Week 11 was my rough week. It was the weekend of thanksgiving. I was able to eat okay the day of but after eating my body felt like it literally shut down. And kept shutting down. I think I started feeling worse Sunday and knew I needed to call the drs Monday. I called and the response I got was “well eat small meals, take a lot of small sips throughout the day. Have you tried tea? Or different temperature of juice or even Gatorade” I wanted to reach through the phone and slap her. This is NOT my first rodeo honey! I know how it goes, I wouldn’t be calling if I hadn’t tried that. But she said to try that and then call at the end of the day. Well I ended up having to come home and rest by noon, and was getting weaker and weaker. By the morning I was toast. I was shaky and really really weak. And as always I take notice of my urine color (to detect dehydration) and it was getting darker and darker. Tuesday morning I called to give the status I was supposed to give the afternoon before. The nurse called back and said if I wanted to come see the PA I could but they didn’t think I was “that bad”. I thought twice, always second guessing myself, that maybe I should just wait it out. But of course I knew it would only get worse and opted to see the PA. Unfortunately I would have to go to the Farmington office rather than the Penfield office but I didn’t care, I just felt bad that Alfie would have to take me (I was in NO shape to drive. I could barely sit upright). So off we went. Once we arrived, I shuffled myself into the office. And when I say shuffle I mean shuffle. It wasn’t a slow walk it was a hunched over, hold onto the car, then Alfie, then stair railing, then wall, just to check in. When the nurse called me back to give a urine sample, I remember thinking, “man my body is shot”. What I mean by that is that feeling your body has when you have the flu and you have the body aches an general weakness. That’s it. Sure you can force yourself to be upright and walk for a very short time but the strain on your body to do that isn’t worth it. That’s how I felt. I could barely get onto the scale by myself. Luckily I had only dropped 3lbs instead of the 8lbs with Colty. Again I shuffled into the room and lay on the exam table. When the PA came in she took one look at me and pretty much said, she didn’t realize from the messages I’d left that it was this bad. Luckily she was kind, and had been through it before, herself. Not only did she ask me how it was, but she asked Alfie, which I thought was great. Because really, I hate to be thought of as a wimp, so I don’t always tell how bad things are (with the exception of blogging… I really put it out there!). So anyways, she gave us two options: just try a cocktail of meds (Zofran and Phenergan together) or go to the hospital for fluids. And thank God for Alfie, because he jumped in with “Can we do both?” which of course she was more than willing to allow. So with the promise of feeling better on the horizon (or so I thought), off to the hospital we went. Since Alfie had to be at work, mom was able to step in and take me, which I was more than fine with. I would have been fine just being dropped off, as this wasn’t my first time and I’d literally be just lying there doing nothing. But it was nice to have mom there with me. It’s always nice to have your mama with you. Of course that day was extremely busy, and the wait in the waiting room reflected that. But we signed in anyways and waited our turn.
so I opted for a wheelchair when dropped off as I was extremely weak from dehydration. While mom parked the attendant wheeled me over to get signed in. There was an older couple waiting right by the door between where I was signing in and where I had to go to wait. The old lady was sitting with the older man behind her resting against the wall. Mom, came in and was then attempting to move me to the waiting room, when WHAM she clipped my wheelchair with that of the little old lady’s. LOL YIKES! They certainly gave us the death glare. Although in moms defense the old couple blocked the area pretty good and there wasn’t much room to maneuver. They really shouldn’t have been there! Anyways, they got their payback when another older couple ran into my wheelchair on their way back to be seen…lol no harm done
When I say the ED was busy, I mean they were putting patients in the HALLWAY on beds! I was praying hard that wouldn’t be me! I can’t handle hospitals anyways that being in a hallway and watching the sick be wheeled by would have been too much for me. Much too much. Anyways, I was finally called back and put into the holding room where a Dr. came and asked the typically preliminary questions: whats wrong? How long have you been feeling like this? When is the last time you puked? When was the last time you ate/drank? Is this the first time pregnancy? Was it this bad before? Etc. And then I was wheeled over to “room” to receive fluids. Luckily I wasn’t AWFUL (I’m not kidding when I say I did things differently this time) and only needed 2 bags of fluids. I was pretty much expecting that outcome. What I wasn’t expecting, was the trouble to get blood work drawn and an IV put in. I knew the correlation between ease of finding a vein and hydration but it did not come to mind until the first nurse came over to grab blood. Three different location attempts and nothing. Grr. So she grabbed another girl. 2 location attempts and SUCCESS! Only problem was that in order for the IV to work, I had to hold veryyyyy still and keep my arm insanely straight or else the fluids would stop dripping and the IV machine (?) would start beeping. Talk about being a pain! But I figured anything to make things feel better, right? Right! So I lay there, doing nothing, watching the comings and goings of the ED, trying to grab the scoop of the couple on the other side of the curtain, by using mom as my interpreter (they only spoke Spanish and were there for some sort of cyst that was painful…lol yeah I’m nosey like that!). After a few hours my nurse comes back and says “sooo I have some good news and bad news: Good news, congrats you are in fact pregnant! Bad news, your blood sample coagulated and we need to take more.” MOTHER EFFER! Of course I was gracious and said, “Reallllly????” But she assured me they were going to get the “expert” on the floor to do it, since my veins were being problematic. And sure enough, a few minutes later a murse (male nurse) waltzed on it. “So you are going to try taking my blood?” and his response was something along the lines of “I’m not going to try, I’m going to be successful!” Just the winning spirit I liked to hear when someone was about to poke me for the bazillionth time. And true to his word, he was successful on his first try! Praise the Lord!! Granted he had a much more hydrated patient on his hands than any of the other nurses, but that’s neither here nor there. Now that that was taken care of, the only thing that stood between myself and freedom was a half bag of IV fluid. And so we waited…and waited… and hello, rotation change! Which brought on a new nurse. And she pops in and goes “so I haven’t checked your chart, what’s up?” As she starts fiddling with my IV. Not.OKAY. I was on my phone and was trying to hang up to respond but she waved me off saying I didn’t have to get off the phone… again while fiddling with the IV which was now beeping because she moved it from its finicky position. I tried to explain the ordeal, but she jumped in with “well that’s not supposed to be like that” (no sh*! Lady, I mean really?!) So what does she do but start sliding the iv farther out. At which point it stopped beeping and flowed like normal, but instead of not being able to feel it like before, it was burning and it felt painful. I told her and her comment was “well you only have less than a quarter of a bag left, is it really painful?” I said yes. So she fiddled again and essentially ended up pulling it out. I.Was.FUMING! No, “I’m sorry”. No, “oh no!” nothing other than “let me see what the Dr. wants to do.” What I wanted to do was biotch slap her! If only she had checked my info, maybe we wouldn’t be in this lil predicament, lady. Luckily the doctor was okay with the amount of fluid I received and although I still felt really nauseous, was at least hydrated. They sent me home with a lovely prescription of Phenergan to take every four hours in addition to the Zofran I was taking twice a day. Its times like that, that I get worried. A double prescription. What harm is it to the baby? Of course it’s on the “approved” list but that’s not a guarantee (of course what in life is?) but it still makes me nervous and made me feel guilty yet again that I needed to do be on medication. So many tears have been spilled from being sick. So much anger has been shouted in my mind, in my heart, both this pregnancy and the last, and so much aloneness has been felt. Very few understand. I think because of that I feel extreme empathy for anyone experiencing morning sickness, at any level through their pregnancy. I get upset at the people who brush it off like it’s just another cross us pregnant mama’s must bear, another symptom we must endure. No, it’s a lot more than that for a lot of women. It’s frustrating and overwhelming, and when people don’t say that to others, it perpetuates the stigma that we have to just grin and bear it in our own silent hell. I’m not saying we have to daily complain about pregnancy but all I am asking for is a bit of honesty. It is not the best time in life for every woman. And it’s interesting because the more honest we are about the hard and frustrating parts of pregnancy, the more often I find there are more ladies out there who would agree. And by no means does talking about this difficult side of pregnancy mean that we are ungrateful it just means that we are shedding light on the less talked about side of things. Because it is the times that you find yourself so alone, and so discouraged and so feeling like nobody understands, that having had those conversations makes you feel a bit less alone, a bit less discouraged and a bit more like someone else gets it.
Wk 12-17: Parts of this time period are a blur to me. Filled with some good days, some bad. Some puking, lots of gagging and constant nausea. Many tears were cried, many arguments had. Some days I showered, more often, I did not. Some days I worked from home, more often I went into the office. I had weeks of food trends. Salami, ham, jarlesburge cheese and croissants; Peanut butter and jelly; toast…always toast; eggs and sausage. There were food aversions: fruit, juice, pop, pizza – anything with red sauce, greasy/heavy foods and onions. There were holidays tossed in there: Thanksgiving and Christmas. There were quiet moments, there were loud moments, there was anger and there was hurt. Times of “I can do this!” and times of “Make this stop”. Some cuddles, exhaustion, kissies and huggies, and nausea…ohhh the nausea. But it’s over. Praise the Lord it’s so over. The feeling of looking at my meds and knowing I am okay, and no longer on them : PURE JOY! But through those weeks there was ALWAYS the support of my family (mom, dad, sisters, in-laws, aunts and uncles) who for sure prayed me through those dark days and weeks. They took turns watching Colty and making sure him and Alfie had a home cooked meal. They sent encouraging texts, emails, Facebook comments and messages and literally dragged me through those days and weeks when I would have never been able to make it on my own. And then there were my friends. Most close…most ladies I have known for years upon years, some I saw often and some only via Facebook, but still their encouraging words and stories and “I’ve been there too, and it blows” were soothing to my soul. So a BIG thank you goes out to all those family and friends. YOUR faith and YOUR kind encouragement carried me and my faith. And so we thankfully and joyfully move out of the “Dark Period” and into what I lovingly call: “The Hunger Games”
