Sadness

A girlfriend of mine, MG (who isn't a blogger so I can only use initials to safeguard her privacy), just found out today, that she just lost her baby girl at 13 weeks. Her ultrasound was today and there was no movement and no heartbeat. It sounds like the amniotic fluid was on the low side and the doctor estimated that the baby had likely passed about a week ago.

MG had done CVS in the last few weeks and it had determined that her baby girl was chromosomally perfect. MG is an immune patient of Dr. B's and Dr. S's so she did the usual humira, lovenox, IVIg cocktail when she found out that she was pregnant.

Everything was fine. Fine until she did her CVS. Immediately prior to CVS her NKs were at about 22. Ultrasounds looked great. She had a SCH (subchorionic hemmorage) but it was handled effectively by cutting of her lovenox until it had subsided. Which it did. What is telling, however, is that after her CVS her NKs mysteriously skyrocketed to over 30. My take is on this that her CVS like introduced a uterine infection into the placental area that her body responded to with a full blown immune attack. We won't know for sure what happened until they are able to obtain a tissue sample for biopsy.

That CVS and amniocentesis can cause an infection that, in turn, can lead to miscarriage, scares the hell out of me. It's a strong arguement for doing PGD so that you can avoid having to do CVS or amnio at all. I think the risks for miscarriage due to CVS are something like 1 in 100. Maybe less. I remember when my friend Mary was pregnant last year, her NS showed her odds of a Down's baby were something like 1 in 300. The risk of miscarriage due to CVS was higher. 1 in 100 or thereabouts. They opted to not do an amnio or CVS due to the risk.

I thought they were being reckless. But you know, after hearing, tonight, about MG's loss, I really have to wonder if I will do CVS or amnio now. I'm not sure if we can afford to do PGD with each IVF. I doubt we can. But this really has opened my eyes to something I hadn't given much though to. Til now.

This was MG's second loss. The first came at 5 months and it was because her amnio showed DS. She terminated and she still lives with the torment of that decision. Today's loss was just another needle into her heart. And ours.

MG. I am so sorry for your loss. It's just utterly unfair.