The Duchess

A Clean Cave at Last

I made it! I checked into the hospital around 10 AM on Wednesday and I was home by five. The short stay unit had some of the worst nursing I have ever been subjected to. Apparently my new name is Honey, or Sugar and sometimes Darlin'. I had to request that my hospital bracelets be put on, after which she only put my main bracelet on I had to again request that she attach my bright orange allergy bracelet, you know so if they gave me drugs they wouldn't be the wrong ones and I Would Die

If you have been around this site for a long time you know my history, if you are new thanks to twitter and my big mouth you may want to go into the archives and look at the first few posts, I am not linking to them because, well for a lot of reasons and I don't have to. So thanks to said history, and resulting PTSD, I tend to freak out when there are things on my face or I can't move my arms. I am VERY clear about this when I do my pre-op screen w/ the hospital and with my doctor and with the nurse who sucked and again I have to tell the nurse who comes and puts in my IV and she promised she would tape a note to my file (which as a side note is kept in a 2" three ring binder) and of course she doesn't but I can hear the nurses talking about me because their station Is Right Outside My Door. I finally can't take it anymore and start to cry. I am advocating for myself and it feels like no one is listening. Why the hell do you tell us to "speak up" if you are still going to ignore me because I have a newsflash if you don't listen you are going to have one freaked out woman on your hands and that isn't good for anyone.

When the anesthesiologist showed up in my room to introduce him self (I was offered the same great lady from my C-section but she would have been switched from some cool heart surgery, how pissed would she have been....) I took a chance and repeated verbatim the same three sentence warning I had told 6 other people, he kind of nods and says it is time to go. Or at least I think he says it is time to go, he is a mumbler (new word) extraordinaire in fact he rivals Milton form the movie Office Space (stapler guy). I ask him if I should walk and he says okay and then he proceeds to push my empty bad out of the room and down the hall, everyone working in the wing finds this very funny and I feel stupid. I totally would have ridden in the bed, I have no problem with it at all and now I look like a jack ass. Now that I am typing this however I wonder if my 3-sentence warning didn't freak him out a little. He did listen hear me however because as I was telling the OR nurse (who was trying to put oxygen on me) the same thing and this time crying while saying it, he told her to stop and I was still sitting up and trying to cry quietly, she stopped and put her arms around me and said it would be fine and she was so sorry she wished I had told someone (WHAT THE FRACK). At this point I was so over it and embarrassed that I was crying that I just kind of hung my head. the last two things I remember were looking over my shoulder and seeing the versed in the syringe all milky white, I said thank you to the Doctor and he said no problem and within about thirty seconds I could no longer sit up I said I was going to go ahead and lay down (ever the control freak to the end) the nurse helped me lay down and the Doctor said that should help with the fear and then I was out. and naked for all nine people in the room to see (why so many people you ask, I agreed to students in the room and also the resident (?) working with the anesthesiologist had the brightest blue eyes I have ever seen he also looked mildly shocked to see me made me wonder if he recognized me from somewhere, thanks small town).

In the next minute I was awake and in some rocking pain. I felt like I had just screwed a Rhino with an attitude problem, as soon as I could get out of there I was gone cheeseburger (the nursing may suck but my god the cheeseburgers are to die for) in hand.

Pathology won't be back until next week my post-op is next Thursday. DocAwesome called me the day after to make sure the bleeding had slowed apparently I bled "more than he cared for" during the D&C portion of the day. This whole situation has left me really wondering about another baby; as in how the hell do I get my hands on one, and we all know what that means...

It is Official...

The Duke and Duchess have welcomed a Lady

Sasha Grace

was born on Tuesday at 7:45 am she is 7 pounds, 7 ounces and 19.25 inches long.

She is the most amazing creature I have ever met.

 

 

 

Simply the best

There are really no words to express my gratitude for all of the comments on that last post. I am trying to take a new attitude that I am doing everything I can to have a healthy and successful pregnancy. If something is going to go wrong my body will let me know, once again I am faced with the lesson of letting go of control. To be honest until Melanie commented about her friable cervix I hadn't even thought of that - I bleed after pap smears, IUI, physical exams and sometimes sex. I have had a very friable cervix in the past and I can't believe I didn't draw the line before now. This is exactly why I love comments so much.

With that being said I have written a letter to Doc Wonder about his picture comment. I fully agree again with Melanie and Julia that women whose babies are dying need pictures just as much if not more than ones who are not. If I had a penny for every time I took out the pictures of my ectopic and looked at them and thought about the time that surrounded that loss I could pay for a trip to the moon. In fact it was only right before this last cycle that I removed them from my nightstand and put them in a safer place. I still keep the small plush bear that they gave to me in the hospital on my bed - I look at it and I remember everyday. Without having these small tokens of remembrance I can promise you my grieving process would have been much different and far less complete. I wrote all that and more in my letter and while I have no doubt that he was just trying to put me at ease and meant no harm, for all I know that was a lie he told me, he needs to know that it is important and very necessary.

I am so not a fan. **Updated**

Has it really been five days since I posted? I have been so busy doing fun and exciting things such as puking and spotting that the time has just flown by. Yes, you read that correctly I am spotting again. It started on Sunday and has been getting progressively worse since then. I have an appointment with Doc Wonder in an hour. At least then we will have some answers.

**Updated**

Everything with the baby looks fine heart-rate was 173 and the baby has almost doubled in size from five days ago. There is bleeding coming from my cervix but my cervix looks fine and the ultrasound did not show any standing or free blood. My uterus was peaceful - no cramping coming from there and I was told in all likelihood that the cramping was from ligaments and ovaries. In all respects if you have to have bleeding this is the bleeding you want. Doc Wonder offered me another picture and told me that he only gives pictures when things are okay. No sense giving someone another picture of their dead/dying baby. It seemed a little harsh to say that but it was also really comforting (what can I say I like straight shooters) What I want to know is when does pregnancy gets easier? So tell me Internets, when did you relax in your pregnancy?

Worth a million words

Ultrasound #2

The ultrasound looked perfect this morning. A perfect yolk sac and bouncing baby bean with a heart rate of 153 bpm.

To say that we are thrilled is an understatement of gigantic proportions. Doc Wonder reports that the spotting is nothing and there was none visible today. I am officially being released to an OB this week. We also discussed my mounting levels of anxiety and my options at this point for handling it. I am going to try and call upon my skills of meditation and regular sleep and exercises and eating. I have been lacking in all three as of the last week and have been paying dearly with rolling anxiety/panic attacks. If I still don't have it under control at 13, 14 weeks we will talk about other options.

All in all I feel like a woman who has been pardoned. Today is a good day.

Because we share everything

I started having some spotting around 3:00 am this morning. Doc Wonder said we should still wait until tomorrow to do the ultrasound, you know because if something is going horribly wrong there is nothing they can do.

This fucking sucks.

I asked for this.

I am still pregnant, this is a fact that seems to shock me more and more everyday. The newest chapter in this saga is the fact that I am sick again. I have this achy flu feeling in my body and a horrible hacking cough and I can't hear out of my left ear I am also trying my best to keep my fever under 100. I have not been sick this much since I was 12. Then you have the morning sickness which is bullshit because it lasts 24 hours a day - everyday. So far the only thing I have kept down is water, Gatorade, soda crackers and a cheeseburger with pickles.

San Diego was beautiful, I however spent most of my time in the many bathrooms the hotel had to offer. The one day I felt well enough to venture out and about I went to the pool. It was cloudy and kind of cold, super windy off and on but I sat out there and read my book and then feel asleep and woke up a lobster. I have only really ever sunburned twice, I have pretty nice medium olive skin so it is usually not a problem but I am burnt so bad that my nose has blistered along with my shoulders.

So there you have it, I am sick, burnt and puking.

My next ultrasound is on Thursday.

Ultrasound #1

Sorry for my lack of promised updates yesterday. It would appear that there is a nice yolk sac and fetal pole apparently my math was off and I was 5w4d yesterday...a little early to see a heartbeat - I hope. I hope that that is just not what he told me to keep me calm.

In another related note the puke fest has begun, I am not a tosser by nature so I am most displeased by this current change. Also today was my first day back at the gym and it felt AMAZING! I did some water aerobics and it was rather soothing but hard at the same time, it is definitely not the same high as running but it will do for now.

I am off to get a mani/pedi before Duke and I head off to San Deigo to stay at this fabulous hotel for the next four days.

Beta #4

Beta #4 at 25 dpiui was............... 7200!!!! (or something close to that I forgot the last two numbers and the nurse didn't have my chart in front of her)

First ultrasound tomorrow morning, I promise to update then.