We had our preconceptual appointment with our obstetrician on Monday. We talked through the differences between my pregnancied with Thomas and Tobias, and talked about the reasons why my waters broke so early. From looking at all the notes he's pretty sure that it was because I had bleeding from 6 weeks which will have irritated my uterus and the membranes from very early on, causing a weakness. He said we will never know 100% whether the infection was also a cause or whether it was an 'innocent bystander' that was only able to infect my placenta and Tobias after my water had broke or whether they were already infected prior to my waters breaking. He also thinks I definitely had some kind of bacterial/flora imbalance in the birth canal which caused the repeated thrush and the BV right before my waters broke, and that's what allowed the haemophilus (which he thinks i already have that bacteria in the birth canal naturally) bacteria to grow in such great amounts in the first place. So he's advised before we try again, I need to have an infection screen to test for any infection and also specifically for the haemophilus infection, so, if needs be, I can treat it before I get pregnant. He's advised us not to try again until September, as my uterus will still be recovering from the infection and needs 6 months to recover fully and that he wants to see me as soon as we find out i'm pregnant. He's told me I can chose whether to be under him at Leeds or he's recommended an obstetrician at our local hospital who he's very good friends with, who also deals with ladies who have had a very early preterm birth. When I do get pregnant again he has also said I need to have infection screens done at least in each trimester, and more often if needed, so if I get weird discharge or bleed regularly again. He has also said he wants me to have scans done every 2 weeks from 16-26 weeks on my cervix just as a precaution to make sure I don't have any weaknesses in my cervix which could have contributed last time. If, at 26 weeks cervix is still long, thin and shows no signs of funneling, he would probably stop the scans then, but if my cervix changed at all, he would talk to us about placing a stitch to hopefully hold things in, which of course comes with its own risk of rupture. So much information, and I'm not even pregnant yet, but I'm so beyond pleased they're taking what happened seriously, even though though i have had one very boring pregnancy in the past.
