Friday, October 10, 2008
Monday, June 23, 2008
2/04/06
I just had the first of many breakdowns I am sure will occur today. Part of me wishes that we weren't even having this. She deserves a memorial, but I just can't take it. I need to print some pictures for her photo album. Another tough task. Only 3 more hours. I hope it goes well.
2/03/06
I have been putting of talking about Trey's family because just the thought of them sends me into a rage.
Trey's father didn't come to the hospital when Keiran was born because he "doesn't deal well with this kind of stuff." I was upset by this, but I was far too preoccupied to care. We got a call from Trey's mom on Monday saying that he is not coming to Keiran's memorial celebration on Saturday because he has to go out of town. Apparently he has had this planned for a "really long time." Poor Trey was so upset. He was so angry. I have never seen him like that. He scared me just a little. I know the anger was just covering the hurt though. His father isn't a real man. He can't even step up when his only child needs him. I don't care what he is going out of town for. What can be more important than your child?
We got another call on Wednesday night. Trey's grandmother is sick and Trey's mom is flying to go see her. She also will not be at Keiran's memorial celebration on Saturday. Then she asks Trey if he can call and cancel her lunch date for the next day.
Are you kidding me? This totally set Trey over the edge. He had a total breakdown. His own parents are not even going to be at their own granddaughter's memorial. Their son is in pain and needs them and they are somewhere else.
How the hell did he come from these two people?
Then comes the cherry on top. Trey's dad left a message on our answering machine last night TELLING (not asking) us that we need to go out to their house if there is a freeze and turn on the lights in the well house and some other random instructions that I was too angry to remember. They live 30-40 minutes away. This is not at all convenient for us. Maybe if they weren't such a-holes they could make friends with a neighbor and have them do it. I hope it does freeze, we don't go out there and they get so mad at us that they never speak to us again. That would be awesome.
Trey's father didn't come to the hospital when Keiran was born because he "doesn't deal well with this kind of stuff." I was upset by this, but I was far too preoccupied to care. We got a call from Trey's mom on Monday saying that he is not coming to Keiran's memorial celebration on Saturday because he has to go out of town. Apparently he has had this planned for a "really long time." Poor Trey was so upset. He was so angry. I have never seen him like that. He scared me just a little. I know the anger was just covering the hurt though. His father isn't a real man. He can't even step up when his only child needs him. I don't care what he is going out of town for. What can be more important than your child?
We got another call on Wednesday night. Trey's grandmother is sick and Trey's mom is flying to go see her. She also will not be at Keiran's memorial celebration on Saturday. Then she asks Trey if he can call and cancel her lunch date for the next day.
Are you kidding me? This totally set Trey over the edge. He had a total breakdown. His own parents are not even going to be at their own granddaughter's memorial. Their son is in pain and needs them and they are somewhere else.How the hell did he come from these two people?
Then comes the cherry on top. Trey's dad left a message on our answering machine last night TELLING (not asking) us that we need to go out to their house if there is a freeze and turn on the lights in the well house and some other random instructions that I was too angry to remember. They live 30-40 minutes away. This is not at all convenient for us. Maybe if they weren't such a-holes they could make friends with a neighbor and have them do it. I hope it does freeze, we don't go out there and they get so mad at us that they never speak to us again. That would be awesome.
2/02/06
So I am going to try and post my birth story. It may end abruptly as I am not sure how I am going to handle it.
On Tuesday night I woke up at about 10:30 with awful pain at the top of my uterus. It was so bad that I was crying and I normally handle pain pretty well. It was a constant pain, not like contractions. I took some Tylenol, put a heating pad on it and fell back asleep sometime after 3:00. Trey woke up to go to work at 3:30 and accidentally set off the truck alarm by hitting the panic button. He felt so awful. I fell back asleep at about 4:30 and my alarm went off at 5:30 Wednesday morning. I called my mom to ask about the pain. She told me to call the after hours nurse. I didn't think I needed to, but I did anyway. The guy was a JERK. He asked me why I decided to call now after being in pain all night. I started to say because I had to go to work and moving around seemed to aggravate it. I got as far as saying, "Because I have to go to work..." before he cut me off by laughing at me. Guess he thought that I was trying to get a day off. Then he asked my if the baby had been moving like normal. I told him that I normally don't feel her move. She has trisomy 13 and doesn't move much. So he asks, "Well, is she moving though?" So I just told him, "As much as she normally does." I tried several times to tell him things like that my amniotic fluid was low, I had just recently had a version and that the pain was in my upper back and uterus. I was interrupted each time. He then concluded that I should call the office when they opened because lower back pain (umm, I said UPPER) and pain in the upper uterus weren't signs of labor. Then he asked if this was my first in a mocking tone. He also told me to go ahead and stay home. So I went to work.
I called the doctor at 8:00 and they told me to come in ASAP. I waited in the school nurse's office for my mom to come pick me up (Ha ha, I never realized how funny that sounded). Trey was working really far away and I didn't think I was in labor anyway. I was nauseated and feeling kind of funny, so she took my blood pressure. It was 160/100. Not such a great number. My mom got there and we went to the doctor. Now, in defense of my doctor, I have always received excellent care. There is this one nurse though that doesn't know her butt from a hole in the ground. This happened to be the nurse that checked me that day. She had to weigh me twice because she did it wrong the first time. Yes, she weighed me wrong. When she checked my urine for protein and sugar she stared at the little chart on the bottle so long I got worried. I guess she decided all was well though because my doctor never mentioned anything, and he would have. She even took my blood pressure so fast that my mom even commented that there was no way she got an accurate reading. She got 120/70. I guess going to the doctor soothes me. This lady is a gem. Why I didn't mention my previous bp or my other concerns to my doctor, I don't know. It would have been smart and saved me some trouble in the end. I tend to underestimate the value of my own opinion sometimes. So I was hooked up to the NST machine and Keiran did super. My doctor sat in the other NST chair and chatted with me and my mom. There were only a few little contractions. He sent me home to take a hot shower and sleep. We were walking out to the car and the pain started up again. I just went home.
I didn't shower or sleep, but I did rest. The pain got awful again at about 5:00 that night. I made Trey call the after hours number. I didn't want to chance talking to that man again. It was a really nice woman who happened to know that my doctor was on call at the hospital and called over there to talk with him for us. He wanted me to come in so he could figure out what this pain was.
I called everyone on the way there and told them what was going on. I was having contractions at this point, but they were still small and pretty far apart. I was feeling nauseous again too. I had a coughing fit when Trey was pulling into the parking garage (I was still getting over bronchitis) and the nausea got worse. I thought I just had to burp and relieve some pressure. Turns out I just need to projectile vomit all over the inside of Trey's truck four times. In between each time I was vomiting I was apologizing to Trey. I felt so bad for puking in his truck and he also cannot deal with vomit. He was a trooper though. I actually felt a little better too. We pulled some clothes out of our suitcase and I changed right in front of his truck in the parking garage. I did not care who saw me.
I was admitted and my doctor ordered bloodwork and a urinalysis. He told me that he thought it could be my liver or my gallbladder that was causing the pain. My bp was up again (or still) and my contractions had caused me to dialate to 1.5 cm. When the labs came back he found that my platelet count was low, I had protein in my urine and my liver enzymes were out of whack. He had been predicting it for the majority of my pregnancy and it had finally happened, I had pre-eclampsia. They started me on magnesium sulfate to prevent seizures caused by high blood pressure. The stuff made me feel awful. Better than having a seizure though. He also told me whenever I wanted an epidural to just say the word. I said the word pretty quickly as my contractions were get more intense. They also decided to help my body along and give me some cervidil. I like cervidil. Very good stuff. During the epi the poor guy had a hell of a time fitting the needle where it needed to go. Turns out I wasn't sitting in the right position. He tried for so long that the numbing agent wore off and he hit a nerve. It felt like every nerve ending in my right leg had exploded. I almost looked at my leg to make sure it hadn't actually exploded. He numbed me again. I repositioned my body and it went right in. I also like epidurals. Very good inventions. Unfortunately the epi caused my bp to plummet making me throw up some more. After that though everything was good. I actually slept until 3:30 the next morning.
When I woke up I had this urge to push. I called the nurse at about 4:00 and she said I was 10 cm. I about had a heart attack. We called everyone. They doctor came in to check and said it would still be a while, but if bearing down helped I could do it. Oh, it helped and I did it. My parents, uncle and MIL all got there and my sister was still on her way when I thought I felt something coming out. My mom checked and sure enough there were some baby legs hanging out. I called the nurse and a bunch of them came running. I asked them if they wanted me to try and stop pushing, but they said to go for it. I pushed twice more and she was out.
It was really quiet after that. I asked if she was alive. I knew she wasn't though. The nurse told me there was no heartbeat. The cord wasn't even pulsing. She had been gone for a while, but not really long because her coloring was ok. She looked like she was sleeping. She was absolutely perfect. I was so calm. I was a woman on a mission. All I wanted to do was hold her, kiss her, look at her, tell her I loved her. Dead or alive it didn't matter. I wanted my baby. They gave her to me as quick as they could. I counted her fingers and toes. There were 20. We had miss counted on the u/s. I couldn't believe how much she looked like Trey. He got to hold her then too. Seeing him hold his child for the first time was so amazing. He kept rocking her and patting her. He looked so natural. Then while I delivered the placenta they cleaned her up a little. I wanted to give her a bath, but they said that they weren't sure how her skin would react. I couldn't have dealt with that, so I just held her.
My sister came in not knowing she had already been born. The look on her face was awful. She felt so bad that she hadn't been there for her birth. She kept apologizing. She got to hold her next. She just kept saying how beautiful she was.
I'll have to finish later...
On Tuesday night I woke up at about 10:30 with awful pain at the top of my uterus. It was so bad that I was crying and I normally handle pain pretty well. It was a constant pain, not like contractions. I took some Tylenol, put a heating pad on it and fell back asleep sometime after 3:00. Trey woke up to go to work at 3:30 and accidentally set off the truck alarm by hitting the panic button. He felt so awful. I fell back asleep at about 4:30 and my alarm went off at 5:30 Wednesday morning. I called my mom to ask about the pain. She told me to call the after hours nurse. I didn't think I needed to, but I did anyway. The guy was a JERK. He asked me why I decided to call now after being in pain all night. I started to say because I had to go to work and moving around seemed to aggravate it. I got as far as saying, "Because I have to go to work..." before he cut me off by laughing at me. Guess he thought that I was trying to get a day off. Then he asked my if the baby had been moving like normal. I told him that I normally don't feel her move. She has trisomy 13 and doesn't move much. So he asks, "Well, is she moving though?" So I just told him, "As much as she normally does." I tried several times to tell him things like that my amniotic fluid was low, I had just recently had a version and that the pain was in my upper back and uterus. I was interrupted each time. He then concluded that I should call the office when they opened because lower back pain (umm, I said UPPER) and pain in the upper uterus weren't signs of labor. Then he asked if this was my first in a mocking tone. He also told me to go ahead and stay home. So I went to work.
I called the doctor at 8:00 and they told me to come in ASAP. I waited in the school nurse's office for my mom to come pick me up (Ha ha, I never realized how funny that sounded). Trey was working really far away and I didn't think I was in labor anyway. I was nauseated and feeling kind of funny, so she took my blood pressure. It was 160/100. Not such a great number. My mom got there and we went to the doctor. Now, in defense of my doctor, I have always received excellent care. There is this one nurse though that doesn't know her butt from a hole in the ground. This happened to be the nurse that checked me that day. She had to weigh me twice because she did it wrong the first time. Yes, she weighed me wrong. When she checked my urine for protein and sugar she stared at the little chart on the bottle so long I got worried. I guess she decided all was well though because my doctor never mentioned anything, and he would have. She even took my blood pressure so fast that my mom even commented that there was no way she got an accurate reading. She got 120/70. I guess going to the doctor soothes me. This lady is a gem. Why I didn't mention my previous bp or my other concerns to my doctor, I don't know. It would have been smart and saved me some trouble in the end. I tend to underestimate the value of my own opinion sometimes. So I was hooked up to the NST machine and Keiran did super. My doctor sat in the other NST chair and chatted with me and my mom. There were only a few little contractions. He sent me home to take a hot shower and sleep. We were walking out to the car and the pain started up again. I just went home.
I didn't shower or sleep, but I did rest. The pain got awful again at about 5:00 that night. I made Trey call the after hours number. I didn't want to chance talking to that man again. It was a really nice woman who happened to know that my doctor was on call at the hospital and called over there to talk with him for us. He wanted me to come in so he could figure out what this pain was.
I called everyone on the way there and told them what was going on. I was having contractions at this point, but they were still small and pretty far apart. I was feeling nauseous again too. I had a coughing fit when Trey was pulling into the parking garage (I was still getting over bronchitis) and the nausea got worse. I thought I just had to burp and relieve some pressure. Turns out I just need to projectile vomit all over the inside of Trey's truck four times. In between each time I was vomiting I was apologizing to Trey. I felt so bad for puking in his truck and he also cannot deal with vomit. He was a trooper though. I actually felt a little better too. We pulled some clothes out of our suitcase and I changed right in front of his truck in the parking garage. I did not care who saw me.
I was admitted and my doctor ordered bloodwork and a urinalysis. He told me that he thought it could be my liver or my gallbladder that was causing the pain. My bp was up again (or still) and my contractions had caused me to dialate to 1.5 cm. When the labs came back he found that my platelet count was low, I had protein in my urine and my liver enzymes were out of whack. He had been predicting it for the majority of my pregnancy and it had finally happened, I had pre-eclampsia. They started me on magnesium sulfate to prevent seizures caused by high blood pressure. The stuff made me feel awful. Better than having a seizure though. He also told me whenever I wanted an epidural to just say the word. I said the word pretty quickly as my contractions were get more intense. They also decided to help my body along and give me some cervidil. I like cervidil. Very good stuff. During the epi the poor guy had a hell of a time fitting the needle where it needed to go. Turns out I wasn't sitting in the right position. He tried for so long that the numbing agent wore off and he hit a nerve. It felt like every nerve ending in my right leg had exploded. I almost looked at my leg to make sure it hadn't actually exploded. He numbed me again. I repositioned my body and it went right in. I also like epidurals. Very good inventions. Unfortunately the epi caused my bp to plummet making me throw up some more. After that though everything was good. I actually slept until 3:30 the next morning.
When I woke up I had this urge to push. I called the nurse at about 4:00 and she said I was 10 cm. I about had a heart attack. We called everyone. They doctor came in to check and said it would still be a while, but if bearing down helped I could do it. Oh, it helped and I did it. My parents, uncle and MIL all got there and my sister was still on her way when I thought I felt something coming out. My mom checked and sure enough there were some baby legs hanging out. I called the nurse and a bunch of them came running. I asked them if they wanted me to try and stop pushing, but they said to go for it. I pushed twice more and she was out.
It was really quiet after that. I asked if she was alive. I knew she wasn't though. The nurse told me there was no heartbeat. The cord wasn't even pulsing. She had been gone for a while, but not really long because her coloring was ok. She looked like she was sleeping. She was absolutely perfect. I was so calm. I was a woman on a mission. All I wanted to do was hold her, kiss her, look at her, tell her I loved her. Dead or alive it didn't matter. I wanted my baby. They gave her to me as quick as they could. I counted her fingers and toes. There were 20. We had miss counted on the u/s. I couldn't believe how much she looked like Trey. He got to hold her then too. Seeing him hold his child for the first time was so amazing. He kept rocking her and patting her. He looked so natural. Then while I delivered the placenta they cleaned her up a little. I wanted to give her a bath, but they said that they weren't sure how her skin would react. I couldn't have dealt with that, so I just held her.
My sister came in not knowing she had already been born. The look on her face was awful. She felt so bad that she hadn't been there for her birth. She kept apologizing. She got to hold her next. She just kept saying how beautiful she was.
I'll have to finish later...
2/01/06
While I am still waiting to post a picture of her sweet face, I have decided to post the picture that we are using for her announcements.
Those are her little feet in Trey's hand. My hand is barely visible underneath. I love this picture.
The wonderful women on my birthboard set up a March of Dimes memorial band in honor of Keiran yesterday. As of this morning there was already $750 raised. I feel so honored and so completely unworthy. I never thought that we were doing anything extraordinary, but so many people have reached out to us. I feel so honored that my little girl's life, however short, has touched so many.
Those are her little feet in Trey's hand. My hand is barely visible underneath. I love this picture.
The wonderful women on my birthboard set up a March of Dimes memorial band in honor of Keiran yesterday. As of this morning there was already $750 raised. I feel so honored and so completely unworthy. I never thought that we were doing anything extraordinary, but so many people have reached out to us. I feel so honored that my little girl's life, however short, has touched so many.
1/30/06
It has started to really sink in today. This is the first day that family has not been here hovering. It has just been me and Trey all day long.
We signed the papers at the funeral home today to release her body for cremation. I was ok until the actual signing. Right next to my name I had to write my relationship to her. I got to write "mother" for the first time. It was so bittersweet. How can so many things be awful and wonderful at the same time?
My blood pressure has also been crazy today. The last time I checked it was 119/70. The worst it was today was 164/97. I am hoping that my body stops deceiving me soon. I can't put up with anything else.
An all encompassing sadness has come over me. It is awful. I keep pushing the tears back, but it is only a matter of time. Once they start to flow I know that I won't be able to stop them. I just want to be alone, but I know I will hurt Trey if I tell him to just leave me alone. The last thing that I want to do is hurt him. He'll probably end up making me feel better anyway. I'm not sure I want to feel better though. I just want to wallow for a while. Keiran deserves to be mourned.
We got back a few shots from the photographer today too. They were so beautiful. I can't wait to get the rest. Looking at them is yet another thing that makes me so sad and so happy at the same time. God I just want to hold her one last time. I want to feel her soft little cheek once more and kiss her little fingers. I have to keep reminding myself that is just her body, her soul is in heaven. It doesn't console me much though.
We signed the papers at the funeral home today to release her body for cremation. I was ok until the actual signing. Right next to my name I had to write my relationship to her. I got to write "mother" for the first time. It was so bittersweet. How can so many things be awful and wonderful at the same time?
My blood pressure has also been crazy today. The last time I checked it was 119/70. The worst it was today was 164/97. I am hoping that my body stops deceiving me soon. I can't put up with anything else.
An all encompassing sadness has come over me. It is awful. I keep pushing the tears back, but it is only a matter of time. Once they start to flow I know that I won't be able to stop them. I just want to be alone, but I know I will hurt Trey if I tell him to just leave me alone. The last thing that I want to do is hurt him. He'll probably end up making me feel better anyway. I'm not sure I want to feel better though. I just want to wallow for a while. Keiran deserves to be mourned.
We got back a few shots from the photographer today too. They were so beautiful. I can't wait to get the rest. Looking at them is yet another thing that makes me so sad and so happy at the same time. God I just want to hold her one last time. I want to feel her soft little cheek once more and kiss her little fingers. I have to keep reminding myself that is just her body, her soul is in heaven. It doesn't console me much though.
1/29/06
I got home from the hospital yesterday. It has all been such a blur. Sometimes I understand what is happening and other times it feels like I am not really in my body. Like I am reading a really sad story about someone else. Then all of the sudden reality sets in for me and it hits really hard all over again.
My family has been amazing. They have been here supporting us continually. I am so blessed to have them. They are willing to talk about her and tell me how much they love and miss her. This is so wonderful for me to hear. It is what I need.
Trey and I seem to alternate times when we have breakdowns, so we have been able to lean on each other. I have never been as in love with him as I am now. I see the wonderful man that he is with every thing that he does. He never left my side in the hospital except to eat or to get some air. He slept on those awful uncomfortable cots even though I told him to go home and sleep. We have hardly been apart since labor started and I have no idea how I will make it through when he goes back to work in a week. I don't even want to think about it.
I'm not quite ready to post about her labor. I want to. I just don't quite want to relive it all just yet. I do want to talk about how beautiful she was. She looked so much like Trey it was amazing. I have always had a hard time telling who an infant looks like, but this was unmistakable. She had my long fingers though. God, she had the most beautiful baby hands I had ever seen. She was so perfect I kept waiting for her to wake up. I examined every little part of her so that I could memorize it. Except for her eyes. I never opened her eyes. That was the only thing I was afraid to look at. She had Trey's little chicken legs too. She was so long and thin. Trey had been calling her our super model baby because of her u/s measurements. He had it dead on. 19" at 4 lbs 12 oz. She also had these big ol' feet like Trey. I was amazed when they took her little footprints. Gosh she looked so much like her daddy. Oh, she did have blonde eyelashes like me and light hair. It was the color of her Aunt Jennifer's hair.
The hospital staff was amazing. They had a very discrete way of letting everyone in the hospital know that we had experienced a loss. There was a little picture of a falling leaf with a drop of water on it that was placed on the door of our room. This way everyone knew what was going on. It was perfect. So many people told us how sorry they were and no one was afraid to ask her name or talk to us about her. One man even said congratulations. I appreciated that so much. Yes, it was so sad and awful, but like Trey expressed to me, this was simultaneously the best and worst day of our entire lives. We got to meet this beautiful little girl that was born of our love and she was taken away too. It was amazing that she made it as long as she did. Though I am a little bit bitter that I could not meet her alive, I finally got to meet her. She was better than I could have ever imagined.
My family has been amazing. They have been here supporting us continually. I am so blessed to have them. They are willing to talk about her and tell me how much they love and miss her. This is so wonderful for me to hear. It is what I need.
Trey and I seem to alternate times when we have breakdowns, so we have been able to lean on each other. I have never been as in love with him as I am now. I see the wonderful man that he is with every thing that he does. He never left my side in the hospital except to eat or to get some air. He slept on those awful uncomfortable cots even though I told him to go home and sleep. We have hardly been apart since labor started and I have no idea how I will make it through when he goes back to work in a week. I don't even want to think about it.
I'm not quite ready to post about her labor. I want to. I just don't quite want to relive it all just yet. I do want to talk about how beautiful she was. She looked so much like Trey it was amazing. I have always had a hard time telling who an infant looks like, but this was unmistakable. She had my long fingers though. God, she had the most beautiful baby hands I had ever seen. She was so perfect I kept waiting for her to wake up. I examined every little part of her so that I could memorize it. Except for her eyes. I never opened her eyes. That was the only thing I was afraid to look at. She had Trey's little chicken legs too. She was so long and thin. Trey had been calling her our super model baby because of her u/s measurements. He had it dead on. 19" at 4 lbs 12 oz. She also had these big ol' feet like Trey. I was amazed when they took her little footprints. Gosh she looked so much like her daddy. Oh, she did have blonde eyelashes like me and light hair. It was the color of her Aunt Jennifer's hair.
The hospital staff was amazing. They had a very discrete way of letting everyone in the hospital know that we had experienced a loss. There was a little picture of a falling leaf with a drop of water on it that was placed on the door of our room. This way everyone knew what was going on. It was perfect. So many people told us how sorry they were and no one was afraid to ask her name or talk to us about her. One man even said congratulations. I appreciated that so much. Yes, it was so sad and awful, but like Trey expressed to me, this was simultaneously the best and worst day of our entire lives. We got to meet this beautiful little girl that was born of our love and she was taken away too. It was amazing that she made it as long as she did. Though I am a little bit bitter that I could not meet her alive, I finally got to meet her. She was better than I could have ever imagined.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)