Beautiful Life

I need to post something - not because I need the world to know what my last few weeks have been like but because I need to write it down for me. Maybe I'm not dealing with things right. Maybe I'm bottling it up so instead of feeling better (emotionally) I'm feeling worse every day. Maybe that's why I'm in this funk. I love Dr. Suess's book Oh, the Places You'll Go! because I think it's very true to life. I've been thinking about this part:

"You'll be on your way up!
You'll be seeing great sights!
You'll join the high fliers
who soar to high heights.

You won't lag behind, because you'll have the speed.
You'll pass the whole gang and you'll soon take the lead.
Wherever you fly, you'll be the best of the best.
Wherever you go, you will top all the rest.

Except when you don't.
Because, sometimes, you won't.

I'm sorry to say so
but, sadly, it's true
that Bang-ups
and Hang-ups
can happen to you.

You can get all hung up in a prickly perch.
And your gang will fly on.
You'll be left in a Lurch.

You'll come down from the Lurch
with an unpleasant bump.
And the chances are, then,
that you'll be in a Slump.

And when you're in a Slump,
you're not in for much fun.
Un-slumping yourself
is not easily done."

And that's where I'm at right now - a Slump. I think the reason I haven't felt like crying or complaining about my stuff is because I know people have experienced so much worse. My situation seems so easy when I compare it to what others have been through so I don't even feel like I have a right to be sad about it. But, like I said, I think I need to write it down and then I'll feel a little better. =)

It's been a roller coaster couple of weeks for us.

Up - On Monday 9/20 we find out we are pregnant. Yay!! Perfect timing - a baby due in May.
Down - On Saturday 9-25 I wake up to spotting and cramping and I'm pretty sure I'm miscarrying. Nathan had gone to Dallas for the weekend so I had a good cry and then packed up the kids and we shopped til' we dropped - I bought jewelry, shirts, pants, ice cream and we walked barefoot in the rain at the outdoor mall. I felt better after hanging out with my kids. They are beautiful and sweet and I feel so blessed to have them. That night I rented a movie and made chocolate chip cookies. I know how to spoil myself! Hahaha! The next day I was super sick - it felt like the flu so Nathan took care of me and I laid in bed all day long.

Up - I read about miscarriages and it sounds like they are accompanied by a lot of blood and a lot of pain. I didn't really have either so I take another test on Wed 9/29 - still positive! Yay! Maybe it's just a fluke - there are a lot of women who bleed in their first trimester. But, I never have so I couldn't shake the uneasy feeling.

Down - On Friday I read some more and start to wonder if I should see a doctor just to be safe. I may or may not have thought I was dying (I do that sometimes). =) I call up the office I'm assigned to and tell them all of my symptoms. He tells me to come in a half an hour. I hurry and throw Bren in the car and we head over. And then we waited for TWO hours. They finally call me back and the doctor comes in and says that they don't see OBGYN patients at that clinic. I was SO SO SO mad. Why did I wait TWO hours? Why did the guy make me an appointment there? He knew it was an OBGYN case. Anyway, he sent me to the hospital GYN center. I barely made it home to pick up the kids from the bus stop and then we headed to the University Hospital (luckily Nathan was there that day and was just getting out of class so we traded and he took the kids home). I was seen pretty quickly - I got poked twice for blood (my dang veins are so hard to find!) and then saw a doctor who did an exam and a sonogram. They didn't find a baby but they weren't concerned because it was so early. According to my hormone levels I was 2-3 weeks along. Not so much - at this point I was 6 weeks. I didn't really understand what was going on with that. Anyway, it took about 3 hours and I watched more Supernatural than I've ever wanted to watch (it's not my favorite show) and I had brought a book called Harmful Intent

but it started out with a woman dying in childbirth so I tucked it away for later. =) It was not a good day for me.

Up - They had me come back 48 hours later so I went in on Sunday and went through the exact same thing - 2 more pokes in the arm to draw blood and an ultrasound. A 3 hour wait. My numbers had almost doubled which was a good thing. They had been at 420 and they went up to 790. I started thinking that maybe I did have a super early pregnancy and had miscarried the original one - maybe I dropped an extra egg at the end of my cycle? I don't know. Either way I was feeling hopeful again!

Down - 48 hours later I head back in for the same thing. 2 pokes in my arm and an ultrasound and lots of waiting. Still no baby to be found but my number had only gone up to about 1100 and they expect to see a baby around 1500-2000. The doctor on this day was really sweet and sat down and asked if I understood what was going on and if I had any questions. She said it could still be okay but they were concerned about the slow rise in my hormone levels because that can indicate that something is wrong. At this point they are trying to figure out if it's an abnormal pregnancy or if it's an ectopic. I'm given instructions to not exercise and no sex for SIX weeks. Say what?!

Down, Down, Down - On Thursday night at 7pm I went in for my next "quant check" - 2 more pokes. I brought a good book this time and settled in for the long haul. There were a lot of people there this time. So far I had only seen the girl residents. On this night there was a young guy that kept calling people back and I thought 'Oh please no!'. I'm okay with men as OBGYNs I just don't want them to be younger than me! He finally called me back and introduced himself as the student doctor and he took me into a little room and asked me a bunch of the same questions I had already answered over the past week. I don't get it - why can't they just put my answers into the computer and look at them rather than asking me a million times? Do I smoke? Drink? Drugs? Any STD's? How many kids? Ages and weights? Any problems? Health history? Last pap? Last time I had sex? Married? How many partners? Sorry about the tangent but I was SO tired of answering the same questions over and over! I was relieved that he was just asking me questions though! He sent me back into the waiting room. I got called back a couple minutes later and LUCKY ME! I got to be his guinea pig while the resident taught him how to give an exam. I just lay there picking at my fingers and staring at the ceiling. The resident took over to do an ultrasound. No baby in the uterus. She couldn't find a baby in my fallopian tubes either. There was a corpus lutuem which supports a pregnancy so she knew there was one somewhere. She wanted her boss to have a look so I got to go wait in the waiting room some more. Side note - there are at least 3 women there in handcuffs with police officers. Neat. They called me back and I waited for a minute on the hospital bed thing and stared at the sonogram sticker upper thing and it had goop dripping down it and I was panicking that they hadn't cleaned it and that the doctor would come in and use it on me. I'm not very brave at saying anything but this was freaking me out. Everyone came in - it was a party! The boss doctor, the resident doctor, the cute medical student, and the nurse. I know she was talking to me but all I could think about was the goop - surely she would see it and wipe it down! Nope she was just about to cover it with a new condom thing and I burst out with "I'm SO sorry! I'm not usually a germaphobe but do you think that's been cleaned? I just saw that goop and I've been worried." Nope it hadn't been cleaned. The doctor said she had just assumed I was the last one to use it so she didn't think to clean it. The resident said that no, I had not been the last one. So - EW! I'm glad I said something! I would not have wanted to share germs with the girls that were in the waiting room with me. They looked for a LONG time. They spent forever on my right side. They couldn't tell for sure if it was ectopic or not. SO, she sits back and says that she recommends a d&c - a surgery where they go in and scrape the uterus clean and then they will be able to have what they take out tested to find out if there was an embryo. If they don't find anything they will know for sure that it's ectopic. 4 people are staring at me and I'm trying to be chipper (why do I always have to be chipper?!). I asked if they were absolutely sure there wasn't a baby inside me that could live because I didn't always want to wonder if I had inadvertently had an abortion (the d&c). She said no - at this point it is either miscarry or ectopic and they need to find out for sure because if it's ectopic it could burst and that is pretty dangerous. So, I said ok to the d&c. The resident took me back to sign some stuff. The usual surgery stuff - possible internal bleeding, hole in the uterus that could lead to complete uterus removal, death, etc. I started to freak out a little. =) Then, if they were to find out it's ectopic I was given the option of surgically removing it or taking Methotrexate (a chemotherapy drug). I went for the medicine. Less risky. I then headed next door to look at the surgery schedule with the nurse. 9:30 the next morning. They said I could leave and come back. I was happy about that because I needed to get to my car so that I could cry and because I wanted to love on my kids one last time (just in case I did die). They sent me to the waiting room to wait to be discharged. It was FREEZING! At 4am the Dr. came out to tell me that my insurance had a weird thing where they would need 72 hours notice for a d&c unless I was admitted right then. So, I didn't get to go home. I didn't get to cry. I didn't get to love on my kids. I called Nathan and tried to keep it together - I just didn't want the doctors to catch me with tear stained cheeks. They admitted me and got me into a hospital room (a maternity ward hospital room). I got poked 4 times before they were finally able to get my IV in. This IV was the most painful one I've ever had and it throbbed the whole time I was in the hospital. I tried to sleep but they kept coming in every half hour to check my vitals, to take blood, to ask me the same questions again, to introduce themselves. My friend Kelli took my kids that morning. Nathan got Anika to school and then dropped them off at her house. I didn't know if he would make it to the hospital before they took me back for surgery! The nurse had taken me to another part of the hospital where I had to wait until they were ready for me. Nathan made it and was able to hang out with me for awhile. I felt better as soon as I saw him. He always knows how to make me smile and he doesn't take my dramatics too seriously. =) They nurse anesthetist gave me some versed and that stuff works fast! I remember them wheeling me away and I blew Nathan a kiss. Then I remember them transferring me to another bed and telling me that my arm would probably hurt pretty bad for a minute and that I would feel the urge to cough. I did cough and that was the last thing I remember. When I came to I felt a little crampy but I was just glad to be alive! I asked if I "could have" my husband and he came and hung out with me. I was SO tired. They wheeled me back to my room and I fell asleep next to Nathan for a couple hours. At 2 he took off to pick up the kids. I was supposed to be out of there by 7 that night. That didn't happen! Nathan dropped the kids off at Heather's and they spent the night there. Nathan brought me a blizzard and came and hung out with me. We asked the nurse if we could please leave and come back the next day if I needed to take the Methotrexate. Nope. So, we waited. I hate sleeping at the hospital because they just can't leave you alone! It was awfully nice of them to put me in the maternity ward. I got to listen to the sounds of crying babies being take to their moms the whole time. It felt like I had been through childbirth and had all of the after stuff - but no baby to take care of. Anyway, I do have an ectopic pregnancy. No baby was found from the d&c. My Saturday morning nurse was super nice but pretty insensitive. She told me that her friend had this same thing happen and she didn't follow up and it turned into full on cancer so they had to remove everything. Then she said that the Methotrexate shots they give me in my butt are NOT going to feel good. In fact, it's going to hurt pretty bad. She must have missed the memo about me being scared to death of cancer and shots. Then she went on and on about how far along she is and how she is so much bigger this time around. I was happy for her - just not in the mood to be excited for my nurse's pregnancy. Later, the doctor came in to talk to me about the Methotrexate. He said I would have to follow up in 4 days and then in 7 days. I said that in 7 days I would be in Utah for my little sisters wedding. He said nope. I can't travel. I stowed away in the bathroom to shed a few tears. I didn't let loose though - I didn't want my nurse to come in and catch me. I got the shots - which didn't hurt as bad as I thought they would. And then the nurse let me walk out even though the doctor had ordered me to be wheeled down. And then I drove home and then I slept. So, I'm pretty sure I have a built up torrent of tears that need to be shed and that is why I'm feeling so blah. It's just dumb. At least it happened when I was early pregnant before I got sick. And at least I didn't die. I'm grateful for that. And I'm so thankful for my sweet kids and my husband who were waiting to love on me when I got home. Here's hoping I get back to normal next week and get out of the "waiting place". =)

"You can get so confused
that you'll start in to race
down long wiggled roads at a break-necking pace a
and grind on for miles across weirdish wild space,
headed, I fear, toward a most useless place.

The Waiting Place...

NO! That's not for you!!
Somehow you'll escape all that waiting and staying.
You'll find the bright places where Boom Bands are playing!

With banner flip-flapping
once more you'll ride high!
Ready for anything under the sky.
Ready because you're that kind of guy!

Dr. Suess knew his stuff. =)