After marrying in 2016, Bridget and Scott were excited to start a family straight away.
Over the next six months, Bridget would fall pregnant three times only to lose all three babies within weeks.
Bridget shares the challenges they faced leading up to the birth of their first son with Mum’s Grapevine readers.
After her second miscarriage, she requested a referral to see a private obstetrician.
She was pregnant again !
The pregnancy was to last, and Bridget made the appointment to see the obstetrician.
“There was nothing in my family history to suggest we’d have problems.
So when my obstetrician ordered a slew of tests, I remember him saying that the odds would have the tests come back inconclusive, and my three miscarriages were put down to just bad luck.”
“It turned out I had several factors that weren’t allowing a pregnancy to progress. I wasn’t absorbing folate, possibly causing neural tube defects.
I had uterine polyps, increasing my risk of miscarrying. I had low progesterone – the hormone that sustains pregnancies.”
She had a blood clotting disorder relating to the MTHFR gene mutation, which may have been causing tiny blood vessels in the placenta and cord to become blocked.
And on top of that, my AMH hormone levels indicated a very low egg reserve.
“A month later I had surgery to remove the polyps and was taking folate, progesterone, and blood thinners. I recovered from surgery and kept plodding along, still picking up the pieces of my shattered heart”.
“My pregnancy was managed with medications and progressed well.
“I remained under the care of my amazing obstetrician and found the continuity of care invaluable. With my losses, my medical conditions, and all the medications, I needed to know that my medical team knew my case.
I didn’t want a rotating doctor or midwife to be learning my history from a chart, especially at the last minute.
I felt a pop in my abdomen .
“I joked that I’d go into labour at 38+5, as that was the day my obstetrician was five hours away in Bundaberg, and it was the last day of the school term, and we’d need to battle school holiday traffic on the Bruce Highway in roadworks to make it to the hospital – Murphy’s Law.
“So at 38+5, just as I was falling asleep at 5 am after a long night of insomnia, I felt a pop in my abdomen and thought surely my water had broken. But there was no fluid, went to the toilet, I wiggled, I walked, I squatted, Nothing.
It had to have been my waters breaking it was unmistakable! ”
After calling a midwife a few hours later, they said that the pop could absolutely be membranes rupturing, and there should have been fluid leaking by now.
It turned out my son’s enormous head was blocking the fluid from escaping, and after eight nervous hours, he finally moved and the fluid was released.
“Contractions ramped up my labour progressed quickly with never more than three minutes between the start of one contraction and the start of the next. We ran the rat race to the hospital, snaking our way off the highway and shortcutting in and around traffic as best we could.
“On arrival, we were promptly taken straight to a birthing suite.
My midwife, Tara, helped me into all the different positions – shower, squatting, on the toilet, leaning over, in the bath, on the bed, on my side.
She knew the baby was right there, but moving very slowly.
“I pushed for more than three hours, and then my baby’s heart rate plummeted. We needed to get this baby out. I was exhausted.
Speeding back from Bundaberg, my obstetrician arrived and finally, my mind relaxed knowing I was in his care. An episiotomy and ventouse later.
Finally : She had her little boy in her arms
This was the first moment I really let myself believe I was finally a mum.
