Onwards and upwards

In my world, once a miscarriage has happened, the only thing to do is start trying again. As soon as possible. My doctor is not convinced there is an underlying problem, so it's back to the bump'n'grindstone. However, my good friend Mel suggested that I consult with a friend's Mum who is a very senior midwife, to see whether she had any theories given my history... and she did. She believes that I have a clotting disorder called antiphospholipid syndrome, or Hughes syndrome, which is preventing enough blood getting to the baby once it embeds, so although we had seen a heartbeat early on on a couple of occasions, the embyro was effectively being starved of blood, hence the early miscarriages.

I looked at the information that my friend's mum sent over and thought that yes, there might be something in it. I had come across the syndrome in my own researches, but it's hard to self diagnose really. Dr G told me I could try taking a baby aspirin per day if ti would make me feel like I was doing something, so I have been doing.

Anyway, the fertility fairies have struck at work again: one lady who was told she could never have children went to the doctor's feeling under the weather, only to be told that she was four months gone, while another who only started ten weeks ago has just announced that she is 14 weeks or so. So I was feeling a little bit down and decided to look more closely at this possible problem. I went on the Hughes syndrome website http://www.hughes-syndrome.org/ and immediately I was struck by the fact that one of the symptoms - classic migraines with aura throughout teens that disappear and recur in the thirties - fits me to a tee. There are a couple of others, such as poor circulation, and of course the early miscarriages, that also apply, but it is the migraine one that has got me thinking, yes, this is it. The treatment is fairly simple - a baby aspirin per day to thin the blood. They do use heparin as well, but you can only get that if you are officially diagnosed, and as the diagnosis takes 6-8 weeks at least and can be inconclusive, I'd prefer to keep going with the aspirin and hope to get pregnant, at which point I'll lay the evidence before Dr G and ask him to monitor me as if I have it.

This syndrome has implications for my future health also, so I'll have to get tested at some stage, but apparently it is fairly easily managed with the aspirin.

So fingers and everything else crossed for a good result next time.