WEEK 19 : Week by Week Incompetent Cervix Pregnancy Guide - VAGINAL DISCHARGE!

NOTE : For the regular advice on Week 19, I suppose there are hundreds of other websites to tell you how it goes. This blog serves to supplement those sites, my personal favourites being What To Expect, Baby Centre UK and Parents. Do take note, however that I am not a professional physician, I practise law for a living and the only thing I know about incompetent cervix is through my own experience as a mother of 2 and a 20 week old baking in the oven! :)  The purpose of this blog then is just to simply share the joys and heartaches, the blessings and curses, the sadness and happiness and the disappointments and the pleasant surprises of our journey as a mom with an incompetent cervix.
We are almost halfway there.  If you are reading this because you have been googling the internet after you have just been diagnosed with incompetent cervix, then you are at the right place.  I just pray and hope from the bottom of my heart that you have not lost your baby, but you have just had your cerclage placement, and you are either bedresting at home or at the hospital.  You may want to read this series of my blogs from the beginning, as I document what to expect, physically and emotionally, in this journey of an IC mommy.

Some of you may have been following through this journey as a 2nd time IC mommy (I'm a 3rd time IC mommy myself), so we know exactly what is coming ahead of us. Well... do we, really? Every pregnancy is different, and every IC pregnancy is different.  Other websites will tell you that Week 19 is really a good week to travel, have that 'babymoon', because once a new baby comes along you won't have that luxury anymore.  Well, what babymoon? We can't so much as walk to the bathroom for a simple toilet trip without worrying that our cerclage may give way there and then!  Ok, so for those of you who had a preventive cerclage, you are probably in your 2nd month of bedrest.  Our emotional wellbeing aside, we are probably noticing some changes in our body, particularly where the stitch is.  A lot of discharge? Twinges? How does a cerclage look like in a first place and how much trust should we put in it?

There are several types of cerclages, but I am not about to discuss the technicalities and medical aspect of that here as I am no doctor.  But what I do know is the cerclage gave me my 2 boys (I almost lost my 6 year old at 23w4d but for an emergent cerclage, and I had a preventive cerclage at Week 15 with my 2 year old.  I carried both till fullterm, both cerclages removed at Week 37.  Currently I am pregnant with No.3 (a little girl at last!) and had a cerclage placed at Week 14.  I was told that I was already funnelling (read more about funnelling on Week 18) and there are scar tissues on my cervix due to previous cerclages, but so far, the cerclage is holding up.  That doesn't mean I have never worried, or I am not worrying.  With the progesterone vaginal suppositories, there is a lot of watery discharge, and being an IC mom, the main worry is always the leaking of our waterbag.  So what is this discharge? Why is there so much discharge? Well, I am going to give a few explanation, but remember, if it really troubles you or your gut instinct is telling you to go to the ER... PLEASE GO.  

Otherwise, here may be some reasons why there is so much discharge (speaking from my experience and observation of others with the same condition):

1) There IS a foreign object in there namely the cerclage, it's nature's way to flush out any foreign objects for the safety of the pregnancy (but don't worry, it's not going to flush out your cerclage

2) If you are on vaginal suppositories, again these little pills are foreign objects, and if you do a quick google search now, you will see all these websites will tell you that it is normal to have vaginal discharge as one of the side effects of the vaginal suppositories.  I have spoken to my doctor as well and he did say it's normal but if it is troubling me (well, I was so troubled for weeks I did not get a good sleep as I was checking and checking whether the discharge would suddenly be a gush of water) then perhaps I should swallow it instead of inserting it (I was on Utrogestan, one of those you can take orally, so before you down any of your vaginal suppositories please speak to your OBGYN)

3) You may have an infection. How do you know what's the difference then? Well, this discharge is probably yellow or green, or whitish (not clear) and it SMELLS. This one calls for the ER as I was told by my doctor that if we have an infection, our body will release prostaglandins, the same hormones which will accompany our onset of labour.  

4) Very unlikely, but yes, you may be leaking amniotic fluid (your waterbag is leaking) and of course this is serious!!!! Like I said earlier, if you are gushing water or you have changed a few soaked pads (not the pantiliners, but the thick sanitary pads) then go to the ER!!!

5) Or finally... relax.  Ask ANY pregnant women, even those with normal healthy no risk pregnancies... they will tell you they have discharge as well.  This is for the same reason as No.1 - it's our bodies flushing out anything which it thinks harmful for the pregnancy, so the discharge is actually good for us!

I hope this week's blog allay some of your discharge fears.  At the same time, remember to eat well, swallow those prenatal vitamins and enjoy your baby.  Yes, especially those little movements which are reminding you that she/he is in there waiting to snuggle in your arms :)