What happens when you reach the climax of the fairytale and it doesn't go as its supposed to? When the Prince has thrusted his sword into the heart of the dragon thinking he has slain it, but then all of a sudden the dragon gets up and keeps fighting.
What happens when the handsome Prince rescues the fair Princess and as he is carrying her down from the tallest tower he slips and they both fall? What happens when the left glass slipper breaks and there is no right one to replace it? You know that part in every Disney movie where the hero is either going to win or lose? The kingdom will either be saved or not. Sleeping beauty is either going to wake up or not. The part where the glass slipper is going to fit or not. What happens when instead of ending like your heart wants it to, everything just all of a sudden goes left? What happens to the handsome Prince? What happens to the fair Princess? It was July and I was on bedrest- which is not as pleasant as it sounds. My mom was staying with me and my husband to help out since I couldn't get out of bed. This was probably the only time in my life I can say that strangely my mom was constantly there. We have always had a rollercoaster of a relationship being in and out of each others lives but through out my pregnancy she was such a help to me and Alex. It was around 10pm at night when Alex walked in the door with round table pizza-chicken and garlic gourmet. He took a shower, put on his pajamas and got in bed with me. We ate pizza in bed while watching one of our favorite Alaska shows. I remember my arm falling asleep and needing to switch positions. So I rolled over to get out of bed and as I stood up all of a sudden it felt like I started to pee myself. I was standing there thinking "omg! I'm peeing myself!" and had this terrified look on my face like how was i going to explain this to my husband that I can't control my bladder and I'm peeing all over myself. He looked at me as I stood there with confusion not being able to clinch the pee to stop. After it stopped I cowboy walked my way to bathroom and my sweats I were wearing were completely soaked. Literally like I jumped in a small kid pool. "Did I piss myself?? It doesn't smell like pee???" I told my husband as he stood in the doorway while I sat on the toilet wondering what the hell was going on. "Don't panic, its ok, butMaybe we should call the Dr." He replied. I just remember this gut wrenching feeling that like always-the party never stops. Something else was going to happen. Something that only happens to 1% of the worlds population of pregnant people is happening. it was now around 10:45pm. We called our Dr. who told us to immediately go to labor and delivery and she would meet us there. Just to be safe- she said. 20 minutes later we arrived at the hospital and were waiting to be checked in. I remember sitting in the waiting area chair just leaning on my husband praying to God that everything be ok . It was now probably 12:am and we began the ultrasound. Its strange the way the brain works. If I close my eyes its almost like I can vividly see everything in my mind. The placement of everything in that room, The way my Dr.s hair fell over her glasses, the way the ultrasound screen was tilted ever so slightly so I couldn't see anything. I remember her making a sigh then turning the screen towards me showing me the sacs my babies were in. "You see this dark space around the baby? You remember how this was a lot more full and now its like totally collapsed?" she asked me pointing it out on the screen "Yeah..?" I said "Well, what thats the fluid your babies need to have their lungs develop and pretty much what they live in. And all yours is pretty much gone." "Are they ok?!?! I asked as i began to cry" "They all have heartbeats sweetie, yes. But they have to have this fluid or they won't survive. I'm so sorry." "There is nothing we can do??? Can we put more fluid in there? Can the fluid come back??" I asked desperately trying to find a solution. Cuz obviously there has to be something right???? I mean hello, I'm finally pregnant! That was the hard part! Ive already defeated the bad guy, slain the dragon, the princess is rescued..i am rescued! Please tell me there is something we can do!??? "There is a chance that some fluid could accumulate back but you have already lost so much. And the longer we allow you to leak the higher probability of you getting an infection, and then you or your babies could die or you could never be able to have babies again." All I could think of at this point was "So what does that mean??" almost like she was giving me all this information and being totally sympathetic but wasn't getting to the end result if thats makes sense. I just remember being in total disbelief and not understanding what she meant by anything. My husband came up and laid his hand on me and I feel like it was at that point that i realized I would never get to see my babies. That this short lived fairytale was about to abruptly end. I began sobbing my eyes out as i asked my Dr. "So what happens to my babies? How do get them out?" Now, maybe it was completely naive of me, but having had lost our baby Boston about a month prior- nearly the same thing happened. I was getting out of the shower and started leaking. Went to the Dr, and she said one of the babies sacs was complety gone and the baby's heartbeat was nearly gone. The rest of the babies, now only 3 were doing fine. And my body would naturally absorb the baby. I know, that sounds very silence of lambs freaky as shit to me to. But having had that happen i thought either there was some scientific way that would happen?? Or I would have to have surgery and they would take them out of me. So as if ALL of this wasn't horrific enough... ill never ever ever forget what my Dr. answered me with.. " You will have to give birth." "BIRTH?!?! BIRTH?!!? LIKE GIVE BIRTH?!?!." I literally have never been so shook in my entire life.What kind of backwards ass fairytale is this?!!? Now that may sound weird that THAT is what shook me. But let me try and explain. So here I am, nearly 6 months pregnant.. never been this pregnant, never read a book about giving birth , never went to a class, never even got to the actual giving birth conversation with my Dr. or anyone. Its like if all of a sudden I was to tell you ok, tomorrow you are getting married. Or tomorrow you are going to perform a heart surgery. Its like- Wait a damn second. Im not ready! I have no idea what I'm doing! Wait wait WAIT!!! You just don't picture the first time you are going to give birth as a spur of the moment type thing. I remember in that moment feeling like a little girl. I felt like I shrunk back to a 10 year old bubba (my nick name all my life) and all i wanted was my dad. I wanted him to fix it, to make sense of it, to stop it, to something. And for the first time in my entire life i legit thought- There is no way I'm going to be able to do this. I am not strong enough for this. Everything went so incredibly slow...it was like a movie that was just stuck on slow motion. The next day my Dr started my medication that would induce me-which wasn't in an IV, of course not. It was a tiny little pill...nope not that kind. One that would have to be placed manually into the vagina. How lovely. Maybe thats no big deal for some of you, but a little back story about myself. I do NOT like to be touched, probed, have my space invaded, show off my body or anything like that. I never changed in front of my friends growing up, like I am a very very modest buttoned up type of fair princess. Anyway... During this slow process there was a lot of questions being asked.. do you want medication to help you not remember? Do you have a birth plan? Do you want your babies baptized? Whats your religion preference? Do you know what you want to do after funeral wise?....When would you like the counselor to come in and talk with you both?... It just all felt like a bad dream. Looking back on it now and how many women I have been able to help that sadly went through the same thing..I am thankful for the traumatic experience. No one was there to guide me through this entire thing. Not only the losing your babies part- as if that isn't bad enough. But there are TONS of other things and questions that happen after wards that I wish I would have had someone to help me with. One of the hardest hardest questions I was ever asked in this entire process and to this day is the ONLY regret I have. Is when I was asked " Once you deliver your babies, do you want us to take them away? Put them on your chest? Give them to you in your arms?" This wasn't a normal birth and I was a first timer here. I didn't know how developed my babies were, I didn't know if they would look "normal" or "scary" I had no idea. And as messed up as it may sound, I didn't want to have my babies scare me and i would have this memory of them being not developed or only one arm or i don't know! I don't know what I was thinking about but I was just terrified to see them. I was automatically thinking the worst. So I let the nurses know that after I delivered them, if they can weight them, clean them up, make them all cozy and then my husband would see them and determine if It was ok for me to see them. Which looking back now, and when Ive spoken with other families going through a similar situation the first thing I say is when that baby or babies are born... plop that/those little angels on your chest. Hold them and hold them and take TONS of videos and photos and just spend every second with them that you can. That is my #1 advice for anyone in a similar situation and the only thing i regret. I wish the second they were born that I would have had them all laying on my chest, that I would have had them all with me every moment until i left the hospital. Back to the fairytale... Since I got into the hospital they were trying to give me medication to help ease the process. Which any normal person probably would have taken. But I have a weird hang up about medication and not being in control...i know, I'm an idiot. So I decided to do 34 hours of labor taking only Tylenol. --INSERT EYE ROLL HERE-- I know...I'm an idiot. After about 34 hours I decided I couldn't take it anymore and asked for an epidural. Thank you Jesus for epidural. If I am every to give birth again, i am getting that damn epidural days before hand lol. I needed to dilate to 9 centimeters and having only been about 6 right before the epidural I figured I had a lot more time. But literally, I got the epidural, the pain went away, my nurse and Alex helped me sit back into my bed cuz you have to lean over and sit on the side of the bed to get the epidural...and by them time I sat back and was situated my dr checked me and said "Ok, we have to push NOW."
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