random updates :)

I realized I've mentioned some things and then never gone back to them, and have had a couple of requests for updates :)

But first, I have to tell you guys this story.

I have a friend, M, who I used to work with when I was a first year teacher. He and his wife and hubby and I hung out sometimes, but they have 4 kids, so it's way harder for them to be free. Anyway, in October, I ran into him and he told me that his sister and brother-in-law had had a baby, and she wasn't doing too well and had been transferred to Mayo. It was horrible news to me-I wish this would never happen :( Anyway, he emailed me a few days ago to tell me that his baby niece had passed away after a month from a rare lung condition. He was wondering if I would get in touch with his sister-in-law just to be a support person, and I said I absolutely would.
So I sent her an e-mail with links to glowinthewoods, my blog, some other stuff, and just told her that I was here when she needed anyone to vent to or someone to understand. I noticed on her facebook that she had posted how hard it was going back to work.
Well, I just got her reply, and she was so nice and then....you will not believe this. She told me that there's something M probably never told me. She is a NICU hurse. At the hospital where I had my babies.
Not only was she there when Aiden died but SHE TOOK CARE OF HIM.
She knew my son.
She knew him. Saw him. Took care of him and tried to keep him alive.
She said she hung back while he was going because she was pregnant and loss was a lot harder (which, hello, of COURSE it would be!). And she said she thought of us for weeks after and how hard it must be.
And I HATE that she is feeling this now. I hate that her sweet daughter is not with her. But I don't think I need to explain to you all the impact of hearing from someone who KNEW MY SON. This gave my heart this burst. Which simultaneously broke all over again thinking of the pain she is now in.
Life is mysterious, yo. I swear.

Anyway, some updates :

I ate in the teachers lounge all 3 days this week. So far, so good. No one got up and like screamed or anything when I walked in, and we mostly gossiped about admin and students (don't worry, we don't talk smack about kids, just talk about how we can help them :)

I went to the urologist. He said that he thinks I actually never had a UTI in the first place! Apparently, I have had 5 red blood cells in every urinalysis I've had since at least 2004 (which is when I moved here, so records go back that far). He looked at a CT scan I had a year and a half ago and he ruled out kidney stones or a tumor. He thinks I might have tiny little lesions in my bladder that are further pushed on when I'm pregnant. He wants to check my bladder, but not while I'm pregnant because going up there could introduce infection (AH that word-no way). He actually thinks that the antibiotics I took for the UTI that I probably didn't have further irritated my bladder. Seriously-so confusing!

I don't have another dr appt until 2/12. Two more weeks. I can do this. And if I can't, I'm just going to call and ask for an appt! Because just try and tell me no!

I'm SO glad tomorrow is Friday. We have had 3 house showings in the past few days. Isn't that nuts? I am so, so, so, so hoping we can ditch this place, and soon!

Ok, I think that's about it. :)

Clueless? Ignorant? Blind?

I feel ok.

I feel ok. I am 16 weeks and some change. I feel completely fine. My nausea is gone. I'm not having headaches. I'm not all that tired. I have no itching or unusual discharge (I mean unusually unusual), I have no pains, cramping, blood.

I'm starting to feel little tiny swishy swishy movements. They come really early in the morning or right before bed.

I don't feel any pressure. I don't feel any pain. I feel like I'm carrying much higher than I did with the twins-I don't know if that's necessarily true, but it just feels so different.

So, all I can wonder is, what am I missing? Because last time I certainly didn't "know" anything was wrong.

But, if I wanted to be honest, I wondered. But it was my first pregnancy, and it was twins, so how was I to know? Was I clueless? Just dumb?

And now, am I blind? Am I turning my eye to something that I should be seeing? Is there something I should be noticing and telling my doctor about? Is it there and I just don't want to notice?

This time there is a 5 week wait between doctor appointments. I read a lot of other blogs and there are a few of my people that are pregnant again, around the same gestation as me. I read that they are getting cerclages, and ultrasounds, and medicine, and lots of doctor appointments.

Please don't misunderstand. It's not like I want a cerclage. I don't want all of this stuff if I don't need it. I'm trying to trust my doctor and my second opinion.

What happened was a "fluke." But since they can't tell me exactly WHAT happened, I would like to know how they know that.
I would like to know how I just get treated like a normal pregnancy this time. Starting at 18 weeks my doctor said I would get transvaginal ultrasounds to check my cervix. He is so certain that it is not my cervix. But my next appointment is made for 19 weeks because I'm having the anatomy ultrasound at the same time.

I'm not positive, but I'm guessing that it is like this for whatever kind of loss you had. If your precious child was stillborn, you are constantly wondering if their heart is beating. For me, my water broke early. Whenever I cough, or sneeze, or roll over in bed, I brace myself. I get ready for that horrible popping sound (the doctor says you can't hear it, but I have a distinct memory of that sound so whatever) that feeling of water gushing down your legs. I have yelled at my husband for driving too fast in the car going over a bump. I mean, going over a bump? Come on-a bump isn't going to make your water break.
Or is it?

I have nightmares. Ones where I peek into the toilet and see my mucous plug and realize it's too late. Nightmares with lots of blood-which is weird because I haven't had (knock on wood) a drop of blood in either pregnancy. Even in my water breaking and for the two weeks after where I leaked I didn't see any blood.

I think a lot about those two weeks I spent on bedrest, after my water broke on baby A (Sophie). There was a prayer I said every night. I was fighting for hours, minutes. I just needed to make it to 23 weeks when my hospital would at least try to save them. I couldn't stop crying and people were saying " You have to be strong, it's not good for the babies."
Right, I'm laying here knowing my babies are dying and you're telling me not to cry?

I am so anxious. I feel as though time is literally standing still. I got new students today as its the beginning of a new semester. I had some students mention that they had French class at the end of last year when I was gone and they joked about how they didn't learn anything at all. There's some guilt in that, of course-there's a lot of guilt in education, I think. Anyway, all I could think was -Oh, what if I leave these kids again. What if I'm out again because another baby dies. They will be so disappointed and they won't learn.

Ok, now, let's get realistic here. If they don't learn any French in middle school, it's going to be OK. Really. They will live. For real.

But it's how my brain works. I don't know. I don't know. I don't know. I'm trying so hard to focus on teaching myself to relax. But I'm scared of everything. I love warm baths and they are so relaxing but I've read that if you are dilating at all, it could cause infection. I'm scared to exercise. I'm scared to not exercise.

This is so ridiculously hard. Please tell me that what I'm feeling is normal. That I'm not going crazy.

Am I ready for this?

I had an interesting conversation with a coworker/friend yesterday. She came to my room at lunchtime and said, "Come on. You're having lunch with us. Let's go."
I just kind of looked at her. I tried as quickly as I could to come up with some excuse as to why I couldn't.
I just kinda said, "I think I'll just stay here-maybe tomorrow?"

Since the beginning of the school year, I've been eating lunch at my computer, where I eat and simultaneously read blogs. I just click, click away and sit there by myself.

Maybe it's not healthy, I don't know. Maybe I do know that it's probably not.

But I used to eat in the teacher's lounge with a really, really fun group of ladies. All really super nice-all people who I like to be around. They are funny, and kind, and they care about me. But- BUT- 3 of them just had babies. One in March, one in April, and one in July.

There are two reasons why I feel reluctant to go in. 1. I don't want to sit there, just waiting for someone to slip up and say something that makes me freak out or cry or want to run out, and 2. I really don't want THEM to have to spend their lunchtime with the "broken" person, watching what they say, trying not to slip up in front of me.

I mean, I don't want them to NOT be able to mention their new, beautiful babies. Babies are blessings. Why wouldn't you want to talk about them?

But I don't know if I want to hear it. I don't know if I CAN hear it.

I told this to my friend.

She looked at me and said, "Christy. You can't do this forever. You can't avoid people forever-you're going to have to do this sometime. When you're ready, I'm here for you. I want to eat lunch with you. I miss you! "

I said back-"I know. You're right. Ok, come get me tomorrow and I'll go down with you."

I immediately I wondered if I really agreed with what I had just said. Is she? Is she right?

I mean, I know. I can't avoid people forever. But I sort of want to. But maybe it's not exactly healthy to seclude myself, looking at blogs, and never having any social contact.

It just hurts so. bad. I don't have anything to share. I could talk about my dog or something. How he peed in the bedroom, maybe. But I have nothing. I don't have any tips to share about being a mom, most of the time I have no clue what they are even talking about.

The thing is, they barely mention their babies. Really. I'm sure they talk about the students at school, and what's going on, and the new administrator in our building.

I feel like I should do this. But am I ready? Do I really want to do this?

What if they think that by coming back, I'm ok? What if they equate this with the fact that I am pregnant again? Because I am, I feel a lot better and all of the sudden I come back?

She stayed and ate with me in my room that day. She told me everyone missed me and just wanted to see me!

What if they miss the old me? What if they realize that I'm not the same anymore and wish they would've just left me in my room with my salad and the Internet. What if I immediately start crying?

Barnes and Noble

Last night I walked around this store for 30 minutes.
The whole time I held a book of baby names.
Then as I left, I set it back on the shelf.

My maternity clothes are still in the rubbermaid tub. If I dig through them that way and don't take them out, it'll be really easy for me to store them away (hide them) again. If I don't buy any books...if I don't make a single to-do list, then there will be nothing for me to have to put away (hide) again.
If I don't come up with a name, there will be nothing for me to doodle when I'm talking on the phone, thus there won't be a paper trail.

This year, my calendar is online. You see, I won't be able to come across scheduled doctor appointments and classes because they can all be deleted by someone else and are all in one place.

I have dreams where I am standing, in the baby section of a store-debating. Should I buy this? It's on such a great sale. I had one the other night where I was in Paris in this neighborhood that I've certainly never been to, and there was a big with French writing on it that I thought was so adorable. In my dream I knew that it would be my only chance to get it. But I wrestled with myself. Should I let myself buy it? In the end I woke up and bought nothing.

I am just so, so scared.

An Escape

It is dark when I wake up.
The alarm hasn't gone off, and so I lay there, waiting.
Waiting.
For what, I'm not exactly sure-but not just for the alarm.
That I know.
Something I think I will always be waiting for.
The daily routine-lather, rinse, repeat-is done on autopilot.
I watch my shape in the mirror-rather critically-
My skin is dry and crackling, dark circles underline my eyes.
It is still dark when I leave the house.
The routine is so simple-so monotonous-
6:42 a.m. is when I leave.
Every day.
Light is peeking through.
I drive down my street, and my attention is drawn to the left.
There's that car.
That car.
It's still running, it's headlights bounce off the white garage door.
I want to look away.
I need to look away.
But instead, I stare in.
The big window stands open as a mom hands over her most precious item.
She hands her baby to someone.
Someone she must trust.
She leaves the baby here each day.
At the same time.
At 6:42 a.m.
This could be me.
This should be me.
I should be stopping.
I should be turning left, pulling in, carefully taking out MY most precious item(s).
But I don't.
And I can't.
And I may not ever.
Instead, I drive.
And every.single.day.
As I get to the next intersection,
I see an airplane.
It takes off, pulling up its wheels.
Shooting up, up, up in the sky.
Irony at its finest.
How I wish I were on that plane.
Going away, away, away.
Somewhere away.
Anywhere away.
I wish I were turning left, pulling into that driveway.
I wish I were on that plane.
Instead I drive ahead.
I enter my silent classroom.
And I pretend.

Happenings

Ok, so, what a week this was. And what a day this was. They are changing my schedule (again? yes, again) at school and now because of it they want me to teach four five week classes for the rest of this year. Are they CRAZY? FIVE WEEK LONG CLASSES?
I said, FINE! That's 25 days. I'll photocopy 20 worksheets and then we'll watch the Lion King in French for the last week. If only I could just let up a little-lighten up a little, maybe I'd be more ok with it. But I'm just not.
So sick of it. I really, really need a new job. I just really do. I let it stress me out too much. Going through a high risk pregnancy after a loss should be just about enough for me. We also had parent/teacher conferences, which were horrible. There is another teacher at my school who had a baby right when Aiden and Sophie should have been born. When I see this baby, it makes me tremble with pain. Excruciating pain. That's exactly what they would look like; the things he's doing would be what they would be doing. And once before school started she brought him into a meeting I was in and I literally had to go have a TOTAL breakdown in the office-I was hyperventilating. So I walk into parent/teacher conferences and WHAM. There she is with her baby. Now, my first thought was, what in the world is her baby doing at conferences? So then she walks him around from table to table, and takes him all around the school. I totally want her to have the attention-I want her baby to be loved and I want her to be able to show him off-but just, please, not in a place where I can't get away. Not where I HAVE to be. And maybe with a little warning????? I don't feel comfortable enough to talk to her about this-and I know she doesn't understand. Right after I lost the babies she wrote me an e-mail offering to "share" her son with me. This was amazing and heartfelt, but she just does not understand. And I don't want her to, honestly-no one should have to feel this way.

Then, this morning, a dift colleague came in this morning, and asked how I was. I just said tired, mainly because I was at work late last night because of conferences. And she said, oh, you ARE pregnant.
Well, seriously.
This just boggles my mind. I haven't really told too many people at wokr. I know they know. They stare at my stomach region. Duh. But to just blurt it out?
So she says, Aren't you excited???? And I said that yes, I am, but it's hard for me. It's hard to be excited sometimes.
"Well, you need to not be, because your'e going to hurt the baby."
Enough said about that. Not the way to start my day.


So then I had a doctor appointment today. I was nervous, as usual, but I was ok. And I was really glad to go because I finished the antibiotics for the urinary tract infection and I still am not feeling better.
So first of all, overall on the doctor front, this was a good visit. We talked more, he was in a MUCH better mood and he really helped to calm my nerves and explain things.
But they took a urine culture and everything came back clean-except there is a still a presence of hematuria-or red blood cells in the urine. They're invisible to me, but they are there, and apparently they've been there since even a month ago. So I have to go see a urologist now (yikes). I just get nervous about this-because I have no idea what to expect and I don't know what could be causing this . What I DO know is there no infection and there is no bacteria. He gave me an internal *SO SO FUN* and then even felt my bladder. When he pushed on it, it burned-so something is there irritating it, but it's not an infection.

Then, came the doppler.
I laid down and he squirted the gel. Asked if I was about 14 weeks, which I am. Before he started he said, "Now, Christy, this could take a while, it's still pretty early."
So he started moving the doppler all around and he kept finding my heartbeat-but no baby heartbeat. I swear, every second that went by, my heart started to pound harder. I just kept looking at B and I could feel my face getting hot.
It felt like eternity, but I bet he tried for 3 or 4 minutes or so.

Then he packed up the doppler and said, "Well, we're gonna have to do a quick ultrasound, I guess, and see what's going on."

He left the room for me to get dressed and I just stared at Brian. I said, over and over, "This cannot be happening. This cannot be happening."
He looked so nervous-and I just did.not.want. to go into that ultrasound room.
We went in and I just kept my mind blank. He turned on the machine and said, "WHOA! Your bladder is really full."
Yeah, great. Thanks.
So, anyway, he squirts more gel and says, "Oh, yep, there's the heartbeat." Shows me that my cervix is long and closed, flicks off the machine and tells me to meet him back in the room.
I really don't remember anything after that. I just stared at the screen. I sometimes go days in denial of this pregnancy. But, I swear, when you see that baby moving around on the screen, you just can't deny. There is a love and a joy and a pride and even if (which it will NOT) the worst happened again, if lightening struck twice, I am still a mother. This goes for all women who have ever been pregnant-who have ever been a foster parent-who have ever had a match for an adoption-who used s surrogate mother-and I need to remember this and keep it in my brain.
My blood pressure is still up from this. It was my worst nightmare. The thing I thought of all month. What will happen if he uses the doppler and we don't hear anything. And then it seemed like it was happening.
Seriously. I was so scared. I still feel like I'm waiting to fall off that cliff---
BUT I am ok. And we're making it through. And grieving is getting harder as we inch closer to the year mark (it will be 9 months on Wednesday) but we are surviving. And we have SO much to be thankful for right now. There is a baby growing inside of me, and he/she is doing just fine, and I'm going to be ok, even if my bladder falls out :)

Phew. That was a long one. If your'e still here, thank you :)

Well, then.

I have spent most of this work in a tizzy. Yep, a tizzy is the best word I can come up with. A dramatic fit of crying all the time and feeling scared and sorry for myself.
I don't want to dwell.
But here's the long and the short of it.
Friday: Diagnosed with UTI, given antibiotics
Monday: Go back to urgent care, symptoms are not improving. Take another sample and a culture this time. Refer me to OB.
Ob says it's getting better from the second sample but will wait until culture.
UTIs hurt, yo.
Tuesday: Call OB. Tell me to take a urinary pain reliever and wait for culture to come back.
Today: Culture came back contaminated or whatever, I didn't give a good sample.
ARAlahjgk;ashg;lakghalkg;.

Ok, enough complaining. Seeing OB tomorrow and I will get this figured out. Taking lots of probiotics and guzzling cranberry juice.

Tonight, I decided I will not sit here and be miserable. I seriously need to be happy. I need to have a little fun. I can't be like this for 27 more weeks. Can't do it and won't. I need to live for the day because RIGHT NOW I am pregnant and RIGHT NOW I have this baby as my future-stupid UTI or not. I know this feeling won't last, but I'm trying to write it out so I remember to come back and read this.

So...I turned on my Michael Jackson History CD-on full blast-and got out my scrapbooking stuff and made some birthday cards and scrapbooked a few pages. Then I went out and bought my dog....a.......



SNUGGIE! (Do they have these in other countries? I think they are ridiculously funny, and the commercial cracks me up. Here is the commercial for the actual human one:


People buy these like crazy here. It cracks me up.

So, anyway, I am hanging in there. Not feeling the greatest, but hoping this all gets resolved soon.

Love to you all.
xxoo

ARGH.

Thursday I started having a weird feeling in my va-jay-jay area. I called the doc, and the nurse told me that it was probably nothing, but if it persists, take myself to urgent care and have an "infection check."
Well, there you have it.
She said that word.
You know, that one word.
{infection}
So, I proceeded to freak out.
Which is fruitless, I know.
So New Year's Eve was fine, I tried to ignore it. But the problem was, it wasn't getting worse but it wasn'y getting better either.
So yesterday morning, New Year's Day, I took myself to Urgent Care. B was still sleeping but I thought I'd be fine. And I was, until I sat in the examination room and the doctor came in and then I started sobbing hysterically.
Seriously. Shouldn't have gone alone.
Anyway, I have a urinary tract infection. Got some antibiotics. It's apparently very common in pregnancy. But what is unsaid is that it could have been something like this, unnoticed and untreated, that caused my water to break. It's just an overall feeling of uneasiness that will never go away.
I have had a UTI before. It hurts like HELL. There's burning and that feeling like you have to pee RIGHT THEN or...well, or else. But I had none of this. My vajayjay was just irritated, that's all. It just was a little annoying. Barely any different from everyday.
I also got scolded for being dehydrated, which is hard for me to understand because ALL I do is drink.
AND she wouldn't even get the doppler for me just to hear the heartbeat. How rude.
So today, I am drinking gatorade, and nursing my antibiotics, hoping they don't in turn give me a yeast infection.
I just read Bree's post about anxiety and what people have to say about it. I have had the exact same issues so far. They just will say, "Oh, you need to stop worrying. It will hurt "the baby." Who would say that to someone? Because obviously if we could stop worrying, we would. Duh.
I wish it helped when people say "It's all going to be great this time, you'll see!" Or when they say that my new year is going to be the "best.one.ever."
Because, really, we all want that. BUT we certainly don't know that it's going to happen. And we, more than anyone, know that just because something shitty happens doesn't mean you "deserve" or "earn" something good to happen in return. And bad luck doesn't come in threes-it just might come in FIFTEENS or really, while we're on that-would you really put cancer and death under the category of "bad luck" because I'm thinking bad luck is more like getting a flat tire and the stomach flu on the same day.
I am trying different things. Yoga, meditation. Trying the whole "scheduled worrying time". But it's just not that easy-I'm going back to see the family counselor, just to have someone to talk to (besides you all) who isn't going to just tell me, "It'll all work out this time."
This is hard, yo.