Hi, I wanted to share our story of reduced fetal movements to help raise awareness and thank kicks count for the wonderful work that you do.

Our son was born after a category one emergency c section. At 9 days overdue, I had gone to bed with some random contractions. I woke in agony and spent the following few hours in an enormous amount of pain, with a very tense stomach (very hard) as though a contraction would not release and I became gradually more poorly, vomiting and shivering and experiencing lots of pain and contractions in my lower back. To begin with, I thought it was similar to what I had learnt about labour and that it was just a lot more painful than I anticipated. A few hours later, I realised Jack was not moving as normal. He was still moving but much less and more gently. We called the hospital who asked us to go in. As we arrived and they hooked us up to be monitored, it became apparent that both Jack and I were in distress. We had very high heart rates and I was in incredible pain in my back. The midwife who examined me said I was only 1cm dilated. This is when I realised something wasn’t right. She then accidentally broke my waters and lots of blood came out. The consultant immediately became involved and diagnosed a placental abruption. Within minutes of this, we were in theatre. Jack was born healthy and they confirmed that a large blood clot was behind the placenta and it could have come away at any moment. We were very lucky.

I did not have any bleeding and so could not have realised anything was wrong from my symptoms as many were similar to labour. I had heard that many people feel labour more in their back and so believed the pain in my lower back and tummy were normal when actually it was as a result of internal bleeding, not labour. As a first time mum, I tried to brace myself to deal with a painful labour but it was the lack and change of movement that made us call and go into hospital.

Understanding the importance of monitoring fetal movement is what saved Our son and I am very supportive of and grateful for the work that kicks count do. Spreading this message is so important.