What to Expect (Part III) - What to expect during a D&C

Sorry, y'all, but I had to take a little hiatus from blogging because every time I would post I would have an anxiety attack, have to take Lorazepam and then pass out for several hours. Not so productive. So with the house clean, grocery shopping complete and a casserole in the oven - here goes...

We left off at Cytotec. Five days after that horrendous night puking and cramping, there was still pretty much NO BLOOD. A few swipes, nothing more. I went to my doctor, and my cervix was tight as a preschooler's fist wrapped around a marble (my teacher friends will understand just how very tight that is), so obviously the Cytotec DID NOTHING. At this point, my doctor asked us to consider a D&C because he felt that there was no way that the baby was going to come out on his own. The whole point of waiting, and acupuncture, and the meds were to AVOID a D&C and now that looked like our only option.

Here is why I didn't want a D&C. A week after Jason and I returned from our honeymoon several years ago, I had an emergency appendectomy. General anesthesia did not agree with me in the slightest - I stopped breathing three times in recovery, and I remember it ALL - not only the searing pain (no laparoscopic for me), but also the struggle to breathe, the understanding that I wasn't breathing but not knowing how, and being so panicked and freaked out that I was praying for God to TAKE ME NOW. Not good memories.

I am not sure that this is how all D&Cs are done, but my doctor traditionally does them in the hospital with the patient under general. Not going to happen. I told Dr. Farley that I would do it, but only under IV sedation - no intubation or any of that jazz. He struck a deal with an anesthesiologist at the hospital who agreed to do it my way, so the date was set.

Before the D&C, Dr. Farley did routine blood tests that were required for surgery. The Monday before I was scheduled to go in, his nurse called to say that they were concerned about my HCG levels not dropping or being as low as you would expect. They wanted me to take a second blood test to be sure. WTF? Are you joking me? I freaked out - full blown panic that Wild Thing wasn't really dead, that they had misread the ultrasound, that I had taken all those meds with a live baby inside me. I seriously could not believe it - when I say that this process was one thing after another - I mean it. The second blood test results came back two days later - my HCG levels were dropping, so I definitely was not carrying a live baby.

So onto the D&C. Physically, the surgery itself was not as bad as I thought. My nurse who did my IV was fabulous (best IV I've ever had - didn't feel a thing). It turned out that I was running a fever - which is indicative of infection - so it was good that we opted to do the surgery when we did. Once I was in surgery, I don't remember anything except being wheeled into the operating room and staring up at the bright light and my two new nurses. They kept commenting, "You have the most beautiful eyelashes..." I couldn't keep my eyes open after that. I just remember waking up in recovery and about an hour later being returned to my room, and then maybe an hour later we were sent home. Thank you, Jesus, for morphine and vicodin....

What was so horrible about the D&C was the emotional side of it. Thinking about having Wild Thing sucked out of me is still too traumatizing to really even acknowledge. I am not going to even discuss at this point my views on abortion (and it is an interesting subject for me because Jason and I have conflicting opinions) but getting a D&C, even though I KNEW Wild Thing was already dead, felt to me like I was having an abortion. It is, after all, the same procedure used in abortions, and they wrote on my paperwork "Spontaneous Abortion" (yet there was nothing spontaneous about it - Wild Thing had been dead for two weeks - nor was it an abortion as the procedure itself wouldn't be the cause of his death).

I think a D&C is huge in the shame factor of a miscarriage. First of all, my body couldn't keep a baby alive, nor could it do what it needed to do to get the baby out once he died. Also, I think any sort of reproductive/pelvic surgery is embarrassing. I know doctors and nurses see it all, but it is not fun to think about my body being exposed for long periods of time for all to see (and it was not like I was doing it for the noble cause of delivering a live baby, either).

In addition, my hospital experience left much to be desired. I had about eight different nurses. Each time, each one of them would ask me, "Why are you here?" And I had to answer, each time, "For a D&C." God, it INFURIATES me just thinking about it. The lack of consistent nurses meant that I never felt comfortable with any one of them, so even though I was dying inside, wanting to cry and wail and express how awful this was - I never did. I spent the whole time I was at the hospital literally biting the inside of my cheek to keep myself from losing it.

In addition, they switched anesthesiologists on me last minute. So the doctor who had agreed to do my IV sedation was no longer my anesthesiologist. I was the one who ended up telling Dr. Farley this pre-op ("Uh, I think that they just gave me a new anesthesiologist....") and when Dr. Farley informed the new doc that the procedure would not be done under general, he was none too pleased. I am thankful Dr. Farley held his ground and insisted, but after he left, the doctor spent a good five to ten minutes LECTURING me on general anesthesia and how I was wrong to be afraid of it. Are you joking me? I am doing all in my power to not freak-the-hell-out over a surgery that will suck my dead baby out of me, and you are wasting your time basically berating me for my medical choices and reminding me that if something goes wrong, that you'll have to intubate and switch to general. Shocking.

What is interesting with this whole miscarriage experience is that only once did anyone on the Western medicine side of things even ask how I was doing emotionally. A dear, sweet nurse at Dr. Farley's took time with me, as she had three recurrent losses before carrying her healthy baby girl to term. She was so kind, and asked how I was doing, and shared her experiences and hope with me. Besides her, not one nurse or doctor at the doctor's office or hospital even bothered to ask me how I was handling it emotionally. It was always, "How's your pain?" not "How are YOU?" It gave both Jason and I a new perspective on health care, and in another future post I'll share not only those realizations but others that came of this whole experience.

My acupuncturist was smack-dab on when she said, "You have experienced not one, but TWO deep traumas. The first being the death of a baby, the second being a D&C." When we got home from the hospital, all of the emotional progress I had been making was essentially undone. I don't remember much of the two days following the procedure, but I know that I completely shut down and was unable to care for myself in any way. I didn't eat, barely got out of bed... At one point I remember somehow being in the shower crying - Jason put me in there, washed my hair and body, then lotion-ed me up, dried my hair (God bless a man trying to manipulate a brush and hairdryer) and put me in new pajamas back to bed. What a good husband. I love him.

What snapped me out of it was that McBossy (Hazel) started breathing really weird, and we had to take an emergency vet visit. That is what finally forced me outside of myself - my ratty girl was sick and needed me and I had to pull it together to take care of her. After that night, I started to slowly take care of myself and get up out of bed for longer, but I would still have random set-offs that would send me into despair and sobbing. I guess that should be present tense - I am okay most of the time, and then small things will absolutely freak me out (an infant in Starbucks, a Fit Pregnancy magazine, nursery items, etc.)

So, with the D&C, all was supposedly finished physically. Not my luck. I developed an infection - including severe prolonged pain (as in walking bent at a 90 degree angle) and intense bleeding (as in soaking through pads, waking up in blood with the whole bed covered sort of bleeding). Two weeks later, after a good round of antibiotics, the infection is cleared and hopefully I really am done...

Here is one thing I want to leave people with who might be facing a D&C. Your experience might be different than mine physically and emotionally, but I was not told anything about the procedure or what exactly would be going on. Being the stellar researcher that I am, I googled my heart out and found the following links helpful when trying to prepare myself...

eMedicineHealth
Medicinenet.com
Americanpregnancy.org
Justmommies.com - this link helped me THE MOST because it is real-life accounts of LOTS of women's experiences.

My next post will focus not on what NOT to do if someone close to you experiences the loss of a pregnancy, but WHAT to do. For every insensitive comment, I had three more wonderful, caring experiences from friends and family who stood by me, supported me in very specific ways, and listened with compassion and love.

I'll leave you with the best quote that I have ever heard regarding pregnancy loss (from a card my parents sent me a few days after Wild Thing went to Heaven) -

"What the heart has once owned and had, it shall never lose."

WHAT TO EXPECT (Part II)

What to expect on Misoprostol/Cytotec.

I had what they called a "missed miscarriage." My baby was dead inside of me, but my body really didn't know it, and went right along acting like it was pregnant. We waited a week for my body to actually start the miscarriage, and in that time I decided to try alternative means to try to get Wild Thing out. I knew that if all else failed, we would have to do a D&C (more on that later) and the emotional trauma of my baby getting ripped from me in surgery was not something I could handle at that point. I was praying that he was going to come out in the comfort of our home, with my husband and dogs beside me, where I could rest in my own bed and grieve as large and as loud as I needed to (again, not much of a public griever).

I'll backtrack a bit and say that my first instinct when they told me he was dead (remember? In the ultrasound-room-from-hell equipped with Phillipa, the-worst-ultrasound-tech-in-the-world) was to, "Get him out right now. I need him out RIGHT NOW." I told this to Jason over and over the first two days. In the first hours home, during the non-stop crying, I tried to punch my stomach to get him to come out and tried to bribe Jason to get him to punch my stomach (um...fail. If you know my husband, you can imagine his face when I said that). I couldn't bear to think that I was carrying around something DEAD inside of my body. After the first two or three worst days, my mind changed to where I almost didn't ever want him to come out. I knew he would have to eventually, but as long as he was still in me, I still had him (is this creepy?). By the time I had my D&C, I didn't want him taken from me, because then it would be like he had never happened, like I had never even had a baby, that I never was a mommy. Again, more on that later.

I regress. In an attempt to get my miscarriage going naturally, which the doctors had said would happen in a few days (hahahahahaha), my sister found me a cranial sacral massage therapist. Cranial sacral massage is a type of massage.... I can't really explain what they do, exactly, but it is supposed to be for severe physical or emotional trauma. The cranial sacral masseuse told my mother after my appointment that she didn't think cranial sacral would work for me because I was in too deep emotional pain and had too high anxiety. Oh. Fail.


She recommended I try an acupuncturist named Dawn-Starr Crowther. Her business is Jade River Healing Arts Center. I went to her, and she WAS AMAZING. She was the first medical provider to even ask how I was doing emotionally, to validate what I was feeling, to ask all the right questions and to make me feel like I was more than just a fragile patient (doctors and nurses will walk on eggshells around you when you go through a miscarriage). I guess that I felt that I finally had a partner to help me through this who actually cared about me. She thought for sure that with acupuncture, we could induce my miscarriage as well as help me with my emotional pain. She gave me hope for subsequent pregnancies - Eastern medicine we could try to both get me pregnant and keep me pregnant, as well as help with childbirth. After my first visit, I felt so much better emotionally. I had more energy, and while I was far from happy, I wasn't crying (score!) or feeling like I should run right back to my room as soon as I could. For the first time, I felt hope that I would be able to survive this. I luuurve you, Dawn-Starr.

But still no miscarriage. Wild Thing, even in death, was naughty and did not do as he was told. He obviously liked it in there. Our next step, after more waiting, was to try the miscarriage drug Misoprostol (also called Cytotec). Again, I was trying desperately to avoid the D&C. The drug is supposed to start contractions and expel the baby. Disclaimer: This is where some of the gross stuff comes out, so like I said in my previous post, you might want to end reading here. But if you want to really know what to expect on cytotec, read on.

This drug is Satan's bitch. Purty sure. I took my dose (just one big, honkin dose by mouth - some take several smaller doses, some take it vaginally) at around 1:00 in the afternoon. By 4:00, the cramping started, but still no bleeding. I felt pretty good if I laid down with a heating pad and was getting hungry. I hadn't eaten all day (whoever thought that I, of all people, would forget to eat? Proof positive that I was seriously effed up) so Jason went out and got some delicious Thai food to tempt me into eating. This was about 6:00. In the middle of munching, I got the worst nausea ever, and puked up bile in the toilet downstairs. Jason ran to get my nausea medicine the doctor had prescribed and I took a couple of those. I tried to eat a bit more, but the pain was increasing so I went up to lie down again (my bed has been my best friend these past few weeks fo sho). At about 7 the pain was so bad that I popped the vicodin that my doctor had given me. What helped, at least for me, is Jason rubbing my belly and the heating pad. I love you, heating pad. Heating pad was my other best friend. By 8:00, I was fast asleep. Still no blood.

At 9:15ish I woke up in a cold sweat. I knew that I was in trouble because the pain was HORRENDOUS and I felt so nauseous. I made it to the bathroom to go pee and there was a bit of blood on the tissue. I was so freaking sick. I started screaming for Jason, and he ran into the bathroom. I puked my brains out (bye, bye coconut-covered prawns) all the while having horrendous cramping, sweating, shaking. I was gripping the towel next to me and I remember looking right at my husband between pukes with sweat dripping down my back and telling him - "I AM NEVER DOING THIS EVER AGAIN." And I meant it. I knew, in that moment, that I never, ever wanted to be pregnant ever again.

Right after that, I had him get our trash can because whew wee, I knew I was going to have massive diarrhea. I switched to sitting on the toilet. So picture this, puking in the trash can, having blowout diarrhea in the toilet, and massive cramping/contractions. Not okay. This went on for quite some time. Jason gave me more vicodin and nausea meds, puked those right up. Now do you understand why Misoprostol/Cytotec is Satan's magical medical concoction? Finally, I stopped puking enough to hold down the drug and went back to sleep. I woke up in the morning still cramping, but NO BLEEDING.

WTF? Cytotec, you suck.

What to Expect (Part I)

What to Expect When You Are No Longer Expecting.

I've been meaning to write this post for a long time, but up until yesterday had felt too traumatized to reflect or share what I have been through. I feel like it is necessary, however, to do so, as when I was terrified and alone after we learned of Wild Thing's death, I really had no resources to tell me what might happen, what to expect, how it might feel, etc. I did have my good friend Laura, and thank God for her. When I lost Wild Thing, several friends came out of the woodwork, sharing their loss. I wondered, how did I not know of this before? Why is this not more talked about? I have learned through this process that by sharing our stories, we give courage to others. I recognize that there is a lot of shame, I KNOW there is a lot of shame (whole 'nother post), surrounding pregnancy loss, and hopefully sharing what I have been through will help me release some of my own shame and help others sift through theirs, as well.

Disclaimer: I will not hold any information back. I wanted to know EXACTLY what to expect or what potentially could happen to me when I lost my baby and was frustrated by people sugar-coating their experiences. If you got a weak stomach, stop here, m-kay?

We got the news of Wild Thing's passing on April 24th. Let me tell you how it went down. We went in there expecting a strong heartbeat. My doctor (nor the hospital radiologist, nor the ultrasound techs) had given us any indication the week before that we should be worried. He was little, they said, they saw a heartbeat, they said. "We will see a big, strong heartbeat next week."

So we were sitting with the ultrasound tech, and she was poking around with the vaginal ultrasound. The week before, the tech had been talking, explaining what she saw. This chick was DEAD SILENT. Uh, we are NOT stupid. I asked, "What do you see? Do you see a heartbeat?" She just continued to make measurements on the u/s screen. Infuriating. "DO YOU SEE A HEARTBEAT??" The answer: um...no. No heartbeat visible, no heartbeat we could hear. I asked her (her name was Phillipa, and I will despise that name for as long as I live), "What reasons would there be for us not to hear a heartbeat?" I was thinking, "Oh, he is still too little...they didn't actually see the heartbeat last week. We'll come in next week and it will be there." Wild Thing looked much bigger than the week before and Jason looked happy and excited that he was growing. Worst-ultrasound-tech-in-the-world Phillipa goes, "If I knew why there wasn't a heartbeat, I would be a doctor, wouldn't I?" Okay, woman, if I wasn't so scared right now, I would take out that vaginal wand and beat you with it.

So she leaves, saying she is going to go over the results with the radiologist. We KNEW. We knew, we knew, we knew. But she said NOTHING. So we waited in anguish. She comes back in, and says, "Your doctor wants to you to call him at this number to go over your results." Okay, another very not normal situation. I knew that if things had been okay, she would have just said, "Everything looks good, your doctor will call you soon," etc. Again, not stupid over here. So I call the number - shaking, freaking out. My doctor's office doesn't know what the hell is going on. Doctor Farley called me back on my cell phone right after, still in that stupid ultrasound room, still praying for a miracle, hoping he was going to say, "He's growing, he's still little, we will see an heartbeat next week." It is funny how one holds onto whatever little shred of hope there might be, forgoing all logic or intuition.

What floors me is that I learned of Wild Thing's death OVER THE PHONE. No ultrasound tech was brave enough to tell me in person, no radiologist came in to offer condolences. My doctor told me over the PHONE. Well, rather told Jason over the phone, because I started wailing the second he started speaking. My poor, sweet, steadfast husband received the news for me, took the brunt of those words, shouldered that burden so that I would not have to relive that conversation over and over for the rest of my life.

I cannot tell you the feelings I was bombarded with. I have never felt any devastation quite like it. I could not breathe. All I could keep repeating to Jason was, "I am so sorry, honey. I am so, so sorry." There is that shame element again. I don't know if I remember any more at this point. My sister was there - which was not good, because I have some deep psychological issues with showing grief in front of anyone but my husband. She tried to comfort me, but I seriously, at that point, was so wracked with pain, I could not acknowledge anyone. Somehow I got out the hospital. I remember mumbling to my sister to call my waiting parents and tell them. I told her I didn't want any calls, any texts, any communication AT ALL. Somehow Jason got me home and into bed. That is all I remember.

Okay, that is enough for the day. This has been the first time I have really shared what happened that day, and I feel myself starting to hit panic-attack mode. Lorazepam here I come. More later.

He will be with you always...

Like I mentioned in my last post, I am experiencing a bit of a crisis of faith after losing Wild Thing. I am struggling with WHY God would allow us to get pregnant, to know that joy and plan for that future, and then allow it to be taken all away.

My friend Laura sent me an email about what to expect during my miscarriage, and how she herself has made it through recurrent pregnancy loss. One thing she said helped her was listening to Christian music.

This has helped me hang onto whatever sort of communion I do have with Jesus right now (like I said, I am in the throws of a terrible tantrum). I must admit, some Christian songs absolutely

ENRAGE

me (just as Duke is ENRAGED that his best friend Bentley is suddenly five times bigger than him at 8 months). But one song in particular does help me, so I have been listening to it a lot. It describes God's promise to "be with you always." It helps remind me that God never promised me a healthy pregnancy or a biological child or that I would never suffer loss, shame or defeat. Instead, what He has promised is to never abandon or forsake me, and to carry my burdens as long as we are yoked to one another. This song also reminds me that Jesus was the ultimate Healer. Sometimes when I listen to this song, I imagine Jesus' hands on my belly, healing me and setting the stage for new growth. Stupid, I know, but whatever gets me through...

This realization (Jesus as Healer, Jesus shouldering my burdens) does not necessarily quiet my fury or questions or accusations. Oh well.

Here is the song that has helped me. It is called Safe by Phil Wickham.

Please Don't Make These Idiotic Statements...

to someone whose baby has just died.

I have refrained from finishing and posting this, because I have been VERY, VERY BITTER. I wanted to make sure that this post would be coming from a place of education and reflection as opposed to being a way to bitch my brains out. But I also am realizing that I need to tell this story, my story, RIGHT NOW!!!, as a way to not only process what I am going through but also help those who have lost babies. I have been BLESSED (totally ironic and morbid, I know) by the stories of others who have been what I have been through. Who have gone through the process and ended up, when all is said and done, still mostly whole and able to live and breathe again. I hope that I am able to pay it forward by helping other grieving mommas find words and experiences that validate all they are going through.

So here goes. Sorry if it is a bit raw. Sorry if it offends. It needs to be said.

Disclaimer: I don't post the following list to be condemning of those who might have already uttered these no-nos to me or someone else who has suffered miscarriage or infant-related loss. Rather, I really am trying to educate and inform - just so that others might realize the possible mindset of a grieving mom (or dad) when they hear these things. It is very, very hard to understand this whole situation without going through it, so I don't judge and I am through being angry about it. People are doing the best they can with what they have.

That being said, never speak these things, ALRIGHTY?

1. "Oh, well, you weren't that far along." Pardon? From the second we knew I was pregnant, our baby was all that mattered to us. We loved him, we sang to him, we shopped for bedding and clothes and diapers for him. Our conversations, our diets, our schedule and our future all revolved around this baby. We knew for 3 1/2 weeks that we were pregnant, and it drastically altered us. We now have no baby, and everything we thought was our future no longer exists.

2. "Oh, well, you can try again." First of all, that we might eventually get pregnant again does not change that we lost THIS baby. THIS baby is dead. THIS baby will not be here in November, won't be here for his first Christmas, won't be here to lay with the dogs, take baths, be loved. It took us 9 months to get pregnant, and we have NO clue what we did to conceive him as we didn't even think we could get pregnant without Clomid. The idea of trying again is devastating, depressing and daunting. I miss my baby. That is all there is.

3. "You are young, you have plenty of time." Anyone saying this to me obviously does not know me very well. Just sayin. I have known I wanted children (and lots of them) since 4th grade. It was in 4th grade that I felt called to pursue adoption at some point, and I think it was even earlier that I would peruse Pottery Barn catalogs and Baby Gap for baby bedding and clothes, going to the extent of clipping pictures and filing them away in a box. In my childhood bedroom at my parents' is lists of baby names I have been keeping since ELEMENTARY SCHOOL. Since I MET my husband (which would be, like, way over 7 years ago) I have dreamt of having children with him. I wanted to try to get pregnant starting our honeymoon, but Jason wanted me to finish grad school, teach a year, etc. So please, for the LOVE OF GOD, do NOT tell me that I have plenty of time. I have been waiting decades. Literally. It is this statement in particular that makes me want to tell people to STFU!

4. "Lots of women go through this. Lots of people have had miscarriages." BUT THIS WAS NOT SUPPOSED TO HAPPEN TO ME!! Maybe selfish and egocentric, but I am telling you, as a little girl, you NEVER sit awake dreaming of all the trouble you are going to have getting and keeping a baby. Most of us spent our high school and college years doing all we could NOT to get pregnant, because we thought it would happen if a guy even flexed his biceps at us. I know that this has happened before to other women, but no one before has been seared by MY grief, lost MY little Wild Thing. And when you say this to me, I somehow feel like I am inadequate, unjustified in feeling so very sad - like because it happens to others, I should be tougher than I am being, that because others have survived it, I will too. I WILL survive it, but in the throws of the pain, you don't always WANT to survive it and knowing that it happens to others DOES. NOTHING.

5. "Your body does this to get rid of a defective child." Don't even know how to respond to this one (often quoted by doctors and nurses). No comment.

6. "This is God's plan." This gem was uttered even by my husband (who, I will freely admit, is more spiritual and Christ-centered than I BY FAR). Sorry, I am pissed at God. He knows it and loves me anyway, but we are not exactly on the best of terms right now. I'll maybe go more into this and what I feel about this later (or maybe not), but please don't say that it is God's plan for a baby to die before his mother even holds him. God is crying, too.

And don't even begin to call my baby TISSUE. Thanks, bye.

Dear Wild Thing,

Mommy misses you every moment of every day. So does Daddy and your puppies. Mommy will never stop praying for you, crying for you, or wishing that our time together had been longer. Well, maybe Mommy will have to stop crying soon because Daddy thinks she is dysfunctional and needs a grief counselor.

I love you,
Momma