My husband and I decided to end our pregnancy at 21 weeks, our daughter, Kasia, was born on the 17th June 2018, at 21 weeks and 6 days, she was 380g and beautiful in every way.

We'd gone for the 20 week scan on the 4th June, full of excitement, only for our world to come crumbling down in a few short minutes.

During the scan the Sonographer was very quiet for a long time, she kept pressing on my stomach really hard, she turned to us and said I have three concerns, which means I need to refer you.

She said our daughter had a cleft lip and palate and her arms and feet were at strange angles. We were ushered into the special counselling room and I just went numb, I knew this was a big deal if we're in here.

The senior midwife came and told us about further tests and we were due back two days later to see a consultant.

We spent the next few days in a fog, waiting and researching everything we could. We had a further scan with the consultant, confirming that her hands were in a strange position and he couldn't get a good view of her heart.

At this point I was offered an amniocentesis, which we agreed to. It was a very long few days waiting for the results, five days later we got told she was negative for Down's, Edward's and Patau's. While it was good news, in a way it still left us with no answers and more waiting.

We were then referred to a specialist at another hospital. two more days of agonising and waiting, the whole time I could feel her wriggle inside me. I kept willing her to be strong and to be ok.

We talked and talked about what we would choose to do, we both agreed that the stress and pain she would have to go through, if born, was too much if her heart wasn't working, on top of the other problems.

Unfortunately, we got the worst confirmed; that her heart wasn't working on the left side and she had no bones in her forearms, meaning an immediate heart transplant at birth if she survived and many other operations during her early life into her teens.

There was no other choice for us but to let her be at peace. We were told to go to the maternity ward the following day to begin the process, there was a special suite for parents like us but I could still hear women in labour and new born babies crying.

It was so surreal, we never in a million years thought we would be in this situation. Swallowing that first tablet, I felt a piece of me die that day.

When she arrived we got to spend some precious time with her, pick an outfit for her, including little boots and a beautiful knitted dress. We took some photos and it felt so natural. We had her privately cremated on the 5th July. It's been nearly 4 months now, and I'm surprised we have found the strength to carry on, but somehow we have. We are still waiting for the results of the postmortem, so we still don't know for sure what was wrong and we may never know. I'll forever feel 'what if' about the choice we made, but in our hearts we know it was the right decision for our daughter.

 

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