QuestionI had a medical termination 9 days ago. I was 6 weeks and 4 days pregnant. I went into hospital in the morning and inserted the tabelts approx 9am. By 1130 ish am I was cramping and immediately started to pass large blood clots anytime I sat on the commode. This continued until approx 4pm when the nurse told me I had "expelled both products" what does this mean? They monitored my temp and blood pressure continuously through the day. I was kept in until 7pm when the bleeding had subsided. I have bled like a heavy period for about a week and it stopped around 7 days after the procedure. Ive not had any complications like fever or illness, cramping etc. I have been on the pill since the day of the procedure. Only thing is 9 days on and I have taken two home pregnancy tests and they come back positive. Im worried sick and am worrying I could still be pregnant? I will be going back for my followup at the family planning clinic a week this wednesday but until then im worrying alot. Am I stressing un necessarily?
Please help with any advice you may have
Thank you
AnswerDear S:
1. "Expelled both products" means that both the "products of conception" - the fetus and the placenta - have now been expelled from your uterus. This is a good thing. You want to be sure that all the products of conception have been expelled, and it's great that the nurse was able to determine this right away.
2. Don't worry, you are not still pregnant! If you have unprotected sex anytime after two weeks after your abortion, you could still become pregnant again, but right now, there's no chance. It's still very early after you abortion, so the level of pregnancy hormones in your system is still very high. This will cause all types of pregnancy symptoms like a false positive pregnancy test (until 8 weeks after an abortion), nausea, breast tenderness, unpredictable periods (heavy or light or spotty or late or early or even missed). Many of these symptoms will only go away about 3-4 months after your abortion. It takes 6 months for the pregnancy hormones in your body to be completely eliminated.
Take a pregnancy test 8 weeks or more after the abortion, and then check. That will give you reliable results. In the meantime, try not to worry too much, and keep using protection when you have sex because you never know when you will ovulate!
(BTW: you do know it's dangerous to have sex - or even let anything into your vagina - until two weeks after an abortion, right? Your cervix is now open, instead of tightly closed, and this increases the chances of a cervical or uterine infection if anything gets into your vagina. No vaginal sex, no tampons, no douches, no swimming, no baths (showers are ok) for two weeks. After your follow-up checkup, once your doctor is sure that your cervix is tightly closed again, you can go back to your normal activities.)
