I don't think it's any secret that I am a natural-minded individual. And as such, I have issues with our medical system, and specifically the medicalization of the natural process that is giving birth. Doctors and hospitals definitely have their place, I can certainly attest to that. I even go as far as to say that I felt more comfortable giving birth in a hospital than at home, but there still remains the unnecessary medicalization of giving birth. Just watch "The Business of Being Born" if you want to know more. And if you don't, well, I'll stop my rant about this here, but it's on Netflix if you want to check it out.
Anyway, when I was pregnant with Laura, we took prenatal classes at the hospital where she was to be born, and there they told us that we needed to be open minded about everything to do with labour/ delivery. At the time, I told myself, "Yep, okay. I know I'm no hero when it comes to pain management, so if I need an epidural, I will take it. I would really like to do it without one, but I will take it if I need to. The only thing I am not open to is a C-section."
Of course, then, we found out that Laura was breech before she was born and had to schedule a C-section despite my wishes. I discussed with my doctor and the OB/GYN options for turning her, but they said any efforts would likely be unsuccessful. I even went as far as to discuss a vaginal birth despite her being breech (my sister was born this way), and although the OB I was working with was trained for that, he didn't think it was a good idea given other factors. And because I was a First Time Mom, I conceded to their recommendations. (Knowing what I know now, I'm sure I would have fought even harder to avoid the C-section route.) And then one C-section led to two, despite my best efforts.
I preface this post with all that because today I had my follow up appointment with the surgeon who performed my hysterectomy. To be honest, I was dreading the appointment. I didn't want to talk to her. I didn't want to acknowledge what had happened. I wanted to move on and try to forget (or at least not think about it nearly as frequently as I currently do).
I had the appointment scheduled for when Laura was at preschool, and so after we dropped her off, Rachel and I headed to the OB's office. We spent an hour in the waiting room, Rachel charming the pants off everyone there, and then were taken in. Rachel, at this point, was beginning to get fussy/ tired, so I started nursing her just when the OB came in. The first thing she said was, "Oh, I'm so glad you are still able to breastfeed!"
"Yes, me too.We're down to less than one bottle/ day."
"I was a little worried because when your blood pressure gets as low as yours did, sometimes it starves your pituitary and subsequently messes with your hormones, which could have left you unable to continue breastfeeding."
"Oh.......... I would have been really mad at you if that happened." (half jokingly)
"Well, good, then. And you still have your ovaries, so you shouldn't need hormone supplements."
"Yes, I can already tell I've been cycling based on my moods."
But an even more interesting part of our conversation involved her telling me that when she was sharing my story with a very old and experienced OB/GYN colleague of hers, he simply stated, "Oh. That was a cervical pregnancy." My OB said that these were extremely rare, as she had never seen one before, only read about them.
I had never heard of a cervical pregnancy before, but as soon as I came home I looked it up. Apparently they happen in 0.1% of ectopic pregnancies. Not all pregnancies, ectopic pregnancies (pregnancies that implant outside of the uterus). So, they are extremely rare. Hence her never seeing one before. Also, my family doctor called a few weeks back to say he received a pathology report on my uterus, but hadn't received an operative report and wanted to know what happened. When I (painfully) recounted the story to him, he too said he had never seen anything like that. This, from a man who has been doing obstetrics for longer than I have been alive. So yeah. Rare. Even more rare than getting pregnant within six months post-partum. ;) My, this baby was something special.
Anyway, after educating myself on cervical pregnancies, and truly believing that this is what happened, as all the other information about them fit the bill to a T, I feel much more at peace about the situation. Its so nice to have an answer. Yes, it still was a horrible situation, but at least I know now that no one was at fault, and that nothing we could have done would have prevented it.
One thing I did read about them though is that cervical pregnancies are more common in women with previous cervical or uterine surgery, prior history of
curettage or cesarean delivery. Me. I have had a D&C (dilation & curettage - surgery to remove retained "products of conception" from my first pregnancy), uterine polypectomy, and two caesarean sections. So, I was probably a pretty good candidate for a cervical pregnancy. And that is how I have twisted this story into "How C-sections Ruined My Life". Because I hate C-sections.
Thursday, January 17, 2013
Thursday, January 10, 2013
Rachel: 8 Months
She has grown into a very capable little person in the last month. She had seemed somewhat blob-like for the last seven months, not being mobile and whatnot, but this month she has really blossomed. She is really into exploring things now. Yarn. Computer. Shirt buttons. Fan pullstrings. Placemats (and anything on them) - she'll clear a table now, and almost pulled the tablecloth trick at Christmas at the in-laws! She's also working hard on her pincer grasp and has grabbed and dumped several bowls of her food while I wasn't looking.
The day she turned 7 months, I stood her up at the ottoman, and she held on and stood there for a significant amount of time. She is not pulling herself up on furniture yet, but if she is placed there, can balance herself well. She is also finally able to sit up well enough to be able to be left alone that way. She is sort of crawling now, too. She has mastered pushing herself backwards around the room, but forwards is mostly a series of faceplants followed by kicking/ swimming motions, at the moment. But forward, nonetheless. :)
I'm sure real crawling is not far off.
She has made leaps and bounds with her personality this month, too. While I was in the hospital she came up with a bunch of funny games when she came to visit: funny hyperventilating and wobbling her head side to side, which Laura dubbed "The Neck Dance". She totally lights up when you speak to her or acknowledge her, and joins in with you when laughing. So adorable. She also has become good at expressing her anger and frustration, too, especially when her big sister takes her toys from her. :)
She is coming along verbally, as well. She has said both 'mama' and 'dada' now, though not in context. She is quite the little babbler, though. She has also mastered object permanence now, as demonstrated by looking for things when she drops them. Naps have become a little more consistent in the fact that she generally takes two a day now, though the timing of them is still quite variable.
As far as feeding goes, we have made significant improvements over the last month despite our unfortunate situation. While I was in the hospital, she was pretty much solely sustained by formula. Josh would bring her in twice a day to nurse, just to make sure my body knew we were still doing this, but she was only getting maybe a few ounces of breastmilk at most. Now that I am recovering (and not pregnant any more) I am making enough milk to support her needs again. She is only taking one 4 - 5 ounce bottle every second day or so. I'm sooo happy that at least this positive has come of our terrible situation, and every night when I'm nursing her to sleep I am so grateful to be able to do so. <3 The twice in the middle of the night feedings I could do without, though. ;) She is also eating solids like a champ. Last night I was so shocked by how much she is eating, I had to look up what an appropriate amount of solids is for an eight month old. (She seems to be on track... I'm just surprised by how much is recommended for such little tummies!) Her favourite right now seems to be butternut squash, and least favourite is anything tomato-based. I think it bothers her tummy like it does her daddy's. :(
As always, she seems to be growing up faster than I'd like, and as she is now my last baby, I am just focusing on enjoying every moment with her. <3
Saturday, January 5, 2013
Urge to Purge
Generally I hate the whole concept of having so much stuff that we have
to get rid of some in order for it to all fit in our house. I am fairly
repulsed that as a society we need to do that. But, nonetheless, it happens. And so I've spent the entire week going through almost everything we own and just getting rid of stuff. The new year always gives me an itch to clear out and organize our house. It's like a fresh start.
And actually, I was pretty happy with the girls' gifts this year. I headed their wish list with a disclaimer about our play room being full enough and requested they please only receive quality toys or books or experiences. And it even seemed to be somewhat effective.
Still, we brought home many new things that needed homes. The day we arrived home I just wanted to go through every room of the house and GET. RID. OF. STUFF.
Declutter.
I read somewhere clutter causes stress, and it definitely causes me stress. Or at least unease.
So now, it's taken me a whole week, but I have gone through the crawl space and gotten rid of things we had in storage that we (unfortunately) will not need anymore, baby clothes we won't need anymore, books, random stuff, etc. It feels good.
And actually, I was pretty happy with the girls' gifts this year. I headed their wish list with a disclaimer about our play room being full enough and requested they please only receive quality toys or books or experiences. And it even seemed to be somewhat effective.
Still, we brought home many new things that needed homes. The day we arrived home I just wanted to go through every room of the house and GET. RID. OF. STUFF.
Declutter.
I read somewhere clutter causes stress, and it definitely causes me stress. Or at least unease.
So now, it's taken me a whole week, but I have gone through the crawl space and gotten rid of things we had in storage that we (unfortunately) will not need anymore, baby clothes we won't need anymore, books, random stuff, etc. It feels good.
Tuesday, January 1, 2013
Grief
Yes, it's the beginning of a new year, and I should be happy for a fresh start. And I am. But also, I've been getting that sick feeling in my stomach again lately. You know, the one you get when you realize your kiddos are growing up way faster than you'd like? And it's especially heart wrenching now that I know I can't/ won't be having any more babies.
My biggest trigger currently is that every time I walk into the nursery I notice that we've lowered the crib mattress down to the lowest setting in the crib. Odd, I know... but it's just one step closer to being done with the crib. Forever. And just writing that brings tears to my eyes.
Rache is such a sweet baby, and I wish she could be my baby forever... or at least a really long time. Much longer than regular life would allow, at any rate. She seems to have grown with leaps and bounds the last month or so. She is pretty much crawling, albeit clumsily, but that too will pass far more quickly than I'd care for, I'm sure. She can support herself standing up, and is learning to wield a spoon. She is developing such a little personality on her, too. She is ever increasing her ability to make her needs/ wishes known, and has become much more interactive, laughing at jokes and games we play, etc.
Laura too has had the ill-making effect on me. She has been quite lovely since I've been home from the hospital (growing out of the terrible twos? fingers crossed!), and nearly every day comes out with a great one-liner. One day over the holidays I was helping her use the facilities, and remarked at how big her 'product' was. She replied, "It's like a crocodile!" Priceless. I'm really enjoying her right now. While we were away over the holidays, she slept in a few different beds, and I couldn't help but notice that she didn't seem in danger of falling out anymore. So when we got home we took the guard rail off her bed and haven't had any problems. I think she is also in the middle of a growth spurt: eating like crazy, and growing out of pants like there's no tomorrow. I'm concerned she might blow by 2T all together.
All things considered, I think I've been fairing pretty well emotionally so far, but maybe now that the busyness of Christmas is over, and we've had a few days to settle down, it is finally hitting me: I still don't feel as though our family is complete. There's nothing quite like having your baby-growing organs removed to make you realize how over the moon you are about being able to have your own children... but I still feel a void. I have had three beautiful people offer their surrogacy services, but, unless we win the lottery (like $50K +), I can't foresee that happening for us.
Of course there are the menial benefits, like the fact that our house only has three bedrooms and much better suits a family of four rather than five (and ditto for our car.... and the world, in general, really), financially it will be much easier to have two than three children, I feel like I will be able to keep up with my quality of parenting, et cetera, et cetera. But none of those things fill the hole in my heart. Sigh.
Sunday, December 30, 2012
Christmas Holidays
The week before Christmas was hectic. (I'm so glad I had the foresight and motivation to get most of our Christmas shopping and wrapping done way ahead of time!) We were a bit stuck for the Friday - still needing some help with the girls/ running the household, but thankfully my lovely former roommate came up to help. When Josh got home from work we took her out for the Festive Special for dinner as a thank you. :)
Saturday I was still pretty drained, but we had to run a few errands and grab a few last minute presents. My Type A personality would not allow Josh to do that himself, so we all trooped out together, which was a little stressful on the last weekend before Christmas. We don't really like crowds - they especially stress Josh out. Anyway, we got everything we needed and hid in the house for the remaining days before Christmas. I ideally would have liked to do a good clean before we left for the holidays because I hate coming home to a dirty house, but this year there was definitely no energy for that.
We spent Christmas Eve morning with the neighbours having a delicious breakfast and exchanging gifts, then spent the next several hours packing up everything we needed for the rest of the week away. So. Much. Work.
We headed up to my mom's in the afternoon and had another delicious meal there for Christmas Eve dinner. My dad and grandma joined us as well, and Laura enjoyed playing with "Friend Grandma" who is 82, but just loves little ones. This may be one of her last Christmases, so it was nice to spend time with her. We had a short sing-along after dinner with my mom on the piano and dad playing harmonica for a few of Laura's favourite carols, and then tucked the girls into bed.
Christmas morning my sister and her fiancee, and my dad and grandma all came back over just after 8:00am. The whole concept of Christmas/ Santa is still a little lost on Laura who had not even awoke by that point. When she did get up, she said, "Hey - where's Santa?" ... I guess she thought he was staying.
We opened stockings first - highlights include Rachel receiving Smarties, which she immediately saw the obvious use: enjoying them in their rattling form.The girls also got cute matching hats/ scarves/ mitts knitted by my sister's fiancee.
After stockings we went upstairs to open the 'big' presents. Laura's Santa gift was first: she got the movie 'Brave', and a plush Merida doll. She had been going on about that movie non-stop since we saw it in the theatre, and that was what she wanted from Santa.
We then opened presents for several more hours. Laura was only marginally into it this year. We all received lots of nice things (too many, probably!), and the girls did well.
Another cute moment: my mom bought Rachel a little handmade wooden rocking chair, and upon opening, Laura obviously wanted to try it out. So Rachel got to sit on her lap and Laura started rocking and singing 'Baby Mine' to her, just like Mommy does in the big rocking chair.
After all the gifts were opened we had breakfast/ lunch (bacon and egg sandwiches - nom), and then we watched Brave with Grandma, who hadn't seen it yet. We headed over to the family cottage mid-afternoon to visit with my cousins and their kids who were all there. There were 18 of us for dinner all together. We used to spend Christmas morning with them when I was a kid, so it is really nice to be able to still get to see them at Christmastime.
Boxing Day we packed all our things up and hit the road to Josh's parents' house. Rachel had not been sleeping/ napping well the previous couple days, so she ended up sleeping for most of the ride (thank God), and considering it took us five hours to get there, Laura did really well, too. When we were about half an hour from our destination, Laura said, "I'm full of driving." LOL I think we all were at that point.
We spent the next couple of days there, and really enjoyed the company. We don't get to see Josh's siblings that often any more now that they are all off at school, so my favourite part of the holiday was hanging out and playing games with them. We opened gifts with them the next morning, and the girls were once again spoiled. Laura received a doctor kit from Josh's sister, which was a huge hit. She spent the majority of the day running around with the toy thermometer telling everyone they had a fever. Other favourites included a family set of anatomically correct plastic lions, and a huge bin of mega blocks.
We got a pretty significant dump of snow the night we arrived, so we also took the girls outside to play in the giant snow pile the plows made at the end of the street. Laura liked the idea in theory, but not as much in practice.
Josh's Grandma also made it over for a visit and really enjoyed meeting Rachel for the first time.
All in all an enjoyable time. Until the drive home, that is. What is normally a 4 - 5 hour trip turned into a 7 hour nightmare, complete with passing 9 cars in the ditch and several on tow trucks, swerving around a near miss of an accident, etc. We really should have just stayed one more night, but we didn't realize how bad the roads were until we were too far away to justify going back. So we soldiered on. All I can say is, thank God for that headrest DVD player Laura got. We had spent far too much time in the car and decided to call it quits by the time we got back to my mom's to pick up the dogs and the rest of our gifts. We stayed the night there and headed home in the morning. A good decision for sure.
We spent the rest of the day unpacking the car and putting away our masses of presents, vacuuming, washing the floor, washing bedding and remaking beds, sorting/ doing/ folding laundry, getting groceries, taking down the tree, etc. So basically we did the big clean I like to do before we leave after we got home this time. We didn't get everything done yet, but I still feel very accomplished.
I am so glad that Josh has the entire week between Christmas and New Year's off. It still feels like weekend - and who doesn't love that?
Now to tackle the rest of the never ending To Do List.
Happy Holidays, everyone!
Saturday I was still pretty drained, but we had to run a few errands and grab a few last minute presents. My Type A personality would not allow Josh to do that himself, so we all trooped out together, which was a little stressful on the last weekend before Christmas. We don't really like crowds - they especially stress Josh out. Anyway, we got everything we needed and hid in the house for the remaining days before Christmas. I ideally would have liked to do a good clean before we left for the holidays because I hate coming home to a dirty house, but this year there was definitely no energy for that.
We headed up to my mom's in the afternoon and had another delicious meal there for Christmas Eve dinner. My dad and grandma joined us as well, and Laura enjoyed playing with "Friend Grandma" who is 82, but just loves little ones. This may be one of her last Christmases, so it was nice to spend time with her. We had a short sing-along after dinner with my mom on the piano and dad playing harmonica for a few of Laura's favourite carols, and then tucked the girls into bed.
Christmas morning my sister and her fiancee, and my dad and grandma all came back over just after 8:00am. The whole concept of Christmas/ Santa is still a little lost on Laura who had not even awoke by that point. When she did get up, she said, "Hey - where's Santa?" ... I guess she thought he was staying.We opened stockings first - highlights include Rachel receiving Smarties, which she immediately saw the obvious use: enjoying them in their rattling form.The girls also got cute matching hats/ scarves/ mitts knitted by my sister's fiancee.
After stockings we went upstairs to open the 'big' presents. Laura's Santa gift was first: she got the movie 'Brave', and a plush Merida doll. She had been going on about that movie non-stop since we saw it in the theatre, and that was what she wanted from Santa.
Another cute moment: my mom bought Rachel a little handmade wooden rocking chair, and upon opening, Laura obviously wanted to try it out. So Rachel got to sit on her lap and Laura started rocking and singing 'Baby Mine' to her, just like Mommy does in the big rocking chair.
Boxing Day we packed all our things up and hit the road to Josh's parents' house. Rachel had not been sleeping/ napping well the previous couple days, so she ended up sleeping for most of the ride (thank God), and considering it took us five hours to get there, Laura did really well, too. When we were about half an hour from our destination, Laura said, "I'm full of driving." LOL I think we all were at that point.
We spent the next couple of days there, and really enjoyed the company. We don't get to see Josh's siblings that often any more now that they are all off at school, so my favourite part of the holiday was hanging out and playing games with them. We opened gifts with them the next morning, and the girls were once again spoiled. Laura received a doctor kit from Josh's sister, which was a huge hit. She spent the majority of the day running around with the toy thermometer telling everyone they had a fever. Other favourites included a family set of anatomically correct plastic lions, and a huge bin of mega blocks.
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| cute matching sets from their Auntie |
We got a pretty significant dump of snow the night we arrived, so we also took the girls outside to play in the giant snow pile the plows made at the end of the street. Laura liked the idea in theory, but not as much in practice.
Josh's Grandma also made it over for a visit and really enjoyed meeting Rachel for the first time.
All in all an enjoyable time. Until the drive home, that is. What is normally a 4 - 5 hour trip turned into a 7 hour nightmare, complete with passing 9 cars in the ditch and several on tow trucks, swerving around a near miss of an accident, etc. We really should have just stayed one more night, but we didn't realize how bad the roads were until we were too far away to justify going back. So we soldiered on. All I can say is, thank God for that headrest DVD player Laura got. We had spent far too much time in the car and decided to call it quits by the time we got back to my mom's to pick up the dogs and the rest of our gifts. We stayed the night there and headed home in the morning. A good decision for sure.
We spent the rest of the day unpacking the car and putting away our masses of presents, vacuuming, washing the floor, washing bedding and remaking beds, sorting/ doing/ folding laundry, getting groceries, taking down the tree, etc. So basically we did the big clean I like to do before we leave after we got home this time. We didn't get everything done yet, but I still feel very accomplished.
I am so glad that Josh has the entire week between Christmas and New Year's off. It still feels like weekend - and who doesn't love that?
Now to tackle the rest of the never ending To Do List.
Happy Holidays, everyone!
Thursday, December 20, 2012
To Be Thankful
A week ago tonight I spent my evening in the operating room, nearly bleeding to death. Needless to say, this past week has been a rocky one. I've spent my nights trying to fall asleep and make sense of everything. I'm still struggling to understand why this has happened to me/ us. Perhaps only time will tell. But as the bruises are fading and the wounds are healing, and through all of the terrible things that have happened, I have found it surprisingly easy to focus on the positives.
This past week I have found myself eternally grateful for:
This past week I have found myself eternally grateful for:
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| Alive! |
- The fact that I am alive and can be with my family that I love. Especially at this time of year. That woulda been really crappy to die like a week before Christmas.
- Blood donors. Obviously. All nine of them (for me, and for the rest of them, too.)
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| All of us at Laura's Christmas concert today :) |
- My husband, who through thick and thin has doted on me, and deserves a lot more credit than I often give him. <3
- The fact that I am privileged enough to already have two beautiful babies. That I can nurse Rachel to sleep, and sing to Laura. That I am here to watch and learn all of Rachie's funny, new games. That Laura can stick stickers all over me. That I can attend Laura's first preschool Christmas concert. Family jam night. All the little things that don't seem to matter on a daily basis, but when they've been threatened to be taken away, you realize how much you truly cherish those moments.
- Nurses. God bless you.
- Our family and friends that continuously give of themselves to us so selflessly.
And our friends and family that can't be here, but sent kind messages, condolences, flowers, and offerings of use of their uteri. <3
And for all of those we know who have already donated blood to repay my 'debt'.
- Chester. This dog gets all my 'leftover' attention, but is there for me whenever I need him.
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| A picture of us that I randomly took a couple of weeks ago |
- Certain random people that come into your life for unforeseen reasons but that end up helping you in a beautiful way.
- Free WIFI in the hospital. Facebook, for allowing me to share and grieve. Pinterest, for providing a welcome distraction.
Sunday, December 16, 2012
What Do You Title a Story Like This?
I feel the need write this story down and get it all out there. It is graphic, emotional, scary, and long.
But I need to do this for myself. Feel free to read as much or as little of it as you want.
I would like to start this story by stating that I have always wanted three children. I consider myself a very maternal person, and for as long as I can remember have always planned to have three kids. After we had Rachel, Josh was not so sure about the Three Child Family route. We had our hands full enough as it was. We decided to leave it in the air for the time being and make a more concrete decision when she was a little older.
Then we found out when Rachel was only 5 months old that I was pregnant with our third child. I had not started cycling yet, and we hadn't even had much opportunity, but nonetheless, we were surprised with another pregnancy. There is a less than 2% chance of this happening when you are exclusively breastfeeding during the first six months, as I was. So, at first we were shocked and didn't know what the heck we were going to do with two kids 13 months (or less) apart, never mind three under the age of 3.5. But eventually we started seeing the positives, and were happy that this new little person was going to complete our family. We figured this baby was in the top 2%, it must be pretty special and be given to us for a reason. Almost eerily, this was my fourth pregnancy in as many years, and this baby was due right at the exact same time as our first baby, that I lost.
A few days after we had confirmed the pregnancy I began bleeding. It was reminiscent of when I miscarried the first baby, and we trucked off to the hospital right away. Thankfully, we found a little bean on the ultrasound about six weeks along and with a heartbeat! Hurray! The chance of miscarrying after a heartbeat has been established drops down to only 3%, apparently.
I had about two to three weeks of morning sickness, but then it started tapering off. I was a little concerned because this was exactly as it had happened with my first pregnancy. I told myself not to worry - it was probably just a boy this time ;), and that I should be thankful I didn't feel too sick while trying to care for the girls. I was, however, really stressed out about the fact that my milk supply was plummeting and Rachel was not getting enough to eat. She was already going to have enough issues being the middle child and not getting to be the 'baby' for long, so I felt this was really unfair to her on top of everything else.
Fast forward a few weeks.
Wednesday of this past week I had a large, nearly unmanageable bout of contractions/ cramps that required me to lay down and breathe through. I then passed some blood. I called Josh to come home from work and watch the girls while I got in the tub. I stayed there for about 1.5 hours, but not a lot more happened. I didn't want to go to the hospital unless it was dire. If I was miscarrying, I wanted to do it at home and be part of it (as opposed to going to the hospital and being put out for a D&C - the surgery they perform to clear out the uterus after a fetus has passed.) I called the midwife and she suggested going to the hospital, but I seemed okay, and stayed home. (I have a friend who would have bleeds like this with her first pregnancy due to a low-lying placenta, but she came out with a lovely little girl from it, so I was still holding onto a shred of hope.) We did decide to go into emerge around 10 that night when my mom could come and stay with the girls. The ER doctor couldn't find anything of note (ie fetus or heartbeat) on their portable ultrasound machine, and said we should come back in the morning for a proper ultrasound when the technicians and radiologist would be around. I was hoping that everything was still okay, but my mommy radar was telling me otherwise.
Thursday morning I went in for the ultrasound while Josh stayed home with the girls. The technician and the radiologist told me the baby had stopped developing at 8w 2d - right around when I had stopped feeling so sick - and that they couldn't find a heartbeat. I should have been measuring 11 - 12 weeks by this point, so I was upset, but had been mentally prepared for this kind of news. The radiologist also said something else "looked like a subchorionic hematoma", and that I would likely start to miscarry later that day. I went home and although Josh had an important meeting he wanted to go to, he stayed home from work for the rest of the day to help with the girls. I was still holding onto a shred of hope that this was somehow all a terrible mistake, and that they had messed up on the ultrasound (as has happened before). But, a friend who knew about the situation came over to drop off a treat for me just after 4pm, which was unfortunately right when I felt it coming on. I excused myself as she left and passed a large gush of blood in the tub again. (I had chosen the tub over the toilet because with the first baby we lost I didn't know better/ think it through and everything was just flushed. That felt pretty disrespectful to me, in hindsight. This time I wanted to see the fetus and honour it properly, especially as I had just seen its little centimetre long body on the ultrasound a few hours earlier.) However, I didn't last long in the tub before I had lost too much blood and passed out. I was able to yell to Josh just before I lost consciousness that I was "not okay!". He called 911, and since their dispatch is only a few blocks from our house, they arrived promptly. Poor Laura was so scared - she didn't understand why our house was suddenly swarming with uptight paramedics and fire fighters. Josh said he put her in her room, and she just sat in the corner quiet and scared. I hope she isn't scarred for life from this. Luckily our beautiful neighbours saw all the commotion and came over to take the girls for awhile. The paramedics carried me out to the ambulance and gave me an IV right away. I was rushed to the ER (also only a few blocks from our house), and seemed to stabilize somewhat. I had regained consciousness before we left but my blood pressure was quite low. I waited in the ER for a little while, as the bleeding had slowed. A little while later it started up again, and I began to feel quite awful. It was then that they decided I needed a D&C. As I mentioned previously, this was not my first choice route in dealing with this. Also, my faith and trust in our small town hospital is not great, and if I did require a D&C, I would have much preferred it to be at the hospital we regularly use, with the surgeons I knew and trusted. Alas, there was no time for that.
An obstetrician I had never met before came in to talk to me, and said we would be doing a D&C. I made my wishes known to her about the fetus not just being discarded. She looked at me like I had two heads, but told me she would have a look through the tissue to try to find it.
After what was supposed to be a 10-minute procedure of removing all pregnancy tissue from my uterus, I awoke in a dark room. Josh was there, and my mom. I glanced at a clock and it was after 1am. I was in a LOT of pain, and my mouth and throat had never been so dry in my life. I could barely breathe because my tongue was just a solid mass in my mouth. I desperately needed water, but my squeaks and pleas were ignored. They did at one point tell me I could not have any water for fear of me vomiting. And why the hell was I in so much pain?! I didn't remember my D&C hurting so much the first time. Through my fog, I realized the nurses had also been asking to check "my incision". After that registered in my brain, I was furious! How dare this OB go in through my c-section scar again! There was absolutely no need for her to do that with a routine D&C. I now have had it opened three times, and if there was any hope of me ever having a natural birth again - she pretty much just shot it down to zero. I was livid. Josh and my mom had gone, they said something about relieving the neighbour who was at home with the girls. It's all kind of a blur to me. I remember waking up about every half an hour through the rest of the night, begging for pain relief and something to quench my parched throat and mouth. As the night dragged on, the nurses eventually let me have some ice chips, so long as I ate them slowly. I was being given morphine every hour, but it was not holding my pain that long, and I was extremely uncomfortable by the time I could have another dose.
In the morning Josh came in to visit me and to have our briefing with the surgeon. This is her tale of what happened:
We began what was only supposed to be a 10-minute procedure, but as we were vacuuming the tissue out of the uterus, we pulled loose a piece of placenta and your blood pressure dropped and your heart rate suddenly went through the roof. We then spent the next five hours trying to figure out where you were bleeding from and how we could stop it. We checked if we had somehow perhaps poked a hole in your previous incision, but after checking that and still finding nothing, we thought opening you up through the incision to have a better look and try to find where the bleeding was coming from was the best choice. However, at this point, you were losing a lot of blood, and your blood pressure was fatally low - we ended up giving you all of the donor O negative reserves we had here. We had police rush extra blood from the hospital in the next city over, and also from a hospital in a city about three hours from here. You took 8 units of blood (and the anesthetist said he was pretty sure I lost all of my own blood - so the entirety of the blood in my body right now is other people's. Thanks people. :) Plus, when all was said and done, I had been given over 12L of saline.) The general surgeon and I had to stop the surgery several times and just manually hold your arteries closed while the anesthetist gave you more blood. After checking over every inch of your uterus, we finally determined that the source of bleeding was coming from somewhere near your cervix - below where the main arteries come into the uterus, below the previous incision, etc. So, the only choice we had was to do a hysterectomy.
- "Wait, what??? Are you serious???" I began to cry, and glanced at Josh, who was crying too. -
I was honestly worried you would otherwise die, and I didn't want to leave your two beautiful girls at home without a mother. We had come out of surgery at a few points to update Josh, as clearly it was taking much longer than expected. Finally around 1am we finished up. I'm so sorry.
I didn't even know what to make of all this. I was so angry and confused. I am only 27 - I was not done with my uterus yet! How the hell am I barren??? Now I can never carry another child. How dare she do this to me, and without my consent!! I felt so violated. Some random stranger, who I was not even comfortable with had just gone into my body and taken one of my most precious organs. How did this even happen?? Who even knew the risk of miscarriage could end so badly?! I suppose in the grand scheme of things, not waking up at all and leaving my children motherless would be the worse option. The surgeon did mention that she left my Fallopian tubes and ovaries, so I still have all of my eggs, and if we really wanted another child that surrogacy would be an option.
I am now being monitored in the ICU (though doing much better). I did end up receiving a ninth unit of donor blood yesterday because my hemoglobin was still quite low.
Everything is still so surreal right now, and I'm still hoping I wake from this terrible dream.*sob*
But I need to do this for myself. Feel free to read as much or as little of it as you want.
I would like to start this story by stating that I have always wanted three children. I consider myself a very maternal person, and for as long as I can remember have always planned to have three kids. After we had Rachel, Josh was not so sure about the Three Child Family route. We had our hands full enough as it was. We decided to leave it in the air for the time being and make a more concrete decision when she was a little older.
Then we found out when Rachel was only 5 months old that I was pregnant with our third child. I had not started cycling yet, and we hadn't even had much opportunity, but nonetheless, we were surprised with another pregnancy. There is a less than 2% chance of this happening when you are exclusively breastfeeding during the first six months, as I was. So, at first we were shocked and didn't know what the heck we were going to do with two kids 13 months (or less) apart, never mind three under the age of 3.5. But eventually we started seeing the positives, and were happy that this new little person was going to complete our family. We figured this baby was in the top 2%, it must be pretty special and be given to us for a reason. Almost eerily, this was my fourth pregnancy in as many years, and this baby was due right at the exact same time as our first baby, that I lost.
A few days after we had confirmed the pregnancy I began bleeding. It was reminiscent of when I miscarried the first baby, and we trucked off to the hospital right away. Thankfully, we found a little bean on the ultrasound about six weeks along and with a heartbeat! Hurray! The chance of miscarrying after a heartbeat has been established drops down to only 3%, apparently.
I had about two to three weeks of morning sickness, but then it started tapering off. I was a little concerned because this was exactly as it had happened with my first pregnancy. I told myself not to worry - it was probably just a boy this time ;), and that I should be thankful I didn't feel too sick while trying to care for the girls. I was, however, really stressed out about the fact that my milk supply was plummeting and Rachel was not getting enough to eat. She was already going to have enough issues being the middle child and not getting to be the 'baby' for long, so I felt this was really unfair to her on top of everything else.
Fast forward a few weeks.
Wednesday of this past week I had a large, nearly unmanageable bout of contractions/ cramps that required me to lay down and breathe through. I then passed some blood. I called Josh to come home from work and watch the girls while I got in the tub. I stayed there for about 1.5 hours, but not a lot more happened. I didn't want to go to the hospital unless it was dire. If I was miscarrying, I wanted to do it at home and be part of it (as opposed to going to the hospital and being put out for a D&C - the surgery they perform to clear out the uterus after a fetus has passed.) I called the midwife and she suggested going to the hospital, but I seemed okay, and stayed home. (I have a friend who would have bleeds like this with her first pregnancy due to a low-lying placenta, but she came out with a lovely little girl from it, so I was still holding onto a shred of hope.) We did decide to go into emerge around 10 that night when my mom could come and stay with the girls. The ER doctor couldn't find anything of note (ie fetus or heartbeat) on their portable ultrasound machine, and said we should come back in the morning for a proper ultrasound when the technicians and radiologist would be around. I was hoping that everything was still okay, but my mommy radar was telling me otherwise.
Thursday morning I went in for the ultrasound while Josh stayed home with the girls. The technician and the radiologist told me the baby had stopped developing at 8w 2d - right around when I had stopped feeling so sick - and that they couldn't find a heartbeat. I should have been measuring 11 - 12 weeks by this point, so I was upset, but had been mentally prepared for this kind of news. The radiologist also said something else "looked like a subchorionic hematoma", and that I would likely start to miscarry later that day. I went home and although Josh had an important meeting he wanted to go to, he stayed home from work for the rest of the day to help with the girls. I was still holding onto a shred of hope that this was somehow all a terrible mistake, and that they had messed up on the ultrasound (as has happened before). But, a friend who knew about the situation came over to drop off a treat for me just after 4pm, which was unfortunately right when I felt it coming on. I excused myself as she left and passed a large gush of blood in the tub again. (I had chosen the tub over the toilet because with the first baby we lost I didn't know better/ think it through and everything was just flushed. That felt pretty disrespectful to me, in hindsight. This time I wanted to see the fetus and honour it properly, especially as I had just seen its little centimetre long body on the ultrasound a few hours earlier.) However, I didn't last long in the tub before I had lost too much blood and passed out. I was able to yell to Josh just before I lost consciousness that I was "not okay!". He called 911, and since their dispatch is only a few blocks from our house, they arrived promptly. Poor Laura was so scared - she didn't understand why our house was suddenly swarming with uptight paramedics and fire fighters. Josh said he put her in her room, and she just sat in the corner quiet and scared. I hope she isn't scarred for life from this. Luckily our beautiful neighbours saw all the commotion and came over to take the girls for awhile. The paramedics carried me out to the ambulance and gave me an IV right away. I was rushed to the ER (also only a few blocks from our house), and seemed to stabilize somewhat. I had regained consciousness before we left but my blood pressure was quite low. I waited in the ER for a little while, as the bleeding had slowed. A little while later it started up again, and I began to feel quite awful. It was then that they decided I needed a D&C. As I mentioned previously, this was not my first choice route in dealing with this. Also, my faith and trust in our small town hospital is not great, and if I did require a D&C, I would have much preferred it to be at the hospital we regularly use, with the surgeons I knew and trusted. Alas, there was no time for that.
An obstetrician I had never met before came in to talk to me, and said we would be doing a D&C. I made my wishes known to her about the fetus not just being discarded. She looked at me like I had two heads, but told me she would have a look through the tissue to try to find it.
After what was supposed to be a 10-minute procedure of removing all pregnancy tissue from my uterus, I awoke in a dark room. Josh was there, and my mom. I glanced at a clock and it was after 1am. I was in a LOT of pain, and my mouth and throat had never been so dry in my life. I could barely breathe because my tongue was just a solid mass in my mouth. I desperately needed water, but my squeaks and pleas were ignored. They did at one point tell me I could not have any water for fear of me vomiting. And why the hell was I in so much pain?! I didn't remember my D&C hurting so much the first time. Through my fog, I realized the nurses had also been asking to check "my incision". After that registered in my brain, I was furious! How dare this OB go in through my c-section scar again! There was absolutely no need for her to do that with a routine D&C. I now have had it opened three times, and if there was any hope of me ever having a natural birth again - she pretty much just shot it down to zero. I was livid. Josh and my mom had gone, they said something about relieving the neighbour who was at home with the girls. It's all kind of a blur to me. I remember waking up about every half an hour through the rest of the night, begging for pain relief and something to quench my parched throat and mouth. As the night dragged on, the nurses eventually let me have some ice chips, so long as I ate them slowly. I was being given morphine every hour, but it was not holding my pain that long, and I was extremely uncomfortable by the time I could have another dose.
In the morning Josh came in to visit me and to have our briefing with the surgeon. This is her tale of what happened:
We began what was only supposed to be a 10-minute procedure, but as we were vacuuming the tissue out of the uterus, we pulled loose a piece of placenta and your blood pressure dropped and your heart rate suddenly went through the roof. We then spent the next five hours trying to figure out where you were bleeding from and how we could stop it. We checked if we had somehow perhaps poked a hole in your previous incision, but after checking that and still finding nothing, we thought opening you up through the incision to have a better look and try to find where the bleeding was coming from was the best choice. However, at this point, you were losing a lot of blood, and your blood pressure was fatally low - we ended up giving you all of the donor O negative reserves we had here. We had police rush extra blood from the hospital in the next city over, and also from a hospital in a city about three hours from here. You took 8 units of blood (and the anesthetist said he was pretty sure I lost all of my own blood - so the entirety of the blood in my body right now is other people's. Thanks people. :) Plus, when all was said and done, I had been given over 12L of saline.) The general surgeon and I had to stop the surgery several times and just manually hold your arteries closed while the anesthetist gave you more blood. After checking over every inch of your uterus, we finally determined that the source of bleeding was coming from somewhere near your cervix - below where the main arteries come into the uterus, below the previous incision, etc. So, the only choice we had was to do a hysterectomy.
- "Wait, what??? Are you serious???" I began to cry, and glanced at Josh, who was crying too. -
I was honestly worried you would otherwise die, and I didn't want to leave your two beautiful girls at home without a mother. We had come out of surgery at a few points to update Josh, as clearly it was taking much longer than expected. Finally around 1am we finished up. I'm so sorry.
I didn't even know what to make of all this. I was so angry and confused. I am only 27 - I was not done with my uterus yet! How the hell am I barren??? Now I can never carry another child. How dare she do this to me, and without my consent!! I felt so violated. Some random stranger, who I was not even comfortable with had just gone into my body and taken one of my most precious organs. How did this even happen?? Who even knew the risk of miscarriage could end so badly?! I suppose in the grand scheme of things, not waking up at all and leaving my children motherless would be the worse option. The surgeon did mention that she left my Fallopian tubes and ovaries, so I still have all of my eggs, and if we really wanted another child that surrogacy would be an option.
I am now being monitored in the ICU (though doing much better). I did end up receiving a ninth unit of donor blood yesterday because my hemoglobin was still quite low.
Everything is still so surreal right now, and I'm still hoping I wake from this terrible dream.*sob*
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