Did you know that approximately 1 in 4 pregnancies end in miscarriage or stillbirth?
Even though miscarriages are more common than one might think, not many women decide to talk about their devastating experience – leading them to suffer in silence.
Alyssa and Justin Young also had to go through this heartbreaking tragedy.
Because the doctors told them that their baby girl was totally healthy, weighing about 14 ounces at 19 weeks, the couple was absolutely not prepared for this to happen.
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Few weeks after Alyssa’s routine check-up, though, she found herself in an unusual amount of pain.
At first, she thought it would disappear with time.
But, when her pain didn’t go away and started to get worse, Alyssa went straight to the hospital.
ince the doctors couldn’t find anything wrong with her or the baby, Alyssa was sent home.
The next day, however, Alyssa had to be rushed back to the hospital.
When the on-call obstetrician finished examining Alyssa, he told her that she was suffering from Cervical Incompetence.
Cervical Incompetence, a condition in which a pregnant woman’s cervix begins to dilate and efface before her pregnancy has reached term, is not rare.
In fact, it affects 1 in every 100 women.
Unfortunately, diagnosis of cervical incompetence can be challenging, especially since it’s difficult to catch it at an early stage.
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And, because Alyssa had cerebral palsy and type 2 diabetes, the doctor told her that performing a procedure to keep the cervix closed would be too risky.
Instead, the doctors gave Alyssa magnesium to stop the dilating process.
Sadly, the magnesium didn’t help.
There was nothing else to do – baby Scarlett was on her way.
At just 20 weeks and 5 days along, Scarlett was born. And they all knew that she was too young to survive, so the couple prepared for the worst.
Alyssa and Justin called their family and friends, so that they could get to say both hello and goodbye to Scarlett. Everyone took turns holding Scarlett, telling her how much they loved her.
How Alyssa recalls this specific moment is heart-rending:
“Seeing your child dying and knowing that there is nothing you can do to save them, it’s a terrible feeling. You’re helpless.”
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Even though Scarlett lived for just two hours, Alyssa says that Scarlett was loved for every minute of those two hours.
Because she didn’t want others to suffer like she did, Alyssa decided to go out and help out others by raising awareness about cervical incompetence and miscarriage.