Surprise IUD Baby! Need Some Reassurance...

[JuniperMama]

Hi Mamas,

I've been a long time MDC member but between 2 kids, a very full-time job, and a house and marriage, etc, I have been dormant for a long time.  Then last week happened:

To cut to the chase, I found out last week that I'm 20 weeks pregnant (they said it's probably a boy) and due Mid-February.  It's a totally unplanned surprise. 

 

So you may be thinking: "That's half way! You've had two children, how can you not have known before now??"

 

A reasonable question...  Here's the long story...

 

I had been having pregnancy-type symptoms since June.  In the past few months, I asked my dr. on 2 different occasions about the possibility of pregnancy.  She assured me each time that since I had an IUD, there was like a 1% chance that I could be pregnant and I really shouldn't worry about it.  She said that there were lots of other reasons for those symptoms (ie: stress) and that I should put pregnancy out of my mind.

 

In a rather rare move for me, I listened to her advice!  I don't know why I didn't follow my intuition at each of those junctures but I didn't.  I guess I just decided that she must be right and that I was crazy and should let it go.  

 

That is until last Thursday when I decided, despite losing over 20 pounds this summer, my belly was becoming undeniably rounded and I was pretty sure I felt movement.  I finally went and got a drugstore test and lo' and behold, it was screamingly positive.  I called my OB (as opposed to my regular doctor who had been blowing me off these past few months) and she had me come in immediately to get an ultrasound and see what was going on and if everything was ok, etc.  At that point, we discovered that this was a "missed" pregnancy that was 20 weeks along and that the IUD is totally MIA!  YOWZA?!?!?!?!?!  I was speechless. 

 

At this point, we are working on adjusting our brains to the idea of a third baby after having planned to stop at two.  It's totally wild that it happened now, just when I gave away literally ALL of my maternity clothes, newborn gear (swings, bottles, clothes, etc.)  This is going to be like starting over in some ways.  Our heads are still spinning.

 

I am definitely in need of some support and thought it was time to head back to Mothering.

 

If anyone can tell me stories about IUD babies that turned out ok, I'd be really grateful.  They can't find the IUD on ultrasound so don't know if it's in there or not.  I'm so far along that we can't do any of the genetic screening we might have otherwise done. 

 

I am feeling really worried that something could be wrong with him or that the baby or I will be in some kind of danger.  I called the dr. today after getting no response to repeated messages this week and got an on call dr. who was monumentally UN-reassuring.  She gave me nothing to help me feel like this is really ok.  She just kept saying it was so rare, they really didn't have risk data.  NOT HELPFUL. 

 

I figured that there have got to be lots of mamas in the MDC community who have either had an accidental IUD baby or know someone who has.  I'd love to hear the stories.  I need all the good news about this that I can get.

 

TIA!

 

[Similar message also posted in Feb 2012 DDC]

[Contrariety]

Wow!  I don't have any personal experience with IUD pregnancies, but researched the crap out of them when i had an IUD that was falling out.  It seems to me that most of the babies are just fine.  I don't recall any bad stories.  My IUD disloged itself and could not be seen on ultrasound.  It was just in my cervix (I could feel it, so I knew it was there), easily removed, but totally did not show up on the ultrasound they did to look for it.  HTH

[birdhappy85]

I don't have personal experience with this, but my sister-in-law got pregnant with her first baby while she had an IUD in place. This was before my husband and I met, so I don't know the full details of whether or not they removed the IUD once she found out and when. Her IUD child is perfectly healthy and fine, though!

Congratulations, and I hope everything goes well during your pregnancy and birth!

[Kedrosami]

Did you have the Mirena or the Paragard? I just got a Mirena last week so I've been reading up on IUDs a lot recently. I read (I think it was in the PI for the Mirena) that there have been millions (13 million something, if I recall) of women who have gotten the Mirena, and out of those millions and millions of people, there have only been a handful (like 400 something) of live babies born with the IUD in place through the whole pregnancy. Those 400 babies all seem developmentally normal and healthy, although they are all still children so long-term effects of the hormones on the growing fetus can't be completely ruled out. With the Paragard there are similar concerns but instead of exposure to progesterone, you'd have to worry about possible copper toxicity.

Bear in mind that the VAST majority of women who think they got pregnant with an IUD have actually gotten pregnant after the IUD has fallen out and they just didn't realize it was gone. That's why it's important to check for those strings regularly. When it falls out it often drops into the toilet when you're going to the bathroom, and you may not notice especially if you're on your period anyway--it's pretty tiny.

I would bet money that you just lost your IUD and didn't notice, then got pregnant sometime after that. Especially since they couldn't find it with U/S. I think everything should be fine with your baby since you've made it to 20 weeks. If on the small chance your IUD is still in there, it can cause the baby to be born premature, so I would just make sure to monitor the rest of the pregnancy very closely. I don't believe in routine U/S but in this case I think U/S is a valuable tool just to keep checking that everything is still okay. Very worst case scenario, the IUD could be embedded somewhere in the uterine wall and increase your chance of rupture, but it's so rare. And the fact they didn't see it when they looked is reassuring. I would be vigilant and maybe get second (or third) opinions. But your chances are very very high that everything is perfectly fine.