby is thriving!)
I hesitate to post this, but the wonderful, amazing thing is that the perfect little person is with us now.
Post away! DD knows full-well both the good and bad outcomes. A close friend lost the baby right before delivery - a still birth due to cord knotting/compression. DD shares with me because we are close and because she enjoys talking things through with me. Keep those stories coming!
FWIW - I figured this as a companion to the “Grandparent Thread.” I didn’t want to post in the Grandparent thread, with all the happy Grandmas and Grandpas loving on their grandbabies, since I am not in that place yet, and I knew that there are more of us out here. Lots of worries, joys, sadness, fears, celebrations to share in the 8 months to come!
@anxiousmom, there’s always room for more places to talk about future and current grand babies! However, many of us shared our anticipatory news in that thread, as well, moving on to news of births and growing babies and the trials and tribulations of new parenthood for our sons and daughters.
@anxiousmom --this thread is fine, but I, and a lot of us, did post before the grandbabies were born on the grandparent thread. Either way, looking forward to you joining when you do!
I saw DIL and son this weekend. They were telling me details about the anatomical ultra sound. The heart, brain, fingers,toes all are good. The only slight worry (so of course I am obsessing about it) is the baby right now is in the 12th percentile. The date may be off 6 days, so that might make a little difference. And son and DIL are fairly small (maybe 40 percentile). I need to stop worrying.
@anxiousmom – what’s important in these early days is the HCG doubling time. I don’t remember the appropriate values off the top of my head anymore but there should be “HCG calculators” online that do it for you. Enter the dates of the tests and levels and it’ll calculate the doubling time. You want a doubling time pretty close to the “good” value. A slow time is bad news. A fast time can be good (twins!) or indicate a problem.
Knowing what we know now (or 19 years ago, wow!), I wouldn’t tell anyone but the potential grandparents about a PG until the 12w scan … and only in the most tentative manner. The loss rate is extremely high before then.
Nature is mean and heartless.
PS. I created one of the first online JavaScript HCG calculators back in 1998 or so, when we were deep into our infertility war. It was copied all over the web. It’s surprising how much you can learn about a PG from just the doubling time.
@anxiousmom – I found a copy of my old files. You want an HCG doubling time of 25-50 hours, with 30-40 hours being ideal/common in viable pregnancies.
Note: I was wrong in my previous post. A fast doubling time is not an indicator of twins. It’s the absolute HCG level at a given days-post-ovulation (DPO) that hints at twins. However, I say "hints’ because the acceptable range of HCG is large at any given point DPO. Focus on the doubling time because that’s what is important right now.
I agree with @HImom. The percentiles stretch from 1% to 100%. That means that normal is anywhere between those numbers. My older was always ~5% – because his parents are small – and he’s healthy as a horse.
Tx5athome - how wonderful that the anatomical ultrasounds shows that all body parts are there and growing! About worrying; I thinks it’s okay to think through the worry and experience it. The important part then is to move on and let go. I am working on this! Update to DD: her HGC levels doubled in 48 hours. Next update will be Feb 1 when they check to see if there is fetus growing and and a heartbeat. I am so glad to be able to share here; IRL I will need to wait several months to do so.
Romangypsyeyes - Holding you to the light and hoping that you will have healthy, happy pregnancy. I’m glad your University insurance covers fertility and it sounds like a very good strategy to utilize that benefit. As DD and DIL have learned, it is VERY expensive to get pregnant by non-standard ways.
Thanks everyone for sharing your experiences and struggles, etc. I look forward to following these through to (hopefully) grandbabies in arms.
Congratulations! I hope things continue to go well for your daughter! Having so many blood tests and scans can be fun but also nerve wracking. She could very well see a little embryo and heartbeat next time, which is so exciting! +++ thoughts!
The percentage is not as important as the growth curve, both before and after birth.
My daughter was a micro-preemie and always very low on any chart (if she even made the chart). The doctor was only concerned about the growth curve and if she was keeping up on HER curve. I was extremely lucky that my pediatrician was a tiny person so understood that everyone wasn’t going to be 25 lbs at a year (which was a good thing as my daughter didn’t weigh 25 pounds until she was 3).
Yeah, my kids were always small but proportionate on their respective curves. They still are 5% for height and weight. It works well for both of them and they have a lot of clothes that have fit them from HS to now 29/31.
@anxiousmom I am in a similar situation. My daughter got pregnant this past August, started a grad program, and miscarried. She was devastated. She quit her program (for a lot of reasons), then got pregnant again right away. (Statistically, it’s easier to carry a baby to term if you conceive again within 3 months).
So now she’s about 18 weeks, past that dangerous first trimester, but there are no guarantees.
We went through this last year. D1 and her husband had been trying for months to get pregnant. Finally a positive hCG test. That lasted for a month or two but the doubling time was never what it was supposed to be and eventually there was a miscarriage. She had told us she was pregnant but had not announced to anyone else, not even to her husband’s parents.
Daughter was depressed because it had taken so long to get pregnant the first time. But the second time was the charm. Just a month or two after the miscarriage she got pregnant again and this time it stuck. From there we went through all 40 weeks - awaiting and passing every test and milestone.
Our first and so far only grandchild was born late last June, and she is the total apple of our eyes. She is 6 months old now and is so beautiful and lively.
They live 700 miles away, but my daughter texts me a new picture of the baby every morning. It’s the highlight of my day.
Now measuring almost 11 weeks, and wiggling and squiggling around on the ultrasound, per DD. I gave birth to DS without any idea if he was a boy or a girl; now you can do a blood test at 9-10 weeks and find out about Down’s syndrome, trisomyies and gender! Those results should be back in a 10-15 days… And the waiting continues! How is everyone else’s grandbabies-in-utero doing?