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Ending a pregnancy for fetal abnormality

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1-2 years since pregnancy ended

Interview 38

Interview 38

Age at Interview: 22
Sex: Female
Background: Pregnancy ended in 2004. No. of children at time of interview: 1. Age of other child: 2. Occupations: Mother - mother, Father - factory worker. Marital status: married. Ethnic background: British Asian.

Brief outline:Mother of 1 child, married to her first cousin. 2nd pregnancy: 12-week scan normal. 20-week scan detected anomalies in the baby's brain. Specialist scan confirmed multiple abnormalities. Pregnancy ended at 20 weeks by induction. Post mortem indicated baby had proliferative vasculopathy with hydrocephaly (Fowler syndrome). Sent for genetic counselling, established she and her husband carriers of gene responsible for syndrome. She was pregnant at time of interview.

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She can remember everything about her baby who died less than a year ago, and still thinks about him every day.
Print Probably just a day, to recover from the delivery part of things, that was it. But I remember the baby every single day, you know, like when I go to bed, it just... every time, I just imagine me going through the labour. I think because I'm pregnant again, it's just bringing it all back. I can imagine me going through the labour, and just for the first time you know, seeing the baby, getting that, that shock, of seeing him not properly developed. And just finding out, you know when they did the scan, it weren't proper, it had like abnormalities and all that. It just runs through your head again and again. It just comes back to you, everything that happened, since you know going for that scan, till burying the baby - everything.

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