Miscarriage and Stillbirth in Qld Public System

[Tobily]

Before my daughter was born I experienced a missed miscarriage at 10 weeks. I was told I had to go into the RWH in Brisbane the following day to have a D&C. I was never given the option to go home and wait it out and being completely naive at the time I just did it.

This sort of experience is obviously pretty awful no matter where you go through it but I will never forget how alone I felt that day and how horrible it was. I fronted up to the ward at 7am not knowing what was going to happen or how long it would take.

About 10am I saw someone and they admitted me and gave me some gels to soften my cervix up. I began cramping and spotting a bit and I was just crying the whole time. At about 1pm they took me into theatre and I had the D&C, and as soon as I opened my eyes I started crying again knowing my baby was gone.

I was put on the maternity ward with heavily pregnant women and newborns which was just beyond insensitive...listening to women labour and babies cry all afternoon. I know this isn't unusual and happens in alot of hospitals and I think is one of the things they really need to look at in their handling of miscarriage and stillbirth.

Anyway at about 9 that evening I finally discharged myself because basically I'd been forgotten about. Took me a very long time to come to terms with that loss

I had another missed miscarriage after my daughter and was treated in the private system - there was such a difference. I was in and out relatively quickly and never went near a maternity ward. A much less traumatic experience.