Friday, January 22, 2010

Finally over...sort-of.

It is finally almost over. I had my D&C 2 weeks ago today. Unfortunately, my ob/gyn's office called today to inform me that while my hcg levels dropped significantly, they were not near zero so I need to go back in 2 weeks for further testing. I had been feeling really good until I heard that today. I have had my moments, but for the most part I have felt like I have been reborn. I have felt great. It is like I am trying to make up for the past 6 hellish years. I picked up my ring finally to mark the end of this journey. It has 3 bigger diamonds, one for each miscarriage and 6 tiny diamonds, one for each year of trying to have a baby. It really helped me to mark the end. I also did quite a bit of retail therapy over the past few weeks which always helps. Oh, and the wine... I also took a trip to WI to surprise my mom for her birthday. I had been worried that I wouldn't be able to take the trip because of the whole D&C thing. My mom was very surprised and we had a fun weekend. I got to see lots of my old friends, which really helped.

I do have to admit that when I see a new baby, I still get upset. Maybe it is just still a little raw. I don't really get mad as much at the person with the baby, but I get sad for myself and my family. Maybe that is just the process of truly letting go of a dream. I have never truly let go of a dream before so I don't know how the process works. I am very concerned about how anxiety will affect me as soon as my hcg drops back to zero. With my last 2 miscarriages I suffered from severe anxiety attacks and my hcg only got up to 220. This time it was at 81,000 right before my D&C so I have to be prepared. It sucks because I feel so great right now and just want that feeling to continue! The only anxiety I have experienced so far was on my flight home. The guy behind me made a sniffle/snort sound rather than just blowing his stupid nose and it drove me insane from Milwaukee to Phoenix. He did it 61 times. I counted. He was already at 27 before we even took off. At first I thought he maybe had special needs, but when I saw him after we landed he was clearly a businessman. No ring on his finger and I am certainly not surprised. He probably makes that annoying sound a lot. Between his annoying snort and the turbulence for the last hour of the flight my nerves were SHOT. Maybe it was a good thing that I still had hcg in my system keeping the anxiety at bay.

Nothing else really new. Just trying to keep to myself and process everything. Hoping that I will continue to feel pleased with my decision to stop any form of fertility treatment. I won't even look at fertility blogs on the internet. I want nothing to do with it. I am moving on :) I hope that if there is anyone who actually reads this who is in the thick of the whole infertility mess they will see that there is light at the end of the tunnel. I would never have believed it myself if I hadn't seen it!! I am trying to run toward the light, but I know I will get tripped up along the way. There is always something...

Thursday, January 7, 2010

Almost there...

This feels like it is dragging on forever. To top everything off, I now have full-on morning sickness. Apparently the placenta is growing just fine, but it hasn't gotten the message about the baby not being there anymore. Since I was a little girl, there has been nothing I hated more than vomiting. I am sure nobody likes to vomit, but I was terrified of it. So last night, it finally happened. I laid next to the toilet while my cats watched in shock. One was sitting on the bathroom counter looking down at me and the new kitten had his paws up on the toilet seat for a better view. He was fascinated. This is the same kitten who watched Animal Planet for almost 30 minutes nonstop today. He is a curious little guy and I am positive that this is the first time he has ever witnessed someone vomiting.

So, I had no choice but to call in sick today for work. I have no sick time left, technically, so it is considered "unpaid leave." Not good for the pocketbook. I have to take tomorrow off, too, and so does my husband (also unpaid) so that I can finally have my D&C. Honestly, with all of this nausea and vomiting, I am not so sure I want to ever be pregnant again. It is absolutely not glamorous on any level.

I will write again when I am feeling up to it, though it may be a while as I let all of this nonsense sink in. Maybe this made my decision on child-free living that much easier since now I am not so sure I would want to do egg donor (since that could involve me being pregnant). Maybe adoption will start to sound different. Who knows. I can only take life minute by minute anymore...

Sunday, January 3, 2010

I think this is finally it...

I think that this is the official last day of this pregnancy. I am sad, but I will be relieved when this whole ordeal is over. I had only had a little bit of brown spotting after visiting the ER the other night, but today I had some red spotting. That is usually the official beginning of the end. I know that hearing it from the nurse or doctor will make it more real so I am dreading that, but at least my husband will be with me at the appointment. I already took the entire day off work and I may even take Tuesday depending on how I am feeling. I am still hoping to do this naturally, but I am supposed to be flying to WI to surprise my mom for her 71st birthday in 12 days and I want this to be over before then.

On a happier note (sort-of), I did find the ring that I plan to buy to honor my 3 little babies. It is a beautiful Tiffany ring that is just a silver band with three .05 carat diamonds. It is platinum, but I want to see if they can make it with white gold instead since that would probably cut the cost in half. I just want this ring to be special.

One of my good friends is a psychiatrist, so she has been encouraging me to get out and do things and not lay at home in bed not eating. She took me out to a movie the other night and then today she brought over a casserole. That is the sweetest thing anyone has done for me after these miscarriages. I also took her advice and went out to dinner last night. It sucked ordering a virgin margarita, but at that point I still had that little voice in my head saying, "You never know...". That damn voice is still there, but I think I have beaten it to a whisper finally. It should be gone by tomorrow.

I am just looking forward to that glass of wine tomorrow night.

Friday, January 1, 2010

So much for ringing in the New Year...

I warn you in advance that I am going to be pity partying for several weeks here. Since most people would minimize what is happening to me, the only sympathy I will get is from myself and I feel very deserving of it at this point.

So, I of course had to come up with a great way to end yet another crappy year. This was perfect! I couldn't have planned it better if I had tried! I started bleeding a little and passed a large clot (sorry, tmi) right after stopping to pick up some non-alcoholic champagne for our big New Year's Eve celebration. (I had even been motivated enough to buy some fish and a salad to make for dinner. I also picked up 4 movies including "Up" which supposedly covers the topic of infertility and miscarriage). So even though I knew it was coming, the bleeding made me cry. I called my ob/gyn and was transferred to the answering service as the office was closed. A very rude doctor called me back and was just very flippant about the whole thing. He actually sounded like he had opened his New Year's Eve champagne bottle a little early... In the end, he said that I should just go to the ER if the pain gets worse and maybe they will agree to test the tissue that I had just passed and saved, but that it probably would be expensive and not covered by insurance. Of course it wouldn't be covered, I am no longer really pregnant so why would ANYTHING be covered.

My husband was sweet and left work to come home and take me to the hospital. We checked in along with a million other people, including a poor little boy who had just had his finger cut off. He was probably the bravest person in that hospital. He didn't even cry. Meanwhile I had tears streaming down my face. We didn't have to wait as long as I thought. They brought me back to the very same room I miscarried in the first, no, the second time. The first time we were in Hawaii when the bleeding started. I didn't go to the hospital there, I just avoided swimming with the sharks. So, they came in and I had a million vials of blood drawn and an IV put in 'just in case'. Then came the dreaded catheter. I do prefer them for the ultrasounds where they want you to have a full bladder because I just can't hold it. This time it was more painful and my bladder started having a spasm as soon as they got the catheter in there. The ultrasound took quite a while. I had hoped that the little circle I saw was a yolk sac, but no such luck. It was the stupid catheter. It didn't take a rocket scientist to see that when we got to my uterus the sac was still empty. Now it was measuring 5w2d instead of the 5w3d that it measured TWO days ago. From all of my googling, it was clear to me that the diagnosis was "Blighted Ovum." I don't know why people are so hesitant to call it what it is. I am a big girl, I can take it.

After the ultrasound, we waited for a while for the radiologist to read it and get the bloodwork with my hcg level. When the doc came back, he asked what me what my last hcg had been. On Monday it was 10, 268. Well, he said that it was now 31,000+ (can't remember the exact number). So, it had doubled and was continuing to do so. He basically said that it might be just too early to see anything on u/s and that I should follow up with my doc on Monday. There was no discussion of the d&c that I had been planning. I guess we will have that talk on Monday. I think he was surprised that I looked so upset about the numbers going up since he considered that a good thing. According to my googling, that is NOT a good thing. Bleeding/clotting/cramping in pregnancy is rarely a good thing regardless of hcg level. I explained to him that I had really wanted to consider this whole thing as part of 2009 rather than start 2010 off with a miscarriage. For now, I am going to consider it still as part of 2009 because that is technically when the miscarriage "started."

So, our usual ritual after miscarriage is going to KFC so I can get one of those mashed potato and chicken bowls. I am not necessarily a huge fan of Kentucky Fried Chicken, but it is true comfort food. I never actually eat there unless I am miscarrying. Imagine my utter shock and disappointment when we drove by our local KFC and it was CLOSED! Where have I been? I never noticed that it closed! I was upset because after 4 hours at the ER, I was starving and craving KFC. Ugh. So much for a miscarriage tradition. We ended up at Arby's, which turned out to be great. I LOVE, LOVE, LOVE the horsey sauce there!

We rang in the new year watching a movie until the countdown and then drinking the sparkling cider. That stuff actually tastes better than champagne!

Now it is January 1st and I am trying to motivate myself for yet another year. I am so tired that I just can't get excited about it. I don't even want to KNOW what 2010 is going to bring. It scares me to death. Every year I have hope that things will be better and every year I am deeply disappointed. Lest you think that I am a complete ingrate, I do realize that I have many things that other people only could dream of (a bed, a pillow and a blanket for starters). It is just very hard to keep losing the one thing that you want especially when it is something that everyone else gets easily and for free. Miscarriage is an extremely painful experience, both emotionally and physically, particularly when it takes you many years and tens of thousands of dollars to get pregnant in the first place. I refuse to let anyone minimize my pain and I will allow myself the time to grieve and give myself the sympathy that I get from nobody else. Until someone has walked in my shoes for even a day, they are not allowed to have a say in how I "should" feel and how "lucky" I am other ways. I am quite positive that they would not be feeling very lucky at all if their third child was in the process of dying. There is truly nothing worse out there than the people who always say, "Look on the bright side, at least you can (fill in the blank)." This statement comes only from the mouths of people have never experienced anything truly devastating in their lifetime. I know that I should pity their ignorance and inexperience, but I just don't have the energy. They should just know better. My advice to those who want to know what to say in ANY sad situation is to just say "I am so sorry, I can't imagine what that must feel like." Please don't go on about how fortunate I am. If your parent/spouse/child/friend was dying, would you want me to say, "Think about how fortunate you are." ?? I seriously doubt you would be feeling fortunate in that moment.

Happy New Year.