February 18, 2009

1 p.m.-1 day shy of 21 weeks pregnant-We were at home watching a movie. As the movie came to an end, I started to not feel very well. I felt strong cramping and a fullness like what I had felt in the past with a bladder infection. I had a hard time using the restroom and assumed that it was indeed a bladder infection from the catheter I had during my surgery. They had told me this could happen. I called my usual family doctor to see if they could get me in and help out. The nurse said she would get back to me and see what she could do although she believed that I couldn't be fit in until Friday...today was Wednesday. Within a matter of minutes, the pain and uncomfortableness I felt grew to almost unbearable. I was nauseated and sweating, couldn't find any way to stand or sit that seemed to ease anything, and was contemplating calling an ambulance. I had had strange attacks kind of like this before I got pregnant and was scared this is what I was having. I could get through the attacks before I was pregnant...but barely. It wiped me out and was the most painful things I had gone through until now. I knew I couldn't go through it at home, not now at almost 21 weeks pregnant and with an 8 inch cut in my abdomen from a surgery just a week before. I tried to use the restroom again and as a sat contemplating the call for an ambulance....all of a sudden...i felt this rush of water and this huge release of pressure. In an instant, everything I was feeling was gone. It felt like I just peed a bucket full ...but the pee wasn't pee. My water had broke (3 p.m.). I wiped and saw blood and signs of my plug...things you shouldn't see until you are closer to 40 weeks pregnant. I screamed from the bathroom for my husband who was at the back of the house and we immediately called our hospital. They told us to come in asap and they would be waiting for us. In a matter of minutes, we were on our way. Everything I had felt before that release was gone...now slowly being replaced by contractions. I was hysterically crying on the way to the hospital. My husband tried to soothe me and tell me not to think of bad thoughts...but they wouldn't leave. I kept holding my "bump", talking to God saying "please no, release no" and talking to Claire saying "please hold on". When we arrived at the hospital (3:30 p.m.), they took me in immediately. I sat in a chair waiting for the room to be ready while the nurse was timing my contractions and my husband was holding my hand and talking to me. When we got in the room, I changed into my hospital gown, while changing more liquid and blood rushed out of me as I ran to the bathroom. A nurse came in as I came out of the bathroom and saw the trail I had left on the floor. I climbed in the bed and the nurse said she was going to take a look. She did and confirmed that my water had broken and it was indeed amniotic fluid coming out. They tried to calm me but I was going in and out of shock symptoms and hysterically crying. My husband was trying his best to be strong for me. They tried to hear the heartbeat but the couldn't find it...they tried several times. They brought in an ultrasound and immediately on the screen I could see that Claire was not moving. It was so surreal...like I was looking at her ultrasound picture...not the live shot. This is when I would usually see her kick or suck her thumb or something...anything. I couldn't hold it in and begin sobbing again. The ultrasound lady tried to soothe me because she was trying to get a heartbeat and it was difficult because it was very low, I was crying, and she was limited on where she could put the equipment due to my abdominal cut. The doctor came in and the ultrasound lady said "67"...I lost it. Her heartbeat was always around 120-140...not 67. My OBGYN that had taken care of me throughout my surgery was on vacation. They did not know that and therefore called her to let her know what was going on. She was patched through to my room and we spoke for a bit...actually...she spoke for a bit. I tried to listen. The only things I was hearing were "I am so sorry", "I don't know why this happened", "There is nothing we can do", and then she began to tell me what would "happen" in the next hours. The baby could not be saved, was too yound, and the heartbeat was dropping to zero. She would alreadyhave brain damage by now. Afterward, she asked if she could speak to my husband. I was crying hysterically the entire time she talked to me but was holding in as much noise as possible to try to comprehend what she was saying. When my husband got on the phone, He too began to cry hysterically and we just held each other while she proceeded to tell him everything she had told me. When he hung up, we just continued to hold each other and cry. Sometime later, the doctor on duty came back to us to also tell us what would "happen", ask if we had questions, and then asked some questions of his own. One of which was, "Do you want to see and hold the child afterward?" He told us to think about it, we had some time to think about the answer. After he left, we looked at each other and asked each other the same question. We both immediately said "yes, of course, she is our daughter and this is hard no matter what". We didn't want to regret not seeing and holding her and not having any "closure". The doctor came in at 9 p.m. and put the medicine in me to induce my contractions more to help push her out and save me from possible infections. When he put the medicine in, he said it would take about 8 hours. Within a half hour, my contractions were really bad and my abdomen was hurting from all of my moving around I wasn't technically suppose to be doing only one week after surgery. I called a nurse in and they gave me morphine. It helped a little at first and I was actually able to fall asleep for a bit. When i woke up again, my contractions were worse, more morphine did nothing. The nurse said I can do an epidural. Me, the person who was convinced originally throughout her whole 21 weeks of pregnancy that she was going to do this with no meds told the nurse that I wanted the epidural and that "I want to feel as little as possible". After all, this was different...this wasn't the labor I had planned with the outcome I had planned. They did the epidural which was hard since I had to lay on my side and felt my abdomen splitting open as I held to the side of the bed. The epidural only made my right side go numb...I still felt everything on my left side. It did help a bit though with at least what I would have felt on my right side without it. A few hours later, they came in and did it again as it wore off. I had the same result. Only my right side worked. I was able to drift in and out of sleep a little, even in pain. I was exhausted and worn out from crying...so much that I couldn't cry any more. I was slightly in shock from it all too. The nurses kept "checking" me and saying they can feel the baby and I wasn't ready yet. At about 4:55 a.m. the next morning (February 19), I called the nurses in and told them that I felt like pushing and that I felt like she was coming...these feelings woke me up to tell me it was time. They checked and said that they could see her head and that i was at 8 cm but it would probably be another 20 minutes before I would be ready. As the nurse washed her hands at the sink in our room, I felt a movement and then started saying "The baby is coming, the baby is coming" over and over again. My husband jumped over to me and the nurse called for back up. When they came to the bed to check again (only minutes after the last check), sure enough the baby was coming. They put me in position and my husband stood by my side. He held my hand and caressed my face and the doctors were coaching me through this. I had not gone to a class on birthing and had never gotten around to reading the books from my doctor's office...it was too early. Everything I knew was from movies. They said "okay...breath....okay... push" and I pushed. ..hard. Something didn't feel right though and then it hit me instantly...in the movies they tell you to push with the contractions. The nurses said "okay...breath....okay... push" (the second time), I felt a contraction, and pushed with it. The nurse reached in and pushed down on Claire's head a little to release her from being stuck behind my pubic bone which was apparently blocking her, and she came out. My husband and I kep holding each other and saying we loved each other as the nurses cleaned her up and brought her over to us. The room was so silent...the way it shouldn't be after giving birth. The only thing I heard was one nurse telling me I did a good job, a nurse announce "4:59", and another nurse holding her immediately saying "It's a ...(pausing to look)...little girl"...to which I filled the pause and said "Girl...It's a girl" before she could. She was born at 4:59 a.m. , exactly 8 hours after I was given the medicine. She was 9 inches long, weighed 11 ounces, and beautiful. The nurse that handed her to me took my hand and guided me to touch Claire's hands and feet while telling me "look at her hands...and her feet...she has 10 toes and ten fingers...." while moving my hand accordingly to Claire's fingers and toes as she spoke. This was to me the single most important thing that anyone could have done for me and I am thankful for this nurse and her actions at that time EVERY DAY. Tears flooded my eyes but I could not sob anymore...I was almost out. I held her for three hours although I didn't do much while I was holding her. I was in shock and knew that my affect was blank. Only once did I really look at her..move the blanket around and play with her feet and hands. She had her daddy's upper lip which is hard to explain but it was 100 percent her daddy's. My husband, as if he knew I was thinking this, said "She has your hands and fingers". The nurses came in around 8 a.m. and took her away. I thought I was ready for them to take her and I told them I was but after they did, I somehow found more tears to cry knowing I would never see her again. We somehow managed to eat something for breakfast. My husband left me for a bit to make some phone calls to friends and family to let them know what had happened and to call the insurance company to see if they cover the autopsy since we had to let them know before I left if we would be having one performed. On his way back to me, a lady asked him in the elevator if he had just had a baby. He was wearing a maternity pass and this must have triggered the question. He didn't know how to answer...didn't want to answer. The nurses left us alone for awhile. We noticed they put a picture of a tear drop on the outside of our room's door. Apparently, that is the sign of grief. They did another ultrasound to make sure everything was out and it was. Then they asked me if I wanted to stay in the maternity ward or move to another section of the hospital. I was confused by this at first...I didn't want to not be in the maternity ward because I was no longer having a baby...but I didn't want to be in the maternity ward and continue to hear others go into labor with happier endings. I asked to be moved. Over the next 24 hours, I was visited by family and few friends. We didn't talk much about what happened...it was the elephant in the room. I was torn. I wanted to talk about it but I didn't want to cry and hurt anymore. It was easier to just sit next to them in silence. My breasts filled with milk and started leaking so I had to ice them to try to stop it as well as dealing with everything else that happens after birth...except having a live baby to take care of and "show off". The epidural still gave me side affects and I had a hard time walking sometimes which I was encouraged to do to help move things in my system...both from the labor and the surgery. My husband stayed with me the whole time. Leaving the hospital caused anxiety...over more friends who wouldn't understand what happened and a house with a baby room but no baby. The next week was excruciating. We had to go back to the hospital a few days later to sign a release for the autopsy to be performed and for the funeral home to pick up her body. We had to meet with our doctor for a follow up meeting and to get the autopsy report. We had to meet with the funeral home and make arrangements for her burial. We attended her burial on February 27. Her burial was payed for by Family...some family that I didn't even keep in contact with. We are so thankful for this. Her autopsy was not covered by insurance and upon us leaving the hospitol we had to tell them we couldn't afford to do it which was difficult. I wanted answers but we didn't have $3,000 dollars to "possibly" find one. They said over 75 percent of the time, no answer is found. We left the hospitol without an autopsy being performed. An hour later when I arrived home, the hospital called and saifd that our doctor ordered the autopsy and by ordering it, it was covered by the hospitol and not insurance. We didn't have to pay anything. On top of the autopsy being ordered, genetic testing was also ordered. We had also declined that while leaving the hospital because it was also a $3,000 charge that we would have to pay....this too was not free because our doctor ordered it. Unfortunately, nothing become of either one. The genetic testing was incomplete because the cells wouldn't hold so nothing was found. The autopsy didn't show anything precisely but isnow being used to guide my husband and I through genetic testing for future possible pregnancies.

About me

I am not a writer...much of what you read here may be out of form, misspelled, or just seem like random ramblings...and they probably are. I just type as I think and that's how my story goes. I am 29 years old, have been married to my husband for 4 years in June, and live in sunny California. I have had lots of jobs and I loved each one. I worked as a girl scout camp counselor, a portrait photographer, a wedding photographer, a wench at medieval times, a group home child care worker, and now as an executive administrative assistant. My husband, Challen, is a graphic designer. We both love the outdoors and love photography. We have been together for 6 years in October. We were engaged three months after we started dating, and married a year and a half later. He is the love of my life and really is my other half. Sometimes I don't even think of him as a separate person...we are a we. We married in Long Beach and went away on a one week road trip up the coast of California to Oregon for our honeymoon. It was fun and exactly the kind of trip we like to do. We are hoping to go to Hawaii next June for our 5 year anniversary and renew our vows.

February 12, 2009

This was the day I had to go in and have a cyst on my right ovary removed. I was 20 weeks pregnant at the time with our first child. The cyst had been seen in my ultrasounds every month and had been growing consistently every month..but slowly. At my last ultrasound (4 weeks earlier), I knew something was wrong because the lady performing our ultrasound left the room and brought the doctor in to "look around". I had been feeling the cyst for awhile before this ultrasound so I knew it had grown again but I didn't know that it had grown to the size of a softball. He did not tell me the size at that time, just that it had grown, "looked funny", and that he would rush the results to my OBGYN. I was a little scared but it went away as we focused on the great news...we found out that we were having a girl. We were so happy and excited, even though I had already known that it was a girl. If the doctor had told me it was a boy, I would not have believed her. I had had several vivid dreams of a little girl in pink and a pink baby room several times within the two weeks prior to this appointment and had already told me husband that I thought it was a girl. Right away, we had already known her name too, Claire Elizabeth Carland. The name has just come to me one day and it jsut fit. We both loved it and when you look up the meaning of the name "Claire" is means "clearly". Of course it did, it was "clearly" her name. When I spoke to my OBGYN next, she said she wanted to send me to a cancer specialist to look at the result and do a blood test on me to look for a positive CA-125 which could mean I have an elevated chance of having cancer. My blood test came back positive and I met with the cancer specialist. He wanted to remove the cyst as soon as possible and I agreed once we ran over some questions. The cancer specialist, my OBGYN, and the Ultrasound doctor were very scared that I had ovarian cancer. The ultrasound doctor said that I had is a very well known ultrasound doctor in the ultrasound world apparently. The cancer dr. said that when that particular doctor gets scared it is for a good reason and he is right 4 out of 5 times. If he is wrong, he still was right because it was still the best choice at the time although it might not be cancerous at the time. It most likely would end up being something bad still and could lead to worse results or emergency surgery. The cyst was getting close to a size that would start affecting the baby and it was just the best thing to do all around. I agreed but I was scared. I cried on the way home. I cried the next day when I told my family, friends, and co-workers. I cried when the hospital set up my surgery and I cried when I had to cancel my 20 week ultrasound. I tried to reschedule it sooner because something was making me very upset that I wasn't going to see Claire on the ultrasound before the surgery...there just was no time. The day of the surgery, I was nervous but the nurses were amazing..besides making me bleed everywhere when they put my iv in. They let me talk about the baby and let me hear her heart beat before going into surgery. They even all took turns listening to Claire themselves. I was very thankful for that. They said her heartbeat was strong and they called her by her name. After all of the paperwork and prep work was done, I said good bye to my husband and they put medicine in my iv to make me go to sleep. It burned so bad and within a minute, as the nurses were wheeling me down the hall, I had a completely drunk and almost delirious feeling sweep over my body. I remember them wheeling me into the room, I remember partly what the room looked like too. I remember them parking my bed and moving me to a stationary bed in the middle of the room. As they did this, I heard one of them say "the medicine is kicking in" and then a hand with a cup went over my mouth. I heard someone say to count to 100...I think I remember getting to 2. I don't remember anything after that until I woke up. I believe I was out for an hour and a half for the surgery. My first memory of waking up was me thinking "I have to go to the bathroom" and just seeing black. Then my eyes opened a split second later and my next thought was "Oh my God this hurts!". I was confused for a second as to where I was and why. When I remembered, my first words were "Is the baby okay?"and then immediately "ouch ouch ouch" over and over again as I clutched my abdomin until a nurse sitting next to me that i did not see before, stood up and came over. This was within a mintue of me waking up...they were very attentive. She gave me some pain medicine, said the baby was fine, and as she was doing this, I told her I had to go to the bathroom. I kept saying this to her over and over again as she kept replying that I had a catheter in and I can go. It wasn't sinking in what she was saying. I dosed on and off for awhile after figuring out what the nurse was telling me...this was my first catheter experience after all. I kept hearing other people in the room in pain and that made me feel comforted...it wasn't just me in pain. After a little bit, I was wheeled into the maternity ward into my own room. My husband and mother-in-law came to visit me right away. My husband told me that the doctor came and told him that everything was successful but that they had to remove my right ovary, not just the cyst, and the right tube because the cyst had killed my ovary. He said that he was told by the doctor that everyone in the room was relieved when they got to look at the cyst and by looking at it, he does not believe it to be cancer. It was bigger than a softball though and sent to a lab to test it for cancer just in case. My obgyn came in a bit later and discussed it all with me as well. She described the surgery room as a bunch of people who were all thinking that they were going to see this horrible case of ovarian cancer in such a young girl who is 20 weeks pregnant. I didn't even know she was present during the surgery and this shocked me. She is such a busy person and to take time out to just be present for a patient of hers' surgery is amazing to me when she was not the one performing the surgery. She said that it was her baby too and she wanted to be there to make sure they stayed far away from touching her. I was in the hospital overnight and released the next night. I was in a lot of pain and had to push myself to walk and to get up to use the restroom. The pain was horrible and the act of getting up and down from the bed and the toilet was worse. My cut was almost 8 inches long and goes vertically from my belly button all the way down to my pubic region. The nurses and I listened to Claire's heartbeat every time there was a shift change. This was about every 8 hours. This made me feel better. Her heartbeat stayed strong the entire time.

Why I started this?

I have felt for awhile now that I needed to do this. I am not much of a writer and I do not enjoy it. But the fact of the matter is that I am afraid that if I don't write some of the things I experience down then I will forget some of it. All, although, some of the things I want to write down are not the best moments or memories I have had (one in particular is the worst day of my life)...they are still apart of what has made me who I am today. I honestly don't care if anyone reads this because I am not looking for anything from this...just a place to write my story down. Should something come of it, besides my own relief that my story is written somewhere, then I hope it is something of a support to others that have gone through any of the same situations or is used as a reference to friends of people who have gone through this as to what helps and doesn't help someone get through these times. I have learned a lot about myself these last few months and I am along way from healing, but I know I can do it. I can do it because I have a wonderful husband and have built myself a great support group...small but nonetheless supportive. I am not the type of person who needs several people to comfort me. I only need a few..just a few to at least acknowledge that they see me going through this and to tell me I can get through it.