Pregnancy Week By Week – Week 6

As a first time to-be-mother, pregnancy was a completely new experience for me. I had a lot of questions and was fondling to understand the changes taking place in my body. I was equally worried about the growth of my baby inside my womb.

With this blog series, “Pregnancy Week by Week”, I hope to extend a helping hand to all expecting parents by telling you about my journey.

There might be some things that you would be able to relate to and would even give you solace to know that someone went through the exact same thing as you. Hope I’m able to help!

Disclaimer – This is entirely my personal experience. The intent of the blog is not to advice but only to share. Any medication, medical examinations, dietary intake or exercise mentioned in this blog, were prescribed as per my pregnancy and my body. Please do not perform these without consulting your medical adviser.

Precap to Week 5

On 3rd June 2022, I woke up with a strong feeling that I might have conceived this month. I did my pregnancy test and it was positive. I tested using two different brands and both showed a positive!

My last periods started on 4th May. This date is what is used to count the number of weeks one is pregnant. With this, on 3rd June, I was 4 weeks pregnant and half way into my 5th week of pregnancy.

On 3rd June itself I visited my OB-GYN. I had been going to her previously as well for other gynaecological issues. 

My OB-GYN put me on Vitamin D tablets, folic acid and increased the dosage on my thyroid medicine. I should mention that I have an autoimmune disease, called vitiligo. Keeping this in mind, she also added Ecosprin to my prescription. This was done to help with the blood supply to my uterus. 

Week 6 Begins With a Bang

I had just entered my 6th week of pregnancy and I noticed slight vaginal bleeding. I was in my office at that time and decided to rush to the hospital immediately.

My office is an hour long drive from my hospital. This was the longest one hour of my life! The anticipation of what the doctor’s verdict would be, was nearly killing.

Once I reached there, a transvaginal ultrasound was done to confirm my pregnancy. The radiologist could see a zygote in my uterus. However, she wasn’t able to pinpoint at the cause of this bleeding. 

Some typical reasons for vaginal bleeding are implantation and ectopic pregnancy.

Implantation bleeding happens at the time at the time when a fertilized egg attaches to the lining of the uterus. It’s usually a small amount of bleeding that happens around the same time as your periods and is not a sign of worry.

As per my assessment, in my case, this seemed unlikely mostly because of the timing of the bleeding – it happened around 20 days after my conception – is much later than the timeline of implantation bleeding that is, 10 to 14 days after conception.

Another reason for vaginal bleeding is Ectopic pregnancy. Normally, a fertilised egg attaches itself to the lining of the uterus but in some instances, fertilized egg might get implanted outside the main cavity of the uterus.

An ecotopic pregnancy can not survive and could additionally harm other organs if left untreated. In my case, it wasn’t an ectopic pregnancy since the ultrasound showed the zygote inside the uterus. 

Also, the presence of a zygote doesn’t really confirm pregnancy. Pregnancy is 100% confirmed only when the doctors can hear the heartbeat.

Again, a transvaginal ultrasound is performed for this but towards the middle of the first trimester. So while, a zygote was seen in my ultrasound, pregnancy was still not confirmed. 

To add further to my stress, bleeding continued for the next 3 days. It started as slight spotting but on the first day itself reached a decent flow, like the first day of periods. It wasn’t a constant flow but like that tap in the kitchen which leaks periodically.

By the next day, it had come down significantly and by the third day it was almost not there. The color of this bleeding was not too red, slightly pinkish and also, brown at times. 

To help sustain my pregnancy, my OB-GYN prescribed 2 hormonal injections, 1 shot each every week for the next 2 weeks. The injections that I have been prescribed are HUCOG 5000 IU and Proluton Depot 500 mg. 

She also prescribed an oral hormonal medicine, Duphaston, to be taken twice a day for 15 days.

Ecosprin, a bood thinner, was removed from my prescription. A blood thinner wouldn’t have caused the bleeding but as the name suggests, would reduce thickness of the blood and further increase the flow.

My OB-GYN also advised that I should avoid travelling for sometime. This also included road journeys. Since my office was over an hour long drive from my home, I had to request work from home. On this front, I got great support from my manager and was given this permission without any hassle.

Early Start of Pregnancy Symptoms

Coming to pregnancy symptoms, since week 5 itself, I felt a major surge in pregnancy symptoms. For me it was Day 1 – positive pregnancy test and Day 2 – pregnancy symptoms!

I got no time at all to to adapt to this new change. It was like being thrown in the deep end of the sea without any equipment. Since I got no time to research on expected pregnancy symptoms and how to ease them, I found it hard to cope up in the beginning.

My pregnancy symptoms were strong. I felt highly nauseous. In fact, I had been vomiting air as well. I started having food aversions as well, so much so that, within this week itself I lost about 1 kg.

To manage my symptoms, I started taking small meals. I also took saunf or fennel seeds for gas and acidity. Cold water with rose syrup (Rooh Afza) was also calming.

I think some of these symptoms would be natural, but they might have gotten exaggerated due to the hormonal injections and oral medicines that I was taking.

Now let’s see how the next week goes.