# Period After Stillbirth?



## MI_Dawn (Jun 30, 2005)

I've never not been nursing a baby after a pregnancy... what happens, in terms of your period returning, after a stillbirth? When does it come back, on average? I'm finding numbers like anywhere from 2 weeks to 6 months online... not helpful.







In your experience, how soon did your period return after?


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## Cuddlebaby (Jan 14, 2003)

I bled post partum for 21 days. first period on day 44 which was probably anovulatory and had a period again on day 24. (had to check fertility friend)

lactation stuff is SO tough. emotionally. how are you? I'm with you, I nurse my babies for 3 plus years each. I can't even imagine not. and here I was, not. just like you. your body ACHES to nourish someone. cabbage leaves. binding. too small bra. you know it's really tough to even TYPE that cuz I am the breastfeeding advisor, I really hate to tell someone how to dry up their milk. some here have pumped and donated their milk. or saved and used to fertilize a plant or tree which seems very healing to me.

how ARE you? soft gentle, and very understanding mommy hugs to you. (I remember being squished at the funeral.


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## MI_Dawn (Jun 30, 2005)

Quote:


Originally Posted by *Cuddlebaby* 
I bled post partum for 21 days. first period on day 44 which was probably anovulatory and had a period again on day 24. (had to check fertility friend)

lactation stuff is SO tough. emotionally. how are you? I'm with you, I nurse my babies for 3 plus years each. I can't even imagine not. and here I was, not. just like you. your body ACHES to nourish someone. cabbage leaves. binding. too small bra. you know it's really tough to even TYPE that cuz I am the breastfeeding advisor, I really hate to tell someone how to dry up their milk. some here have pumped and donated their milk. or saved and used to fertilize a plant or tree which seems very healing to me.

how ARE you? soft gentle, and very understanding mommy hugs to you. (I remember being squished at the funeral.


Thankfully, my milk only leaks now when I'm crying and looking at pictures of him or thinking about him. No more engorgement. That was hell. I'm still bleeding, but it's light. REALLY light. Way lighter than any of my other pg. I think it was the pit, but I'm not sure. And it was weirdly brown and clotty-ish at the beginning. Pinker now actually. But more like spotting than lochia. It's the weirdest thing. Physically, this whole last month, from the strange prodromal labor pattern through this odd bleeding, has been totally "off." And I still have this pain just above my pubic bone, where I was feeling all those prodromal ctx... I think it's just sore from over-use... muscle strain... at least, I hope. I guess we'll see at the PP at 6 weeks.

Emotionally? Feh. Anger. Sadness. Depression. Rage. Jealousy/envy. Resentment. Guilt. Panic. Fear. You name it, I've done it. Except happy. Don't remember how to get back to that particular neighborhood.


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## Amy&4girls (Oct 30, 2006)

Quote:


Originally Posted by *MI_Dawn* 
Thankfully, my milk only leaks now when I'm crying and looking at pictures of him or thinking about him. No more engorgement. That was hell. I'm still bleeding, but it's light. REALLY light. Way lighter than any of my other pg. I think it was the pit, but I'm not sure. And it was weirdly brown and clotty-ish at the beginning. Pinker now actually. But more like spotting than lochia. It's the weirdest thing. Physically, this whole last month, from the strange prodromal labor pattern through this odd bleeding, has been totally "off." And I still have this pain just above my pubic bone, where I was feeling all those prodromal ctx... I think it's just sore from over-use... muscle strain... at least, I hope. I guess we'll see at the PP at 6 weeks.

Emotionally? Feh. Anger. Sadness. Depression. Rage. Jealousy/envy. Resentment. Guilt. Panic. Fear. You name it, I've done it. Except happy. Don't remember how to get back to that particular neighborhood.









Thinking of you.


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## expatmommy (Nov 7, 2006)

My stillbirth was at an earlier gestation (22w5m) but like you I've always been breastfeeding post birth and AF never returned before 18 months pp. My milk came in & I wondered how long I'd have to wait for my body to figure itself out.

My bleeding lasted about 2 wks. I had some "retained products" that came out 10 days after delivery. AF came like clockwork 32 days after that, which is my typicalish schedule. The buildup to AF was horrible. My body ached just like it had done after delivery. I was an angry angry out of control bear for a few days until it started. Grief and hormones can make nasty bedfellows. I've never had bad PMS before but now it is almost unbearable.


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## SMR (Dec 21, 2004)

Dresden was born September 9th via cesarean, I had my first period November 21st, and ovulated again December 23rd. I really can't remember how long the bleeding after birth lasted.. it seems like a while. Then I had some spotting that began on December 1st for a few days... but I was charting by then, and it wasn't a normal period. I concieved on December 23rd, the same day I conceived Dresden the previous year.
Big hugs!


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## JayJay (Aug 1, 2008)

Well, my period came exactly a month after the stillbirth, more or less. I actually have that chart up on my homepage, so you can see that the temperatures I took initially ere higher and certainly indicative of ovulation, though goodness knows how long the LP was, since I wasn't charting at the time.

I bled heavily for about two weeks, and then spotted for another week or so. Then, nothing to speak of for about seven days, then the first period. My doc (now no longer my doc!) - OB - at the time said it was probably just lochia continuing, but as we see from my chart, that was most certainly NT the case.

So that period was basically normal. Then, I had a cycle with a 7 day LP, and the period that came after this cycle just....oh man...kicked my a$$. It was like labor. Geez, I seriously tell you, it was terribly painful - labor, you have something to focus on, but this was just blood upon blood and terrible pain - pain that made my head spin. I actually seriously thought about taking some of my post-op percocet to dampen it. In the end, I bore it for about sixteen hours and then took a prescription strength 800mg ibuprofen, and that numbed me up a bit.

So that is a short version of my first two cycles. If you like to analyze (I know I do), you can see all of my cycles since the birth, including the dumb, totally non-helpful and non-productive one I'm on right now









Anyhow. I hope you don't have a second painful period like mine. I don't think it happens that way to everyone. I hope you heal so very quickly, and have no complicated "anything", physically, if you see what I mean.

*HUGE, enormous hugs* to you mama. XXXXXXXXX


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## bluewatergirl (Jul 26, 2007)

After a vaginal delivery, my postpartum bleeding hardly amounted
to anything - very much as you described yours.
I wondered if it was somehow related to the stillbirth.

My first period was about 2 or 2 1/2 weeks later . . . very light
compared to my usual heavy flow, and so was the next one about
26 days (my normal cycle length) later.
The third one was my normal very heavy flow, which I took to mean
that my body, anyway, was "healed."
It was right after that that we conceived Will, in the same month that
his big brother J.T. was conceived the year before.

Your feelings are ALL SO NORMAL, Mama.








I remember feeling all that. For a while, I wanted to run miles away
every time I saw a baby - and at the same time, I wanted to snatch
them up and savor them and remind their parents just how lucky they
were.
I know it's hard to believe now, but you WILL get back to happy, too.
It will just be . . . different.


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## Vespertina (Sep 30, 2006)

I ovulated at 8.2 weeks postpartum and got my period at 9 weeks. I had the lochia for about three weeks.


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## NullSet (Dec 19, 2004)

My dd was stillborn June 22 and I had my first PP AF on Aug 16, so about 8 weeks. I do remember it being very light and short. And those first two cycles were kind of wonky (short LP).


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## AbbeyWH (Feb 3, 2009)

i believe i had lochia for about 10 days? too heartbroken to remember...
then a period exactly 6 weeks later (no cramps but spotted for days then a heavy flow and bleed for a week)
and then a 2nd period 29 days later (my usual 4 day bleed but a little heavier still no cramps)
i am sure the 2 wks. - 6 mo. answer is true
there is a wide range of "normal" that we need to allow ourselves
be gentle with yourself







s


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## Samaria86 (Jan 17, 2008)

My dd was stillborn in MArch 08 and I got my pp AF at the end of may.


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## Storm Bride (Mar 2, 2005)

I don't remember exactly, but it was pretty close to a month after my post-partum bleeding stopped. I remember thinking that cramps and a c-section recovery were a bad combination. Different factors will affect it, of course. I wasn't lactating - my breasts started to fill at the hospital, then I leaked a bit, and that was the end of it. It was also a term stillbirth (during labour) and I don't know if that makes any difference.


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## Cheshire (Dec 14, 2004)

My son died after his birth and I bled for about three to four weeks. It seems like six weeks after his birth I had my first AF. It was very painful and lots of bleeding.

My second AF was a little better. I was not regular with my second AF. I'm normally a 28 day kind of gal and I just remember it wasn't like clockwork.

Hugs to you.


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## Mom to E and A (Jul 11, 2005)

Quote:


Originally Posted by *MI_Dawn* 
Thankfully, my milk only leaks now when I'm crying and looking at pictures of him or thinking about him. No more engorgement. That was hell. I'm still bleeding, but it's light. REALLY light. Way lighter than any of my other pg. I think it was the pit, but I'm not sure. And it was weirdly brown and clotty-ish at the beginning. Pinker now actually. But more like spotting than lochia. It's the weirdest thing. Physically, this whole last month, from the strange prodromal labor pattern through this odd bleeding, has been totally "off." And I still have this pain just above my pubic bone, where I was feeling all those prodromal ctx... I think it's just sore from over-use... muscle strain... at least, I hope. I guess we'll see at the PP at 6 weeks.

Emotionally? Feh. Anger. Sadness. Depression. Rage. Jealousy/envy. Resentment. Guilt. Panic. Fear. You name it, I've done it. Except happy. Don't remember how to get back to that particular neighborhood.









I feel the exact same way! Everything! (((hugs)))


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## Cuddlebaby (Jan 14, 2003)

hugs to you Kelly.


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