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Irma distraction: Kim Kardashian & placenta accreta


Annie G
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Since I'm worried about my family and their possessions (not trying to be shallow, but it would be awful if they lost all their stuff) I'm trying to NOT watch hurricane news. So I was reading People online and saw a story about KK's surrogate. In it Kim recounts her first pregnancy and this is what she says:

 

“My doctor had to stick his entire arm in me and detach the placenta with his hand, scraping it away from my uterus with his fingernails. How disgusting and painful!!!†she blogged about her experience in giving birth to North.

 

 

Is that how they do it when the placenta is stuck? For real?  

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Since I'm worried about my family and their possessions (not trying to be shallow, but it would be awful if they lost all their stuff) I'm trying to NOT watch hurricane news. So I was reading People online and saw a story about KK's surrogate. In it Kim recounts her first pregnancy and this is what she says:

 

“My doctor had to stick his entire arm in me and detach the placenta with his hand, scraping it away from my uterus with his fingernails. How disgusting and painful!!!†she blogged about her experience in giving birth to North.

 

 

Is that how they do it when the placenta is stuck? For real?  

 

I know they do it that way with cows!

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With my youngest, the resident did something rather like that to get some bits and pieces of the placenta that hadn't come out - it was probably the most painful part of the birth.

 

I think if that had been done during my first birth than I might only have one child. I'm usually not squeamish but for some reason this is pinging high on my 'no way' meter. 

 

I think I thought it was done with a long, thin instrument with a loop or something on the end to help scrape. I wonder where I got that idea!?

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I imagine they do have to manually remove bits. "Scraping with his fingernails" is just KK drama. And I'm sure she had an epidural so what would she really feel?? My opinion--she doesn't want to get pregnant again so they've hired a surrogate and making her deliveries sound worse than normal is how she publicly defends that decision.

 

Now I need a shower. I hate thinking about those people. Blech.

Edited by Moxie
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Yes, they can manually detach it that way but it's dangerous, you risk tearing the uterus. It has to be balanced against the bleeding risk. I feel badly for her, but I still don't think renting a womb for more kids is really the way to go either. Surrogacy is its own subject but there is no doubt that placenta accreta is life threatening and likely to reoccur once it has happened, if by a miracle mom doesn't need a hysterectomy.

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They don't do it with their fingernails because gloves, but yes they do it manually if necessary.

 

I had this exact thing done; thankfully I was under general when I happened. I went on to have two normal deliveries with no complications and no contraindications from my doctor. Every case is different though and mine was quite mild.

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I had that with my first- no, not fingernails and all that - but yes, the doctor reached in and pulled it out. It didn't hurt at all and he didn't pull hard- he had said if it didn't just come out easily, I would be getting surgery. But it came out easily. I didn't have a problem with either of my next two pregnancies.

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Thinking on it, that sounds HORRIBLY painful. A woman is not as big as a cow, and thinking back to how sore everything was post birth, uterus, birth canal, etc, I can imagine having someone jamming a hand up in there. And even for cows, they don't like having to do that, becasue even with washing, gloves, etc. any time you introduce a foreign body into a uterus, you're drastically increasing the risk of infection.

 

Ugh.

 

 

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I guess the perk of a c-section is that they can really see what they are doing.... They took my uterius out to deliver my placenta and sew it back up!

When my oldest was born via C-section I made the comment, "oh that felt weird." I wasn't really talking to anyone but the Dr heard and replied, "just putting your uterus back in."

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Oh yes, doctor was in 'up to the elbows.' Mine was just retained rather than accreted.

Better than bleeding to death. I had a spinal tap first, thankfully.

 

That was baby #2, he had a velementous cord insertion that meant the cord broke, luckily that happened after he was born. 3&4 had no problems.

Edited by LMD
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Oh yes, doctor was in 'up to the elbows.' Mine was just retained rather than accreted.

Better than bleeding to death. I had a spinal tap first, thankfully.

 

That was baby #2, he had a velementous cord insertion that meant the cord broke, luckily that happened after he was born. 3&4 had no problems.

Wow, how does that happen? DH had to use force to cut the cord!

ETA--that is a strange custom. "Here Dad, your job is to cut the physical connection between mother and child".

Edited by Moxie
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Wow, how does that happen? DH had to use force to cut the cord!

ETA--that is a strange custom. "Here Dad, your job is to cut the physical connection between mother and child".

It was after delivery and cord cutting. We were waiting for the placenta to deliver, I had already had the injection.

 

The midwife used gentle cord traction to encourage the placenta out - we didn't know about the velementous insertion (cord was attached to the placenta membrane rather than true placenta) and it just snapped off, leaving the placenta inside. We tried massage and pushing but it wasn't coming, and the injection meant that my uterus was trying to clamp down but it was just pouring blood.

 

So dh was left holding our son while they rushed me to theatre. I was awake as I only had a spinal and saw the... um... depth that the doctor had to go to! She also quipped that it 'looks good' down there - lol, nice to hear after literally just birthing an 8lb 10oz baby...

 

Eta - They had missed the velementous insertion on all my scans, it's lucky that DS didn't pull it off during pregnancy or labour. I made them specifically look for it with the next two.

Edited by LMD
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Wow, how does that happen? DH had to use force to cut the cord!

ETA--that is a strange custom. "Here Dad, your job is to cut the physical connection between mother and child".

My youngest's cord snapped when he had just been born and I tried to pull him higher on my abdomen. Short cord apparently.

 

I had a Dr. manually extract the placenta with my firstborn. He was just in a hurry (there was no medical indication and it had only been a few minutes since baby was born) and didn't even tell me what he was going to do before shoving his had up there. I was furious.

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