Have you ever heard of placental lakes… Neither did I.
I was almost 20 weeks pregnant when my husband and I went for my anatomy scan. It was so amazing to see our baby (even though he was stubborn and didn’t wanna turn for a picture). Everything was perfect…. or so we thought. The ultrasound tech said we’d hear from the doctor within a few days. So nothing to worry about, right?
After my appointment, we went and got hibachi for dinner. We had to celebrate the amazing news we were definitely having a boy! We sent all of our close friends and family our ultrasounds pictures. Everything was great.
A few days later, I’m getting ready for work and literally about to walk out of the door and my phone rings. It’s the doctor from the ultrasound center. Again, I’m not worried everything seemed perfectly fine.
Everything was not fine.
The doctor begins to tell me she seen something from the anatomy scanned she was concerned with. My heart sank. I immediately started panicking. I couldn’t even process anything and had to ask her to repeat everything because I had no idea what she was talking about.
She tells me I have placental leaks…. or so I thought that’s what she said. After doing a Google search, I realized she said placental lakes. The worst part is, Google really didn’t even help that much. There aren’t a ton of articles on placental lakes.
WTH are “placental lakes”?
Basically, placental lakes are enlarged spaces in the placenta that are filled with the mother’s blood. So what does that mean for the baby? Well, it means there could be fetal growth restriction. The doctor explained more once we went to our follow up appointment. It definitely wasn’t what we wanted to hear but we felt a little better. The doctor said our son could be born at a low birth weight if the placental lakes affect his growth.
One perk to placental lakes- a ridiculous amount of ultrasounds.
The doctors wanted to monitor my son’s growth so that meant regular ultrasounds. I enjoyed these so much! I got to see my little babe all the time and knew he was doing ok!
I was about 37 1/2 weeks pregnant when I went for another ultrasound. My son wasn’t growing as much as they wanted him to. It seemed like the placental lakes were affecting his growth. The doctor actually told me my placenta was only functioning at 75%. I was told it would be best if I got induced since staying in my belly wasn’t doing too much at this point and that they could take better care of him in the hospital.
We picked our induction date.
I was scheduled to be induced on either a Monday or Tuesday… I forget now! But our little man decided he wanted to make his entrance on his own time! I went into labor late Friday night and had him Saturday morning at exactly 38 weeks. He was born at 5 lb 12 oz. So yes, he did have a low birth weight. But thank god, he didn’t have to go into the NICU and he was healthy!
Placental lakes can make a pregnancy high risk.
So this was actually news to me. I found out I was high risk when I received my short-term disability papers AFTER I had my son since I ended up going into labor at 38 weeks. It was kinda crazy to me I was considered high risk and was never even told that!
BabyCentre states, “It’s only a concern if the placental lake is large and takes up more than 10 per cent of the placenta, or if your baby is small for your stage of pregnancy.”
Placental lakes can also be no risk at all to your baby. So if you’re reading this and found out you have them too, do not stress! Talk with your doctor!
I was extremely grateful I got to see my baby a lot with so many ultrasounds. But pregnancies like this can be so scary. When I first found out I was pregnant, I hoped and prayed everything would be ok. Getting news like that or worse is so terrifying and you really just feel so helpless.
I think a lot of mother’s don’t really talk about their negative pregnancies or birth experiences because they’re afraid to possibly scare other mothers. Or simply because it was just traumatizing. But it’s so important that we do take the time to actually talk about it and reflect. We can’t do this alone and we really do need a community.
