Pregnant after preemie?

mybb

Hey ladies,

This has been on my mind for the past few days. I'm sure someone has already asked this question, but I scrolled down and wasn't able to see it. I was just wondering for those of you who had your baby due to pre-e and got pregnant again, how scary was the next pregnancy for you? Did your next baby come early as well? Of course DH and I aren't thinking of having a baby yet, but these are just some of my fears. I know they say pre-e can happen with your first one and then never happen again, but i just wanted to get some info from those who may have gone through this before. I hope I'm not offending anyone by asking this question!

becketts

I'm pregnant after preemie, but I won't be able to speak to the end result for a long time (I hope!!).  I've definitely had more anxiety with this pregnancy, partly due to my experiences with DD (6wks early; 23 NICU days) and partly due to other issues (m/c last year, infertility issues, known risk factors).  However, this is fading more quickly than I'd anticipated. 

I wasn't ready to think about another child until DD was around 11 months.  What really helped me was talking with my OB about our chances of pre-e striking again.  She said 20%, which was a small enough risk that I felt comfortably trying for #2.  I feel that in the worst case, I'll have a better idea of what to expect and how to be a better advocate for myself.  Hope that's helpful!

greenclown

I'm lurking but wanted to chime in, even though my preemies weren't born early because of pre-e. My daughter was born at 24 weeks but didn't make it. I was terrified to get pregnant again, but then once I was pregnant again, it turned out to be not as scary as I was anticipating. My son was born at 34 weeks, but it was for a different reason (my daughter was due to incompetent cervix, his early arrival was due to a suspected placental abruption). We are hoping to have one more, and I'm nervous about two previous problems now, but at the same time, it's kind of off my radar, so I'm not that worried about it yet.

Long story short, the anticipation was worse than actually being pregnant again. I had to kind of let go and put my faith in my doctor to take good care of me. 

mybb

Thanks ladies for taking the time to write about such a sensitive topic! I think it will be my biggest fear. We know we want to have more kids, and may want to start trying once our little man turns 1 or something of that sort, but i just feel like i will be waiting for week 28 to come and see if i can pass that...i also feel like maybe others will be watching us carefully and waiting to see if something will happen again. Our OB said that she will make sure to watch me like a hawk to make sure that my blood pressure is stabilized, etc. Anywho, thanks for sharing! I guess I just wanted to share my insecurities with those that may be able to relate. I appreciate your input!

jcsntms06

I'm currently pregnant again after having a preemie. I had pre-e too. I actually spoke with my doctor back in February and she gave me the statics of what I was up against. I have about a 33% of having another preemie w/pre-e at 33w or early. I've heard cases that if you wait a certain amount of years your chances decrease. If your considering having another baby I would speak with your doctor and then talk with your DH.

My doctor is confident that she can get to me 37weeks. My water also broke the night I was put in the hospital all on it's own, so my doctor is now pushing for 17p shots. I'm all for cooking this LO for as long as possible.  Good luck with your decision.

mybb

jcsntms06:

I'm currently pregnant again after having a preemie. I had pre-e too. I actually spoke with my doctor back in February and she gave me the statics of what I was up against. I have about a 33% of having another preemie w/pre-e at 33w or early. I've heard cases that if you wait a certain amount of years your chances decrease. If your considering having another baby I would speak with your doctor and then talk with your DH.

My doctor is confident that she can get to me 37weeks. My water also broke the night I was put in the hospital all on it's own, so my doctor is now pushing for 17p shots. I'm all for cooking this LO for as long as possible.  Good luck with your decision.

Thanks so much for your input! Yeah DH is definitely wanting to have more children just as much as I want them, if not more but I just wanted to know what someone with experience from this thought about it. We already spoke to my OB who definitely said that she will watch me like a hawk the next time around, and appeared to be prettt confident that she could get us to full term, at least 36 weeks is what she said. DS came at 28w1d and we found out i had severe pre-e on that day as it was a routine dr appt! Had we known about this earlier, i may have been put on bedrest or given medication, etc to prolong the pregnancy. I am not thinking about having any other children until DS is about 1-1.5yrs old (TTC around that time) but i would like to have another one, if not 2 others running around here with their big brother :-). Thanks for sharing!

TriciaJoy

I'm currently 28w pregnant after having my son at 26w due to pre-e.

I'm not going to sugar coat it- the stress is pretty intense. At my 12w baseline labs, my protein was already a little elevated, and at 24w it was up more and my liver enzymes were up a bit.
I got the call at 26w exactly to come in for steroid shots. That pretty much put me over the edge. But here I am 2+ weeks later and still hanging in there.
They did put me on bedrest (modified) this week and I'm already pretty sick of doctors, but it's worth it.

This will definitely be our last both because clearly my body can't take pregnancy well and because the stress of it is just too much, but I also dont' regret this pregnancy. We did a lot of soul searching and doctor-talking before we decided to proceed.
We had to pretty much accept that it could go worse.. or better.. and be okay with that.

 

mybb

TriciaJoy:

I'm currently 28w pregnant after having my son at 26w due to pre-e.

I'm not going to sugar coat it- the stress is pretty intense. At my 12w baseline labs, my protein was already a little elevated, and at 24w it was up more and my liver enzymes were up a bit.
I got the call at 26w exactly to come in for steroid shots. That pretty much put me over the edge. But here I am 2+ weeks later and still hanging in there.
They did put me on bedrest (modified) this week and I'm already pretty sick of doctors, but it's worth it.

This will definitely be our last both because clearly my body can't take pregnancy well and because the stress of it is just too much, but I also dont' regret this pregnancy. We did a lot of soul searching and doctor-talking before we decided to proceed.
We had to pretty much accept that it could go worse.. or better.. and be okay with that.

 

Thanks so much for being so honest! It definitely puts things into perspective! Sending thoughts and prayers your way!