Positive on test day then my second beta dropped. Is this what they mean by a chemical pregnancy?

Some of you know we had one frozen embryo left. We transferred it at the end of September in the end, after all that agonising.

Saturday was test day. Positive. Not even a faint one, a proper line. First blood test that morning was 61. Clinic were pleased, said come back Monday. Today's was 38.

The nurse used the words "likely biochemical" and "stop the progesterone after the next result" and I said thank you and put the phone down and I have been sitting on the kitchen floor for about an hour.

I don't even know what to call this. Was I pregnant? Is this a miscarriage? My sister said "at least it was early" and I nearly threw my phone at the wall. I don't know what I'm asking really. Just whether this is what a chemical pregnancy is and whether anyone else has had a positive taken back like this.

Oh Niamh. Yes, I've had exactly this, on cycle two. Positive, then the numbers went the wrong way. You were pregnant. It's a loss. Your sister means well and is wrong.

I'm so sorry. I had one too, years before any of this, before I even knew what IVF meant. I only found out what it was called long after. It's strange how much it can hurt something so short, and it's allowed to.

niamh_c said:

Was I pregnant? Is this a miscarriage?

Niamh, I'm very sorry. To answer your direct question: yes, what your clinic is describing fits a biochemical pregnancy. An embryo implanted far enough to produce hCG, which is why your test and your first blood level were positive, but it stopped developing before a pregnancy could be seen on a scan. A falling level on the repeat test, as yours has done, is the typical pattern, and most of these losses happen by around 5 weeks of pregnancy, which is where you are now.

You were pregnant, and it is a pregnancy loss. Medically it is usually recorded separately from a clinical miscarriage, which is a loss after a pregnancy has been seen on ultrasound, but that is a classification, not a measure of how much it matters. Most very early losses are thought to be due to a genetic problem in the embryo that stops it developing, and there is nothing you did, or could have done differently, that caused it.

Practically, follow your clinic's plan on stopping progesterone, and they may want one more blood test to check the level comes down. The bleed is usually like a period. Heavy bleeding, severe or one-sided pain, shoulder tip pain or feeling faint need same-day assessment, so please ring them or go in if any of those happen. When you're ready, Emma's guide to dealing with a failed IVF cycle covers the grief, the follow-up review and how people think about next steps. That conversation belongs at your follow-up, where they can look at your cycle properly.

Thank you. Reading "you were pregnant" from an actual doctor did something. I've told my sister, kindly, that I'd rather she didn't say "at least" about anything for a while.

Thinking of you. I'm not going to say anything about my own situation because it wouldn't help today. Just that I remember your threads and I'm sorry.

Small update. Bleed came and went, last blood test was back to under 5. Follow-up is booked for November. That was our last embryo so it'll be a conversation about another collection, and the one useful thing I'm holding onto is that the embryo did implant, which is more than either of the others managed. I'm going to take a month first. Thank you for keeping me company on the kitchen floor.