Pregnant and Bedridden: When the Light Starts Shining at the End of the Tunnel

           

            I guess you could say things started picking up.

            A dim, hazy light started shining at the end of the tunnel. 

           

            As contractions increased in intensity and frequency, nausea and indigestion settled in for a final attack. Lying somewhat tilted upside down has a way of cramming your digestive track into your chest and screwing up the normal processes.

           

            To give the baby the best chance of survival, if he or she were born prematurely, I knew I—we—had to make it another week. That would put us squarely into the thirty-two week mark. The minimum time Dr. Landry hoped to achieve when we’d first started this journey three months before.

           

            Yet thirty-two weeks loomed like a hazy guidepost marker on the horizon. As it neared, though, I felt a powerful, calming assurance that God would see us through the amount of time absolutely necessary to have a healthy baby, without needlessly prolonging the suffering; to allow me to experience what I could withstand physically and emotionally. And no more.

           

            Once before I had passed through the roaring waters with Him. Now, every day, my resolve and faith were being ramped up into a conviction that I could walk through them again without being drowned. Should I be made to tread through fire, I wouldn’t be burned or consumed by the flame and reduced to an ash heap of carbon. I sensed that the end was quickly approaching, our reward soon realized.

           

            Knowing God was with us did not, however, preclude us from making necessary preparations for anything, including the possibility of the stitches suddenly rupturing while I was home alone. That catastrophe would certainly require an emergency transport to our small hospital—without an available neonatal intensive care unit. That thought alone was enough to ignite panic in me about being able to get in touch with someone—anyone—in enough time to deliver the baby at the Escondido hospital where I could be assured of adequate neonatal support. A friend from church gave me her beeper number for contact at any time during the day and promised she’d drop everything and make herself available to me. We now marched forward. Well, figuratively we marched. One day at a time, one hour at a time, one minute at a time.

           

            Tick, tick, tick…

           

            Church members continued to provide physical nourishment for Chris and Parker as well as spiritual nourishment for me through their prayers. To avoid unnecessary stimulation, I no longer entertained visitors or took phone calls. Parker returned to daylong preschool stints after being allowed a brief respite from them. At five in the evening, a friend deposited him at home. He even started showing enthusiasm for the baby’s arrival, strongly reiterating his wishes for the baby to “come now!” Oh, I know just how you feel! I chuckled to myself.  

           

            Along with his enthusiasm, however, came the fatigue and stress of spending entire days at school and becoming accustomed to another, “new” schedule. He frequently arrived home exhausted, hungry, visibly frustrated and emotionally volatile. Angry. He often collapsed into a heap of tears on my bedroom floor.

           

            One night he carefully crawled into bed with me after dinner, gingerly inched across the mattress, encased me in his little arms and said in a beseeching tone, “I want our family back the way it was,” (Meaning: dinner together followed by playtime and singing), “then you can go and lie down in bed.” In almost the same breath he spoke of, “the next time you are pregnant…”

           

            After constraining my amusement by taking a deep breath and biting my lip, I informed him that this would be the last time. With a downcast expression, he pronounced with simple, blunt and determined four-year-old conviction, “No it’s not! We have to have three more!”

           

            I blinked and stared at him wordlessly. How could I possibly respond to that? Only if we adopt, my precious Son, I thought.

           

            We silently languished in the comfort of one another’s arms. I reveled in his tender, loving touches. He sighed and allowed his little body to relax in the secure grasp of my remaining strength.

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NEXT WEEK: The thirty-two week marker, the steroid injections ramp me up, and my final panic attack. Surviving the final, difficult days…

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Until next week,

Thanks for joining me!

Blessings,

Andrea

Pregnant and Bedridden: Teetering Atop the Roller Coaster, Awaiting the Ride Down

           

            I love roller coasters.

           

            Well, at least I used to love them. Not so much anymore. My arthritic neck and back can’t take them now. So, I have a choice to get on and get hurt, or to sit on a bench and watch screaming humans get tossed, looped around and nauseated. For fun!

           

            This ride I’d been on for three months, I chose to get on. Set my face like flint to ride, get walloped around and live to tell about it.

           

            Just because it was voluntary didn’t make the end ride any easier.

           

            I thought I'd been chucked around pretty good up to this point. 

            But the death drop was just beginning.

           

            The final days of January and first several days of February brought a sweltering heat wave, turning my south-facing room into an oven. The air conditioning brought some relief, but by six in the evening, I was damp, drained and eager to extinguish the lights. With such an early retirement, I awakened in the earliest morning hours, conceding to banal television entertainment with its insomniac lineup of pocket-draining infomercials and worn-out talk shows. Eventually, even the local station couldn’t justify transmitting any longer and vacated the night airways.

           

            I more frequently listened to Christian radio, opened my Bible more often to study it, wrote letters, filled my journal and signed checks for the constant supply of bills streaming into the house. I also played with Parker—to the best of my limited ability—and managed to crochet two baby afghans, one for my baby and one for a friend’s. Unfortunately, the latter one was lost in transit to Chicago. (I could only hope the unintended owners appreciated my labors.) The liquid diet continued, except for the moments when I broke down and treated myself to solid food—then wished I hadn’t been so foolish.

           

            I imagined that as the March date of thirty-six weeks approached, time would pass more quickly.

           

            I was wrong. It only seemed to slow down.

           

            Tick…Tick…Tick...

           

            A friend happily surprised me with several cuddly receiving blankets, which elevated my hopes that I might actually bring a new baby home to wrap them around. Tucked among the blankets were a bath sponge and gel, for me! For the time when I’d be able to soak luxuriously in a tub brimming with steaming water and vigorously scrub my skin into a shiny pink glow. Dr. Landry expected me to come to his office for weekly visits beginning February 8, providing mini-goals that I cheerfully anticipated would eradicate the creeping clock.

           

            By February 8, I was more than ready to complete the pregnancy, though. I actually had visitors, which meant welcome conversation and companionship, but the animated socializing also delivered unwanted fatigue and contractions. On Saturday, the contractions were so numerous and consistent that I needed to finally break down and ingest some of the Terbutaline, Dr. Landry’s “Vitamin T.” Then I had to maintain a subdued, sequestered afternoon. Sunday brought more inconsistent uterine activity, making it difficult to discern whether I was having Braxton-Hicks or bona fide contractions. My forehead’s worry creases deepened.

           

            The examination at Dr. Landry’s the following morning told the story: my cervix was rapidly deteriorating—thinned to the thickness of a paper towel—with an effacement increase to ninety percent.  

           

            “I don’t think we’re going to make it another two weeks,” he pronounced. “I’m going to begin steroid injections today to enhance the baby’s lung development; home health will come out to your house tomorrow, then again next Monday and Tuesday to administer more injections. I do not want you to come in next week; you need to stay in bed. And you need to be taking your “Vitamin T,” he finished with a smile. 

           

            My head swirled. Ninety percent, hanging by a thread paper-thin cervix, steroid injections… I tried to focus and nod, like I was following along. Good thing Chris is taking all of this in.

           

            There was one redeeming aspect to the visit: my baby was doing well. “Looked beautiful,” according to Dr. Landry. Doing all of the things he expected a baby to do in the womb at that stage, and the lung development was good. Good weight gain, good growth, strong movement.

           

            Impending childbirth.

           

            Suddenly, the clock seemed to have accelerated.

           

            Tick. Tick. Tick.

           

            I had spent so many weeks, days, hours, minutes and seconds in bed, I wasn’t sure what to think at that point. Lying flat and confined had become “normal.”

           

            But maybe it’s finally time to pick out baby names and prepare a hospital overnight bag, I thought.

           

            Juxtaposed among the happy feelings of having a new baby to bring home, though, were feelings of having a tiny, fragile, premature infant in neonatal intensive care for an indefinite amount of time. It was a given. At this stage of development, the baby would be too small to come home, and I’d be released from the hospital long before the baby would be. Even though the baby looked strong in the womb, any number of problems could develop in the ICU, leaving him or her with permanent, physical damage.

           

            We had made it so far, and even though the survival rate placed us high on the statistics chart, there was no guarantee the baby would survive. There were still an unknown number of pregnancy days remaining, and then the actual delivery. Even a perfect nine-month pregnancy could end with debilitating problems. Or death. Experience told me nothing—absolutely nothing—could be taken for granted. There were no guarantees.

           

            Call it knowing too much. Stubborn doubt and fear clouds remained parked over our heads. Parker managed to sum it up in profound, child-like fashion. “You’ve been pregnant  a l-o-n-g time,” he observed following that doctor visit.

           

            Oh, Sweetheart, you have no idea. It feels like a lifetime!

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NEXT WEEK: The ride down begins…

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Until next week,

Thanks for joining me!

Blessings,

Andrea

             

Pregnant and Bedridden: Relishing Life’s Simple Pleasures

           

            

            Life's simple pleasures.

           When you’re pregnant and bedridden—flat on your back, with nothing to do and nowhere to go—simple pleasures are few and far between. When they do come, they become so much more than simple.

           

            The final Sunday of January, 1997, promised to be a good, light-hearted day, as Chris and Parker propped their big yellow San Diego Chargers bolt on the entertainment center and initiated a tiny, robust cheering section in a corner of my room. Even though our beloved Chargers had a rough Super Bowl appearance, the game excitement elevated my spirits. Immensely. So immensely, in fact, that I was actually concerned about exciting myself right into premature labor, since I can view a football game with as much intensity and emotion as any die-hard Green Bay Packers’ fan. (Well, maybe not quite that much intensity, but you get the picture.)

           

            The Chargers’ performance waned—as did our rural television reception—and I was saved the emotional and physical agitation of a good, head-to-head clash. Instead, I was relishing the delicate warmth of sunlight spilling through the open door, and the cool January breeze drifting tenderly across the room, its alighting fingertips awakening my famished skin. I think I lay slumbering comfortably before the final clock minutes fizzled out.

           

            With the door open, I could finally view the rolling landscape beyond our home that proudly displayed glistening green lushness recently acquired from the winter showers. Oh, how I longed to stand outside with my face turned toward the sun, with its warmth infusing and recharging my stiff, brittle body. How I ached to run through the glorious panorama, hair flying, liberated and unconstrained.  

           

            But I wasn’t physically liberated or unconstrained. Not yet, anyway. The romp through the harkening vista would have to wait. For now my imagination had to suffice.

oOo

           

            The following day found the intermittent periods of pelvic pain and weekday loneliness return. And it continued. Often, having exhausted all of my daily activities, I’d lie in bed feeling lost and alone, staring catatonically at the silent radio or a blank television screen. Eventually, though, I started sleeping better through the night, and the anticipation and fear of darkness-driven panic dissipated. I thanked God profusely for even the tiniest bit of relief from the nightly horror.

           

           Then came a another godsend of blessings. My friend, Nancy, initiated foot massages during her noontime cleaning and feeding visits. Besides helping me relax, I can’t tell you what kind of effect simply being touched had on me emotionally, physically and spiritually. Forget the fact that one of my major love languages is touch. Just having someone’s hands contact my body in a gentle, loving way was medication to my soul and a barbiturate to my strangled nerves. Such joy!

           

            The skin on my legs and feet had developed a malnourished, reptilian appearance, and my feet had long since gone numb and tingly from the lack of stimulation. My legs no longer resembled the carefully trained, shapely limbs of an athletic woman, but protruded like skinny sticks encased in excess flesh. Dr. Landry had prescribed lying prostrate toe pointing to avoid blood clots. Absolutely NO leg lifts. Just toe pointing. The only time I lifted my legs was to scour them with my electric razor—a practice that became increasingly difficult as my pregnancy advanced and the razor’s blades dulled. Even the vibration on my thighs started irritating my uterus. So, to alleviate unnecessary irritation, leg shaving had to be conducted in little blocks of time on small patches of leg. My lower appendages started feeling more like partially used sandpaper sheets than silky smooth gams.

           

            One weekend morning I allowed myself a risky, resplendent luxury, though, when I allowed Chris to fill the bathtub with warm water and place a chair next to the tub so I could briefly languish with my feet and ankles soaking in the warm, soothing liquid. My atrophied legs shook as I carefully—manually—lifted, then lowered one foot at a time into the placid water. Five short minutes was all I allowed myself to splurge. Five minutes.

           

            It seemed more like a glorious hour.     

           

            After the soak, Chris gently scrubbed my toes and calves with a sponge, returned me to bed, then carefully dried and lotioned my flaking limbs. (Yes, I was in desperate need of an industrial strength exfoliation!) For a brief thirty minutes, I felt as though I’d been airborne to heaven. “When I hit that thirty-six week mark, I’m going to treat myself to a shower,” I proclaimed to Chris with confidence. 

           

            “Whenever you think you want to try it, I’ll help you,” he responded with a smile.          

            His heart and attitude appeared to be softening. Maybe that’s because he’d gotten a really good look at my withering legs for the first time in three months!

           

            At that moment I was deeply grateful for the simple feet and toes stimulation.      

           

            And the heavenly pleasure of my husband’s warm and gentle touch.

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NEXT WEEK: Perched at the top of the roller coaster, awaiting the drop…

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Until next week,

Thanks for joining me!

Blessings,

Andrea