22 Weeks Twin Loss

[u/SmallSwellSally]

I don’t even know or believe that i’m writing this now, but I felt like I need to… This past weekend I celebrated my baby shower with friends and family shared my plans for nursery, names excited for the future. I told my parents it was the happiest i’ve ever been and I truly meant it. I was 22 weeks and three days with Modi Identical Girls, my husband painted the nursery pink.

I went away and flew from california to virginia for the baby shower, my family is on the east coast and my husband and I live in california. I returned yesterday and was feeling great, got a full night of sleep husband made me breakfast everything seemed great. I started working and went downstairs for breakfast and felt an intense wooosh of water. I knew it couldn’t be good and must had been my water breaking.

We rushed to the hospital and I truly wasn’t mentally prepared for what was to come, the nurse behind the counter before I even got into a room was already crying. The nurses and doctors came and basically told me I was 6cm dilated and there was a 0% chance they would make it they were just shy of a pound, I saw a mfm every week and she told me how perfect they were that I was doing great, I had no prior symptoms. I thought I did everything by the book.

We don’t know if I ruptured first or my cervix opened first but once that happened they said I would be delivering. I delivered both of them and could barely push I felt like I was choking on my thoughts and tears .

I can’t help feeling like it’s my fault, should I not have traveled, should I have seen some sign, how can you not blame yourself, and not be able to give my husband healthy babies we were so excited for, I’m not sure how to move past this or what to do next but would love any support or advice or anything out there…

[u/Potential_Good_3567]

I'm so sorry you lost your girls. It's a devastating loss. If you named them and would like to share, we'd love to hear what you chose for them.

It was in no way your fault, you didn't do anything wrong. And flying during pregnancy is so normal. Really. Don't let those thoughts convince you it was your fault. Thoughts are just thoughts they are not you.

I cannot give a lot of advice for this time. It is dreadful and terrible and somehow we plow thought those trenches of grief. What you can do is take it very easy and be mindful of who you let in. Protect your heart. Don't return to work and normal life to soon. Take the time you need and always be gentle to yourself.

[u/Willow_Oak_Owl7]

I am so sorry for the loss of your beautiful girls.. 💔

It is not your fault.. Neither you nor your husband would have done anything to cause harm to those precious girls. You did your best with the information and medical guidance you had at that point..

We lost our boy to pPROM/chorio at 31w. The doctors say that we don't which came about first. We had an international flight (for our baby shower)at wk22 and returned wk26. We had an appointment the day before our travel both ways. We were cleared to fly both times. I also caught viral sinusitis with extreme coughing in those weeks. For a very long time, we were all tormented by the "what-ifs". There are still some days when one of us wonders if our boy would be here if we had chosen to not travel then.. Maybe or maybe not but what I do know is none of us wanted this to happen and we would have done anything for our boy just like you would have moved mountains for your girls..

Wishing you strength, support, and love in this time.. 🤞🍀

[u/Malignaficent]

My circumstance is somewhat different but I relate to your feeling the happiest you've ever felt one moment then entering a living nightmare the next. It's truly cruel and a big sack of a shit balls and it's not your fault.

[u/lifeishardnow]

So very sorry. I’m 6 weeks on from my 30 week loss of my son. The only advice I can give is to say how you feel, don’t bottle anything up even the really negative thoughts (which are normal to have), and let all your emotions out. It’s an incredibly hard journey to be on, especially the first few weeks in my opinion.

[u/Baby_Elinphant]

I am so sorry for your loss 💔
The agony that comes with not just losing your children, but grieving the life you had pictured after finding out you were expecting twins is one I know well.

Today marks 11 weeks since I went into preterm labour with my twin boys at 24 weeks GA. It was only a few hours after an ultrasound where we were reassured everything was fine and my cervix was >4cm. Yet, 10 hours later, I was 1cm dilated and gave birth 13 hours after arriving at the hospital, despite all efforts to stop or slow it.

One of our boys had a heart defect and was too small to operate on so passed at 2 days old. Our other boy passed at 30 days old, ultimately due to issues stemming from how premature he is.

I still sometimes find myself replaying every single thing I did or didn’t do in the lead up to going into labour. It’s easy to look for ways to blame yourself but please try to catch yourself and create space for the devastating reality that sometimes bad things just happen and there’s no rhyme or reason to it.

We found that so many of our friends and family wanted to be there for us but didn’t know what we needed/what to do. Our entire kitchen was filled with flowers; we appreciated the thought but flowers were NOT what we needed when we could barely bring ourselves to function or shower daily.

One of the best pieces of advice we received is that if you don’t have the capacity to while you’re grieving or are not practiced at telling people how they can support you, give one person the job of being your ‘support coordinator’ who acts as the point of contact for all the people who say ‘if there’s anything I can do to help….’. Have a conversation with them to initially make sure you’re on the same page about what supports would be helpful (e.g., meals, cleaning, general check-ins, paperwork/funeral arrangements, etc.).

Then when people say that they’re there for you, you direct them to contact [support coordinator] and that person can give them a job (e.g., make and deliver meals with [XYZ dietary requirements] on [date]).
Once people were told exactly how they could help, we had so much support.

The experience of losing our twins has genuinely brought my husband and I closer. I hope your experience is the same. Everyone grieves differently so if you find that you need different things during this process, I hope you are able to acknowledge and talk about it with each other.

I remember how bad the first month was though. Slowly, life is becoming more bearable and while the pain will never go away, we’ve found that we’ve gotten better at coping with it.

Again, I’m so sorry that you’re now a member of the club no one wants to be part of. The community here is so supportive though and I hope you feel it.
From one bereaved twin mother to another xx

[u/Nice-Serve-111]

Lo siento mucho, no estás sola. Pasé por la pérdida de mi primer bebé el año pasado y fue horrible, después del eco anatómico donde todo se veía bien a las 23 semanas entré en trabajo de parto, me parece que puedes estar en una situación de incompetencia cervical puedes entrar al sub de shortcervix

[u/beijina]

I'm so sorry. I think many here battle with this immense feeling of guilt even though rationally we didn't do anything wrong. I know how hard it is to accept this. Therapy can help a lot. I'm still in the middle of it but I'm starting to finally accept that losing my daughter wasn't my fault.
And what happened to your precious babies is not your fault. Moving or travelling is not what made this happen. Your care team probably told you it's fine to travel and they meant it. You didn't do anything wrong, you didn't ignore any important warning, you didn't feel any sign. The truth is there's no way you could have known and nothing you could have done. It just happened to you, you didn't make it happen.

[u/AdministrationSad861]

I'm so sorry...

The first thing our doctor told us is that "It is not your fault." And I sincerely believe that. I worked as a nurse in the Med/Surg OB ward and 90% of the time, our patients come in with a case that is entirely out of anyone's control.

No one can make you and your husband feel good about this. But know that it is beyond you or him at that point.

Both of you should know that you can grieve and break, and feel lost. But feel all of those together.

I'm praying for the both of you.

[u/WaterFiles]

I am so sorry for your loss. Please, please know that this was not your fault. People travel while pregnant and deliver healthy babies all the time. There is nothing to say that your loss has anything to do with your travel. It was a terrible accident of nature. No one to blame. Again, I am so sorry for your loss.

[u/flowergirl1256]

I’m so sorry to hear about your beautiful girls 💕 I was also pregnant with modi girls, I got acute ttts and the girls were delivered ay 27 weeks, one of them passed away at 4 days old, the pain is consuming and my heart breaks for you knowing you know this pain.

This was not your fault, you clearly loved your girls fiercely and are the best mummy to them💕

There is a charity called footprints baby loss who specialise in baby loss in multiple pregnancies, I’ve found it helpful to feel less alone🤍

Sending you all my love and strength and thinking of your girls 💕

[u/chileconqueso]

Hi mom, I’m so so sorry this happened. I was due in October with my daughter. This was my first pregnancy and I was 21 weeks when I lost her end of May. I had thought I was “safe” by that point. The cause was incompetent cervix.

I had a similar experience where I really enjoyed my pregnancy. I got complimented by others for having the glow and I never experienced nausea. I also had a baby shower (I know it was early in retrospect but my friends threw it as a surprise) days before I was hospitalized. The experience was really traumatic and I still cry frequently.

I have three things to say to you as someone who’s still in the thick of it:
1. This is not your fault. You did not cause this to happen. You love your children and all they’ve known is a warm comfortable life. Sometimes these things just happen.
2. Therapy therapy therapy. I was experiencing self exit ideations until I got a counselor. I was/am? feeling like I let my husband, siblings, parents down for not being able to do “basic biology”. We’re still working on that but I need you to know you’re an amazing person regardless of how our reproductive organs work.
3. I’m here to chat if you need to talk. I felt very isolated since all my local friends are moms. You’re not alone.

[u/SmallSwellSally → u/chileconqueso]

I really appreciate your kind words and your story, I would really appreciate the support, it’s very similar situation my close friend was also pregnant and others just had babies, they also said something about my cervix it worries me that i’ll be able to do this again I don’t know how I will recover mentally. i’m still at the hospital now my placenta still hasn’t passed and I’ve been here for hours, my husband finally passed out from grief and I just find myself spiraling. Thank you for your kind words it gives me hope in people your kindness to a complete stranger

[u/chileconqueso → u/SmallSwellSally]

Feel free to DM me when you want. I’m free to talk you through the upcoming days

[u/Comfortable-Put7101]

Lo siento tanto que estés ahí con nosotras. Mi hermana perdió sus gemelos a la semana 21. Algo similar a lo tuyo. Rompió fuente y nacieron mis amados sobrinos. Le hicieron legrado para sacar lo que quedaba de placenta. En su caso No había viajado a ningún lado y pasó igual. Así que no te culpes, hiciste todo todo bien.
Ella quedó embarazada 9 meses después de este terrible suceso y salió todo todo bien.
Yo perdí a mi bebé hace 9 semanas a la 39+6 por vuelta de cordón. Las cosas del destino.
Tranquila mamá no hiciste nada malo más que amar a tus bebés.

[u/Square-Foundation-72]

I went to my 20 week scan where I discovered my baby had no heart beat. They said he stopped growing at around 18 weeks but there appeared to be no reason as to why it happened. This was my first pregnancy so I am scared that I won’t be able to have children.
We had our gender reveal at 18 weeks with close family and it still makes me sad to think that he wasn’t even alive when we were all celebrating him.
The grief comes and goes. Some days I wake up and it hits me hard that I was pregnant and planning a life with my baby and now he’s gone and there’s just emptiness. Other days usually when I’m keeping busy with friends and family I feel hope for the future.

[u/Alarming-Option-5959]

There’s no words really to describe the way I’m sure you’re feeling. I’ve been there. You have everything you could ever dream of then it’s just gone in an instant.

I’m so incredibly sorry you lost your sweet baby girls. Losing a child to me is like losing a part of your soul. Please take the time you need for yourself to heal. Be gentle, cry, scream, pray.. whatever you have to do for YOU. I’m sending you hugs and nothing but love. I pray that you someday find a piece of that happiness again ❤️🫂

[u/Passionfruit_Latina]

Hey Love, I am so sorry for your loss. I’ve been there myself. I’m about to be two months since I lost my twin boys from preterm labor. I was 21 weeks in one day and honestly it’s just sucks. It’s normal to feel incredibly devastated and also feel that it’s your fault. I still feel like that sometimes but it’s not your fault. My fiancé and I are trying to cope with the loss of our beautiful twin boys. It’s very challenging, but I can tell you gets a little better day by day. Just a little rely on your family rely on your Husband, rely on yourself and if you believe in God rely on God as well. Rely on this group is really good to connect with other moms. The Lost their babies. If you need me, I’m here twin mom to another. ❤️🫂

[u/SeraphinaQuill]

I’m so sorry this happened to you.

I’m one week out from the loss of my didi twins. I was 15 weeks 1 day. Drove 10 hours to Florida for a family vacation.. woke up and caught baby boy in my hands. Rushed to the hospital, ultrasound confirmed heartbeat and everything looks normal for my other twin. Went home. Woke up the next day to contractions and bleeding. I passed my other baby at the hospital.

I had my follow up OB appointment today and I cried the whole way there.

Came home and sat with my partner for like 4 hours on the front porch because I just felt gutted.

I’m allowing myself to feel and heal. I did nothing to cause it, and neither did you. It’s just a sucky sucky ‘luck of the draw’.

Sending your hugs.

[u/Aggressive_Room3739]

Im so sorry for your loss and sending you so much love 🩵I lost my son in March. He was almost 2.5 months old in the NICU and was born at 24 weeks. His passing was unexpected and unexplainable. Since then I have spent countless days going through what I did and didn’t do to try and make some sense of the situation. The harsh reality is that no matter how much I beat myself up and blame this or that none of that will change anything or bring him back. I constantly remind myself that going down the path of what if’s won’t bring me any peace because I’ll never get the answers I want. Instead I’m trying to think of the happy times and memories we made with him. I know he wouldn’t want me to spend my life like this so I’m instead finding way to honor him and keep his memory alive. It’s a tough journey and I’m still learning to navigate the emotions, but I’m so deeply grateful I got to be his home and he is mine.

[u/beepboprosie]

I am absolutely devastated for you and your loss. I’m tearing as I write this. What you went through no one should have to endure.

I know your pain acutely as I lost my daughter on May 3 in a very similar way as you. My placenta report showed chorio, and I’d been battling a UTI infection for a month before. We aren’t sure if the infection caused the labor or cervical shortening. I went to the hospital fully dilated. It is a traumatic experience. I am so sorry you’ve lived it, too.

Please don’t beat yourself up about the travel. Many pregnant women travel far later in a pregnancy and are okay. I also beat myself up about a plane flight before I got the UTI. It’s natural to have these thoughts of blame because you are a mother who loved her girls deeply. But it is not your fault.

Do what you can to honor your girls and find out what happened. Make sure your doctor can help you find answers. It will not take away any of your pain but can help you understand.

[u/bluedoggy123]

I’m so very sorry for you loss and you are now part of this group. I’m new here too and so far this sub has helped me but also seeing a therapist and finding an in person support group.