My Story: Living Through an Ectopic Pregnancy

If you’re looking for symptoms, treatment options, or statistics, I’ve written a detailed guide to ectopic pregnancy here — but this post is about my personal experience. I hope it can help anyone who is going through this.

Those two little lines—I remember my heart racing. After losing a baby once before, I was terrified to feel excited, yet I couldn't help but hope that this time, things would turn out the way I'd dreamed.

By four weeks, a sharp pain had begun stabbing at my left side—not constant, but persistent enough to unsettle me. The thin brown discharge confirmed my fears. Everything about this felt horribly wrong.

I couldn't bring myself to call the doctor right away. All weekend I tried to convince myself it would pass, but in my gut I knew. On Monday morning, I finally went to my GP.

The GP listened, examined me, and immediately referred me to the hospital. They took blood tests and asked me to return the next day for a scan. That night stretched on endlessly. I barely slept.

On Tuesday, in a dimly lit room, I lay still while the nurse moved the scanner over my belly. She frowned slightly, then called in another person. When the doctor came in, the words I'd been dreading landed: "It's an ectopic pregnancy."

They explained I had two options—an injection or surgery. I wanted the injection. Surgery terrified me and I craved the least invasive way through this nightmare. My partner, though, felt surgery might be safer, to make sure nothing was left behind.

While we were still whispering back and forth, the nurse came back, looking concerned. She told us she was surprised the injection had even been offered—she thought the embryo had grown too large for it to work. She left to double-check with the doctor. A few minutes later she returned; she'd been right. The doctor had been looking at yesterday's blood results. After reviewing today's numbers and scan, she agreed: surgery was the only option.

Things moved fast after that. Too fast. Consent forms. A hospital gown. Bright lights. The wheels of the trolley clicking against the floor as they rolled me to theatre. And then nothing.

When I woke up, groggy and sore, my mum was at my side. I remember her telling me, "One day in the future this will just be a chapter in your life." A friend later told me her own mum had an ectopic pregnancy and went on to have eight kids.

They were right. Now, as I write this with my daughter napping next to me, I think of the woman I was in that hospital bed—frightened, grieving, unsure if I'd ever be a mother. If you're reading this because you're going through something similar, I want you to know: there is hope. This is an incredibly hard and lonely path, but it is not the end. You are not broken. You will get through this.

Related Reading

If you want to learn about the warning signs of an ectopic pregnancy and what treatment options exist, read my detailed guide to ectopic pregnancy.