A woman who thought she was expecting a baby, received the shock of her life after she went for a scan only to find something else in her stomach.
A mum was left heartbroken when at her 12-week scan doctors found her unborn baby was actually a tumour.
Siobhan and Alexander McFarlane, both 26, were over the moon when they discovered they were pregnant with their second child.
But at their first scan, no heart beat was detected.
In the place of the couple’s longed-for baby, medics discovered just a mass of cells that were not cancerous, but threatened to develop into the disease if Siobhan wasn’t treated.
Siobhan had suffered a rare molar pregnancy, where a fertilised egg fails to grow properly and instead multiplies into a mass of cells.
The 26-year-old had to face surgery to remove her tumour, the same procedure carried out for a miscarriage or abortion.
The mum-of-one spent the next five months undergoing eight gruelling rounds of chemotherapy.
In an ironic twist, she got the all-clear just days before she had been expecting to give birth to her second child.
Now, the mum-of-one is sharing her devastating ordeal to raise awareness of a disease she had never heard of before.
Siobhan, of Isle of Skye, Scotland, said: “We were really excited to go for the scan and see our second baby for the first time.
“We really wanted to give James a little brother or sister.
“I got to the hospital with Alexander and the nurse put the thing on my belly and then just turned to us and said ‘I’m sorry, there’s no baby’.
“I could see on the screen, it was just like someone had blown bubbles in my uterus. It was so weird.”
The couple were taken into a side room where a specialist came to tell them Siobhan had suffered a molar pregnancy.
“My first thought was just ‘what the hell is that?’. I’d never heard of it before,” the 26-year-old said.
“I couldn’t get my head around it. I had a belly and everything so to be told I wasn’t having a baby, I just couldn’t accept it.
“I was totally overwhelmed. We just sat and cried for hours. To think we were going to see our baby and instead be told I had this disease was devastating.
“I had lost a child and gained this horrible tumour. It was terrifying.”
Devastated, Siobhan’s ordeal was far from over, she had to face going back to hospital for an operation to remove the tumour.
She recalled: “They put me under but when I woke up my tummy was a bit flatter which was so sad. It was such a traumatic experience.”
After deciding they wanted to give their son, James, a baby brother or sister last summer, the couple soon suspected Siobhan was pregnant.
While the first pregnancy test showed a negative result, a second taken a few days later, was positive.
In the first few months, Siobhan, whose first pregnancy was “a dream”, experienced such severe nausea that she couldn’t stomach any food instead drinking litres of milk – the only thing she could keep down.
Putting it down to hormones and morning sickness, Siobhan decided to wait for her 12-week scan to find out if everything was OK.
Although she had suspected that something might be wrong, Siobhan said nothing could have prepared her for the news that she was not having a baby.
Siobhan said: “I found it odd that my first pregnancy test was negative but when the second one was positive, I just put it down to a false negative or a faulty test – it happens.
“But I started to feel really unwell really quickly.
“My first pregnancy was an absolute dream so I wasn’t expecting it at all.
“I felt sick all the time. I couldn’t even stand the thought of food so I lived off milk for three months because it was the only thing I could keep down.
“I just thought it was crazy pregnancy hormones.
“It got so bad I did start to resent the pregnancy a bit but I thought the doctors would just tell me I was being an over emotional pregnant woman so I decided to wait for the scan.
“Even though I felt like something wasn’t quite right, nothing could have prepared me for hearing that there was no baby.
“There are no words to describe how painful it was to hear that.”
What should have been happy news, left the couple fearing for Siobhan’s life.
“We had gone from one extreme to another,” she said. “It should have been one of the happiest moments of our lives but it turned into the worst.”
After having the tumour removed, Siobhan had to undergo five months of chemo to stop any abnormal cells left in her body, growing into another mass.
She finally got the all-clear in April this year, just days before what should have been her due date.
Determined to help other women, and raise awareness, Siobhan has set up a JustGiving page for Charing Cross Hospital’s Cancer Treatment and Research Trust.
Siobhan said: “Getting the all-clear was bittersweet. I got the call just days before my due date and it was such a horrible reminder of what I had lost.
“I was healthy but I wasn’t bringing home my baby.
“I can’t help thinking that if I had known about molar pregnancies then I would have gone to the doctors sooner.
“I wouldn’t have been so ill for so long, I might not have needed chemo.
“If I can raise awareness and stop someone else having to go through all that and going through the fear of being diagnosed with something they’ve never heard of then it will be worthwhile.”
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Via The Sun UK
