Still Lost

It's now been a year since he died. A year knowing I will never see him again. A year wondering how this could have happened. It just doesn't make sense. I miss him so much. I still feel so lost. Lost and empty. And angry.

Falling

So, last time I posted, my brother was sick, very, very sick And this time, he is dead. How does a young man die from an infection in 2019? He lasted until April, but just couldn't fight it anymore and now he's dead. It's been nine months, nine long months, and I still cry for him at the oddest moments. There is so much that happened and so much hurt during his illness and death. It is just hard to even fathom the depth of the sadness he left. He's gone, and I will never see his smile, hear his laugh, or feel his presence again. I miss him.

On the Brink

Last week I heard the hardest words I have ever heard in my life. Even harder than when we knew that our little boy's heart had stopped beating. Then, I already knew--I knew for a few days, although I had hope, I knew. This time, it came seemingly from nowhere. I had no idea just how sick my brother was. We heard on Wednesday that my brother was very sick, he was transferred to a large hospital for specialty care. By Friday morning he was intubated with respiratory failure, liver failure, failing kidneys, all from septic shock. That text was the impetus for us to hit the road that afternoon and drive straight "home", we just didn't know yet how bad it was.

On Saturday, the doctors gathered everyone that was there and told us that his prognosis was dire. He used the words, "we think he is in the process of dying." Somehow, I was the one that had to call my dad. How do we manage these things? To call our own parents and tell them their son may not live. The out pouring of love was beyond anything I could ever fathom. Friends and family came from near and far to be there for each other. We all talked to him, told him our stories and just how much we love him. And we prayed. I asked our own saint to pray and intercede for him. She may not be canonized, but there is no doubt St. Cecilia of New Jersey (Jersey City?) is there for us when we need her.

By Saturday night there was only a small improvement, and Sunday morning the doctors said there was maybe just a small hope of improvement, but there was still no optimism. On Monday, there was hope, and maybe s little optimism. By Wednesday, the doctor implied that there was something big at work here. It was something beyond their control that kept him from death. The doctor even said that he was glad he was wrong.

Today, he was finally considered in stable condition. A week ago he was on his death bed, and today there is real hope. I'll return home on Monday with faith that he will continue to improve. He has a long, long way to go, but if anyone can survive and thrive after this ordeal--it's my little brother.

Saving this for prosperity....lol

It all started with prodromal labor and trying to decide if I should go to work or stay home and rest. I took one day off from work since I was up all night and just couldn’t imagine going in that tired. That day I took off I had contractions every 7 mins or so a few hours out of the day, but no real pattern. I thought to myself, well that was a waste I should have gone to work. That night I started having the contractions every 5 mins again, and a little more uncomfortable. I scrubbed part of the grout in the kitchen (can anyone say nesting?) and thought about the contractions. I ended up calling Dave home from work, again. This time we went in to L&D to get checked and see what was going on with me. This was almost my biggest mistake. We got there at about 10:15 pm on April 28th and I was put on the monitor which showed I was contracting regularly, but not as close together anymore. They checked me and I was about 2cm, which was improvement from my appointment the week before since I was 1 cm. I had to wait awhile since the resident was doing a c-section, so the nurse told me to walk the halls for a while. We waited FOREVER; finally a different resident came back and checked me again. I made it to 3.5-4 cm, so they called my doc and decided to admit me, by now it was like 2 am. The resident told me I would be able to go to the room, move around and sleep as I wanted to without the monitor. I guess the nurse didn’t get that message because she kept coming in every five minutes to get the baby on the monitor. I was NOT able to sleep at all. I think if I had been able to really rest my labor would have progressed much better, but I was afraid to move and get comfy because every time I did the baby would move and we would lose her heartbeat. This went on like this forever. I finally got to see one of my own doctors the next day around 9 am or so. He was not happy with the fact that I was progressing so slowly, I really wasn’t either and I wanted to go home. He convinced me to stay and had to go to another hospital to check on another laboring woman. He came back around 11am and decided to rupture my membranes. I was against the idea, but thought my husband wanted it, of course I thought wrong but didn’t know that until later. We had a little miscommunication, Dave wanted me to stay at the hospital, but didn’t want the interventions. Even though I felt that rupturing my membranes would be bad since I thought the bulging sac was dilating my cervix and not the baby, I agreed. Big mistake. My contractions practically stopped! I had a mini breakdown and cried, Dave and I prayed together which helped me get my head out of my butt and improve my attitude. I started thinking about asking for a breast pump and a few minutes later the nurse came in and suggested I try nipple stimulation. About 20 minutes after that she came back and asked me if I wanted a pump, one of her co-workers daughters had a home birth the week before and used it to get things going. My nurse had asked some of the more experienced nurses for suggestions, and they came through. I started to use the pump around 3pm. My contractions did start to pick up and I felt like this might actually be the real deal. My mom arrived around 4pm, right around when the contractions started to get more intense and pick up a better pattern. Then a resident came in, one with really small painful hands. I was about 5 cm. They put in the internal pressure monitor to get a good time on my contractions. After about 30 minutes it was decided I wasn’t doing enough. Dr. Chainsaw (risk of uterine rupture guy that wanted me to schedule a c-section at 39 weeks) came back and thought a little bit of pitocin would be good. I didn’t like the idea since I knew real labor was imminent, but I also knew he would start pushing a c-section again. He tried to get me to agree then, but it didn’t work. He also kept pushing an epidural on me every time I spoke with him that day, and I refused. I did for a brief moment think about getting one when I agreed to the pitocin because I was afraid of how strong the contractions would get. But, I didn’t agree, my husband reminded me that I was able to do it once before and I was strong and could do it again. The doc gave me a line about getting it before I was past the point of no return to which I replied “Once you get past that point you only have about 30 minutes left anyway so getting it then is worthless.” Against what I wanted I did agree to the pitocin and they started the drip at the lowest dose, with instructions to increase it 2 (whatever units they use) every hour. Can you tell they did not understand me? They didn’t believe I was already in true labor and thought it would be hours. Well, the docs didn’t but my wonderful nurse did. The pit was hung at 5:45 pm. I was given instructions by the nurse to call them as soon as I felt pressure in my bottom since I had gone quickly in the past. So I did, at about 6pm or so. Dr. Chainsaw came and checked me and told me I was 6 cm (finally progress) and the baby was occiput posterior. Up until this point I was sitting on the birthing ball trying to get the baby’s head to come down (another suggestion of Jennifer my awesome nurse). When I heard she was posterior I gave into my urge to be on my hands and knees. I labored like that for about 15-20 minutes. Then I thought I wanted to be on my left side, ouch, it was pretty intense like that and I couldn’t really move from that position. Then it happened. I had to poop, and my body was pushing! Dave hit the button for the nurse just as Chainsaw walked in the room. He was coming in to tell us he would be back later after he checked on the other hospital. And practically yelled at Dave asking if he had called for the nurse. HA! He had to make a pit-stop and catch my baby before he could run off. I pushed to my own drum, they were telling me when to push and I was sort of listening, but mostly just going with letting my body do the work. I helped a little twice, and then he told me not to push so her head could rotate and then she was out in one more push. I think not listening to them tell me when to push is why I didn’t tear at all, not even a skid mark. She came out with both of her hands by her face too. The baby was born just 50 minutes after the one drop of pitocin went in, I am sure the pit helped speed things up but I also know it would have been maybe only an hour more if I didn’t get it. They were not even able to break down the bed at all she came so fast. They asked me her name as they were cleaning her off and I said “Sile Grace”. Then I held her and had some second thoughts. I told only Dave then that I wasn’t sure it was her name. We ended up changing it to Evangeline Cecilia. She just looked more like an Evangeline, and Cecilia is after my grandmother. That caused a little ruckus with the family, but I think everyone is okay with the change now. I think I really intimidated my doctor. I know I impressed the nurses. The postpartum nurse came by to help me out of bed and asked f they had removed the needle from my back. I had to tell her of course I didn’t have one, and her response was “wow, you’re my hero”. I know they say you don’t get a medal for going all natural, but comments like that are worth more. It was so worth it. No, everything didn’t go exactly how I had planned, but it was great nonetheless. I think the only thing I would change is going into L&D too early. Everything else worked out just fine in the end.

Evangeline Cecilia 4/29/2008

Read more: http://www.justmommies.com/forums/f522-birth-stories/1047996-epic-birth-evangeline-cecilia.html#ixzz2qWvxEfKR

Somewhere Over the Rainbow!

He is here!  Killian James arrived on January 12th 2012.

I went into to work with no inkling that it was his birthing day.  I had a few random contractions throughout the day, as usual but nothing I would consider labor.   few of them happened right after I went to the bathroom, leading some friends to think that I might have a UTI, but I was sure it wasn't that.  I figured it was just another pregnancy thing, but I did seriously consider drinking about 5 gallons of tea if peeing made me have that type of contraction.  I didn't do that, but I sort of wanted to.

I left work about an hour early and felt a little crampy on the way out the door, but nothing serious.  Once I got home I started having more regular contractions, and decided I should try timing them around 4:30 or so.  They were about 8-10 minutes apart and still not really painful, so I figured it was more prodromal labor.  They continued even after I laid on the couch, but they spread out a little more.  Dave was on the other couch and the kids were singing the song "Red Solo Cup", so he played it on his phone.  After about an hour they had become 6-7 minutes apart and uncomfortable enough to have me getting annoyed with the family when they talked to me.  Around this time I decided I needed to have a bowel movement and right in the middle I had a contraction that made me need to stand up.  This is when I started to realize it might be the real deal.  All during this time I was updating my friends on facebook and chatting with my husband about the possibility it was birthing time.  It was of course a cold day, and snowing to boot, so we decided to head in because if it was time it might take a while to get there.  I packed a towel and a blanket, just in case since I have a history of pretty quick labors.  We left the house at about 6 p.m.

There was of course the obligatory stop at McDonald's, it was about 6:23 when we were in the drive-thru (thanks facebook updates...hehe).  By this time I knew it was the real deal.  Dave asked when I was not having a contraction if we could stop, it was early and we hadn't had dinner yet and who knew when we would get to eat again.  While we were sitting at the window I had a fairly painful contraction and noticed on the timer that they were now closer to 5-6 minutes apart.  In the midst of the contraction I said, "What the hell are we doing at the drive-thur?!"  My husband responded, 'well, you didn't want to have this aby in the restaurant did you?"  This of course made me laugh.  Laughing in the middle of a contraction, not a good idea!  It hurts.  Imagine sore muscles from doing the hardest abdominal workout ever, then multiply that by 500.  Yeah, not a good idea!  "Red Solo Cup" came on the radio and I asked hubby to turn it up. We continued our drive and thought the gate guard was going to tell us we had to have our vehicle inspected because he told us he had bad news, luckily he was just telling us how cold the weather was forecaste to go. Yes, down to -40F....brrrrr!

When we got checked into triage the nurse seemed to act like maybe it wasn't REALLY labor because I was still pretty calm and quiet.  They decided since it was shift change to let the incoming nurse check me instead of the nurse that was leaving.  They set up the monitors and it seemed like my contractions were still 8-9 minutes apart.  I was thinking it must have been a false alarm.  After asking me the preliminary questions she checked me and afterwards said, "Well my dear...." Which made me think I was about a 2 maybe, but she finished with, "You're a SIX!"  Um, at that point I knew I was staying and then she said, "You're SOOO calm!"  Well, yeah it only hurts when I am contracting, why freak out in between?  This was around 6:30 or so.

We went into the room and it was mostly just the normal checking in stuff.  Dave being his normal goofy self and us all just chatting like it was nothing.  When a contraction would hit I would stop and just relax through them and remind myself that when it is over I would feel so much better and sing the words to "Red Solo Cup", yeah that became my labor song.  Thinking about the relief of the end of the contraction kept me going.  Eventually the doctor came in and had me sign the VBAC consent form, which was the best one I had ever read.  It listed the benefits before the risks and also listed the risks of a repeat c-section.  The stats were even accurate!  Very cool!  We talked a little bit about my wishes, and he was good with everything and said he would leave us alone and be back later.  No pushing of anything, we did discuss rupturing membranes and he was perfectly fine with waiting for me to decide if I wanted it.

At some point they put in the I.V,, blew the first vein, but got it easily on the second.  I ended up staying in bed most of the time because it was easier for me to just relax and focus through the contractions.  After a while I had to make a little humming sound through them, partly to help me focus and partly to remind the others to stop talking to me since they didn't know I was contracting.  They started to come closer, but I don't know how close they were.  I told them I thought we were getting closer and the nurse agreed that I was starting to get into a 'better labor pattern'. At this point I used my phone and posted "baby soon?" That was at 8:40 p.m. The nurse said to let them know if I felt pressure in my bottom and left the room for a bit.  A few minutes later I felt pretty good pressure during a contraction an hit the call bell.  The tech who took the message told them I was ready to push, so they all came running.  I just wanted to be checked! But, the doc got there quickly.  So the nurse checked me, but  had a contraction right in the middle so she stopped.  All she said was, "You're not complete."

I decided I needed to pee because it was making the contractions more uncomfortable, so they helped into the bathroom and left me there.  Sitting on the toilet was pretty uncomfortable.  I had one contraction while I was in there and then went back out.  I got to the end of the bed and another contraction hit,  and the baby was coming!

The nurse said, "It's your bulging bag of waters!"  But, I knew.  She wanted me to get back on the bed because she was afraid the baby would be born on the floor, but I couldn't really move.  I wanted to get in a different position, but it wasn't happening.  So Dave and the nurse 'man handled' me onto the bed.  I was barely at the end.  The nurse asked my husband to go get some help, so he poked his head out the door and calmly said, "Could we get a little more help in here?" (The entire staff loved that and said he was so calm and he could have a job if he wanted one) Then the action started.  They of course didn't get to break down the bed (I had warned them that this happened in my two previous labors.)

By now I was pushing, it felt like it was taking a long time, but I know it wasn't.  They didn't make me pull my legs back, which I liked.  I also didn't get coached to push.  I heard a few mentions of, 'you're doing great.' But nothing else.  At one point the nurse said, "You're my hero" and the doctor echoed her sentiment.  At some point my membranes ruptured/were ruptured, turns out it was about 2 minutes before he was born.  Dave says he thought he saw the doctor rip it with his hand, it would have been cool if he had just left it and Killian were born with it intact.  I really felt the ring of fire this time, and thought for sure I had torn.  I did say, "Man, this kid has a big ass head!"  It seriously felt like my butt hole was turned inside out, but that was more of an uncomfortable feeling.  Shortly after that he was out!  And for the first time I got to hold him almost immediately.  The doctor in the excitement forgot to let Dave cut the cord, forgot to let it pulse for a minute or two, but I forgive him!  After a minute he said, "Oh, I should have let dad cut the cord."

I was beginning to wonder why he was still messing with me, AND why my butt hole STILL felt like it was inside out. That was when I realized the placenta still needed to be delivered, so I pushed and out it came.  Then I felt total relief.  The doctor announced there was no repair needed.  None, and now less than a week later I feel fine!  No pain :)  After the delivery the doctor came up to me and wanted to shake my hand, it was pretty cool!

I so totally would still love to birth at home, but the experience I had here totally helped me heal.  This was as close to being home as you could be in a hospital.  The staff was amazingly supportive and not pushy at all.  I was treated with respect and my wishes were followed.  Simply perfect for us.

Look how quickly!  Of course I started timing contractions around 4:30 and we decided to go in at 5:30-6.  We were at the hospital and checked in around 7:20 or so.

And of course a picture of my little big man! Killian James, 8 lb 4 oz and 20.5 inches long.  He had a 14.4 inch noggin.  Not as large as his big brother's but it felt HUGE!

Getting ready to go home in -40F!

It Doesn't Get Easier

Every year, will it be like this every year? Will my Mother's Day be forever tainted by the feelings I have right now? The Saturday before Mother's Day I knew he was gone. I just knew. I thought I felt him move on Mother's Day, but it wasn't him, just some muscle spasms. False hope and nothing more. He was dead inside my womb, he was gone. And now I have that to remember how I as fooled. Damn false hope. Trying to convince myself that my baby was still alive while knowing he was gone.

I have other children. Yet, I can't find a way to feel happy about them. Tomorrow is Mother's Day and all Iw ant to do is be in bed. Please. No church. All the babies and the "Happy Mother's Day" wishes. How can I be happy when the anniversary of my son's death is in less than a week? How?!?!?

May 9, 2009

I posted this the Friday before Mother's Day 2009.

"Is it possible to hate your uterus?"

"Because right now I do...lol.

I can't feel the baby move, so of course I worry. Even though when they listened with the doppler last time and he "ran" away from it, which I didn't feel at all, I still am worrying. I have never not been able to feel the baby at 20+ weeks.


Blah, as much as I love my placenta for nourishing my child I am very disappointed that it decided to grow on the front of my uterus."

I already knew, I am sure I did.