Guilt And Shock

by Jennifer
(Oklahoma)

I did not know I was carrying mono-mono twins until after they were born as my pregnancy was in the early 70's and ultrasound wasn't used as much.

I lost weight when I was pregnant due to severe nausea and didn't seem to be much bigger than a single pregnancy until about four months. Right after the doctor's visit when only one heartbeat was heard I started to get much bigger and at five months he told me there were definitely twins.

They did schedule an ultrasound but three days later I had sudden violent fetal movements and then nothing at all for several hours. I started to get scared and called the doctor three hours after the last movement and he told me to come to the office where he found no fetal hearbeats at all.

I was put in the hospital and labor was induced unsuccessfully until 24 hours later when the two little boys were delivered stillborn, their cords all knotted together. We had barely had time to adjust to their being twins when we lost them. It was called a "cord accident" because they tangled up in the same sac.

I felt horrible guilt that I had not gone right to the hospital when the sudden movements started but I was told nothing could have been done and at barely 20 weeks they could not have survived birth. Still, it took a heavy toll on me and ultimately on my marriage which failed within the year.

I did a lot of reading later about mono-mono twins and now know this kind of loss is not rare with them. I wish someone had explained that more at the time. Later I had two normal single pregnancies carried to term and one other miscarriage, but early on.

I still remember our little Daniel and Nathaniel even though we never had the chance to raise them. I do wish we had been more prepared and now with ultrasounds being used so commonly I doubt this happens to many people. It was a horrible shock and we had never even heard of mono-mono twins and certainly weren't prepared for anything like what happened.